Jess, I’m so glad that you’ve found a group of friends who can support you locally. You and I are closer now than ever, but there’s really something to be said about having people there who can be soft arms when I need a hug and give me Kleenex when I have to cry. I’m glad you finally have that. It’s something I prayed for you.
The last year and a half have been difficult. I’m trying not to dwell on it, but in less than a month, it will be one year since Mike died. And I still think about him every day. This summer I went through the longest dark night my soul has ever seen. I couldn’t see the end of it. And I functioned- I went to work, I spent twenty- three hours a day with other people, and inside I was dying. I didn’t even like to be around myself, so the people who walked with me through that time must have the patience of saints. (In Mitch’s case, I know that this is true.) I was hard to take last summer. I’m grateful beyond belief to the people in my life who stood by me during that hard time, but there were friends who didn’t. They were hurt by the things I said and did and won’t trust me now because of those things. On the other side of that, two of my best friends right now are friends I made during that time. They saw the state I was in- messy, broken, hurting- and they blinked and said, “I’ve been there, too. Let’s go to Sonic.” They didn’t judge me, they didn’t tell me to get it together or do things differently. They were just there while I dealt with things, because they knew I would be there for them in return.
Jess, I can echo your thoughts on being “fixed.” Who can really be “fixed?” (Besides Gizmo, Travis’s dog. The procedure actually solved a lot of problems for the entire Sappington family, but that’s a story for another post.) I don’t want someone to try to fix me, I want them to walk beside me while God fixes it. And I say that because I’ve been through wanting to fix friends. I’ve seen my hurting friends and wanted so desperately to take them up into my arms and “sew on patches to all you tear,” as Ingrid Michaelson would put it. I had to learn really fast that there’s no way I can sew up friends who have been ripped apart at the seams. I can hold the seams together while God sews them up, but it’s not up to me when that happens. So for me, last summer, hearing comments like, “You should really just go to therapy,” and “He died three months ago, you should be moving on,” weren’t helpful in the slightest. Those are the rational “fixes” to what was wrong with me. My heart was broken, and there wasn’t anything anyone could do to make it better. I just had to do it on God’s time, not mine or anyone else’s. It’s not like I wanted to be depressed all the time. I didn’t want to say mean things because I couldn’t remember how to put nice words together. I didn’t want to have a sinking, irrational fear that everyone else was going to leave me, too. Those things went away with time, but those friends who went away haven’t come back, not completely.
So now, Jess, since you brought it up, I’ve been mulling over this concept of “soul friends.” I have many, many friends and even more acquaintances, but when it comes to those friends who know my heart, inside and out, there are only a few. (You’re one of them, sistah.) I can’t count all of them as “soul friends,” but of the ones I can… oh, wow. I’ve been blessed.
sleeping with smartphones
9 years ago
2 comments:
Brianne,
I wish I could have been physically there for you during this dark night, but I'm glad you did have people there. I am grateful for the time we spent together earlier this year. Praise God that we have become closer--I don't know what I would have done without you.
Soul Friends--people who are there for you through good and bad, who know you deeply, and I believe, as I think the Celts did, whom you learn from (and with). People you walk with--perhaps literally, but more importantly, spiritually. Actually, that reminds me of your Emily story, and the idea that sometimes family is more than just who you're related to. My pastor talked about that this past weekend, come to think of it. Hm.
I'm a firm believer in "found family-" people you don't share blood with, but who have shared everything else in your life. I think that's a very postmodern idea, as well, the idea of "found family." It's placing value on more than the rational, biological aspect of family. I have to admit that the idea intrigues me, and was the reason I started writing about Emily in the first place. It's interesting to me that there can be completely functional families made up of people who just met last year, and it's a concept I wanted to explore in my writing.
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