A Different Way

There once was a little brown haired girl who loved to roar.  Each morning she would rub the sleep out of her eyes and roar.

“Good Morning,” greeted her dad.

“Rawr,” shouted the little girl until she felt it rumble in her heart.  She smiled and then skipped off to play.

Sitting quietly in the grass, the girl concentrated on the activity she labored on.

Up walked a freckled faced boy who asked, “whatcha doing?”

“Rawr,” yelled the brown haired girl as she happily held out her project.  The boy was unphased by her undertaking and walked away.

Later the girl saw a group of giggly youngsters gathered around in a circle laughing.  She strolled up to the assembly, edged her way in, and listened as they all chatted.

“What do you think?” asked a girl in yellow and white polka dots.

“Rawr,” hollered the brown haired girl as she laughed.  Some snickered while the rest of the group looked at her in mild confusion.  But she just hopped away while her hair bounced behind her.

Day in and day out, the roaring continued.  Some wondered if she was angry.  Some wondered if she was silly.  But most didn’t care to stick around to understand the roar.  Until one day she was approached by a curly headed boy.

His shaggy hair covered the tops of his ears as he marched up to the girl in fascination.  He opened his mouth and barely whispered the words, “hello, brown haired girl.”

“Rawr,” screamed the girl in uneasy retort to the squeaky boy she could hardly hear.

“Why do you always roar?” softly questioned the fluffy mass of curls.

“Because all of my favorite things roar,” answered the girl.  “The ocean.  The thunder.  Even the sound of laughter.  Why are you so silent?” countered the spunky girl to the hushed little boy.

“Because all of my favorite things are quiet,” responded the boy.  “A breeze.  The snow.   The warm feeling I feel in my heart.”

The brown haired girl reflected upon the things the boy told her.  For the first time, she meditated on this new way of exchange.  She closed her eyes tight and held her breath nervously.  Then when she was ready to speak, she opened her mouth and almost inaudibly declared, “I like you and your curls.”

“Rawr,” bellowed the boy.

And they both skipped off together.

All the Best I Could Be

I’m in love with a married man.

Stick with me.

Twelve years ago, I kept steady company with a male friend I made in college. He was an insane musical talent. I spent hours in his presence while a guitar surrendered under his fingers and the masses submitted to his smooth velvety voice. His charm was unparalleled. And his mind… He had the most beautiful and discriminating intellect. To say I was in love with his mind is a vast understatement.

He was from Georgia and though we met at university while in Utah, he had some best friends from home whom he remained in contact. I had a few opportunities to speak with and even meet a few. But there was this one.

He was above average handsome. Though he appeared in a few acting gigs in college, his handsomeness wasn’t overwhelming. It was less intimidating and more inviting. Charm seeped from his being. He had shiny happy blue eyes. He had warm brown hair, the kind that looked like it may have been blond in younger days.

He greeted me with all the earnestness of a southern gentleman. His kindness was sincere. He was engaging and benevolent. He was one of the most tenderhearted spirits I ever had the privilege of meeting in this world. And all of his honor was apparent in one breath of his essence.

He was Good.

I spent two worthy days with this man. He was the kind of nobleman who silently crept in, intoxicated you with his virtue, amazed you with his integrity, and left you forever changed by his morality.

He too was musically talented and incredibly sharp. He was a purer version of my friend. 

Upon his departure, we became MySpace (yes) friends. This has since included Facebook and Instagram.

For twelve years, I watched from afar as he bettered his mind with graduate school in Scotland. I watched him travel and observed as he broadened his sophistication. I watched his natural love of people immerse him while he surrounded and absorbed himself in the best of civilization. His exposure to all of this only increased his optimism in humanity and his faith in God.

His ethical convictions are rooted in an open love of God. Of all things about him, I love this most. He studies the writings of honorable philosophers, principled men, and clearly anchores himself in holy scripture.

I believe this lends to his most attractive and most admired quality, his gift of perspective. He is the voice of reason. The antithesis of rash. The embodiment of brilliance.

He is grounded when others would float away. He is quick to differentiate what is now and what is good for now with regards to the future. He frequently reminds me what it actually means to be good and to do good. It has little to do with crappy bosses, material possessions, or fleeting trials.

I held my breath as he found love, lost love, and spoke of the restoration and healing powers of love. Propinquity is the only thing which for so long kept me from declaring my undying love for him. He is my soul mate. Or rather the soul mate of a girl who existed twelve years ago.

The truth is, time has passed. While he continues each day to become more and more the person I was supposed to be, I fear I have gone off track.

Still, there he is. 2000 miles away and without discrimination, he reminds me of who I used to be. Without judgment, he urges me to be a better person.

Tell Me A Story Pt.2

With every hypnotizing tale, there exists good and evil.  There is a building struggle, rallying around a side, a rising provocation, a moment of unquenchable and immutable conflict, and a resolution.  From all of this is delivered a purpose.  A lecture.  A message or a moral.

In this lies MY discovery.  For years, I loved the happily ever after.

Until I realized, every tale has a villain. Every legend meets a monster.  And every hero must conquer a demon.  In that lies my new curiosity.

There are great individuals in this world and the identification of them can be flagged by the hallmarks of a grand crusade.  You show me a man & tell me his story and I will glean most of what I care to know about him by how he handles his devils.

I look around me and see most fighting their evildoers by discounting the very existence of that which would define his journey, refine his nature, and bare a discerning harvest to all he has sown.

Most ignore this beast.  Most are afraid of him and cope often by hiding from him.

But a hero cannot hide from his villain and would not choose to do so if the noble god of perspective had imparted any of his wisdom on him.

His fate lies in the face of his demons and his triumph is predicated on his admittance of this.  His outcome depends on confession and acceptance of this fiend whose sole function is his opponent’s demise.

We do not speak often of our dark terrorist.  We would rather conceal his existence and feign an impossible purity in ourselves.

Except, no man is wholly pure.  This universe requires an opposition in all things.  Every survivor of humanity will disclose he has battled a foe, escaped, and barely lived to tell his story about it.

And from this, our inspiration comes from his conflicts.  His wars were not the immediate slaughter of his oppressor rather the grappling combat which spilt his blood and left him for dead in the trenches.

A hero is defined not by a single victory but by a repeated manifestation of his willingness to continually overcome his villain spanning many battles on multiple battlefields.

A hero will lose.  And we cannot be afraid to acknowledge our enemy for fear of a fight or worse, a loss.  We will fight and we will lose.

But strength lies in resurrection.  Our strength is rooted from our ability to lose and to rise above the loss... to wrestle our demons again in different scenery but with the same conviction.

“I will prevail.”

A hero may admit to not only having lost to a dark sovereign before but to having been seduced by him, conceded to him, and subjugated by him.

However, a story’s companion is time.  For no story is a moment but a collection of elements aged under perspective’s discerning eye.

So when in attack you feel your demise or you sense your imminent mortality, think only to respond, “how does it end?”

In this question there is choice.  There is freedom.  There is your story.

Tell Me A Story Pt.1

When I was a senior in high school, I would leave the noisy chatter of study hall and quietly tuck myself into a seat of our spacious silent auditorium.  The sanctuary built for nearly a thousand would house me in one chair and my then male friend next to me.

He loved reading and I loved being read to.  His baritone voice would lull me into a fantasy world of spells and magic.  A story of wizards before Harry Potter existed.  I vanished into a world of the supernatural and its mysterious far off places.

While the calm warm words dripped from his swarthy voice, a voice I was yieldingly mesmerized by, I found a piece of my soul in that auditorium which would drive my being forever more in this world.

I was unapologetically addicted to storytelling.

I am a slave to a good story.  Compliant.  Submissive.  Inclined to give in to an author who would hush my mind, captain my emotions, and silence my own raging journey to experience another’s.

The Long Road

Like millions, I used to watch Oprah when I came home from school.

I’m not saying she absolutely was but she was the first person I ever heard reference growing into your skin.  She spoke of getting older and feeling more comfortable in your body.

I was young but I could sparsely glean her meaning.  I mean, 17 felt a lot better than 12.  That was plain awkward.

I am not only 30 but am well into my 30s.  For so long I have felt ashamed of this.

I expected more from myself.  I thought I would have accomplished more by now.  I thought my achievements would have been splashed about for my family and friends to witness.  I expected my lifestyle would have borne the badges of acquired skill and outstanding talent.

I always felt incredibly gifted.  Naturally endowed.

I have always been passionately drawn to pop-culture and it has taken me many years to identify MY why. 

Because these were the outliers.  His movie moved me to tears.  Her voice moved me to tears.  And his book moved me to tears.  These were the extraordinary stories and abilities in an ordinary world.

And… I have always felt I too am an outlier.  Extra ordinary.

It has taken me many years to realize my skill is people and my talent is relationships.  These badges rarely payout in monetary rewards or in notorious awards.

These successes take place on a Saturday evening in a car parked in the driveway.  They occur with a well thought out and a well-placed comment in the classroom setting.  My feats of triumph are quietly hidden from the masses and are appreciated by an audience of few.

I’ve wanted so desperately to provide credentials for this trait of mine.  A great love story to a fabulous companion.  A home filled with laughter and love.  A family.

But I can't.  And I’m learning to reconcile my life to that.

Because the older I get, the more comfortable I feel in my skin.

I am loving.  I am cheerful.  I frequently bring joy where I go.  I laugh.  I navigate in tenderness.  I operate with passion.  I’m slow to warm in any new situation.  I’m open to many opinions.  I think.  I assess and I derive.  I stand firm in my convictions.

It’s been penned, “I believe in the sun when it’s not shining.  I believe in love when I’m alone.  And I believe in God when He is silent.”*

It’s been sung, “let me love you, and I will love you, until you learn to love yourself.”**

It’s been taught, “experience is that most brutal of teachers.  But you learn, my God do you learn.”***

These things are all me.  And I am learning to be more comfortable with who I am.  I am learning not everyone will esteem you.  Not everyone will appreciate you or value you.  You will always face opposition.  You will always have someone carelessly cast off that which is sacred to you.

Then again, the more you love your decisions, the less you need others to love them.

That’s the beauty of time.  You fall more in love with yourself and your decisions when they are good.  And there is peace in that.

*A Jewish Refugee   **Ne-Yo   ***C.S. Lewis

My Essence

There is one thing I do well in this world.

LOVE.

This I have always known.

Weathering The Storm

When you are in high school, everything feels big.

Your tests.  Your after school practices.  The nation’s political climate.  Your enemies.  Your love.  Your dreams.

I was a junior in high school with a hip English teacher who we all liked.  He was young-ish with an affinity towards the movies we all were watching and the music we all were listening.  He let us call him by his first name which earned him extra ‘street cred’ in our adolescent minds.

I had two best friends who I spent the bulk of my time with.  We talked about boys, school, and our jobs.  But mostly we talked about boys.  We would divide and share our chemistry and our physics homework in an effort to be done quickly with school work and get to the chatting about boys.

One spring, we had group English projects due.  My partners were my two best friends and we would meet during study halls to work on our project.  However, as is inevitable with 16 year olds, our conversation included more about our crushes than the Canterbury Tales.

It was a sunny Sunday after church and our project was due tomorrow.  My thoughts had been on the project all day and its need for completion.  My family and parents who were very religious held Sundays sacred.  We didn’t eat out, shop, or really play with our friends.  We kept close to home and observed a low-key, conservative Sabbath day.

It wasn’t long before the phone call came and we were to all meet at K’s house to pound out this project.  Only my permission was quickly declined when I presented this before my parents.

In hindsight, perhaps I could have given it a better sell.  But honestly, my shame was strong going into it.  I knew the rules.  I knew I failed to timely manage my business.  Mostly, I knew I was asking for a pardon from a paradigm I knew was deeply ingrained in my parents and our family lifestyle.

That night, my mind raced at the thought of my two friends working on it without me.  I was hyperaware I had placed myself in a position where my hands were wholly tied.  And I felt sick.

The next morning, I greeted them before homeroom with the same enthusiasm I had hundreds of times over but was met with chilly dispositions.

By the time our second period English class came, we were asked to all turn in our projects.  I watched as my friend turned in our project and my mind raced how I could make it better.

Class was nauseatingly terrible.

As the bell rang to let us out, I heard our teacher speak my name and ask me to stay behind.  He explained how my friends informed him of my lack of contribution.  He told me I would receive an ‘F’ and our next group project starting the follow week would be a project I would do alone.

My disgrace knew no bounds.  I was humiliated.  I was embarrassed.  I was angry with my friends.  I knew even then it was a harsh sentence for the crime. 

Now, if I had a dime for every work project or task coworkers failed to pull their weight on, I would be a rich girl.  If we fired each coworker who failed to perform his part, we’d all have an instance when we earned termination at some point.

The social implications in society and government to leave everyone callously to his own demise, whether of his making from mistakes or life circumstances, would be destructive to our greater good.

I didn’t speak to either one the entire week.  Every class we shared and each moment we would have shared was sheer torture.  I didn’t eat.  I didn’t sleep.

I ached.

I remember thinking one day I would look back on all of this and see it wasn’t as big of a deal as it felt.

The fact of the matter is, if we are the character make-up of some sum of striking life events, this is one of mine.

To know me is to know I value my relationships above all.  I hurt most when my relationships hurt.

There are many reasons for ailing relationships.  Some are a derivative of malnourishment.  Others are from a lack of nourishment entirely.  Perhaps the most painful are the expiring relationships from personal growth spurts.

Everything in my life is in a state of drastic transition right now.  When describing all of the change I’m experiencing to my dear friends last night, my one friend pointedly declared, “I think it’s YOU who is changing.”

He quickly detected what I was oblivious to connect.

My momentarily rapid evolution has strained some of my relationships.  Today I felt similar to that 16 year old girl many years ago.

And I ache.