Because My Life Is Not A Movie

"Best Thing That You Never Had" has been playing in my head a lot lately, but I am asking myself if that is really true.  Am I really the best thing?

I have my doubts.

This past weekend I was at Refuge in IN.  It was a wonderful weekend because I got to see a lot of people who I find myself desperately missing on a near constant basis anymore.  My beloved sisters/friends/roommates Amber & Kim, my dear brother/friend Jake, my amazing cousin Hilary, my hilarious uncle Jon, and my good friend Jordan, to name just a few.  These people make me feel home.

Over the weekend, Amber and I's good friend, Jeff asked her how she knew Jake was "the One."  Her answer was perfect.  She told Jeff that no matter where they are, to her, Jake feels like home.

That's what I want.

So this is the thing, maybe he doesn't know it yet, and maybe he never will know, but this is what he's missing: ME.

He will be missing out on me getting up early to make monkey bread or pancakes so that he would have a hot breakfast before he leaves the house.  He is missing me singing all day every day anything at all that makes my heart happy or speaks to my soul.  He will be missing the mix cds that tell him just how incredible he is to me when I can no longer find the words.  He will miss my hands and everything they are capable of.  He will miss my laughter and my constant encouragement as he pursues his dreams.  He will be missing my creative pies and how fun I am to work with in the kitchen.  He will be missing my smile and my constant willingness to do laundry and help with dishes.  He will miss how good I am with his dog when no one else is.  He will miss my sweet sewing skills and my creative ability to recycle everything and find the beauty in everything and everyone.  He will miss my notes and letters.  He will miss my lips on his neck and the number of times I say I love you.  He will miss my passion and my adoration and how completely gorgeous and perfect I think he is and have always (since that Han Solo costume the night we met) and always will.

I hope he misses me.

I feel a million things and nothing all at the same time.  My life is not a movie or this would be well on its way to being resolved.  Instead, he's going to go marry a girl that even his family seems nervous about, and I am going to listen to Jason Mraz sing "I Won't Give Up" a million times and try to find a new dream.

But Sometimes It Hurts Instead

Favorite Things about this Very Moment (11:46 am CST):

• Starbucks Vanilla Doubleshot Energy
• "You've got this" texts from Kimmie (do you know how much I love you, Kim?  Honestly, I do.)
• The Wreckers singing me their perfect blend of sassy and heartbroken country
• Adele (Oh Adele, 21 IS my heart)
• Knowing it's not just me that feels super awkward about the engagement announcement from this week
• Sunshine outside
• Getting paid to hang out in Baskets and talk to the wonderful people that come into Conover and my shop
• Knowing I'll be getting paid twice this week.  Party & bonus
• The immense kindness & love from amazing people like Nikky, Kimmie, Amber, Regina, Hilary, Heather, & Jay
• Jordan Durham, an altogether hilarious experience
• Having next weekend's Refuge trip to look forward to

This week has been a lot of things, and I feel like me being sick was a strange sort of blessing.  It allowed me to be home when I found out the boy I have been in love with since I the night I met him wearing that ridiculous Han Solo costume that no one but me seemed to recognize was engaged.  But it is more than that, he's engaged to someone who makes me nervous down to my very soul.  It has been a rough week.

Even so, I feel like I am taking all of this better than any of us could have imagined.  This may, in part, be due to the fact that I've been living with the feeling like this day would come for the past...oh...4 or so months.  I really thought he'd propose at Christmas or New Year's.  I forgot about Valentine's Day.  How odd to forget it...hmmm...

I've gotten everything that reminds me of him packed away and out of site.  Mixes, pictures, the bracelet he made me, speed dial... He's hidden, but he's not forgotten.  It finally really started to hit yesterday while I was at work by myself typing.  I had been able to find a way to distract myself every moment until then, and suddenly I had to face that this was real. 

I am never going to get greeted by him smiling right after he's gotten up, never going to be the person he wants with him to run errands in the middle of the night, never going to lay next to him watching cartoons, never going to be the person that makes him light up when I walk into a room...it is apparently not in the cards.

Life alternates between dark and light a lot right now.  I realized I have avoided all things romantic even though I am a romantic through and through and usually I watch a lot of sappy movies at this time of year.  Instead I am reading The Hobbit (which is great, but no romance) and watching things like Sandlot, UHF, and Monsters Inc. This is probably really healthy for me, but one of these days I am thinking this will probably break too.

Mom says maybe I am realizing that this is better for me already, but I don't know if that's it.  Letting go of all of this is letting go of a lot of hope.  I want to do that, but I want to replace it with faith that something better is on the horizon and that God has got other plans.  Sometimes that's hard to comprehend, and, on top of this, I am worried about this decision in how it will truly change his life and the lives of his brother and his fiancee.  I feel guilty for thanking God that I at least won't have to see him at family functions for the rest of my life with this girl that breaks my heart.  He's not even the same guy that I was friends with anymore.  He changed for this girl, but not in good ways. 

Hear ye, hear ye, I shall bestow upon you words from my parents who are always wise in the ways of love and marriage:

"You shall only marry someone who brings out the very best in you, that you also bring out the best in."

He's not doing that.

He is not my heart.  He is not my light.  He is not my life.  I will move on.  I will be stronger.

I will sing "Someone Like You" to myself until I mean it entirely, not just the part of it that says for me it isn't over, but also the part that says I wish nothing but the best...

All the Words that I Wanted to Sing Got Replaced with a Wedding Ring...

He is jealous for me. Loves like a hurricane. I am a tree, bending beneath the weight of his wind & mercy.  When all of the sudden, I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory and I realize just how beautiful You are and how great Your affections are for me.

David Crowder*Band totally speaks my heart.

Today I am grateful for love like a hurricane that bends but doesn't break me but instead points out to me that I am loved by the Creator of the Universe.  I need His love so desperately today.

There is a great Matthew Mayfield song called "Fire Escape" which I believe I have mentioned in other posts, and the song ends with him saying, "All the words that I wanted to sing got replaced with a wedding ring."  I have had that song playing in the back of my mind for ages and ages now  with the hopes that this wouldn't be my song.  This song wouldn't be always playing in the back of my mind.  Today it finally becomes mine.

by Andre Jordan

All the words that I wanted to sing...they were replaced with an engagement ring.  And God only knows how long they'll be replaced with wedding rings and vows.

"Fire Escape" won't always be my song.  One of these days it will fade and I'll be able to have something else echoing with joy through the back of my mind.  For tonight though, I will let myself mourn the loss of a best friend who chose a path none of us expected, who chose to cut me out of his life virtually every way he could have, and who is now engaged.

R.S.B, my dear friend, my sunshine and heart, I wish you happiness.  I pray that God blesses you, my dear.  That He gives you clarity of mind and heart so that you can make good decisions that will bring you love and bring you closer to Him daily.  If this woman truly brings you closer to God and brings out the best in you and your heart, than I ask that He would bless your relationship as well.  I just want you to be healthy and happy.  You are something good.  Really, you are.  Please never doubt that.  I love you.

And now, I think I will crank some better tunes, try to sleep, and keep my phone off for awhile.  Things will be better in the morning.

Still Small Voice

Over the years, I have realized that God often has a person teach the exact thing that they themselves need to be learning.

A couple weeks back, the woman I help teach Sunday School with asked if I wanted to teach the weekend before Valentine's Day.  I could do that lesson, she said, because I always liked doing the "holiday" lessons.  This is true, I do love teaching the lessons and Thanksgiving (especially Thanksgiving), Christmas, Easter, and anything else I deem holiday worthy.  I agreed immediately.  Poor Earlene teaches just about every week because, to be honest, I really didn't want to be teaching Sunday School at this point.  I teach whenever she asks, but otherwise, I am content to just be in the class and help with whatever I can.

I started thinking about this lesson immediately.  I thought about I Corinthians 13, the love chapter.  I like that passage, but I don't think it's practical to teach out of this when you're dealing with 4th & 5th graders.  It doesn't have the kind of application I was looking for.

Instead I turned to a passage that has been on my heart nearly constantly for over a year now, Romans 12:9-21.  There's so much good there, and it tells you how you can show love.  You can't be evil to someone just because they've been evil to you, you need to practice hospitality, honor others above yourself, you shouldn't be concerned with peoples' status in life, rejoice with those who rejoice, mourn with those who mourn, do good to your fellow believers and help those who are in need.  And maybe most importantly:

"Do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good." - Romans 12:21

I've been thinking about this passage all week, and as I was reading it this morning, I realized I wasn't living this. 

I've been jealous of people when I should be rejoicing with them.
I haven't been taking care of the needs of the people around me.
I haven't been holding people in honor above myself.
I haven't been showing brotherly love.
I have been looking to avenge instead of leaving that in God's hands.
And I definitely haven't been blessing those who curse me.

God was calling me out.  He is calling me out.  I can't promise that I'm going to suddenly change and be something perfect, no where close.  I can, on the other hand, say that I am going to be working harder.  Working to put God back into the center of my life, into the core of who I am.  I want God to radiate through me.  If God is love, I want to have Him glittering through everything that I do. 

So how the heck do I do this?  Well, I am started today by apologizing to a friend I have been feeling frustrated with.  I gave him a much needed explanation for my behavior, and also apologized for a grouch instead of rejoicing with him in the joy of where his life is taking him.  I have been a coward, a jerk, and afraid of change.  Afraid for myself and the changes in my life instead of helping expand his joy.  It was selfish of me to be like this, and I am tired of this.  I know God is too, so between the two of us, I am going to work on healing that relationship and moving on toward something better.

I will be better.  Every single day.