Free Fall

((I wrote this blog a little over a month ago. Some things have changed but it's still relevant. I just know more now that the Lord's arms are always wrapped around me. Keep on keeping on, mes amis!))

Tonight my dad commented on how tired I seemed. He blamed it on my long day of work and I let him.

But if I'm honest, it's so much more than that. I'm so beyond exhausted.

I want to cry. I want to yell. I want to sky dive and feel the free fall.

I want to feel to the point of blacking out. I want and need the waves that are life to crash into me so hard that all of the air is knocked out of me so that I can take a deep breath in so that when I finally jump off the ledge into the water I’ll be able to swim without drowning.

Life has been so hard lately. No, not lately. It has been hard from day one. I mean, I was taken from the absolute most comfortable place in the world 24 years ago in a brutal and horrendous way (I'm talking about birth). Nothing could get to me there. I was safe and life hadn't touched me yet. Life has been nothing but uphill battles from there. From learning to walk to dealing boys, to driving and high school, to learning to “adult” and realizing it sucks.

Life keeps moving forward and it feels like I’m sprinting to catch up at every turn. Life slows down for a moment, then right before you come to a complete stop, the light turns green, and you take off quickly enough to cause whiplash to an unsuspecting passenger. It's impossible to catch up.

Now I'm an ADULT. And the hardship hasn't stopped. My first real year as an adult is over, but the only thing I’ve learned is that the free fall doesn’t ever really stop. Sometimes gravity takes hold again, but really that feeling of weightlessness that leaves you breathless and forces you to realize you have absolutely no control over anything never goes away. I mean, I've managed to move back home and start a new job so many times that once everyone finally stops asking about my new job they start asking me about my new job again. I never know what the next month will hold.

It's anxiety ridden. All of it. The new job that I'm so supposed to be obsessed with isn't what I thought it would be. It's fine. It's a job, though. I haven't felt creative in over a month.* Which is frustrating beyond all belief. And I’ve come to realize all I want to do is be a hipster wife (or just have what I consider a hipster life) where I stay at home and create amazing things all day!

The problem is that this life only exist in my imagination, where free fall doesn’t exist. There is an infinite amount of possibility my imagination, but less so than in the real world. Something you may or may not know about me, is I'm a very romantic thinker. Not in the flowers and chocolates sense, but in the sense that I like to romanticize life. I bought into the movies and the fairy tales as a child. I love to read (and write) and I love the happy endings. I love the sad endings too. But mostly, I love the in-betweens. Which is even more ironic because when you’re in free fall, you’re kind of in an in between state…..

I never considered life would be so damn painful and hard growing up. I never considered for a moment that I'd have to rely so fully on the love that God HAS shown me rather than the promises He's been making me. 

I never considered that the only real parts in the movies and books were the parts where people cried because life hurt. 

I don't know how people do this or why this feels like it was a secret, but I feel like I'm missing God in this. Like I'm just going through the motions right now. Like I’m free falling.

But even as I fall, I can see the mighty hands of God around me, but not holding me. I picture myself in the middle, turned at an odd angle like the wind is a turbulent sea that I’m being tossed about in. His calloused and strong hands remain around me, ready to catch me when my free fall is over.

When my suspended animation ends and I feel the rush of gravity again, He will gently close around me. His hands just out of my reach, but never so far to not save me, will close the gap that allows my free fall to continue.

He is near. Always near.

*Edit: since I wrote this, I've gotten a new camera and have been going out on the weekends to capture my creativity through a lens. It's been helpful.

Ten Years- Katrina Matters

Ten years ago I was a freshman in high school.

I was afraid of high school and who I would become. I wanted to be the popular girl in the movies and a jock and all the right things. But I didn't have a minute to find out who I was.

Katrina interrupted our first semester and whether it was two weeks or two months I don't remember. All I remember was driving for 8 hours what usually took my family 45 minutes to my grandmother's house, having to pee like nobody's business and wondering what was going to happen.

We never left for a storm. We always stayed. This was big. Really big.

We lost power for a little over a week and only could hear what was happening in our home town by word of mouth and hospital TV if the news was on, which it always was (we went to the hospital for AC occasionally).

I could sit here and type out how traumatic returning to a devastated city was. I could tell you how my family lost their home (not my home, but my aunt, cousnins, etc) and everything they held dear. I can tell you how my mother's grandmother's house was ON TENNESSEE ST and was wiped clean off the foundation when the levee broke.

BUT those details are only part of my story. All of those details.  Every emotion that was stirred in me broke through my own levee. For the first time in my life I began to take God seriously.

Instead of thinking I'd return to school as the popular girl or the one that played every sport or the straight A student, I'd be the one that knew her faith.

Now, this is such a huge part of my testimony because this didn't happen until a year later.

But I'm sick and tired of everyone wanting "to get over the Katrina 10 year stuff" because it is IMPORTANT. Stuff happened. People died and LIVED and moved and moved on.

This is part of our story. Katrina is part of my story. Jesus used this storm and devastation to create a new city, a new home for many, and a (excuse the extreme play on words) NEW Orleans.

Don't discount what He did in this city. Just listen to the news cast. His name is all over them. The Lord saved people and brought people together to save thousands. And while we still mourn for those lost, we celebrate their lives in true New Orleans fashion: with second lines and hope.

Somehow, through all her winds and rains, hope still shown through Katrina's dark clouds.

10 years has done so much.

Levees and Clouds- Learning About the Journey

I just got home from a laid back kind of Saturday. I’m not entirely used to Saturdays yet and don’t always know how to spend them, but today after having open-house at the daycare and meeting my kids, spending some time with my class-team (other teachers in my class), I’m feeling more confident about where God has me right now. I mean I’ve had lots of anxiety about working with the people in my class— wondering if we’ll get along and if we can move past differences and learn to communicate— but God keeps shooting me with these little peace arrows. I swear it’s like Cupid’s arrows but with peace, and just enough to make the breaths come easy and deep.

On my way home from my day out seeing friends and just walking around on a surprisingly “cool” New Orleans' day, I stopped on the levee to check out the Mississippi River. It’s still pretty high right now and there’s something about the river I always find soothing. I could seriously sit there for hours and just watch the water churn as the barges are led by tugboats down towards their ports.

As I was walking up the levee I looked up and saw this picture perfect scene! Clouds just above the manicured levee (doesn’t happen often, let’s be honest) and the sun in a comfortable position that wasn’t too high or low; you didn’t have to shade your eyes as you walked up the levee and you didn’t feel like you were baking either. So, what did I do as a young woman in the twenty-first century? I took out my phone and took a picture. Then I took my sunglasses off and used then as a filter and took another picture because Instagram’s filters aren’t cool enough for me.

I continued to walk up the levee and when I reached the top I was welcomed by a muddy smell. The river was high but not remarkably. I was actually a little disappointed. The view wasn’t horrible, except for the huge industrial plant I could see directly across from where I was.

Despite the smell and awkward view, I decided to stay because it wasn’t terribly hot. I picked a spot in what I always called "scaredy cat grass" and sat. I was suddenly targeted by gnats and other little bugs I couldn’t see and because The Muddy Mississippi isn’t so pretty up close in person, splashing along its banks, I gave up sitting after about five minutes and headed back to the car. It simply wasn’t worth it.

Here’s the thing, though, when I got in my car I decided to look at the picture from when I walked up the levee. It was beautiful. Something you might see on a calendar or a post card. Well, maybe I’m biased but I liked it. I also really like clouds and levees…haha.

And of course Jesus had something to say about the picture that I was so excited about.

I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase, “It’s not always about the destination; it’s about the journey.” Well, yea. I feel like this post should end there, but the Lord went on!

I’m SUCH a destination person. Like, God could tell me I’m meant to do “x” or I’m called to “y” and I’ll be like, “Cool, so I’ma just chill here till something happens to make me magically appear at ‘x’ or get to ‘y’.” I’m not kidding right now. I don’t like to struggle and will avoid it at all cost, but right now I am struggling. I'm practically driving that Struggle Bus! Hope is difficult to come by and joy is sometimes-- often-- fleeting right now. I'm not "living the dream" right now, and that's where I want to get to and it's a hard road. 

But today the Lord made it so clear to me that you HAVE to look up during your journey. You HAVE to see what’s around you. You HAVE to take note, notice, explore, experience...because if not you’re just going to be staring at the ugly arrow on the ugly asphalt out of breath because you don’t work out like you should as you walk up this levee instead of noticing the grass has been cut for the first time in eighteen months and the clouds are perfect and the sky is blue and beautiful and the sun is bright but lovely and you are happy and hopeful and somehow know, really and truly KNOW deep within your soul that everything will be okay; that no matter where you are in life—becoming a teenager, quarter-life crisis, learning marriage, parenthood, non-parenthood, mid-life crisis, etc—God loves you and you are Chosen with a capital C even if you don’t entirely get what that means but you know that you are Loved with a capital L and you somehow know exactly what that means.

Look up and experience the struggle, because, my dear ones, the struggle is part of the story, and there is hope in it. Pause and breathe. Life is made up of desperate, suffering people that need each other and, more so, Jesus. We are all struggling but if some of us just would look up and pause for a moment and notice the beauty on occasion, maybe we could help each other out.

Today my destination turned out to matter very little. In fact, before this revelation I would have said it was a bust. But now, now I say it was amazing and just what I needed, which the Lord knew. He’s known it for so long, and today my stubborn self said okay and went with it.

Keep on keeping on.

--Maggie Mae

Learning to Trust God from Two Year Olds

I just started my first 9-5 job. I’m a teacher’s assistant at a daycare around the corner from my house.

Yes I like kids and I enjoy watching them learn and grow, but having sixteen in one classroom is much different than having one to four in their home nannying or babysitting.

They all come from different backgrounds, they all are disciplined differently. None of them listen well because they’re all barely three. Most are potty-trained (only because I’m coming in on the tail-end of the school year) and so far there’s been only one “accident” but it was in his swimsuit so I don’t even count that one. 

I have to be honest here, it’s been a rather overwhelming first week. Something inside me feels like it has broken, and when I say broken, I don’t mean snapped. I mean I feel broken. My heart maybe. I thought I’d go into this classroom and my old love for children’s ministry would reignite and dancing and singing and laughing would be all natural. I still love singing and dancing and arts with kids...but there's a lot more to working in a school than just that stuff. I don't get to just have fun with them. 

It’s hard. The kids, can push every single button you have, and it’s funny since I went in there with my chest poked out thinking I was Superman. They found my buttons easily.

They ignore you. You have to repeat the same things over and over to the same child over and over. When you think you’ve figured out a way to communicate with them WHY they should stop, they change tactics. It’s rough. Really rough. Being ignored sucks even when it’s by a three year old; rejection is still rejection.

And my heart breaks. The part of me that likes to run from anything hard (the part that normally wins most arguments within my head) is roaring right now, wanting to fly FAR FAR away and go back into a weird coffee shop with horrible hours because it’s what I know. But last night…last week….this past year, the Lord has been telling me to chill. Stay put. He has me here and I need to stay. STAY.

Last night I went to my church’s once-a-month worship service. For about an hour on this one Wednesday a month we get together, worship, receive prayer, and hear some good words from our pastor. Well, if you’ve ever followed my blog you already know God and I are always on some sort of rocky path. I can never seem to find the straight and narrow or maybe this is my version of it. I go months without remembering how to pray and days without even considering Him in my life. Just being really honest here, don’t go crucifying me. Jesus is Lord of my life...but I'm a stubborn toot. 

Anyway, it’s hard for me to connect with Jesus sometimes. Especially this past year; it has been nearly impossible at times. But last week at the beach I asked for Him to use me in a specific way for a specific purpose which domino’d me into longing for Him in such a profound way that I attempted prayer outside of my church community which then opened the door for His coolness last night.

I sit down and close my eyes and open my mind and heart which were flooded with anxiety and worry about this job. I can’t help but wonder if I’ve made a mistake and if I should have kept looking.

He gives me this impression of how I behave with the kids in class. I have to repeat the same things over and over to them. Sit still. Stay seated. Don’t do that. Trust me that I know best. And on and on. And my heart bursts.

I hear Him say, “Trust. I’m always telling you to trust. I’m always taking your sweet face just like you take theirs and looking you in the eyes even as you turn yours from me and saying ‘Trust me! I know!’ “

How many times has He had to tell me to trust Him? How many more times will He reiterate it? He shouldn’t have to. I shouldn’t have to at school, but I do because I care. He does it because He loves me enough to keep pressing forward.

Each step is “trust me.” Each new adventure whether it’s a job or new passion to pursue, He’s always whispering to “trust me.” And I do, for about five minutes until I think I know everything again and….back at square one just like in the classroom.

My heart is still aching and I still the faces of the little ones I’ve been correcting over and over again this week in hopes they won’t hurt themselves or someone else just like God does with me…but He has way more patience.

I don’t know why this hurts my heart so intensely, but it does! I guess it’s because I’m experiencing the smallest amount of what the Lord experiences and has experienced since the Beginning when it comes to human nature..

Free Will, y’all. It can be a real you know what...

And to think I am about to start all over again in August with different teachers. In a different classroom setting. New, YOUNGER children.

I don’t know how I’ll do it. I don’t know how God does it…how His heart does it.

All I know is this, I am so glad I’m not God.

--Maggie Mae

The Slump is Over, Writing and Laughing Without Fear...Sort of...

Alrighty. I've applied my sunscreen and I’m ready to write. It’s been a while and I have no reasonable excuse for that. Only that I've been in a slump and a depression and have lacked the motivation and energy to sit down somewhere without a TV or access to Netflix/Wi-Fi and actually write. This slump has been interrupted a couple times. 

Once I thought I would write a book. I still do, but a friend sort of ruined the ending for me…. See my initial thought wasn't to have the hero of the book represent Jesus, but in a way he does and the heroine (hopefully I’m spelling that in the female hero way and not the drug way…spellcheck doesn't differentiate and I don’t have the internet right now) is representative of my super ego..or something like that. Anyway, I wasn't meaning to write an auto-biographical novel, but it turned out that my plot screamed it. So I've put that on hold…at least physically. Mentally I write it every day and add to it. I love my novel. It’s my own personal adventure. I should probably add more to it…

So aside from my lost novel, blogging has been a wonderfully fruitful passion of mine for quite a few years, but I've not been very consistent in it. I was doing very well with my consistency until about 6 months ago when I had to move home with my parents. Not exactly the highlight of the young woman in her early twenties’ life. And thus my slump began.

Without going into all of the excruciating details of the move and the tears and the readjusting and the finding a job and the tears and the hating the job and the arguments and the kicking and screaming….let’s just stop and give a big hand clap to God. No really, go ahead. Clap for him. As a Christian I’m told to clap for him at every church service and on the radio, but I mean, he really ACTUALLY DESERVES IT. I hated that he put this in my life. That I was to move back home where I would have to live with my parents again. I did not like living with them in high school (because apparently I was abnormal or something), so why would I want to live with them now? I would be leaving my community. I had friends, best friends I would have to leave behind in a city I LOVED. I didn't like my home town (ironically many people I had become friends with LOVED my hometown [New Orleans] and actually want to move there and weren't huge fans or where they lived), and I had no desire to move back. I prayed for 6 months after I graduated for a job. 6 months to find a job that would allow me to make ends meet and continue to live in this awkwardly big town/city. It was just the right amount of rural and city for me. But even though it's not great yet, I have learned all of this stuff, and it's good stuff. Sorry, but I have no other word right now other than "stuff." It's hard to explain....but I'm almost glad I was forced to move...ALMOST. I can't help it, I'm stubborn.  

No matter what I tried or prayed for or how many tears I shed, there was no job for me. Not a job that I could live on and make rent, insurance, bills, and still afford to eat. I cried out to Jesus, like I've been taught. I reached out to my friends and neighbors, to my community. No one could find me a job and I couldn't land one. 

So, after my prayers returned not “unanswered,” but with a very obvious “No, it’s time to move home,” I packed the few things I still had in my small rented bedroom and went home.

Before I left, my darling lifegroup prayed over me and spoke wonderful life giving words over me. The theme coming straight from scripture: 

Proverbs 31:25 “She is clothed in strength and dignity;
SHE LAUGHS WITHOUT FEAR OF THE FUTURE.”

See, if you know me at all, you know I’m a laugher. I have this big overpowering laugh that echoes throughout a room and above every other laugh. Many times my joy has turned to wheezing. 

This verse hit that special string on the violin of my soul and rang out the most beautiful chord you’d ever heard. I’d like to believe it was much like the one that “David played and he pleased the Lord, but you don’t really care for music, do ya?” (if you get that reference without having to look it up, KUDOS to you!) Anyway, my soul sang with the verse and it was amazing.

I immediately accepted that verse as my life and soul verse. I liked to laugh, it made sense; I had a tattoo drawn up and decided some time in my life I would ink my body with those words. 

Well let me tell you a little something, laughing is one thing. Laughing without fear of the future, is something TOTALLY DIFFERENT. At this point I was convinced laughing without fear was only a practice. You had to force yourself to do it and then eventually it would come to you. Just like jogging…or something. I tried to not worry about the future and live more day by day.

So as time went on and I had my little crap job that I hated, I started trying to pay off my credit card debt and make sure my car insurance was paid and if I had a little leftover, I could drive to Baton Rouge and see my friends I had left behind. 

Then the energy drain started. 

The difficulty of not liking my job and having extreme shifts ( i.e. going in one day for 6am and the next day for 3pm) started to really hit me. I was tired all the time, and if you add that to my already constant struggle with depression that had worsened since moving home, you could pretty much guarantee if I wasn't at work, I was in bed or resting on the couch binge watching Netflix until it was time to go to bed or work. I had no energy to go meet people, write, find new places to hang out. I had no money to go to places even if I did make new friends! I didn't want to leave the house to go and find a place without Wi-Fi to get in a writing mood because I knew I’d spend money if I did, and I couldn't afford that.

One Sunday, when I finally had off, I went and visited a church. Then I had another Sunday off and I did it again. Looking back, I realize I was given Sundays off during this period because I had been getting sick a lot and my boss wasn't always sure I would make it in, so he scheduled me less. Just goes to show you God really DOES make EVERYTHING work for the good of those who follow him (Romans reference). I finally stopped getting sick, found a different job that is better, AND found a church home. Oh, AND I MADE A FRIEND!

Within the first week of not working at the crap job, I made a friend. I had energy again, not a lot but some. Along with that energy I tried to start listening to what God was saying again instead of being a brat and sticking my tongue out at him while putting my fingers in my ears. It was the first time since I had moved, that I had let my anger walls down to him. He said a couple things…

First I was freaking out about my schedule and not being able to make relationships with the people I was meeting at church or not being able to meet them at all because of having to work certain nights of the week when they would meet for lifegroups/small groups. “Where are you going?” he asked OH SO POLITELY. My breath stopped short but the peace sank deep. I was staying here. Indefinitely. I needed to get over it. Baton Rouge wasn't my home anymore, New Orleans was where I was called now.

Second, I was still “practicing” laughing, but I wasn't. I was trying to laugh at the days to come without fear, but I was failing. I can't laugh all the time at the future without fear. I'm not there, but I didn't realize that until he spoke this gem a little more gently, 

“It’s a prophecy.” 

My heart swelled and I knew I wasn't doing anything “wrong” anymore. My depression wasn't wrong, my worrying was wrong, my desire to be “okay” again wasn't wrong. I’m just not where I will be yet. One day I will have the ability to laugh without fear of the future. Some days I do laugh at the days to come, but I definitely worry more than I laugh. I’m not perfect.

All I know right now, is that God has some incredible plan for me that has been in the works from day one (duh). And though the past 6 months have sucked royally, I'm finally learning to laugh without fear of the future (and maybe I'll learn about the first half of the verse later). 

I have learned so much about being alone, and for an extrovert, that’s REALLY saying something (ENFP over here). I have been forced to learn how to be introspective; how to rely solely on Christ for all my emotional and spiritual needs; that it is okay to be alone; and that God’s plans are ALWAYS better than ours, even when we kick and scream the entire way down the mountain into the valley and even if we’re not in the “happy” place yet.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still not exactly like skippidy-do-da with Jesus right now…but if you’ve heard the song “Shut Up and Dance With Me” by Walk the Moon, that’s probably the best I can explain where we are in our relationship at the moment. He’s all “Hey, why are you holding back?” and I’m all “Shut up and just dance with me! At least I’m looking in your direction and smiling on occasion! Now SPINNN!!!!”

Anyway, I have no idea how to end this other than asking for your continued prayers in this awkward continuous transitionious (making up words now) stage of life called…life. And in turn, I’ll be praying for you too.

Keep dancing you dancing fools. 

--Maggie Mae