the truth shall set you free

i haven’t posted since last sunday.

i’m tired.

i’m tired of apologizing for the person i am. i’m tired of worrying that i have to choose between happiness in this life and happiness in the next. i’m tired of the nightmares. i’m tired of the isolation. i’m tired of hearing, ‘we don’t agree with it, but we love you anyway.’

i’m absolutely dried up and exhausted. there’s nothing left inside of me to give.

i went to the bird and baby yesterday with a friend and we wrote in silence for hours. it’s been a year since i’ve written a word of fiction, and nearly that long since i’ve read one. saturday, i spent three hours writing stream-of-consciousness in preparation for the story that keeps wanting to be told. there is a girl inside of me, and she has something to say. i can only hope that i am able to get out of the way in time.

i’ve spent a lifetime in christianity, claiming to be fine. everything’s okay. i’m not struggling. i’m just peachy. jesus-loves-me-this-i-know. pretending. hiding. “jesus saved me, hallelujah. not that there was anything to save me from. i’ve got it together, don’t you know?”

i’m over it.

i don’t mind saying now – i’m tired. and i’m not convinced anymore that the thing i’ve flagellated myself for over the past twenty-odd years is the thing i should have been flagellating myself for. i’ve claimed to know god for most of my life, to really know him – more than others, even.

i’m terrified of him.

not a moment goes by that i don’t second guess every footfall, every breath. i’ve immobilized myself with fear.

there has got to be more to life than this.

creating.

there is a story inside of me.

there is a girl in a smudgy world and a story that she needs to tell. there is a house with a history. a lifetime full of people who need the hope that this girl can give.

these things are inside of me, swirl within me like a whirlwind. i think about this girl, and her world, and her need for the story inside of her, which parallels my own. the details are swaddled in the blackest smoke and though i squint and swirl, they elude me.

who is this girl? how am i the one that has come to have her story deep within me?

i keep waiting for this magic, this greatness to overtake me and write itself out of me.

why do i feel the need to create? is this pulling an evidence of something greater, another creator? is there a god whose imagination and joy i feel compelled to imitate?

and if so, what happens if i fail?

ruminating.

tonight is the night that summers should be made of.

the nightsky is dark, and blue, and the clouds that looked like cities in the sky at noontime are thinner now and move with a sleepy stealth.

is there a god somewhere behind all of this? within it?

i stoop to talk to my inner child. “stand with me awhile?” she will. i watch my puppy, the boy, sniff around, looking for a spot to do his business. i realize that at some point a few weeks ago, i would have been grouchy with him for taking so long and possibly even jerked at his leash to get him to speed things along. but tonight, the air is so cool and perfect, and there is a cicada somewhere professing its satisfaction with this one summer night. and i decide to let myself touch the beauty of the earth.

anticipating.

i am at work, stretching out my lunchtime like the taffy pullers used to do at the shoppes in northern michigan, where we often went on vacation when i was a kid.

it is summer now, like it was then, and it’s a relief to me to walk outside and feel the sun on my face. the sky has been a chalky blue for days and spotted with looming cloud-cities and floating white islands.

it is windows-down weather.

and i am terrified that tomorrow i will wake up and it will be gone.

beginning again.

first, i will admit some things:

• i am a lesbian.
• i don’t know what i believe about god.
• i am interested in finding and telling the truth. finally.

now, i will tell you a story:

i found out this year what it’s like to have your heart broken. i learned what it’s like to be razed to the ground and scorched. destroyed. demolished. reduced to rubble.