of sunlight and dust, and the need to write about these things

Sunlight slants through the blinds and lands on the sweet curves of Charlotte's toddler face.  I don't care how cliche it sounds, I love sunlight slanting through blinds. I probably write it down in my gratitude list every time it happens. If you live in the Willamette Valley, maybe you can relate.  Something about the lines of light just makes me swoon a little.

Charlotte asks for help up onto the piano bench, and then she starts playing and singing.  She points at the bench and asks, "Mama?"  So I sit down and play a duet with her.  She is impossibly beautiful in the afternoon light; her baby voice so quiet and content.

I am walking less in darkness every day this week, but today I am overwhelmed by sorrow at the news of a dear friend. . . of a dramatic falter in her battle against cancer.  How long the road has been for her!  And there is no knowing how much longer her road leads.  It's not that I don't believe God can heal her.  I know He can.  Yet His purposes often seem so far from what we wish He would do, and it drives me nuts.  I don't need easy, but why does this life seem so over-the-top brutal all the time?

I feel ashamed.  My heart sobs at the heartache so many people face, but my head knows how small I am in the universe.  Who am I to even ask why?  The words of a song ring in my ears:

I slide off the piano bench onto my knees, praying for all I'm worth, acknowledging my smallness but, like many before me, asking for the miracle of healing beyond human power.  I'm still watching Charlotte, watching the gold on her face, listening to her plunk notes lightly and purposefully.  She turns and looks at me intently, holding my face in her little hands and I can't help it; I'm crying.  She pats me and jabbers a bit before going back to the piano.  The moment is so surreal - the intensity of my sadness sitting right next to my surging mama-love.  I feel like I'm the child.  Somehow I am on hallowed ground, despite my questioning heart.

The answer seems there in the floating dust and warmth. . .We are dust and we are beloved.  We can only begin to find peace and comprehend the unfathomable depth of His love when we fix our eyes on His.

He is jealous for me,
Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree,
Bending beneath
the weight of His wind and mercy.
When all of a sudden,
I am unaware of these afflictions
eclipsed by glory,
And I realize just how beautiful You are,
And how great Your affections are for me.

And oh, how He loves us, oh,
Oh, how He loves us,
How He loves us all

"How He Loves Us," David Crowder Band. 

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I am healing from this long period of bleakness and burnout.  I am placing one weary foot in front of the other, and finding that I do have the energy to move the other foot, and then to do it all over again.  Obedience and praise are my strength.

I want to go forward with this blog, but I'm very unsure where God will lead me, and truthfully, I wonder if I'm capable of coherent writing in this season of intense mothering.  I thought perhaps I would close up shop for a while.  I thought maybe this just wasn't my time, despite how much I want to be writing something.  However, I came across Christa Wells's blog post, This one's for the mothers, and I felt a little stronger about continuing to write here, despite a lack of direction (and sleep) on my part.  I am going to try not to worry too much about the rawness of this post, and leave you with these excerpts from Christa, written in her "teeny tiny margins":

There are embers glowing inside you that won’t.go.out even though you have a human critter or two (or five) to care for and really don’t have spare minutes for artistic flame-fanning.

I’m saying this for you, sister. 

For you, who know you were born to make something but don’t know where to begin or how to stay awake to do it during those rare hours of quiet.

You have been entrusted something marvelous. Invest it, whatever it is. Whatever it is, it COUNTS.