"Even My Dad Does Sometimes"

I am a fan of crying (and Ed Sheeran).

I used to never cry, of course. Growing up I had only witnessed it at funerals, and even then it made me uncomfortable. It wasn't because I thought tears were a sign of weakness (being strong was never one of my concerns). Rather, it felt messy. Hectic. It lacked the calmness and control I had learned to associate with being safe.

Man, what I wouldn't give to travel back in time and tell my fifteen-year-old self that it is absolutely OK to cry. That the feeling she had mistaken for messiness was actually one of freedom and release.

Fortunately, I encountered many emotionally healthy and loving human beings since then, and the lesson I gathered was a simple but crucial one: When one is emotionally constipated, one must take an emotional dump.

Suppressing emotions is extremely gross and unhealthy. In the same way that our physical bodies are not meant to retain excrement and, therefore, have natural means of releasing it, our spiritual selves are not meant to suppress all the shit we so often mask behind false "okay-ness".

This sentiment is said sung far more beautifully by Ed Sheeran in his song titled "Even My Dad Does Sometimes". Now that I think of it, even my Dad does sometimes (see John 11:35).

I'm still learning how to let myself feel. And when I feel like it, I am learning how to cry. It is an incredible thing to be able to weep without feeling ashamed, needy, unstable, sensitive, and like I need to stop and apologize.

At times, I still resort to a cold beer or sad movie as some sort of "emotional laxative" to help the feelings channel outward rather than farther in. Vulnerability still scares me, a lot. Telling someone "No, I'm not okay" still feels selfish and wrong. As with all learning processes, this one is not without its flaws.

Nevertheless, the process is happening—thank God for that. Truly, I thank God for that.

Darling Me

I sometimes don't like to call it "battle".
It surfaces an image of a warrior clad in weight and armor, bruised and cut.

Today, I feel the battle.
But the thought of being a warrior is too much.

Somehow, somehow, somehow we march onward.
We share our struggles.
We understand.

Darlings!
(Can I call us that?)

Today, I want to call myself darling.
Today, I want to say:

Darlings, this battle with depression doesn't have to be our end.

a.c.

I know I should've taken the granola bar. It was my mom's way of doling out her love to me and contributing to my day's welfare. But it was so humid when I woke up this morning and the heat kept me up all last night. I didn't want the Nature Valley bar she was waving at me from the car. I wanted an iced coffee. I didn't want to take the ten steps it would require me to retrieve the fruit-and-nut-mixed snack that would most likely end up unopened and smooshed under the contents of my backpack for the next three months. I wanted an iced coffee. I wanted air conditioning. The Panera I was headed toward promised both, so I ignored my mother and kept walking.

In our home, air conditioning is reserved for the following two occasions:
1. The arrival of the rare houseguest
2. Temperatures that breach 90 °F (sans humidity)

It is a reservation that does wonders on summer electricity bills. And it is something that never really bothered me... until now. Now, the full-moonlit summer night transforms the werewolf into a hungry beast, and its sweltering humidity turns me into a Grade A bitch. And if it's not the heat, it's the food or the curfew or the nagging or the lack of privacy. Lately, it seems the list of things that fuel my hunger for independence might be inexhaustible.

Thumbtacked nearby is yet another growing list. It is titled "Things I do not like about the Church."
Bulleted below it can be found (to name a few): "the 'purity' culture/ mainstream worship/ commercialized conferences/ lofty approaches to short-term mission trips, evangelism, race, culture, mental health, sexuality, and sex." 

This was the condition of my increasingly bitter heart when I rejected my mother's rectangular-shaped token of love. And as I walked away, I began to face a sobering realization: In my attempt to gain "independence," I had grown distant and apathetic toward the person I love more than anyone else on this earth. For reasons all too similar, I had done the same toward God, who I love more than anyone—period.

I am not yet 22-years-old. I have as much experience with being a church member, committed to building up the community and embodying its mission, as I do with being a fully functioning adult. I am a fool to think that moving out of the house will grant me the satisfaction of what I keep referring to as "independence." I am a fool to think that disassociating myself with the Church will free me to experience "truer" intimacy with God.

Running away always achieves so little.

...

Later tonight, while preparing dinner, my mother will replace the granola bar in the fridge to keep it cool until tomorrow morning, when she will offer it to me again. Earlier tomorrow morning, I will be woken by my alarm and met with sweltering humidity, new mercies, and grace.

"You-Will-Be-There"

Last night, I was reading a chapter from Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader (1998) by Anne Fadiman (who is quickly becoming one of my favorite essayists) on what she calls "You-Are-There" reading. Simply put, it is the art of reading an author's account of a particular place while the reader, herself, is there.

In her own account of reading from Major John Wesley Powell's narrative of his journey through the Granite Rapids, while camped next to the very same river-swept canyons with her husband, Anne Fadiman writes in her journal: "G. reads from Powell." 

"G." for her husband George.
It was a detail so delicately nuanced, I felt it before I was even fully aware of it.

It got me to think that there will come a day when I, too, will no longer write out your name.
(I will call this "You-Will-Be-There" reading—a justification for hopeless romanticizing.)

You, like George, will become a letter of the alphabet like F. or D. or maybe R. And the pages of my journal will begin to fill with sentences like:

"R. came over today."
"R. is so beautiful."
"R. is so annoying."

I might tell you I was trying to be green and conserve paper or, as is often the case, that I got lazy.

But ten, twenty years later, I will be flipping through journal entries of past love interests and friends whose neatly inscribed names will draw a blank or a laugh—at best. Then my frivolous flipping will come to a halt. I will have come across a page whose significance will be evident by my knowing smile, and you will see me read it hastily, once, and then a second and third time with deliberate care.

I will walk it over to you (if you are not already beside me).
I will point out its date.

The day you became a letter, I will tell you.
The day I knew I loved you and would never forget your name.

About

Hello, my name is Jane.
My hope is to love boldly, be it in quiet ways.

I started writing on Tumblr during my first year at college and have since grown in my love for communicating and connecting with others. This blog is a continuation of my written journey as well as my means to keeping sane as I pursue medical school and psychiatric medicine. The human mind is a beautifully complicated place, and my life's dedication and joy is to venture in understanding it.

I hope we are friends in real life.
If not, I hope to be meeting you soon.