Salty Rain

When I was a child, I loved the imagery of rain being the tears of angels. I suppose that now it stands as proof that I will never be an angel; God did promise never to flood the earth in its entirety every again.

I have been depressed. I have knitted a blanket and am now working on a scarf. Knitting and watching already run TV shows online, that is how I've been spending my days. Laundry stacks up, children run amok and I sit in self-imposed exile and denial -- valiantly solving complex murders while ignoring the reality of my state. It continues, however, to boggle my mind as to why I'm so depressed. Robert has been generous to a fault while I have struggled with my emotions. He has taken all three kids for the last two Saturdays giving me peace for a day. He has come home from work only to enmesh himself in the work of our home. All with no complaint. My children have been children, no better or worse than they normally are.

I went to see my therapist yesterday after not seeing her for six months. As I talked and talked and talked and cried and cried (more talking that actual crying -- yea!) for an hour and a half, I found myself talking at length about the family I was raised in and the dysfunction into which it has fallen. My family has always been my root, my strength, the place where I belonged and the place where I was accepted unconditionally. I find that since the passing of my mother this is no longer true. Each time I try to deal with the grief of losing my mother, I find that there is more grief to conquer: my father's new marriage and how to deal with a step-mother; my younger sister-in-law's bid for power and manipulations to affect that; my little brother's distance; my father's struggle to make his new marriage work; wondering if my little nuclear family will end up like the family I grew up in -- dysfunctional and distant with little communication. Am I raising children and pouring my love into them only to lose them completely in about fifteen to twenty years?

My fears and worries and sadness then make me question my faith: if I had enough of it, would I really be in this state? Why can't I just turn all of this over to God, who is really in control, and trust His hand? I try and I try but for every time I lay my burdens at Jesus' feet, I snatch them back. Do I want to be beyond His reach? Sometimes I feel like I do; I want to wrap my misery and sadness around me like a warm, wet blanket and feel the weight of its oppression. I want to be alone. If I'm alone and not loving anyone, there will be no further grief. If I don't love my children, I won't miss them when they decide they don't like me anymore. If I don't love my husband or family or friends, I won't grieve them when they die, as we all eventually will.

I don't know. I don't know. I feel a mess for all the convoluted thoughts I have. Every time I try to find a path through the fog, I feel diverted to another path and on and on it goes through the maze until I find myself back where I started. So while I know that Chuck didn't fake her death like Olive thinks but that she was brought back to life by the pie-maker; and that Addison and Pete make each other feel all tingly; and that Dan really does go back in time, not that his brother Jack would ever believe him; and that the riddle of who is Gormogan has not been settled yet, I don't know how to let go of my fears and my hurts and my sorrows and griefs. While I know that I miss my mother desperately and long for her advice, I don't know when I will feel her arms again. While I know what I want life to be, I don't know that God would agree.

So I sit and wonder and write and try to make the maze a straight path. I remember my mother and try to let her go even as I struggle to hold on to the memories that are becoming hazier. I try to let go of my expectations and dreams of who my family is and form new relationships, or even non-relationships, with the people they actually are. I try to find peace amid the emotions of my heart and focus on the fact that the greater the sorrow, the greater the eventual joy. And I try to trust God's hand as to the timing of that gift.