My Life Wasn’t Supposed to be This Way

Like every morning in the past number of years, I wake up with a sense of fear and dread. It is some sense that this is not the way I imagined my life to be at my age. A sense that I’m out on some metaphorical limb – on the edge of some unknown peril that might bring to full completion the seemingly fearful mess of my life.

When I was young, I did not think this way. The world and life were open before me. I married at 22 in an imperfect relationship, yet I held confidence in my future…our future.

I had children. Like (most) every other mother, I was primarily focused in the present day-to-day needs, joys, difficulties and activities involved. Just as in my childhood when we contemplate life when we grow up, I don’t think I imagined too specifically where this all would go.

I simply held a vague sense that we would raise our children the best we knew how. They would grow up, graduate high school and probably college. They would be happy and healthy, find stability in their work and find love. They would marry and have children. And then in some far distant future, these grandchildren would also be part our life.

And divorce? That was not a possibility.

__________

__________

I find that once I start my day after battling through my initial sense of fear and dread, that the fear dissipates.

God’s gift of daylight and all we can put our hand to is truly a miracle that helps us walk through this life.

“Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.” – Ecclesiastes 9:10

I listened to an audiobook “Learning to Walk in the Dark” a couple years ago. The writer says that humans are wired to fear the night and darkness. So many biblical statements can be found concerning day and night. And I find that my sense of fear and dread begins to creep in more and more, daily, as the sun goes down and the time gets closer to going to sleep.

Our sleep state is the place of dreams.

It is the place where sometimes I dream about other lifetimes.…convoluted-plot-memories with each of my husbands, my children, college, childhood or any other surprising scenario my psyche is working through.

The writer of this book says that nothing changes during the night – our surroundings and our internal world essentially are the same and hold the same joys and sorrows – yet when the sun goes down we can no longer see.

We can no longer navigate this landscape in the same way we do during our waking times.

__________

So this morning, once again, as I aroused from slumber and began my practice of grounding myself for the day…thinking about what I will need to focus on and fighting the battle against fear, I glanced over at my window sill to a side-by-side photo I have of myself back in 2015, and one of my father, probably taken of him at his work around 1950 I’m guessing.

I had noticed the camera caught me in an almost identical pose and my eyes and features so resembled him.

And this made me think about battles and War.

Born in 1913, my father drove an ambulance during World War II. Sometimes when we think of facts about a person and what they did, we can go deeper and try to imagine what they experienced.

What did their eyes see?

What did their ears hear?

What did their hands touch?

What did their senses smell or taste?

What was this like for them in their internal world?

__________

There’s a lot for me to contemplate in this.

Since my father died when I was 16 and I never had the opportunity for adult conversations with him per se, it leaves it to my imagination.

Indeed, there were adult conversations he and I held when I was a child – conversations in retrospect too heavy for a nine to twelve to sixteen year old girl.

My father was an imperfect human but he lived faithfully, and cared for me faithfully in a situation that seemed to have no hope and no end…until the day he died.

In some ways, he is a legend in my memory.

He exists as a bigger-than-life figure like Paul Bunyon, Tom Sawyer, Daniel Boone.

In some ways, perhaps this is why my retrospective memories of him both clear and flawed may empower me so much, well into my adult years. And this is a wonderful legacy.

__________

As I gazed at this photo and the little nameplate he had from one part of his life’s works, I think of battles. And I remember him telling me once, “And to think I survived World War II to come home to this.”

“This” was the difficult home situation with my mother, which is not a topic to comment on here too deeply at the moment.

“This” was also my father going to work day after day after day and coming home night after night after night to do dishes, laundry, cook, clean, take care of me (as an infant, I was cared for during the days by the neighbor woman across the street since my mother, who didn’t work, could not handle my care) and if he were lucky, get some time to himself in his basement workshop.

All while dealing with the uncertainty of what my mother’s behavior might be on any given day.

__________

And with these thoughts, I got up to start another day.

And I am grateful.

And I recognize that I am not alone in thinking this is not how my life was supposed to be.

Images of my father navigating the terrains of England, France, Germany, Belgium and more in a horrific scenario with no escape but to move through while he carried recollections of his parent’s farm on another continent drives this truth home: that for many if not most of us, our lives are messy.

Life and many things have taken us to places we did not want to go.

I also recall something my father wrote in a V-mail to his sister during the War: “If I am fortunate enough to make it back home I don’t care if I ever leave the state of Maryland again. Believe me, I’ve seen enough.”

This sentiment as I write it, congers up Dorothy’s famous words in the Wizard of Oz: “There’s no place like home…there’s no place like home…”

And with this, I start another day.

I go through my morning routine and as I play some centering music, I am struck by these words:

Highest Hope

by Hallal Music

Some days I can’t seem to find
A reason to trust that there’s more.
More than the pain of this world,
More than the fear in my heart.
Just when it seems hope is gone,
The sun rise reveals Your awesome glory.
There is no shadow, no fear
That can stand in Your wonderful light.

You are my highest hope,
Your glory I love to see.
All who are thirsty come,
The fountain’s flowing and free.
You are my rest, You are my peace,
You are the hope for all who believe.
Faithful and true, King of all Kings,
You always will be my highest hope.

When I forget you are there,
I hear Your voice in a quiet moment.
You whisper peace to my soul,
Your promises fill up my days.

You are my highest hope,
Your glory I love to see.
All who are thirsty come,
The fountain’s flowing and free.
You are my rest, You are my peace,
You are the hope for all who believe.
Faithful and true, King of all Kings,
You always will be my highest hope.

Come to the table of blessing,
Enter His courts with praise.
Goodness and mercy will surely
Follow me all of my days.

You are my highest hope,
Your glory I love to see.
All who are thirsty come,
The fountain’s flowing and free.
You are my rest, You are my peace,
You are the hope for all who believe.
Faithful and true, King of all Kings,
You always will be my highest hope.

You are my rest, You are my peace,
You are the hope for all who believe.
Faithful and true, King of all Kings,
You always will be my highest hope.

For further exploration
Learning to Walk in the Dark by Barbara Brown Taylor