Fear

Stop the Insanity

/ Roxie / Leave a comment

Here’s the situation: It’s not ok.  It’s not ok to treat people different because of their choices and it’s not ok to force people to do something that they don’t want to do.  If you took this concept and applied it to any other scenario, we would be outraged and it would be considered a crime.

Before I get started, know that I’m shortening the key words in this (and their many forms and tenses), because I don’t need any sort of bot flagging my post and attaching some dumb PSA link to it, even though I’m sure this site is free of that.  You’re smart, I’m sure you can solve these abbreviated mysteries.  Cvd = duh.  V = this should be obvious.  Un-V = if you can’t figure this out, we have other problems.

Well That’s Just Great

Remember 19 months ago when we all heard about this ooky spooky virus and the very thought of it was crazy?  Then we thought social distancing and masks and lockdowns were crazy?  And then how crazy it was that our government essentially cancelled Christmas.  Do you remember the madness?!  Well, that madness almost seems sane to me now because the world has done gone and lost it’s mind!

Prior to that, if you would’ve asked me to list any reasons I could think of as to why my life might not turn out the way I want, I might’ve answered that it would be because the things I’d like to do require me to have a platform and a following but I’m a nobody.  I might’ve answered that it would be because I’ve done and accomplished all I want to/can do as a single person and the rest is dependent on finding a partner to do life with.  It would never have been because some stupid freaking virus would appear out of nowhere, disrupt the ENTIRE planet and potentially screw up all of my future hopes/plans/dreams.

The Blame Game

If I were God (and you should be thankful I’m not), I would be sending the flood right about now.  Just wipe this whole hot mess of humanity out because in the words of a basic white girl – I literally can’t even!  But like actually, I can’t.  The hate in the world is palpable!  There have been so many wrong things that have happened in North America this last year and now to top it off, the government is literally pitting the V and the un-V against each other and it is not ok!  None of anything that is going on right now is ok!  I get that everyone is over this crap, mentally and physically exhausted and looking for something, and now someone to blame, as to why a year and a half later things are worse, but can I just put this out there?  Blaming doesn’t help anything.  Blaming does not get you the results you want.  Blaming only causes more division and more hate.  Do you know who plays the blame game?  CHILDREN!  Tiny little humans whose brains haven’t fully developed.  This is the level of maturity we exhibit when we blame.

To V or Not to V

Personally, I legitimately DO. NOT. CARE. what you’ve decided to do.  If you got V – great, if you didn’t – great.  YOUR BODY, YOUR CHOICE!  But therein lies the frustration and the stress of many right now.  Canadians (and Americans) are losing their freedom of this choice and even more worrisome is many cannot see past the here-and-now to see the bigger picture of how losing this freedom could impact the future in a very negative way!

“Do your part.”  “It’s not a big deal.”  “Just get it so we can get over this pandemic.”  For many people, it’s not that simple!  The people who made the decision to get V had their reasons, just as the people who made the decision not to get V had their reasons.  The reasons might not seem valid to you, but they are valid to each person individually and news flash, it’s not your place to be the judge of someone else’s reasons!

I have both V and un-V people in my life and here’s what I know.  Not everyone who went and got the shot is a mindless sheep and not everyone who hasn’t got the shot is actually anti-V or a selfish conspiracy theorist.  A few people I know who got V were required to do so in order to see family members that live in care facilities, but I’d say the majority had the mindset of ‘we just want to get back to normal and if this is what it takes to do that or travel again, we’re going to do it’.  They can’t be faulted for that; that’s literally what they were guaranteed by the government!  Just as they can’t be faulted for their choice, the people who chose not to get V can’t be faulted for theirs.

I know people with auto-immune disorders who cannot get V because it poses a higher risk to them, yet they don’t fall under the exemption categories.  I know women who are hesitant of getting V because the long term effects on fertility/infertility are unknown and won’t be known for many more years.  I know people, who know people, who have died after getting the V, had adverse side effects and even been paralyzed.  As such, these people would rather take the risk of getting Cvd than the risk of getting V and you know what?  That’s their choice!  Where there is risk, there should be choice!

Stop It!

I could go on and on (and off!) about all of this.  Do I lean more towards one side than the other when it comes to my personal opinion?  Of course, but that doesn’t matter right now, what matters is, I think in all of the chaos that has only been amplified this last month, people have forgotten about the humanity in others. Reminder: there is still a person behind the decision to be V or un-V.  There is a stranger with a story that you don’t know and it’s really none of your business to know.  There is a coworker or a friend or a family member that, even as recently as a couple weeks ago, you could still enjoy the company of, while respectfully having a different opinion than.  Unfortunately, as soon as we were told that one side is to blame, humanity went out the window and now we just look at people and see them as the reason we’re living this unending cycle of insanity!

Let’s think for a moment about what happens when all of this ends?  Not Cvd, because I’m pretty sure that’s here to stay, but what happens when we’ve figured out how to continue living with this thing in the background and things have calmed down?  Are your relationships going to survive?  Will you be able to come back from the opinions you’ve formed or the things you’ve said?  What if it turns out that you were wrong?  What if it turns out that they were wrong?  Is this stupid virus worth losing relationships over?  Sorry, not in my world.

One Last Thing

Where are my Christians at?  No seriously, where are the faith-filled, miracle-believing, pray-without-ceasing Christians?!  I see and hear and read too many things that get posted and it seems like many Christians have forgotten about God (and the devil) in all of this.  Yes, science and medicine have done wonders for us in the past, but I’ve seen faith in a V elevated higher than faith in God.  And let’s not forget that we’ve been commanded not to fear, so why are you allowing fear to drive your life?  Dare I make a suggestion?  Turn off the news.  Close your newspaper.  Stay away from social media.  Why not spend that time in prayer instead?  Pray radical prayers that Cvd disappears!  And when you’re done praying, pray some more.  And then, go enjoy time with your family and friends.  Yes, even the ones who made a different choice than you!  Get to know people again and have conversations that don’t involve anything related to this nonsense!  You’ll quickly realize that people are more than their V status.

Apples and Oranges

/ Roxie / 3 Comments

Here’s the situation: I know comparison is the thief of contentment and for that reason we’re not supposed to compare ourselves or our lives to other people, but what if the person we’re comparing ourselves to is just ourselves?  Could that really be as bad?

I take really good care of my stuff.  Always have.  I think it’s a practice my parents instilled in me as a kid because we didn’t have a lot of money, so when you got something, you took care of it, but it’s a practice that was emphasized in me as an adult when I found myself in mountains of debt.  When you’ve learned the value of a dollar the hard way, and worked your butt off to get out of debt and save for what you have, you gain a newfound appreciation for your purchases and as such, you take care of them!  Yes, I’m debt free now and have some savings, but that doesn’t mean I’m suddenly going to start being careless with my stuff just because I can afford to!

My iPhone 8 from 2018 still looks as new as the day I got it.  Same with my iPad Air from 2013.  I could go on a vacation for what it would cost me to replace them and I’d rather do that than fork over any more money to Apple, so I treat them like my first born!  You can snoop through my kitchen cupboards and you’ll find that the bakeware I purchased nearly 5 years ago all still looks like new too.  I didn’t buy brand new items to have them immediately get that sticky baked on residue from using a non-stick spray!  (Ironic isn’t it?)  It’s all about the parchment paper for me.  Similarly, I take really good care of my clothes as well.  Cold water, gentle cycle, no dryer, sometimes even hand wash (but not often!).  Because I take such good care of my clothes, I also end up hanging onto them for a lot longer than I realized…

Fat Guy in a Little Coat

Every 6 months or so, I go through my closet and drawers, pull out all of the items that I haven’t worn in at least a year and do a fashion show for myself so I can make piles to take to the thrift store or to consignment.  There are pieces though, that I try on every single time and despite how rarely I wear them, I continue to hang onto them.  Dresses for instance.  I have a bunch of dresses from Christmas parties past or weddings I attended that I keep, because when that one, random, formal event pops up, you just might need them and why buy a new dress when you already own a bunch?!  Same goes for vacation clothes.  Where I live in Canada, I rarely need clothes for a hot climate, but when I go on a vacation, I suddenly need the shorts and tank tops and sundresses that I accumulated from previous vacations, so I can’t get rid of those either!  Unfortunately, my semi-annual fashion show purge usually ends in tears and self-loathing and vows that I’ll never eat sugar again and that I’ll work out 7 days a week, all because the clothes I’ve committed to hang onto, don’t fit like they used to!  The party dresses used to zip up all the way and drape and flow, but they’re not doing any of that anymore!  The shorts used to have extra thigh room, but now my thighs look like sausages desperately trying to escape their casing.

Last year in the purge I decided it was time to invest in a new fall coat, because the one I had was getting a little tight.  This decision wasn’t without a lot of anger that my coat used to be cute and loose and now I could barely zip it up if I had any layers on underneath.  Exactly when did I get so “thick”?!  I wanted more reasons to justify the purchase so I tried to remember how many years I’d been wearing that coat to assure myself I’d gotten my money’s worth out of it.  I figured it had only been a couple, but was surprised when I realized – I bought that coat in 2008!  That’s 12 years I wore that coat.  TWELVE YEARS!  Of course it didn’t fit anymore!  That is a long time and a lot of life happens in a 12 year span!  Then I started to think about the dresses and vacation clothes that get me so upset every time I re-try them on.  Some of the vacation clothes I’ve been hanging onto for at least 8 years and a few of those party dresses are from over 15 years ago!  Why do I expect myself to be the same size I was 8 years ago? 12 years ago? over 15 years ago even?

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Me vs. Me

Now that I’m older, I try not to compare myself physically to other girls anymore.  There’s just no point – I’m not them.  I have different genetics and a different metabolism and things that formed me that are outside of my control.  Plus, I already know that I wouldn’t be comparing myself to women my age anymore, because our lives look so different and I don’t feel the same age as them, so I’d be comparing myself to women in my stage [of life] and by now, those women are a good 10 to 20 years younger than me.  It’s just a fact that I biologically can’t keep up with them because I’m already so far beyond them, so it’s not even fair to compare myself!  All I can, or should focus on, is me and I feel like I’ve done pretty well, given what I had to work with – just look at old photos of me! Of course there are still things that I’d love to “modify” (*ahem* this nose), but short of spending thousands and thousands of dollars, I can’t change much else.  I’ve slowly come to accept that this is the way God made me and me alone.  Now when I look in the mirror though, the only person I’m caught up comparing myself to, is my former self.

Remember how you never used to have fat spilling out above and below your bra band, and you didn’t even know chubby armpits were a thing?  Remember when you used to wear shorts because the backs of your legs weren’t riddled with cellulite and you didn’t have any varicose veins?  Remember when your skin was taut and smooth and now it’s tired and wrinkly?

Before I go on, I want to be clear about something because I don’t want to sound insensitive and piss a bunch of people off (which seems inevitable in 2021 anyway).  I know that I’m not actually “fat”.  And while I complain about the extra inches I’ve accumulated, there are people who have serious struggles with their weight and my extra inches might be their goal inches.  And I know how gross it feels when someone who has no right to say anything complains about their size.  It’s like, first of all – screw you and second, ‘if you think you’re fat, then what does that make me?’.  That’s not how I want to make anyone feel when I say these things.  All I want to get across is that FOR ME, what I am now, compared to what I used to be and the size that I used to buy and the clothes in my closet that used to fit and my “normal” that I maintained for most of my life until the last couple of years, is bigger.  FOR ME!  And many people I meet assume I’m about 10 years younger than I am and I actually do think I look better than I ever have, but at the same time, when I look in the mirror, I’m seeing the lines and my skin getting looser and compared to what I used to see, I am so much older.  These are the constant comparisons I’m making now; me vs. me.  And these changes over time, even though most of which are natural and inevitable as you age, make me so angry with myself, as if stopping their progression was somehow in my control!  So why do I have this expectation of myself to be the same as I always was?

This **** is Bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S

I think it’s maybe because my life hasn’t changed at all in 20 years, that I think I shouldn’t have changed at all in 20 years either.  It’s ok for other women, because they’ve lived.  Their grey hair and their wrinkles have been earned through the joys and the stresses of having a husband and a family.  They’re allowed to have outgrown their clothes and have stretch marks, because they’ve grown humans INSIDE of them!  I haven’t done those things.  I haven’t merited my changes.  I’m still trying to accomplish those things (minus the babies)!  And like I said above, instead of being in that stage with other women my age, now I’m in that stage with women half my age.  I might not be comparing myself to them anymore and I know I can’t keep up with their youthful beauty, but I am, unfortunately, competing in the same market as them.  I guess I feel like, if I could stay the same size I was and have a face without wrinkles, then maybe I’d have a fighting chance, but the reality is, my circumference slowly continues to increase with middle age and I’m only going to get older looking from here on out, so if I couldn’t find a spouse when I was younger…smaller…tauter…how do I expect to find one now?  Nobody buys their fruit over ripe.  They’d rather it be under ripe so they have more time with it and can enjoy it when it’s perfect.  Maybe I’ve crossed over into brown banana territory where my only use now is to go in the freezer to make banana bread later?

Glory Days

It’s not just comparing myself physically that’s a problem either.  I’m crazy nostalgic, so some days I’m “triggered” by a song or a scent or the weather and I get caught up comparing my present to my past.  I’ll remember the summer road trips with friends to nowhere in particular or the spontaneous dinners and get togethers we had.  I look back on just the level of hope and anticipation I maintained thinking “maybe today will be the day that…my miracle happens/everything changes/I meet someone…!”, or whatever it was.  It felt like the world was at my fingertips!  Compare that to my every day, here and now reality, and it feels like that world somehow slipped through my fingertips.  Then I start to spiral as I wonder if life will ever be that fun or feel as carefree again, or if the best really is still yet to come or if this present is also my future?  This is about the time that I start to have a mini panic attack, complete with short, labored breaths, uncontrollable tears and a complete sense of dread about life!  But no, comparing ourselves to ourselves couldn’t be that bad…

Stay in Your Lane

Comparison is the death of joy.

– Mark Twain

The death of joy.  The thief of contentment.  Whichever!  I would say it’s pretty clear that YES, comparing ourselves to ourselves is just as bad.  It doesn’t matter who you compare yourself to, comparison is always going to leave you feeling the same way; envious, depressed, lacking, entitled, robbed of something, etc.  Don’t look around and don’t look back!  Don’t compare yourself to anyone else, because you’re not them and you don’t know what they went through to get where they are and don’t compare yourself to your former self, unless it’s to see how far you’ve come.  You’re not who you were yesterday and tomorrow you won’t be who you are today!

Oh, and take my advice – promptly get rid of any clothes that make you feel bad about yourself!

Hope Lost

/ Roxie / 1 Comment

Here’s the situation: The past couple days social media has been filled with posts about how hard 2020 was, but in spite of it all, people learned so many lessons and are hopeful and ready for 2021.  I’m having a hard time sharing this sentiment.  The last half of 2020 and even right up until New Year’s Eve itself, managed to steal what hope I had left.

How long do you suppose we’re supposed to hang on to hope for?  And I don’t mean in the vague sense of the word like “here’s hoping” or “fingers crossed”.  I mean like, actually believing for something.  Does that kind of hope have an expiry date?  Is there a time when we just need to let go?

Enough.  Enough Now.

– Love Actually

You’ve probably seen an episode of American Idol where someone with big dreams but no talent auditions.  It’s so cringy!  They actually think they have a chance, but as the viewer at home we’re thinking – this is never going to happen for you, you need to let it go!  I wonder if this is where I’m at now?  Am I the delusional hopeful clinging to the chance of catching my metaphorical “big break”?  Maybe it’s time for me to just accept things for what they are and try to move on, even though I know I’ll always be slightly disappointed.  It feels like that disappointment would be easier to deal with though than continuing to keep my hopes up.  At least I could live life for what it is instead of always anticipating what might be around the corner…and finding out, there’s never anything around the corner.

This is how I feel lately anyway.  I’ve been believing for some outlandish things for a few years now and other smaller things for decades, but I’m tired of believing for them without even one teensy, tiny little shift in my life to confirm that I’ve been moving in the right direction.  Actually, it feels like I’m somehow getting further away from them and I don’t know how much longer I can hang on.  I’m spent.  I want to give up.  My hope tank is on empty.

Crappy New Year!

I gotta say, I think Covid might be the best thing that ever happened to New Year’s Eve!  I hate New Year’s Eve.  I’ve hated it for 20+ years in fact.  It always felt like there was so much pressure on what to do, where to go, which friend group to spend it with…  And nobody wants to commit to anyone or a plan, because a better option might come along, so you’re left in limbo, meanwhile if you actually want to attend an event, you need to know in advance because tickets sell out, so it’s usually just stressful and a lot of build up for a total let down.  It’s especially uncomfortable when you’re single.  At midnight all of the couples turn to each other to kiss and you’re left awkwardly standing there until they finish so they can throw you a pity New Year’s high five.

high-five-fail

Thankfully I’m old now and don’t really care anymore and if I’m in bed before midnight – bonus!  Even though the pressure of New Year’s Eve has petered out over the years, I still don’t like the feeling a new year brings.  Other people tend to get excited about a clean slate and new opportunities and what’s to come, but after the magic of Christmas ends for me, I usually just think to myself, “great, now we start this same BS all over again”.

I suppose my January 1st “new year, new me” attitude would be more positive if I felt like I had anything to look forward to, but I’ve started too many January 1st’s with the anticipation that “this might be the year!!” and ended enough December 31st’s to know that it’s never been the year.  Even with my hope waning a little bit every passing year, there’s always been a small reserve in the tank, but 2020 seems to be the year that sucked that dry and if you can believe, it had nothing to do with Covid either!

Year in Review

January to July of 2020 were going really good for me, even with Covid being a part of our lives.  I was lucky enough to still have a job, a job where I could go IN to the office every day and not have to work from home.  My spirits were up because I had friends who also weren’t going to let the fear of Covid dictate their lives, so we went on adventures and explored new parts of our province and even odder, while everyone was in some form of lockdown/quarantine, I managed to meet someone!  I spent 4 months getting to know this someone too and was really impressed by this man.  Circumstances were a little complicated for the time being though, so for the season, it could only be a friendship.  But that friendship came with a certain level of curiosity for the future.  It’s sad to admit, but that was probably the first time in my life I feel like I’ve shown my full self to someone…and they seemed to accept it.  Like it, even!  For the first time I was experiencing what it was like to be able to have an open and honest dialog with a mature man and what it felt like when you’re actually treated the way people tell you a man should treat you!  Life was good, but it’s my life and what would I have to write about if things ever worked out?  Due to the aforementioned complicated circumstances, the guy needed to take some time to himself and figure his life out.

You know that saying “it’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all“.  Well, whoever said that needs to give their head a shake.  I’m not saying I was in love with the guy, but unfortunately now I know what it feels like to be cared for and cheered on and unconditionally accepted, and what I assume it must feel like to be loved (even though I know he didn’t love me).  So now, I actually know what I’ve been missing out on and how to be treated and I have to try and find that AGAIN, with someone who’s actually ready for a relationship?!  It took 41 years to find a glimpse of that; the idea of finding it again seems impossible.  My brain and my heart and my very real reality can’t even picture how that could ever happen, but now how could I go back to anything less?

Maybe It’s the Indo Talking.  I Mean Endo.

Mid-July is when everything started to take a turn.  That’s when the guy ended our communication and if I wasn’t hurting enough emotionally, why not throw some physical pain in there too and have my body turn against me?!  What the eff, am I Job or something?  (That’s Bible humor for those of you that don’t know.)

I saw the doctor more times this year than I’ve probably seen her in the last 15.  I could share all the fun details of how I was squished and poked and prodded and violated multiple times, but I’ll give you the Coles Notes version.  Amongst a few other findings, I was diagnosed with Endometriosis this fall.  In fact, my doctor suspects I’ve had it all along!  Information that might’ve been helpful 28 years ago…

What is Endometriosis?  You can Google it, it’s nothing serious, but basically the symptoms are painful periods and difficulty conceiving.  As an extremely single women, with zero prospects, who’s a month away from turning 42, I’m not too concerned if I have difficulties conceiving, since the possibility of conception at this point would be as miraculous as Mary giving birth to Jesus.  As for the painful periods – uh, yea, I’ve been very aware of those since I was 13!  Moral of the story, as a first option of treatment, my doctor placed me back on birth control to try and normalize my body again and when I had the prescription filled the pharmacist said to me “pay attention to your moods, we’re adjusting your hormone levels and some women get depressed.”

stab

Now, I don’t know if it’s birth control induced mood swings, all of the changes that happened this year with the guy and my friend moving away and my cousin having a baby (read about it in The One Without a Title) or if it’s the January 1st funk of the pending doom of another 365 days of the same…  Maybe it’s a combo of all 3.  All I know is I’ve never felt as completely hopeless as I have the last couple months.

The New Normal

I’ve done the same thing on New Year’s Day for years now.  I pull out a journal and review the previous years goals, I write down some of the highlights of the year passed and I write out my goals for the current year.  This year though, I had a hard time coming up with anything.  Covid is still restricting us from so many things and I’m the girl who relies on future plans or goals, or something to look forward to or work towards, to keep me going.  I feel like that’s all I’ve got and without it, I don’t have a reason to go on.  I’ve said it in multiple blogs, why am I here?  What is my purpose?  I don’t have a husband or kids.  I don’t have my dream career or a job that any other girl couldn’t do.  I write this blog, but there’s thousands of bloggers out there to choose from.  I’m running out of reasons to convince myself why I even exist and looking into 2021, I just get sad, because it already feels like nothing could possibly change.  And when I think about that possibility of living another year and being in this exact same place in a year’s time, like I have been so many January’s before, I’m just done.  I’m seriously so over it.  I’ve clung to the hope of “one day” and “I must be getting closer” and I’ve prayed outrageous prayers for years with no changes and I don’t know how much longer I can do this for.  And even if by some miracle the world would go back to “normal”, after 2020, the normal I had doesn’t even exist anymore, so what do I have to look forward to?

One Day at a Time

I usually try to end my blogs on a positive note so I don’t sound like a complete Debbie Downer, but I don’t know that I have a great pep talk in me right now.  All I know is this – I don’t have the answers to my questions and I don’t know what 2021 holds, but I know that I’m closing the door on 2020 and some of the things I thought I was being led to, but have been proven otherwise.  My pastor said this morning to take back what 2020 took from you and it took my hope, so I’m going to try and get some of that back, even though admittedly, I’m actually really afraid to.  Keeping your hopes up means they have a place to fall from and disappoint you and mine usually do!  But, I will continue to pick myself up, one day at a time, put on a smile, even if some days it’s fake and I will keep going, because really, where else do I have to go?

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The One Without a Title

/ Roxie / 2 Comments

Here’s the situation: A lot of things had me ‘in my feelings’ these last 2 months and questioning God’s plan, but what else is new, right?  I started writing to process and just kept writing and well, this is it.  No title, no theme wrapped up with a bow.  It just is what it is, kinda like how I feel about life right now – it is what it is!

Back in September, I did something very unlike me and I joined a book club.  I was invited by a girl from church and even though I’m not a huge reader, I figured it was a good opportunity to meet and make new friends!  The book: Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge.  The plan: read 1 chapter a week and meet weekly to discuss.

One of the evenings a girl in the group asked if we could think of any times in our lives when we were mad at God for doing something we didn’t like or thought was a bad thing, but now we can see He did it for our good (Romans 8:28).  That was a pretty easy yes.  I can think of countless times I’ve been mad at God for what He was doing, because it seems like all He ever does is take things away from me!  Of course, with a little bit of time under my belt, I can usually see what he was saving me FROM, but the more I thought about that question and the things that I’m still waiting for 20/20 hindsight on, the more I started to wonder – but what exactly was He saving me FOR?!

Set Apart.  For This?

For me, there’s no denying it was God who saved me from multiple relationships that I wanted to settle on, but…for what?!  It’s not like He brought me out of them to bring me into something amazing, because He’s had years to do so, but I’m still single.  And almost every one of the friends I feel like HE specifically placed in my life during this “season” so that I wouldn’t feel so alone, HE then opened up doors for and gave opportunities to, which in turn took them out of my life a short time later!  If He knew He was just going to have them pass through my life, why did He bother bringing them into my life?  I sure didn’t need to get close to another person who was only going to leave.  Spare me the time and the heartache!

It’s that piece of my heart…  The piece that longs for companionship, be it a relationship or even just a friendship…  That desire that is supposedly a God-given desire…  It’s that piece that can’t seem to understand what God is up to.  He knows how I feel – why would He bring me here and then just leave me here all alone?

The (Claw) Game of Life

When I think about this in my life, I picture it like one of those claw machines you’d find at an arcade or a Chuck E. Cheese and we are all the toys inside.  The few times I’ve made some life-changing decisions, it was the claw (God) picking me up and dropping me in another spot in the machine.  Or, if there were times when the claw couldn’t grab ahold of me (because sometimes I’m stubborn and don’t want to budge, eg. a relationship He knew was headed nowhere), He would pick up the other toy and move them to a different corner instead.  But more often than not, it’s the claw coming to get one of my good toy-friends and carrying them all the way to the prize chute.  (The prize chute being where they get what they’ve been praying for or hoping for or secretly wishing for all along.)  With their spot in the machine now empty, other toys naturally tumble in to fill it’s place and just as I start to get comfortable with the new toys, here comes the claw again to take another one away…

This Ain’t No Kirk Cameron Movie

Left behind.  That’s how it feels anyway – every time a friend gets married, moves away, has a baby.  All of these things are exciting and I am happy for them, but for me?  Every step forward they take is a reminder of where I’m not (and not even close to being), and it’s a step further away from me.  I’m aware of how immature and selfish that sounds and I know that my friendships won’t end because of these things, but they also won’t ever be the same.  Distance changes dynamics.  Spouses change priorities.  Children change everything.  And that’s fine, that’s life.  That’s what’s supposed to happen.  You’re supposed to grow up!  Leave and cleave.  Heck, if their opportunities had been my opportunities…?  Pssh, later b****es!  So who can blame them?  I would never expect a friend to stay where they’re at on my behalf.  That would be immature and selfish and I sure wouldn’t do it for them!  Unfortunately, their changes have become increasingly more difficult for me the last couple of years, because their changes are now affecting my plans for the future (unbeknownst to them)!

Morgan – You’ve changed.  You always promised me you’d never be one of those girls who ditches their best friend the minute they get a boyfriend.

Mindy – I would never promise that.  All I’ve wanted in my life is to abandon all my friends for a boyfriend.

– Mindy Kaling & Ike Barinholtz, The Mindy Project, S3E4 (I Slipped)

The Back-up Plan

My life feels stuck.  What’s even more annoying is I’m pretty sure it’s no fault of my own either.  I haven’t rejected opportunities or prioritized a career above all else.  I didn’t put off getting married or having a family because I wanted to travel while I was young or save money first.  I’ve been here.  I’ve been ready.  I’ve been trying to make it happen, but no matter what I do, this seems to be where the Lord keeps me and I don’t get it.  Not sure I ever will either, but rather than try to understand anymore, I’ve just been trying to make the best out of life.  Making the best of it however, has been very dependent on my friends and my friends’ lives not changing.  I hate to say it, but my friends, in a way, have become the back-up plan to the things I really want.

Now, DON’T misunderstand me – I love my friends!!  I love spending time with them and even if I were in a relationship, I already know there are things that I’d prefer to do with friends!  Friends are so important!  What I mean, is that there are things that I want that at this point, don’t look like they are ever going to happen, so I’ve had to let go of them and find contentment in the next best thing.

Next Best Thing #1

I want to travel!  I should probably preface this by telling you that I don’t want to travel alone.  Sorry, but the fun for me is exploring with a friend, not going by myself, so for the time being, that’s not an option.

There are trips that are easy to take with friends, but then there are trips that would be better taken with a significant other.  For instance, I’ve always wanted to stay in a glass bottom bungalow in Tahiti for my honeymoon.  Not exactly a vacation that you take with a friend!  I’d also like to get to Europe at some point and if I’m headed all the way in that direction, I’d like to take a few weeks or a month and explore all the places, instead of spending a week in 1 destination and hoping to make it back another time.  It’s easy for my friend’s husbands to say “sure, take a girls trip to Vegas for a few days”, but it’s a far cry for any of them to be able to take a month and a chunk of their savings to go somewhere they’d probably like to explore as a couple!  (Also, I’m not sure I’d want to spend a month with just a friend.)

Sans significant other, I certainly won’t be going to Tahiti and my European vacation doesn’t look very promising either.  It’s disappointing, but the next best thing is that one of my best friends is my cousin and she’s always up for travel!  Plus, her husband wants to travel too and doesn’t seem to mind me being around.  We never really discussed it, but it didn’t seem like they were planning to have kids, so I took solace in the fact that I would likely always have them as travel partners and I already knew they wanted to go back to England, so I could at least get there!  It was also comforting knowing that when I’m 80 and probably still single without children, they’d be 80 without children too, so while everyone else had kids and grandkids to spend time with or to take care of them, we’d have each other in our uncommon life paths.

And then…this spring she announced that she was pregnant.  It’s amazing, but it also totally changed my trajectory.  They were the crux of my singleness survival plan!  They were the 1 thing that didn’t make me fear how my future might end up, but now their lives are forever going to be different from mine!

Next Best Thing #2

I talked about it in All By Myself – I’ve always had a sort of ‘friend spouse’ in my life.  That person I did the boring parts of life with (running errands), as well as the fun.  It’s a lot more rare now, as most everyone is married, but over the years there’s always been at least 1 girl my age, in my stage of life who was up for the same adventures as me!  Or to do things that would be considered a date if you were on them with a man, but since we were both single, why not go on a “date” with each other?  It’s better to be out with a friend than sitting at home alone!  Would I prefer to be doing these things with a man?  Yea, for sure, sometimes!  But, I figured, if I am called to a lifetime of singleness, I’m not going to be thrilled about it, but I should be able to survive it, as long as I have this friend in my life.

This friend though, whoever played the role of it in changing seasons, has always been taken from me!  It’s what I talked about before.  They were brought into my life, but then God relocated them or brought them a spouse or both and with my most recent friend, she got a job transfer that moved her across the country and now there’s literally no one left to fill the role!

Are You There God?  It’s Me, MargaRoxie

So, we’re back at the beginning again; what exactly is He saving me FOR?  I used to believe that what was in store for me must be amazing, that’s why it was taking all that extra time.  Or even that God had to keep emptying the spots I kept trying to fill so that I’d even have space for the someone He was planning to bring along.  After this much time has passed with zero progress though, I’m not convinced of either of those things anymore.  What am I going to do about it?  Nothing.  I’ll still believe in God.  I’ll still have the same desires.  I’ll still get mad at God for taking things away from me and I’ll still keep trying to trust that He is actually doing something.  And, I’ll keep trying to make the best out of life and writing about it until nobody reads this anymore!

jesus_teddy

(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction

/ Roxie / 1 Comment

Here’s the situation: When plans don’t go the way I intended, I’m learning to make the best of them, but even though I can find happiness in the day-to-day and unpredictable moments, overall, I’m just not satisfied!

If I were to ask you what your biggest fears are, would you be able to easily identify them?  Some of the most common ones are the fear of public speaking and the fear of dying.  I am totally in agreement with the public speaking thing – thanks, but no thanks!  And though I’ve never really been afraid of dying, I have feared how I might die.  Alone, in my condo and nobody would notice until my neighbors called the police because of the smell coming from my unit.  That’s when they’d discover my body, half eaten by 42 cats.  Do I own a cat?  No.  Do I plan to own a cat?  Never.  But I feel like they find you at a certain point in your singleness and they’re probably already en route.

Ok, so having a bunch of cats eat my flesh may be a bit of a stretch, but if you were to ask me my biggest fears, for the longest time I would’ve said dying alone.  Or I guess rather, dying having never been married.  Even though the idea of being eternally single can still evoke bouts of panic, it seems to have taken a backseat to what I might actually be afraid of now:

  1. Living an ordinary life.
  2. Never truly being satisfied or content.

Ordinary is in the Eye of the Beholder

chasing-sunriseSo what is an “ordinary life”?  I suppose everyone would have a different idea, but I fear the ordinary in a variety of ways.  I fear there never being anything more to my life than working Monday to Friday, 8 to 5, just to pay bills and afford some things I enjoy.  That doesn’t feel like living life, that feels like surviving life.

Ordinary makes me think of living a ‘small’ life, for lack of a better word.  For example, rarely venturing outside of your community or having a circle of friends that never grows.  Or ‘small’ like you’re so stuck in your little world that you never try anything new and you immediately reject ideas that might take you out of your comfort zone.  Don’t get me wrong – I am not a spontaneous, fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of girl.  I like information, my decisions are usually well thought out and I enjoy a good comfort zone, but I don’t want to get so stuck that I never stretch myself.  There is a world out there and I would like to experience it!

I also fear an ordinary life in that, I might have an unremarkable existence.  You hear people say stuff like “they are the best thing that ever happened to me” or “meeting them changed my life“.  I would like to be that for someone.  I want to make an impact.  I want my life to matter and have meaning, but right now, it kind of feels like it doesn’t.

Survey Says

I texted a few of my friends recently and asked them some seriously loaded questions.  Questions that unintentionally made them worry about my mental health!  Things like:

  • Are you content or satisfied with your life?
  • Do you feel like there’s something that’s missing?  Or something you’re striving for that you think will make you happier?
  • Do you think you’re living out your purpose on earth?

I just wanted to know how people felt about their lives in comparison to me.  Are their jobs fulfilling?  Do they feel like they have purpose?  Or maybe they didn’t feel like they had purpose until they found their spouse or had children?  Is there still something inside of them wanting to get out or goals left to accomplish that they won’t be happy until they achieve?  Mainly, did they truly feel content or satisfied, or I suppose, settled in their lives?  And not that they had settled, but that they were settled; they had a peace about their lives.  Maybe I’m the only one who’s never satisfied with where I’m at?

Striving

That heading about sums it up.  It could be the perfectionist in me or the administrator, or the part of me that hates inefficiency, but I feel like there’s always room for improvement – in myself and in my surroundings.  So that’s what I do; I continuously strive to do better, be better, look better, write better, get fitter, save more, find a more efficient way, etc.

I know the word striving has it’s negative connotations, but I don’t necessarily see striving as a bad thing.  After all, it just means ‘to make great efforts to achieve a goal‘ and there’s nothing wrong with that!  However, I question whether I’m striving because I’m naturally more inclined to due to my personality, or if I’m really just striving to compensate for the areas where I feel that I lack.

The Purposeless Driven Life

When I look around me, I see a bunch of people doing amazing things.  Friends that have always had great aspirations and are actually accomplishing those things.  Lawyers and fashion designers and police officers and business owners.  Creatives and crafters and driven people!  I have a friend who’s a missionary and I have friends who might not think they’re doing anything special, but they are husbands and wives or fathers and mothers and they are cultivating loving homes and raising the next generation.  Their lives all have purpose!  And then I look at my life and wonder what the heck I’m doing here!

Unlike most, I never had great aspirations.  I honestly and naïvely thought I’d get married right out of high school and I guess I assumed that’s all there was to life; graduate and get married.  That was the path everyone I knew had taken, so why would I need other aspirations?  I never even considered things might not work that way for me.  (The fact that no boys were interested in me should’ve tipped me off though!)  I guess the only real plan I had was to go with the flow until I met my husband.

So, with no career goals in mind, I got a job at Kmart after high school and when they went out of business, I worked for my dad.  And when my dad’s boss retired and sold the company to new owners, they laid me off because they wanted to bring in their own staff.  When that happened, the original owner offered to pay for me to go to business school and it didn’t matter if I wanted to or not, my parents told me – you don’t turn down free education!  Nearing that graduation, the school would fax your resume to company’s looking to hire, which is how I got the job I still have to this day, so I didn’t even pick my career, it picked me!  I did take a small hiatus in the middle to pursue a few careers of my choice, but they didn’t pan out as I thought.

A solid 20 years went by before I started to grasp the reality that this marriage thing I was waiting for, legitimately might never happen for me!  If only for the survival of my heart, I decided to let go of that dream as best as I could (but obviously not entirely).  That’s when plan B surfaced.  A plan I am now striving towards.  It’s a new dream and a new goal and if I can achieve it, it might make me feel like I have purpose and validate my worth in all of the areas I feel that I lack.  It would pacify all of my fears of living an ordinary life and never being satisfied!

…but…what if it doesn’t?

Insatiable

What if this dream doesn’t become a reality?  What if I never end up with plans A or B?  Can I be content with neither?  Would I even be content if I had both?  Will I ever feel satisfied or will I always be striving for more?

Everything is wearisome beyond description.  No matter how much we see, we are never satisfied.  No matter how much we hear, we are never content.

– Ecclesiastes 1:8 (NLT)

I’m honestly not sure how to reconcile the possibility that my life may never reflect what I hope for and if that happens, how do you find contentment or satisfaction when you always feel there’s room for improvement?  And if you have to choose to be content, rather than actually being content, are you, in a way, just settling?  Or should we view the stirring in our souls as a nudge to keep striving towards a goal?  Maybe the dissatisfaction means we haven’t arrived yet and we need to keep working?  Maybe there is still more in store?  Who can know?!

Just as you cannot understand the path of the wind or the mystery of a tiny baby growing in it’s mothers womb, so you cannot understand the activity of God, who does all things.

Plant your seed in the morning and keep busy all afternoon, for you don’t know if profit will come from one activity or another – or maybe both.

– Ecclesiastes 11: 5-6 (NLT)