His mysterious ways.......

It was my lunch hour and I had ventured into the woods not far from work to go for a much needed walk alone with my thoughts. It was minus 25 degrees celcius (a.k.a REALLLLLLLLLY cold) but I was bundled-up quite well and had hoped it would be calming to be there with no one but the trees and their dollops of whipped-cream looking snow. It was clear and crisp, and I was hoping that the silence of the woods would embrace me.

Unfortunately however, even as I walked along in this beautiful place, my problems followed with a vengeance.

I was distraught, dreadfully lonely in my marriage, angry, miserable, I was getting fat and now there was some unsettling crap at work to deal with. At first I didn't notice the beautiful sparkle of the snow in the sunlight.

The lattice of sunlight and shadows created by the evergreen canopy was spectacular. When I finally looked up to take it all in, thats when I saw him.

There among the branches was a delicate little red bird. He looked a bit like a grosbeak, (a bird from down south) but a lot smaller. I had definately never seen this type of bird in the frozen-north before today.

*maybe he was lost* , I thought.

It was funny, this crazy little bird actually seemed to be looking back at me!

When I walked further along - he flew further along. When I stopped to look at him -he stopped and looked at me.

I smiled for what was probably the first time all day.

I trudged further along the snow trail. There he was again!, and so I began to enjoy my walk with the little red bird. We played a game: I walked along without watching him for awhile, then when I looked up, sure enough, there he was, keeping-up with me. I walked along the snow-trail and played the game with the bird for almost an hour in the frozen paradise. The little red bird followed alongside right up until I left the woods.

I felt like a child again, the simple playfulness of the game was, in-and-of itself, healing .

I looked back, still smiling, and he was perched on a branch just at the outer edge of the woods. "Bye Mr.Bird" I called out to him in my thoughts.

There he stayed until I rounded the corner, and headed back toward my workplace.

I felt renewed and relieved. Watching the bird's movements had freed me up to enjoy the beauty around me and to forget, for the moment anyway, all my worry and heartache.

Loneliness and the Lifeline:

During the years of my early spiritual awakening (see prior blogs) I existed in an incredibly lonely marriage. It was through this despair, I believe, that God reached me.

I didn't know how to handle my sullen, brooding husband who rarely looked in my eyes unless he was talking about himself, his-day, his-stuff. He spent hours working on the computer and doing cross-word puzzles. ...solitary activities. I couldn't get inside, he never opened the door.

I assumed the problem was with me. I tried harder.

It was near the end of our first year of marriage that I noticed that he "tolerated" hugs, and didn't return them. I told him that I was dying inside, that I needed to be hugged and looked in the eye, I needed these things like he needed food and water. He looked at me as if I just spoke Greek.

I assumed that the problem was with me. I tried harder.

By our second year of marriage, I was instructed to dress more sexy at home at the end of the work-day: Sweatshirts and track-pants were a "turn off" he said. "and don't wear that outfit my mother gave you, its a real turn-off too".

Years later, I learned that I was "too heavy" to be a "turn-on". We rarely had sex and when we did, he would lie-back and cover his face.

I assumed that the problem was with me. I tried harder.

If we did something together it was on his terms: Fishing, hunting, snowshoeing, for example. In hindsight I see that these are things that allow people to be side by side but it relieves them of the need for intimacy. I worked very hard at convincing myself that I really enjoyed these manly activities. I wanted to DO things with him and I thought that maybe through these activities, he would share his heart with me and let me inside.

I assumed that the problem was with me. I tried harder.

Meanwhile:
I was introduced to a Christian woman named Joy. Initially,
I told her that I wanted advice on how to help one of my
clients (see Goth-girl from blog#2) but eventually, after about
4 visits to her home, I let her know that I too wanted to know
more about Jesus and faith. We had several visits at her home
over tea. I first considered "God just might have unconditional
love for me", in Joy's kitchen. My novice prayers of thanks
started to change, and Joy showed me how.

Although I was still hopeful about my marriage, (because there were still some good-times) I just could not understand his emotional isolation. Never-the-less, I tried harder.

I overcompensated for his sullen brooding by being extra cheery. I distracted my family from noticing his sullen brooding and social isolation by saying that he was tired from work and by telling stories about something he said or did that would place him in their favour. It became very very exhausting to always be Chuckles the Clown.

In addition to the despair in my marriage, a colleage at work had become very nasty toward me and others. Work was not a positive place to be. -Now that refuge was gone.

I started to go for walks alone over my lunch hour to
clear my head and get on track, to pray too. Sometimes
I would listen to a Gospel Music CD that a student had
loaned to me. I found it comforting and it drew me toward
a peacefulness that I longed for. In my head I still
questioned whether or not this God-stuff was just smoke and
mirrors. I definately was not ready tell my family about what
I was doing, however, it sure did soothe me. I felt that the
peace that I experieced when I prayed, met with Joy, or listened
to the gospel tapes could be my own secret for now. I was still
being affected by my own, my family's, and my husband's belief- system that defined people of faith as weak individuals who needed
a crutch. If I told anyone at this point, I might feel silly
or weak or stupid. I might lose them.

He did less and less over the years in terms of home-upkeep and attention to bills. We had our gas turned off once because of ignored bills and our taxes were always years late. He was spending money unneccesarily and our line of credit was out of control, he became more and more isolated from me. He seemed to resent me, became increasingly critical, and yet wanted sex more often. (I had started running and my body was quite trim.) I was terribly, terribly, confused - I couldn't see any love, any intimacy in it at all.

Socially with colleagues and friends, however, he was a great guy. Whenever we had friends over he would run around and make the meal, and tend to the children. He would often buy, make, or give things to our neighbours, or he would do kind things for them.

I assumed the problem was with me. I wanted to try harder but I had no where to go that I hadn't already been: Kindness, sincere dialogue, tears, requesting marriage counselling, etc etc..........nothing worked, he would not engage in a process.

I started attending a church. I told him that I went because
the people were nice and the music was good and the church
daycare gave me a little break from the kids. (still not
ready to talk about my blossoming faith) He was not ok with
it. I was drawn however, to the fellowship and to worship.

The Second Wounded Soul bearing gifts from God.

The delicate Goth-Girl walked through the waiting area and settled into my office with a kind of quiet, nervous energy.

She wanted help getting away from her new friends. She said they were dabbling in satanic worship. She wanted to get back to her Christian roots. "I want to be like my Grandma again", she said. "Everything was so peaceful then".

I hedged: I commended her for wanting to resist the flow with her peers and instead striving to reaffirm her family traditions.

Then she upped the stakes:

She asked me if I would pray for her. I was both embarrassed, and honoured:

Embarrassed because I had no clue about how to pray for someone...My prayers were informal, unspoken, and just simple offerings of thanks. What she was asking for sounded really complicated. Maybe there was a list of steps that I should learn?

I was honoured too, that she would trust me with such a request.

I told her that she would probably be better off enlisting the help of a counsellor who was actively involved in a church, I had a few names at the ready but, she wouldn't hear of it.

"No" she said pensively, "I want you to be the one"

Somewhat reluctantly, I said "alright, I will pray for you, and I will help you with your friends and family".

I felt like I had jumped off a cliff.

What the heck was I doing?

Well, I thought: I didn't lie to her, I was honest about my limitations.
I told her she would be better off with someone churchy.

Then I wrestled with some old familiar beliefs.
I said to myself:

"This is just fluffy crap anyway."

Then I wrestled with some new and unfamiliar beliefs.
I said to myself:

"No its not."
"I want to learn more."
"I can pretend that its just for her, for work. Yeah, thats it."

Now I had an excuse to learn more.

Thank you God.

My Dirty Little Secret:

I started saying random prayers of thankfulness in my late 20s early 30s.. Always when I was alone, often while I was driving. Prayers of thanks for a beautiful sunset or sunrise, for the beauty of a fresh snow-covered landscape. I felt blessed to be granted such visual treats. Sometimes my thanks would extend to my health, family, friends, or financial comfort. But usually they were realted to God's creation around me: The beauty of nature.

I was certain that my family, my spouse's family, and definately my spouse would not approve of this behavior or the sentiment. It would be considered weak and flaky. Never-the-less, I was drawn to express my gratitude through prayer.

When I took it a little further in my head, I wasn't quite sure who or what I was "thanking". However, I felt confident that this would become clear to me in time -that I just had to wait.

............all things considered, the above statement of faith and patience was extremely uncharacteristic of me at the time as I was an opinionated black-and-white Science graduate who held strongly to a belief in the superiority of the scientific method of investigation: Hypothesize, test it, make conclusions, revise hypothesis if necessary and test again until the testing outcomes confirm the hypothesis............"wait and see what might unfold" was just not part of who I was at the time.

But I did. That is, I waited patiently on God.

Years went by, and God was patient with me too. He was there, very quietly placing people and situations before me as a backdrop through which to ponder the existence and greatness of Him.

For example: In my work, 2 teenagers chose me as their counsellor and confidante. The first was a bulimic whose mother said that after years of struggling to find help for her daughter and with worry for her daughter, she concluded that she had to simply let go and leave Adriana at the foot of the cross for Jesus to care for her. She told me that it was hard to let go, as a loving mother, but that all of her plans, and programs thus far had achieved nothing but Adriana's increasingly worsening health. This mom explained that she would continue to love her daughter deeply and support her unconditionally but that she would no longer be the rehabilitator, no longer be the therapy "mover-and-shaker" - She would leave Adriana solely in God's hands.

Wow.

I thought a lot about that - the idea of leaving Adriana at "the foot of the cross".

I turned it over and over in my mind. Forever trying to find a fit for it. Where do I put this idea?, I thought. Some days I would try on my old pessimistic/religion-ridiculing hat and declare outloud to my spouse (or quietly, in my heart) that the "cross" idea was a flaky cop-out. I decided that the decision to leave a child at the foot of the cross was a way of using religion as an excuse to give up on one's responsibilities as a parent.

...........then, I would consider the idea of the cross once again. I noticed that time after time, in my dealings with Adriana as her counsellor, whenever I visulized placing her at the foot of the cross, a peace settled upon me. Strange eh? It didn't fit anywhere for me, that peace.

So I left it, for awhile.