Yesterday I spent time curled up on the couch with Audrey by my side.  We watched the end of Julie & Julia and then she helped me find Dead Poets Society online and we absorbed that together.

I cry every time I tried to talk with her lately, and as I type this, the tears are struggling forth again.

I appear to be in a permanent state of overwhelmed right now.  I’m not running from it.  But I’m weak in the ability to marshal on.  My head and heart wander out to our past lives in a way that feels healthy, but raw.  I get verklempt.  (I love that word.)

We watched Dead Poets Society because I recommended it to one of my students.  He and I had a lengthy discussion about a variety of topics.  It was an impassioned talk – full of depth and devoid of student/instructor relationship.  It was pure and deeper than usual.  It was, well, refreshing!  Conversation with a meaning.  Not a task, no points given.  It was ‘Just because.’

One of my favorite quotes from Dead Poets is this one:  ‘Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life.  But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.’

I am humbled to realize this morning that God is steering me back to the things that I stay alive for.  Passion, learning, the intricacies of nature, striving, writing, and steering others towards their ‘stay alive for’ stuff.  My perpetua-tears are a result of Him opening my eyes and heart to the depth of incredible my life has been.  What feels like a lamenting of the changes in my life (daughters moving, daughters marrying, businesses ending, new jobs, etc.) is actually a genuine celebration of the life I’ve been leading.  I love these people.  I relish my new job and the people it brings me in contact with.  I look forward to watching the lives and the relationships my expanding family will be leading.  I’m happy.

Wait.  I’m happy.

Let’s just leave it there for now.  That’s a good place to stop for a bit.  I’ll wallow here.

I’m happy.  And I love – fiercely.

And in this moment, I’m open to that raw vulnerability that accompanies both.

 

 

21 Aug This entry was published on August 21, 2016 at 4:18 pm and is filed under Learning. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.