Patchwork Veracity

My husband recently released info about his latest project as a musician.  I'm extraordinarily excited for him - it's something he's been pondering for almost a year now, and it's going to be amazing.

I strongly encourage you to check it out in his own words: here.  I promise it's worth the few minutes of your time it'll take to listen all the way through.

Things are looking up around here - at least somewhat.

The kids came down with a double dose of strep throat and pink-eye, which forced us to clean the house (mostly - at least I don't feel like the walls are crashing in around me anymore...) and Michael was able to stay home from work today.

Just having him around made me feel like things were a little more secure around here.

We put a call in to our mortgage company about a short sale for our house (we've already filled out the paperwork), but no one was available to take our call.  Of course, they have no problem calling us at all hours of the day to accuse us of being remiss on our house payments (we are not) just because we asked for the short sale paperwork, but no one is available when we call them.  Sigh.  I just want them to get back to me so we can get a For Sale sign out front and start giving tours.  It's getting on the late side of realistic to get out from under this place.

At the same time, I'm reminded that God has been telling us to sell this place for two years now.

We've always made excuses about one thing or another, but the fact is, we've not been listening very well.

It's possible that once we take the leap and put that sign in the yard someone will jump on this house... maybe they've been waiting...?

And so...  since things are moving... creeping, really... ever forward, I'm allowing myself to dream about getting in the bus... about making it home.

Tonight on the way home from teaching one of my adult acting classes I listened to Switchfoot's "Best Yet" album.  Two of their songs have been speaking to me today.

The first one, This is Home, was featured in The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, appropriately.  It's one of those songs that is sort of hopeful and melancholy at the same time.  It makes me think about how, so often, I find myself longing for home.  Longing to be in the place where I belong.

I've gone through much of my life wandering, looking, hoping to find that place of belonging.

There have been glimmers of such a place: the auditorium at my high school, the 4H barn at the township fair in the town where I was born, the bricks above the storm drain at the house where I spent my teenage years, phone conversations with friends, coffeehouses with my son, teaching...anything, anywhere, being on stage at the local amphitheater, hiking in the woods, our cabin at ARGH, snuggling on the couch and reading with my children, sharing dinner a The Pancake Mansion...  all of these places - these moments, really, have been glimpses of what home could be.

I have thought that striking off in the bus would be a way to find a place that always felt like home...

This song, however, always makes me feel like, as humans, we are wired to know that things are wrong - that this world is not our home.  That we missed out on Eden.  That the best is yet to come.  And through this, I've been trying to lean more into the moment - to focus more on the present reality that is a gift to me and mine.  To stop looking at the bus as a way to run away and find an other - but as a way to embrace the now - the present awkwardness that is walking through this crooked world.

The second song, Only Hope, was featured in A Walk to Remember and performed by Mandy Moore - but the original was written by Switchfoot.  It contains all the reasons I love the stringed instruments.

I listened to this song three times in the car tonight, and sang some of it into Michael's new sound equipment when I got home (it's never as good as it was in the car).  It's tougher to explain why this song is speaking to me tonight - but I think it has something to do with the fact that I've been trying to lean on just about everything but God when it comes to my security lately.

I've been putting my faith and hope in Michael's boss.  In the U.S. Navy.  In our mortgage company.  In paychecks and medicines and physical beauty and my own faulty talents.

As a result, I've been depressed, drained, and hope-less.

Today I woke up with pain in my left pinky finger (important for violinists), and felt like I would never get to where I wanted to be with music (I'm average and self-taught, but I want to be better).

It's been my attitude holding me down.

Today was not a bad day.

In spite of the pink-eye and the crumbs on the floor and the pain in my pinky and the light pollution out the window and my less than perfect vocals in Michael's new microphone - there is hope.  There are rays of sunlight.

There is always hope.

And our hope needs to be place on The Rock - not in some other, random place.  And definitely not in our wishy-washy selves.

So I lay my head back down...