I wanted to write about something else this week, but hey, look what day it is. Another year already? What a spectcular waste of time that was.
I used to think that there would be some dramatic moment of revelation, some significant event that would change everything. I tried to force it a few times; tried to assign undue significance to minor things and declare that henceforth everything would be different. It never “took.” Time rolls on, and change happens at its own pace. People come and go. Seasons come and go. But there is no great revelation coming. Whatever else might be said, it’s clear that the God I’ve been looking for for three years isn’t looking for me.
God isn’t who I thought He was.
Love isn’t what I thought it was.
Electrical Engineering definately isn’t what I thought it would be.
But where would I go? Who else has the words of life?
If I was to be completely honest, I would have to admit that my life couldn’t possibly be any easier. Yet I remain miserable. And I always have been. There have been moments of happiness, days, seasons perhaps. But I have never had lasting joy. It’s not about circumstances; there’s actually something wrong with me. I once thought that God could fix that, but not anymore. I’m working on accepting the idea that happiness just isn’t in the cards for me.
So three years then. Should I make a cake or something? How about a song:
i want to…
i want to be someone else or i’ll explode
floating upon the surface for the birds
the birds
the birds
you want me?
well f~ing well come and find me
i’ll be waiting
with a gun and a pack of sandwiches
and nothing
nothing
nothing
nothing
you want me?
well come on and break the door down
you want me?
f~king come on and break the door down
i’m ready
i’m ready
i’m ready
i’m ready
–Radiohead
Lately, I just want to break things, all the time. It’s really quite irrational, and you know I just can’t abide being irrational.
Last night I dreamt that I was getting Baptized again. It seemed to be in a backyard swimming pool. A small boy went before me. They wanted to make it quick, because he was freezing. Then it was my turn. Then the baptizer turned to me. He knew me, but I did not recognize him. (A situation which has literally happened to me at least four times in the past month.) He reached out to me with a very hairy arm. He asked me a question that in the dream I did not understand, and now I do not remember, but it had something to do with the audience, and I responded with something like, “You mean, these people?” My mother was there, as before.
Then, instead of bracing me with his arm and lowering me into the water, he simply gave me a shove on the chest, and I fell over backwards and sank immediately to the bottom. I lay there on the bottom of the pool wondering, “Is he going to come pull me out again, or what?” Finally, I could wait no longer, and frantically swam back up on my own, breaking surface into the waking world.
On Monday, I went for a walk. I went to a local park, but as it was Memorial Day, the park was full of picnickers and families and that was a little depressing to me. I left by a different route than I normally take and happened to pass by a retirement home. An old lady sitting on her patio beckoned me over. I naturally did a mental, “Who me?” but there was no one else around. She asked me what day it was, and I answered that it was the 28th. She then asked when Monday would come, and I replied that it was Monday now. That seemed to surprise her a bit. Then she commented on how nice of a day it was, and how she always sits on her patio and asked if I had ever seen her sitting there before. I could only admit that I do not come that way very often.
I would not even venture a guess as to how old she was. She was quite likely the wrinkliest person that I have ever seen. I somehow got to wondering if she had ever been beautiful, if she had ever been loved, but now she was alone every day on her patio. Time always trumps love and beauty in the end. We really do not have that much time.
That, of course, only reminded me of my mother, but then again, what doesn’t?