Epiphany

…or the latest in a series that shows no sign of stopping, for which I am both grateful and breathless.

I volunteered yesterday morning at my church; our administrator’s on a rare vacation, and we needed phone-answerers. It was a beautiful, crisp, sunny day in the city, and the drive back and forth across the bridge wasn’t bad at all, with a new favorite CD in my knockoff iPod. I got a preview of our Advent set-up, and I love it. Chatted with my rector a little, and did a bit of the MDG work I’m so jazzed about. Did some of the homework I’d brought with me.

Caught a quick lunch at Brewed Awakening (a wrap and carrot-orange juice), and raced up the hill to a counseling appointment. She asked me how I was.

I answered, “Back to feeling capable.”

Yeah. Back. to. feeling. capable. You’d have to have known me longer than this fall, to know how huge that is. I was a poster child for self-doubt, my whole life until recently. I could imagine capability, but never felt I had it. Being at the Ranch healed me of the anger and burnout I’d gone up there with, and helped me find some peace that is deeper than all of my brokenness. I came back here with the energy to do soul-work, and I’ve done it; focusing on courage, rather than competence, but knowing I was showing both. I was really knocked off my feet, at the beginning of this month; enraged and hurt, but I couldn’t even cry for two weeks. Then I spent most of Thanksgiving week at my best friend’s house, crying a little, laughing a lot, and regrouping. (She is family, in every sense that counts. If you, like me, have reason to look, you will find it.)

I had something to “regroup” back into. And I did it. I was a complete slug for about a week; couldn’t focus on my work, couldn’t create anything. Now, I can, again. I have my head back, and my heart. I feel strong, and I’m joyful.

I’m not done with the anger or grieving—but it’s work I can wrap my hands around. It doesn’t overwhelm me anymore, and I don’t resent its presence as work I have to do. There are layers under layers, and it takes time—but I know there will be an end to it. Through this whole ordeal, I never doubted my own intrinsic, whole self. Dear God, that’s tremendous. I’m rejoicing, not only in the sense of capability but in the return to it—and in the already taking for granted that it’s there.

Thank you, all of you who pray for and with me. Rejoice with me.

Alleuia, amen.