Yesterday's News

What’s this feeling? A funk? Melancholy with a dash of anger thrown in just for fun? What kind of cruel joke is that? You’re just sitting there minding your own business doing what you can to be up beat and happy and then Blamo!!! Out of no where the funk hits you, no warning, nothing. You know the day, where everything that usually bugs you is just mega amped up and there’s nothing you can do to change your mood. Those little things…the car in front of you doesn’t use his signal (I hate that!), road construction on every freaken street you drive on (that would be the entire West End), getting the wrong order at the drive through and only realizing it when you’re on the freeway, forgetting your hair dryer in Vancouver. Kay, so that last one won’t apply to most of you but you get the idea. No matter how much chocolate you eat or shoes you buy, you just don’t feel better. For the record I didn’t eat a pound of chocolate or buy a bunch of shoes but my point is, you know nothing's going to help. Usually feeding me works (yes I’m one of those) but even that doesn’t help. It’s one of those days you wish you had a really fast car to hit the freeway with, no one around, no cops, just miles (sorry, Kilometers) of empty road and a full tank of gas.

And NO I’m not pms’ing…I know you were thinking it!

So I’m sitting in the church waiting for Duane’s Aunt’s funeral to begin, writing this on a little dingy scrap of paper in an attempt to get it out of my head (who knows maybe it’ll help) Then the song begins. “It is well, It is well, with my soul, with my soul. It is well, it is well, with my soul…” (you were signing it weren’t ya?) And then the waterworks begin. My heart screams “but it’s not! It’s not well with my soul! I’m angry! I’m tired! I’m weak! I’m sore! When will this ever end!?!” Although crying is completely appropriate at a funeral, I wasn’t prepared and found myself crying and snotting on everything and feeling so very alone. With the ever so faint bit of brain power I had left I thought “where would Jesus be right now?” Sure enough, He popped up beside me with his arm around me. (side note: for those of you who think that’s a strange thing to say, we can talk and I’ll explain it or you can just read Brad Jersak’s book “Can you hear me?” All I ask is that you keep an open mind and remember this is my experience and not a theological debate. If you’re looking for that I can direct you to some pretty cool and very super intelligent friends of mine.) Where was I? Oh ya, Jesus’ arm around me…it brought me comfort for a few seconds but then the thought pops into my head “this is a funeral, these people are grieving and you’re thinking about yourself. You’re wondering where Jesus is for you right now and they just lost their mom/grandma/friend. Isn’t that selfish of you….” and so on. Normally I would have given that a bit more thought and perhaps even bought into it for a little longer but today I was at the end of myself and I didn’t even have the strength to buy into the lie that the nasty little guy on my shoulder was trying to serve me. All I could do was cry.
Turns out that’s exactly what my heart needed. Just as quickly as the funk landed it lifted and was gone. Hmmm, fascinating, but mostly...I’m just thankful for the relief.