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21 March 2023

one who leans

This is just hard.  It's just hard. I don't want to keep saying that. More, I don't want to keep feeling that. But it just is, and if it is for you, too...it takes courage not to shrink from the ache, not to just bury it.

Sigh.

As soon as loss hits you fresh, it hits you all the old places. 

The waves of losing dad stir up waves of losing mom stir up waves of losing daily life and relationships in Haiti...and suddenly I'm underwater and I don't know how we got here. Again.

I miss my parents. I miss my homes. I miss lots of people...relationships....times...places.

I get stuck...wishing things were different. Wishing so-and-so had said something. Wishing such-and-such would do something.Being sure that I am alone. Sure that I can't do this again. Sure that all the best things are finished. Sure that I want to sink into the carpet and disappear. Sure that I'll never laugh and pray and worship with sweet friends in Haiti again or ever ever sit at the ocean again or ever do anything but laundry and clean up dirty socks again and again and again and sure that every sweet gift will be overshadowed with loss.

What do you get stuck on?

I know that all needs let go. Or isn't true. Or won't always be. 

But. 

Life. 

It is all the things. All at once...and the losses are deafening. 

Dad not here for my children is deafening. Lily, missing him, hurts my ears. The present parents of "everyone" else yells at me. The quiet of my phone...the unwritten updates and pictures to not text...like constant ringing. 

It doesn't matter how loud it is, though, for six o'clock comes early, Dad always said, and it does...again and again, regardless. You go to bed. You rise early. You go again. Even if I thought I could pause, a four-year old and a chubby crawler intersect every space and loudly prove otherwise.

I'm a sunshine-pusher by nature, but having so much settling down into the cracks now has me in a foreign, overcast place. Nora is no longer sick, neither is my dad. Our family has grown and transitioned and settled, almost a full year now. There is nothing we are waiting for, no emergency hanging overhead. 

Just a cloud. 

the daily cost of it, O Lord, sometimes seems
more than I can daily bear--apart from your care.
So tend me in the midst of this, O God. 
Hover, O Holy Spirit, over this chaos of loss,
and order it with light and hope.

Let me commune with you
within these many voids, O God.
In each place I encounter pain,
let me there find your Spirit at work, 
shaping my hearts, so that day by day
I am becoming one who leans 
with greater expectations into the fullness
of the coming redemption



3 comments:

  1. Sue LeathermanMarch 26, 2023

    Dear, dear Stacey, I hope and pray that it comforts you to know that your words are powerful comfort and healing for others. Keep writing.

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  2. Father God, you know all of these feelings. The depth of them. The darkness. Despair. Loneliness. Loss. Grief. The consistent, dark cloud. Thank you for walking with Stacey - holding her heart, her emotions, her thoughts. Send encouragement and moments with lightheartedness that runs deep and true in her deepest most part so she can feel hopeful again. Thank you. Amen.

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