Daily 5 - Day 209

To be honest, the last thing I feel like doing right now is coming up with 5 or more things that made me smile or that I'm thankful for tonight.  Mostly what I want to do is bawl my eyes out, and wallow.  Deeply and miserably.  Since that doesn't seem like a productive option, may I present, 

Today's Daily 5:

1. Blackberries and raspberries as part of my supper
2. Skype chat with A. tonight.  Was so good to catch up a bit. To share what's going on in our lives, the fun stuff and the challenges.  We know the questions to ask, and since our time is precious, we talk about the important stuff, celebrating the good and promising to pray for each other through the challenges.  (Definitely having one of those, all the people I love and who love me live way too far away moments, though.)
3. Managed to arrange a ride to house church for Thursday night - doesn't seem like much, but in my current carless state, that ride is a lifeline, because it lets me be at the house church gathering that I've come to appreciate so much.
4. Got through the day without melting down, even without my supplements.  That's a pretty big victory.  (It also helps to know that part of how I'm feeling right now is because I had a third of what I normally take in the supplement that deals particularly with anxiety and mood regulation.)
5. It felt so good to shower tonight.
6. Sort of managed to keep the obsessing about a particular, hard situation/conversation at bay.  Sort of managing that is a victory for me.
7. using the pillows my roommate left me.  hers are much nicer than the ones I had been using.
8. Caught up on "The Amazing Race" online tonight.  Totally cheering on the cowboys - loved the line from one of them in the episode I watched tonight where they found themselves outside some strip clubs in Germany, looking for a clue, and one said to the other, "We ain't in the bible belt no more."  Made me laugh.  Plus, I couldn't believe his cowboy hat stayed on when he bungee jumped.  Now that's a tight fitting hat!
9. still really enjoying the audio book I've been listening to, though it's challenged me a bit at points.  I'm nearly done now (will likely finish it up tomorrow) and then I'll post about it.
10. Got a chapter read in the book I'll eventually be reviewing here.  I'm slogging through this one, and it always feels like an accomplishment to mark another chapter off the list as I count down towards being done.  Let's just say that I'll be picking a shorter book for my next free review, just in case I manage to pick another, um, "challenging" read.
11. Oh, and bonus - Banana cream pie.  So good.

Shower

It's been a long time since the first thing I did when I got home was to try to shower away a very bad day.

I stood there, under the hot water and visualised all the gross things from this day, this season, washing off of me.

The fear and anxiety and panic.

The sense of homelessness.

The anger and resentment.

The worry.

The obessessive neuroses.

I stood there and thought about those things being washed free from me, about being washed clean.

And I wondered, too, in the corner of my mind, if Grandma was thinking that I was taking too long in the shower.

Because one of the things she told me quite incredulously when I first took a shower in this house, was how the previous tenant had showered for 20 minutes, without turning the fan on, and now look, the finish on the bathroom door was ruined. 

And I laughed inwardly, because, though I don't know why she didn't turn the fan on, to save the finish on the door, 20 minutes didn't really seem that excessive to me, but I supposed that to someone who was 80, a child of the great depression, and currently often simply bathes herself at the sink, it seemed like a ridiculous luxury.

So I stood there and washed myself clean, and tried to laugh, remembering the incredulous tone. "20 minutes, can you imagine?"

And somehow, it helped, and I felt freer, moving on to supper, to pills (so grateful that the day was kind of okay without my usual supplements, so thankful to be able to take the suppertime dose), and to anticipating talking with A.

Freer, it seems, feels good.

Tonight

Tonight the plan is to use skype to talk with A.

A. and I have been friends for many years now - she's one of the longer standing ones.  There are two or three of that vintage, all ones I hold dear.  And only a very, very few of an older vintage.

I stayed with A. and her husband B. in Toronto last fall, when L. and I were experiencing autumn for the first time.  We spent a week camping in their living room.

Some of the most restful sleeps I've had in the last year were during that week on her living room couch.

A. is from Columbia, beautiful and graceful.  Trained as a professional dancer.  She moves with grace, but not just the grace of a dancer.  The grace of one who knows and loves Jesus, and who somehow lets that light ooze from her very motions.

And tonight, I get to talk with her.

I'm anticipating it, on this day that has been full of challenges.  This day that has at moments seemed unmangeable.

Because I have been lonely in these days of transition, and she is one who sees me, who knows my heart, and even the struggles and loves anyway.  Because we almost always pray together and for each other as we close our conversation.  Because tonight it will do my heart good to converse with a dear friend.

Quoting

This morning I paused, and noticed yesterday's calendar quote.

"Let us establish a permanent spring season in our heart through 'yes' often repeated to all of God's permissions and wills."  (Saint Francesca Salesia Aviat)

Funny that.  The timing of a quote like that.

Appearing amid a series of days where I find myself longing for spring, for life.  And where I find myself struggling with the ramifications of "yes" to God's wills.

It leaves one with things to think about, in any case.

Worth Reading

Both of the posts below are worth reading today:

Renee's latest.

And Anne Jackson's "I'd Rather Have Fewer Readers"

Viciously Choosing Joy

Okay.  So here's the deal.  I'm back to forcibly choosing joy.  Viciously choosing it almost.

Last night was powerful.  I was blessed to enjoy a powerful evening of worship.  I was blessed to have time in the midst of that time of worship to talk with God about the current places I'm existing in.  There was some grumpyness.  And some confession. A few deep moments.  And a healing warmth that stole over me, carrying peace and joy with it again.  And some renewal of a committment to trust. 

Trust is not my strong suit.

I was thinking this morning that it's been particularly hard the last few years to trust God's handling of my life.  It has often seemed like the places he's led me have been cruel.  The results only painful.

It's easy to forget the beautiful ways those seemingly cruel seasons have shaped my life and deepened my walk with God.

I spent my bus ride to work this morning in two ways.  Obsessing over something that's bothering me, and berating myself for letting that obsessive, controlling fear steal the joy and peace I had.  Letting it interrupt the time of worship and prayer I try to make space for on the bus each morning.

I got to work and discovered that for the first time in months, I'd forgotten last night to swap the empty pill containers in my purse for full ones.  Since I was already obsessing, that was not a calming addition.  The many supplements I take daily make a significant difference in my ability to cope with a day.  Since I was already in a tenuous, tearful, obsessive space, my immediate tendency was panic.

I'm fighting that tendency for the moment.

So, I'm viciously choosing joy.  It pretty much sucks as a process, but I've seen the results over the last several hundred days of making daily 5 lists, and I've learned that on the worst days, sometimes I just have to be vicious about the thought processes.

No, I won't let that thing that I'm obsessing about steal the peace from special moments with Jesus during a worship service last night.

No, I won't let the panic over how I'll cope with the day without the many supplements that balance my mood and energy levels drive me to a place of having a bad day just because I expect to.

Yes, I'll probably have to viciously choose those "no's" and others over and over and over.

Like I said, as a process, it pretty much sucks.

And it requires trust.

Trust that I really can make a different choice and stick to it.

Trust that my emotions aren't some totally wonky thing that I have no control over.

Trust that joy isn't only about a happy and perfect life.  That it exists in the pretty ugly, mundane days too.

So that's my plan for today.

To somehow, viciously push the other things away, and choose joy.