She Glittered When She Walked

A dear friend of mine died thirty-six years ago, and I have wanted to talk about it for a long time. But capturing her has always eluded me, and I want to do her justice. I'm not sure this will do her justice, but I don't want to wait any longer.

She was like a beloved character from a novel who gives you a warm feeling and makes you hate for the book to end. Two years older than me, she was the sister I never had, and I followed her around and hung on her every word, and those were often quirky. She had a way of looking at life that I've never encountered again, and I wish were still in the world. Her zest for almost everything seemed uncontainable, and she frequently brought light into a room and defined it for everyone.

I loved the way she put everything in her terms. Even her terms of endearment. Anyone who was an object of affection, no matter how young or old, was referred to as "old skinny leg." Maybe that's a common expression somewhere in the world, but I've never heard anyone else use it, and I'm not sure I ever want to. I still hear the sound of her voice when she said it.

This week I'm thinking of her because Monday was her birthday. When I hear or see April 5th, she's immediately in my head laughing and talking. Her head is cocked and she's making a crack about something, and I hear myself laugh. I've had to content myself with reliving those moments and wondering what she would have been like as she grew older and married and had a family or whatever it is she would have done. But that's never going to happen, and I still mourn it.

When she was seventeen, she gave up on life. One day after school she shot herself in the head. Her dad found her, and of course he was never the same after that. Her mother never seemed to have much reaction until about ten years later when she killed herself too.

I don't know what particular pain Jan was suffering, but I know the kind of mental anguish that can tempt someone to think ending things is the only way to get some relief. It's a horror to be in that state, and the real tragedy is that it doesn't have to be that way. There is relief that doesn't require self-destruction, but it does require bowing. Bowing to something greater than ourselves. Something filled with more light than ourselves. I don't know if Jan had done that and just lost her focus, but I hope she did. It's the only thing that really alleviates the grieving.

Free indeed

I tend toward snarky, and I've justified its frequent use by mentally trotting out the Apostle Paul's sarcasm to the Galatians or the Corinthians or even the Lord Himself laying it on Job. But the truth is that I don't feel snarky at all when I think of what the Lord has done in my life.

I come from a long line of people who have battled mental illness to the point that several have been institutionalized and a few have committed suicide or tried to. But hey, our family has developed a pretty good sense of humor about these things. Where do you think the snark came from? At get togethers we've made jokes about our family crest being a couple of guys wearing straight jackets or wondering if Uncle Ray* was still alive 'cause no one has seen him outside his house for 15 years or being amused that Aunt Sheila*, a nurse, was doing pretty good these days 'cause she only had Munchausen and not, thank God, by proxy.

And all of this was a regular laugh riot until one day a year or so after I became a parent, my husband asked me, "Have you ever been happy?" To which I replied, "Yes," and he wasn't satisfied with that answer. "When was that? And how long do you think that lasted?" I actually had to think about it. "The day our daughter was born, and it lasted about an hour or two."

Oh, I knew I wasn't Miss Sanguine and frankly, I was proud of that. I cloaked myself in pensiveness as a way of giving great meaning to being so darn serious all the time. But serious all the time is boring -- not just to everyone around me but to me as well. It's one thing to bore others; it's another to bore yourself. So it was only natural that I developed a sense of humor with an edge as I was learning to deal with the world.

Surely, laughter is great medicine, but only to a point. Thankfully, the Lord has shown me another way, and my husband was instrumental in making me realize what I was missing. I've now had many days of happiness and more importantly am understanding the nature of joy. The Lord has shown me what it means to be joyful beyond explanation. Uh, I would explain it, but, oh never mind. :D Suffice to say that John 8:32 is dead on. I know first hand that's real. Thank you, Lord! So I just don't want to laugh out of contempt. I want to remember the grace I have and continually realize I'm overflowing with enough to go 'round. Thankfully, the Lord is in me, and He doesn't let me forget -- hence this post.

Oh, I may veer off at times and say something I think is funny but in reality is spiteful. Ultimately the Lord will keep me from that bondage. May He always keep me from being full of myself so that I don't become the thing I despise -- cute meanness. Oh, please keep me from cute meanness masquerading as cleverness. Let me remember there's no life in it beyond a few moments, and all that remains is the sour after-taste of self-righteousness.

* Heck yeah the names were changed.

XX=Abortion Supporter?

Why is it that if you're a female you are a supporter of a woman's right to have an abortion on demand? Oh, wait, you have to be educated too. Okay, I get it. Those women who do not support abortion on demand just need more education and maybe a female with an unwanted pregnancy in their family. If that would just happen, then they would understand how very necessary it is to preserve a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy. What they absolutely should know is that if this ability is taken away then countless young women will have their lives ruined by carrying a pregnancy to delivery. Got it.

But what about all of these women I've met over the years who had an abortion and now grapple with depression (sometimes debilitating depression) because they believed getting an abortion (yes, I know it's not a pleasant choice ever) would make their lives better than it would have been? Oh, they have been messed with by the religious right or are too much a part of the out dated patriarchal view to understand how good this choice was?

I might heed that point, but these women come from all sorts of backgrounds and beliefs. Some actually come from women who also had abortions themselves and don't seem to have any remorse. In other words, they have been duly educated on the benefits of abortion on demand by both word and deed. So why do they feel bad? Why is this something that just won't go away?