Can poetry help take away the pain?

I believe it can. The Psalms are poetry, after all, and when I am in my "valleys of deep darkness" it calms me down to think that the Lord is my shepherd. The imagery of Psalm 139 helped me get through a dark valley of my last semester of high school.

If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
    if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
    your right hand will hold me fast.  Psalm 139:9-10 (NIV)

Not to be melodramatic, but this has been a dark week. It's a dark season. But poetry, cosmology, story, the routine of a day's work, all these help. And this is how we get by, day by day. If it's not a psalm, it's a song on the radio, or a favorite cartoon taped to our office door.

This is not a coherent post, because my thoughts are not coherent. I'm writing these out for myself, and also for a friend who wants information about poetry and therapy.

A poem I printed out yesterday afternoon, from Miss Edna St. Vincent Millay. I was thinking of someone who died, and of people I love who are missing people who died.

Childhood Is the Kingdom Where Nobody Dies

Childhood is not from birth to a certain age and at a certain age
The child is grown, and puts away childish things.
Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies.

Nobody that matters, that is. Distant relatives of course
Die, whom one never has seen, or has seen for an hour,
And they gave one candy in a pink-and-green striped bag, or a jack-knife,
And went away, and cannot really be said to have lived at all.

And cats die. They lie on the floor and lash their tails,
And their reticent fur is suddenly all in motion
With fleas that one never knew were there,
Polished and brown, knowing all there is to know,
Trekking off into the living world.
You fetch a shoe-box, but it's much too small, because she won't curl up now:
So you find a bigger box, and bury her in the yard, and weep.

But you do not wake up a month from then, two months,
A year from then, two years, in the middle of the night
And weep, with your knuckles in your mouth, and say
Oh God! Oh God!
Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies that matters,
--mothers and fathers don't die.

And if you have ever said, "For heaven's sake, must you always be kissing a person?"
Or, "I do wish to gracious you'd stop tapping on the window with your thimble!"
Tomorrow, or even the day after tomorrow if you're busy having fun,
Is plenty of time to say, "I'm sorry, mother."

To be grown up is to sit at the table with people who have died, who neither listen nor speak;
Who do not drink their tea, though they always said
Tea was such a comfort.

Run down into the cellar and bring up the last jar of raspberries; they are not tempted.
Flatter them, ask them what was it they said exactly
That time, to the bishop, or to the overseer, or to Mrs. Mason;
They are not taken in.
Shout at them, get red in the face, rise,
Drag them up out of their chairs by their stiff shoulders and shake them and yell at them;
They are not startled, they are not even embarrassed;
they slide back into their chairs.

Your tea is cold now.
You drink it standing up,
And leave the house. 

Yesterday, Maurice Sendak died. He was the man who wrote Where the Wild Things Are. He had an opposite view of childhood, as evidenced in this quote:

"I think it is unnatural to think that there is such a thing as a blue-sky, white-clouded happy childhood for anybody. Childhood is a very, very tricky business of surviving it. Because if one thing goes wrong or anything goes wrong, and usually something goes wrong, then you are compromised as a human being. You’re going to trip over that for a good part of your life.”

--Maurice Sendak

Also from Maurice Sendak: "I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can't stop them. They leave me and I love them more.”

Some resources for poetry with youth: 

• Using acrostics.

• Bibliotherapy and poetry. 

• Transformative Language Arts.

• National Association for Poetry Therapy.

False Evidence Appearing Real

I was fascinated to learn this morning while I watched CNN that Osama Bin Laden's tapes inspire his followers. (He has a new tape out.) I remember when I was in Mary Kay, I listened to tapes for inspiration: Rena Tarbet, Zig Ziglar, and Susan Jeffers, who wrote the book Feel the fear and do it anyway. My Mary Kay days are long behind me but I still remember how I listened to those tapes while cooking, driving, whatever. I wonder if my love for audio books began with listening to those tapes, over a decade ago.

So as I started writing this post, about fear, and its false faces, its masks, I refer to some quotes I've culled from an email I opened this afternoon.

I experiment with online devotionals. Some have gone away, some change their style...some get political. The one I like right now is Transformation Garden. In the devotional for January 6, labeled "Handling the future with faith or futility," Dorothy Valcarcel has compiled a group of hymns, quotes, and poems that point that we have a choice, and our choice has to do with how much trust we put in our Savior. I have pretty much lifted all the quotes herein from that devotional, in an effort to encourage myself and hopefully you, dear reader. If you want to receive Dorothy's devotional, you can subscribe by clicking on this link.

Now, I know, dear reader, that you may not trust God or want to. But these quotes do have a wisdom that I hope translates without sounding namby-pamby.

I like this one, from Dorothy Hughes: "Nobody can take away your future. Nobody can take away something you don't have yet." (italics mine.)

I so often forget that the future is this fluid occurrence that hasn't happened yet. My novel-writer's mind has every detail laid out. The story of my life is laid out in my mind: it is so detailed, layered with meaning, that it has me convinced, until it doesn't happen and my confidence crashes once again. I hope this year that I can be more accepting of each moment as it happens, even while I plan for the future that I don't count on a specific outcome.

I recently watched the movie Prince Caspian. It amazed me, the thousands of years of time travel that occurred as the British children were once again taken to the mythical land of Narnia. Here is C.S. Lewis, the author of the Narnia books, talking about the futility of grasping for the future:

"The next moment is as much beyond our grasp, and as much in God's care, as that a hundred years away. Care for the next minute is just as foolish as care for a day in the next thousand years. In neither can we do anything, in both God is doing everything."

Now, dear reader, this next poem could either make you smile and nod or want to throw up. It is not my desire to illicit the second response, I promise, but I really like it, and I do cling to the encouragement it offers. It's by John Greenleaf Whittier, the Quaker poet.

I know not what the future hath
Of marvel or surprise,
Assured alone that life and death
His mercy underlies.

And if my heart and flesh are weak
To bear an untried pain,
The bruised reed He will not break,
But strengthen and sustain.

No offering of my own I have,
Nor works my faith to prove;
I can but give the gifts He gave,
And plead His love for love.

And so beside the silent sea
I wait the muffled oar,
No harm from Him can come to me
On ocean or on shore.

I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care."

That last bit reminds me of Psalm 139:7-12, where the psalmist writes that there is nowhere he can go where God is not also:

7Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
8If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.
9If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
10Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
11If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.
12Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.

Well, the light is gone now. I will be driving home soon. But first, dinner. Because one thing I do know, without a shadow of doubt: if it's snowy and I'm hungry and I have to drive, it is better to EAT FIRST.

Sweet William strikes again...

Billy Joel has not succeeded at life, you say. I agree. He is a bit of a tormented soul.

But when I'm sitting here, browsing the New York Times most emailed list and realizing how much I am like my father (emailing apropos articles to friends), an instrumental of "Just the way you are" comes on my radio station.

And I stopped, stock still, and put my feet up on the side of my desk, and listened, filling in the words.

Don't go trying some new fashion
Don't change the color of your hair
You always have my unspoken passion

Looking at the lyrics, I realize it's Mr. Roger's song "It's You I like" for grown-ups.

And thinking theologically, I open my Women's Devotional Bible (NIV) at Psalm 139. "You hem me in -- behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me... (vs. 5)

"I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful (AND I'M ONE OF THEM, is the silent shout.) (vs. 13-16)

A little call and response for this Sunday morning.

It's you I like,
It's not the things you wear,
It's not the way you do your hair--

As my friend from high school Scott would say, Good morning.

Open Letters

Dear Madison Avenue (and all the advertisers you represent):

I am so sick of hearing about debt-loss, weight-loss, and online dating. Give it a rest. Stop telling us about new cars as we contemplate how to get over our addiction to foreign oil. Stop telling us about how diamonds will make our relationships mean more. Do you think the gaining diamonds and new cars might have something to do with why there are so many commercials for debt-loss and online dating?? Please, we want a great taste test campaign, which is better, Coke or Pepsi (while Pepsi wins on taste tests, Coke wins in the long run!!), or a "Where's the Beef" campaign like Wendy's ran in the mid-eighties. Give us something to laugh about. We'll return the favor by drinking Cokes and going to Wendy's.

Yours,

Sarah Louise

Dear the rest of the world:

Don't tell Madison Ave that I don't need commercials for Coke or Wendy's, since I buy their stuff anyways.

Yours,

Sarah Louise

Dear man at the party the other night:

No, I do not want to date an a--hole or a bastard without guts. I don't think those are my only choices. I think there is another alternative and while he seems to be an endangered species in the wild, I have met the married version: a godly man who balances confidence with humility. I will give you this: when you're dating a jerk, you know he likes you, because he generally treats all other people like crap. When you date and/or are scoping out a nice guy, you have to figure out if he likes you because he's nice to everyone. So while I prefer nice guys, there is less confusion on that particular issue if he's a jerk.

Yours,

Sarah Louise

To the women of the Open Door,

You missed an amazing day at the Women's Gathering. What, honestly, (besides a babysitting job with twin four year olds) was more important than hanging out, chilling with your chicks, hearing someone talk honestly about being a woman, not wanting to lead, but doing it anyways. Hello, I took a vacation day. Katrina took a vacation day. Honeys, I hoard those like GOLD. I will not not work on a Saturday unless it is for GOLD. This was gold, much fine gold, and honey on the comb.

I laughed a lot. If anything, you missed hearing me laugh, all morning. You missed amazing worship. And the food--for $20 bucks, I got all that teaching, hanging out, plus breakfast, lunch, and afternoon tea. (Have you been to a restaurant lately? You can drop $20 easily on just drinks and tapas!) The chicken salad was amazing. Bellefield's basement wasn't Mrs. K's, but the company of women made up for that. As women, we need these role models. We need to have the conversations about milk vs. meat. We need to talk about how Sex and the City offers a great example of comraderie with women but a poor example about how to live a dating life. We need to have those conversations where we talk about what our gifts are and how we think they aren't important and have someone say, yes, yes they are. We need all those hugs. We are a young church, ladies, and we need the wisdom of women that have grandchildren. Um, you ain't gonna get that at the Open Door, at least not yet. You missed out, and I mourn that decision of yours.

However, I had a blast. I laughed, I cried, it was better than Cats. I sang out, I searched my soul, I encouraged friends, I met new people. I learned how to talk like a Southerner:

• "Scared as a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs."

I learned that the antithesis of the Proverbs 31 woman is the Proverbs 7 woman. And I was reminded that the Proverbs 31 woman was imagined up by a MOTHER, giving advice to her son on what to look for in a wife. So of course she's perfect!! (Yins with MIL's can talk about that one amongst yourselves...)

I learned that if Jesus says "Go fishing" you should bring tartar sauce, because there's gonna be a feast. And we laughed over a carpenter giving advice to a fisherman, that the paraphrase of vs. 5 was "Man, you are a carpenter and I am a fisherman, I know all about fish and there is nothing there to catch, but if you say so..."

I learned that a great follower is a leader who hasn't accepted the promotion.

I heard poetry, which I'll share with you:

• "allow poetry to slip in the back door." (William Stafford)
• "He moves your bones and the way is clear." (Wendell Berry)
• and one by Kathleen Norris that I didn't write down...
  

I learned that all women are alike in this: we worry about our hearts and our friends. We get lonely and we get loved. We own lots of shoes. And I re-learned this one: women go to the bathroom together. If you thought going to relieve your bladder was going to give you one second alone, that one second was going down the back stairway. I shed tears. And I remembered, as my tears hit the bathroom floor, that God keeps each one in a bottle.

I re-learned that in Pittsburgh, it's not six degrees of separation, it's one, or 1/2. ("I know your church has 2000 members, but do you know so and so?" "Oh yes!")

And then I re-learned something about myself: if I'm with friends, I can stay out late. (Yes, little miss introvert, after a day with 200 women and some time at home deciding WHAT to wear for a birthday party, went out for tapas at 8 pm and stayed until 11 pm, when she went to the Sharp Edge for a Mystery Brew and some Mediterranean Nachos. We stayed there until 12:20, A.M.!)

You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day

...nor the pestilence that walks in darkness; nor for the destruction that wastes at noonday. (Psalm 91:5-6)

Last night, I pulled into Ligonier just as it was five o'clock. So I missed visiting the shops I love, which all close at 5 p.m. But I went into the library to use their bathroom and to look at their Children's Department, as I always do. I picked up some booklists. A librarian was standing at the front desk, putting bookplates into books. I approached her and said that I was driving through and did she know of any uncomplicated places for dinner? She recommended two. I also told her how I was sad to have missed the shops and she mentioned the Holiday Home Store, which stayed open later, but unfortunately was also going out of sale. We chatted a bit longer, and I told her that I was a librarian. She knew of my library, as her mother is a director of a library in the South Hills of Pittsburgh. I thought of giving her my name and asking hers but I decided against it. I went out, in search of the first diner she'd mentioned, which was within walking distance.

Now, one thing that is different about Ligonier at five p.m. in the summer and in the winter is that in the winter, it is dark. Ligonier being a cute small town, this didn't bother me too much.

The diner the librarian recommended only took cash. Luckily, they stated this in a sign on their window. I had been traveling without cash. So, I thought, I could go to the ATM. In the meantime, I went into the Holiday Home Store and found two ornaments. As the store is going out of business, they were both 25% off.

I then walked to my car, pondering whether I wanted to go to the ATM, or just get in the car and see where the other place was that the librarian had recommended. A man was standing by the parked cars by the library and I thought he was a police man at first, putting tickets on the windshields. Surely my hour (for a quarter dollar) hadn't run out yet. He tried to catch my eye and I tried to avoid him. He approached me, and that is when I got in my car. But not before he engaged me in conversation. He was a tall man with a beard and a blue hat. Up close, I could see that he was indeed not a policeman and I noticed that he appeared a little ragged. He asked me if I wanted to go to dinner--the tavern was having a Mexican spread and Ruth's Diner was having a spaghetti dinner. No, I said, I'm just passing through. I had the car door in front of me, as a shield between us. He handed me a piece of paper. It was a tract. At some point he had asked me my name and I had lied, saying it was Sally. Sally, this is information about our Savior, and on the back it has a unique prayer. I hated that I had told him my name, even though it wasn't my name, that he thought he could just use it in conversation, like those spam emails insert your name in the subject line. I said, I already believe in this, as I tried to hand it back to him, and he said, just pass it on. He wanted to know what church I went to and named a few in Pittsburgh. No, I go to the Open Door. Well, fortunately, he hadn't heard of us, and somehow I disengaged myself from this conversation and closed the car door, turned on the car, and bolted out of Ligonier, hungry and creeped out.

I drove and drove and drove, into the darkness, making sure there were miles and miles between myself and this man. I replayed the scenario in my mind, thinking, was this an angel unawares? Was he a harmless lonely man and should I have been more sensitive?

I was haunted. I couldn't let go, replaying the scene in my mind. Finally, as I sat at a Sheetz in Norwin, I called my family to let them know I was still on the road. My mom said, well, call us when you get home.

"Can I run something by you?"
"Sure, honey."

So I told her about the man in Ligonier and how I had made sure the car door was a shield between us and how I had left Ligonier and not turned back but how I was haunted.

"You did the right thing, honey."

Relief flooded me. But how I wish I had a tape recording of my mother saying those words and the words she said after that, encouraging me (giving me courage) and saying that that was stalker behavior. That a person with real intent to evangelize to me would not have violated my personal space, a woman alone at night by her car.

As I write this, I am struck that evangelize has a root in the Greek, which means good news. This man was the opposite--this man was bad news. Harmless he may have appeared, he haunted me all the way home and even this morning when I awoke I couldn't shake the feeling of violation.

Now, perhaps you are reading this and thinking, for crying out loud, Sarah Louise, he did not try to rape you! Give it up and get over it.

But here's the thing: I have a weakness for men. While this man was in no way attractive to me, I have dated men that have violated my personal space in ways that I should have had shields for. If only I had held them at an arms length, with a car door between us for a shield. So while this event did not end tragically, it opened a bag in my closet of all the memories of shame from the past. Reminding me that I have been in worse shape than that before, and that I willingly let these other men into my life.

I get emails from Christianity Today, focusing on women, or the workplace, or books. Today an article caught my eye, called "Remembering to forget." That is what I need! I thought. Although the article did not have any information about how to forget things that had happened to you, things that triggered past shame, this one sentence was helpful:

Satan would lure us to live in guilt and fear. He pulls us into the shadow boxes of memory, in which our worst sins replay on the walls of our minds, flickering with their shameful power …

Which is what has happened. I have been robbed of a few hours in the car and an hour of this morning, haunted by this non-event that happened last night around 5:45 p.m.

The sun is up, and I should go for my walk. Do you know that I couldn't even listen to the throaty voice of Bono this morning, as he sang about this being "The Real Thing." I needed a woman to calm my spirits, so I listened to Shawn Colvin.

In Brent Curtis and John Eldredge's heartbreaking book The Sacred Romance, these moments are called Arrows. There is something that "lays siege to us in...darker hues and brings to it a foreboding that sometimes nags at the edges of out consciousness even on the most sunlit morning. Something fearful stalks us."(14)

******

Lilly just called--she's back home! (She broke her leg before Thanksgiving and was staying at her brother's while she recovered.) We're having dinner tomorrow, hurrah!

***** (11:51 am)

Well, I feel better. I had a walk and even ran into Babs! My dream of getting to work early so I could leave early is not to be...unpacking will have to wait...

If I take the wings of the morning...(Psalm 139:9)

Psalm 139 is the Psalm that got me through my senior year of high school. It is the Psalm that ushered me into the women's Bible studies at Bellefield. It is almost singlehandedly the Psalm that I can trace my beginning longings for a relationship with God.

I have no idea when I discovered the verses that follow:

If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there thy hand shall lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. (Psalm 139:9-10, KJV)

It was sometime my senior year. I was seventeen. I was skipping class, I was in a twisted relationship (my first boyfriend) with a guy who I later learned was "seeing" five women including me. I was your rebellious teenager. I felt like it was my last hurrah--my last year under the yoke of my parents. I thought my parents were old fashioned and irrelevant. My dad was studying Polish, translating newspapers in the evenings, and so, I the economist's daughter, got a D in Economics. My mom was constantly telling me how important it was to marry a Christian, so I was illicitly talking into the wee hours of the night with a guy who said he believed in God. I imagined that in twenty years, he'd be marriage material. Mr. Morning, where are you today?

Every time I visited a friend's house and they had a Bible, I'd flip to Psalm 139:9-10. Those two verses had enough poetry to carry me through the pain and confusion, through the lies and the deception. I loved reading the verses in different translations. I now own a Jerusalem Bible, at least one King James Version, Dios Habla Hoy (Spanish), at least two NIV translations, and the falling apart red letter Bible that I got when I was confirmed in seventh grade at Northwood Presbyterian Church. It is a Revised Standard Version and as it is the Bible I read the most often, and because it has more poetry than the NIV, it is my favorite. It is currently hiding in my garret. Books will do that when you live in a place long enough.

There's a hymn that has a line, "wherever man can go, thou shalt be there too." I remember that verse and it comforted me. It also led me to Psalm 139:9-10.

I wish I could say I came easily to faith. I did not. I came easily to church. Bellefield was down the street from Carlow College, and I figured, why not? I kept going and eventually got involved in a Bible Study with two other women. We studied the names of God, from the Old Testament. It was poetry. I wanted to be like these women, who were in their thirties and wrestling with the concept of being a Godly single woman. So I stopped doing some things. I stopped calling Mr. Morning. I wrote him a "Dear John" letter with a dinosaur stamp. (I thought it was poetic, you know, dinosaurs are extinct?) By the beginning of the second semester of my freshman year of college, I professed faith. What was it that got me over the edge? The last study in our book on God's names asked if I knew where I'd spend eternity. I realized I didn't know, and I wanted to. I walked to Bellefield the next day, hoping to find the campus minister I really liked, but she wasn't there. I'd heard about discipleship and I thought it sounded like a good idea. Instead, I met with the other woman campus minister and she told me about justification and sanctification. We met a few other times, but I never felt like I'd been "discipled."

I have felt that lack a lot. I'm the older brother in the story about the Prodigal Son. Wait a minute, I didn't get MY share! But God has provided for me in other ways.

I spend a lot of time alone. I take walks. I read books. I drive to work. In these places, God meets me if not daily, every couple of days. Where I have not had the companionship of people discipling me, I have had the words of Kathleen Norris, Anne Lamott, Madeleine L'Engle, Brennan Manning, John Eldredge. I have experienced the words of the Bible as a double edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and a discerner of the thoughts and intentions of my heart (Hebrews 4:12).

***************

I look forward to being someone's wife, someone's fiancée, someone's girlfriend. I know it will not end my loneliness, or my solitary life, but it will be a sharing of at least a bed, a bank account perhaps, and a future. I expect it will require more of me than has ever been required of me in a relationship with another human.

At the last Christmas party, I witnessed folks younger than I in every stage of young adulthood: early dating, late dating, engagement (rings) and wedding dates, married for a year, married for two years, pregnant. I felt out of place--where do I fit in this picture?

Don't get me wrong--I don't wish my life had turned out otherwise--I have a great life. But I haven't met someone yet who makes me laugh, who makes me want to care for the rest of my life. Even though I know I want the whole package and maybe a house with a picket fence, I am scared shitless, too. I wonder...

Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me...

Even there.

Lead me on, LORD. I will follow you. In your beautiful timing, and not a moment before. Teach me patience and prescence and take my hand.

More Psalms...

So, here it is, the seventh day in a row that I'm doing something work related. (It feels like it's the ninth day in a row...) And the first thing I wanted to do when I woke up was email someone about something...

Something told me to STOP. So I picked up Tim Bott's exquisitely illustrated Psalms (someone special got it for me for my birthday--I said, how did you know? He said, when we were at Fox Books you only fawned over it for five minutes.) (Smiling, now, remembering that...) (Oh, he's married to someone else now, but it was a great moment in my life.)

So, I tend to make notes in books or put bookmarkers. Well, I would never write in this book unless it was to inscribe it for a gift, it is that exquisite. But I had bookmarked a page, so that's where I opened and it was like a megaphone to my life. (Psalm 127.)

Unless
THE LORD
BUILDS A HOUSE
The work of the builders is useless

It is useless for you to work so hard
from early morning until late at night
anxiously working for food to eat

For God gives rest to his loved ones.

(In the book, it's one of the ones he calligraphies, so it looks like the roof of a house.) This is one of my favorite Psalms. In my RSV Bible, which was given to me when I was confirmed in the Presbyterian church in seventh grade, this has a ton of dates. (I put dates by verses to mark when they hit me like a megaphone or when I'm praying them. I pray this Psalm a lot.)

Can you see why this would be a megaphone, on the seventh day of working in a row??? A few things in my life are not coming out the way I would want them to, and I have to remember that all my striving is useless "unless the Lord builds a house" for that thing in my life.

Humble pie, that's what I'll be having for breakfast. It's always better if you fix it yourself than if you eat it after making a face plant (BELIEVE ME ON THIS ONE.)

So, thanks for reading and I'll try to make sure I do something restful today...

In the House of Stone and Light...

A comment left by Sistahe reminded me of this song (because she referred to Psalm 91.)

I will not rest till I lay down my head
In the house of stone and light
I make my way
O gonna be such a beautiful day
In the house of stone and light
In the house of stone and light
Let me in beneath my skin
In the house of stone and light
It's been too long
My spirit's been at war
Havasupai Shaman
Let me be reborn

(Page Martin)

The King of Love my Shepherd is

The King of Love my Shepherd is,
Whose goodness faileth never;
I nothing lack if I am His
And He is mine forever. (Henry W. Baker, 1868)

The summer before I was diagnosed bipolar was a trying one. I knew there was something wrong (I'd experienced insomnia at least once a month for months on end, my work was suffering, I was often paranoid). In April, I broke up with the man I had been dating. In early June, he tried to reconcile, and slowly we did, such that we were dating again by July 4th. I was seeking God every day on behalf of myself and this relationship. My walks in the morning were not let's look at nature, but let's come before God and find out what's what. I clung to the Twenty-third Psalm. When the darkness seemed to close in, I would hold onto my desk at the back of Fox Books, in the Children's Department, and recite from memory the Psalm my mother had taught me as a child for a bedtime prayer.

The shadow of the valley of deep darkness--I was acquainted with it, keenly. So, after I started my recovery, after my bipolar diagnosis, that Psalm only reminded me of that trying time. That time of intense suffering and confusion in my life. A time when I was scared because I didn't know where I was headed. I stopped saying it, and whenever it came to mind, I shut it away, so as to not remember that dark time.

I know that God can redeem anything, and this week, Beth Moore exorted to us that the only reason we get hardships as believers is because God has said yes to Satan and God has a bigger plan for that trial. That trial will result in more glory.

This morning, I was a mess. Everything, from an email from a friend to a song on the radio triggered me to tears. I felt like I was in the middle of the desert, with no oasis in sight. But I knew people were praying for me, and I knew that Jesus is always praying for me. I recited Scripture. I checked blogs. I sent emails. I listened to Shawn Colvin, especially Polaroids, from her album, fat city. I called my father and my sister and left messages on their phones. I somehow made it through the day.

And what a day it was: calm and balmy, then blustery, then deluges of Biblical proportion. On the way to work I actually turned off the road for a few minutes, it was raining so hard. When I got to work, the sky cleared a little bit and I walked in with my jacket wrapped around me. By the time it was time to go for my birthday lunch at Chili's, the rain had begun again. Just as we sat in our seats at Chili's, the deluge began again. All day it was like this. And then the sun came out. And then the clouds came back. It's what we here in da Burgh call "Severe Weather."

At 5:30 p.m., the library had a power outtage. For whatever reason, the emergency back up lights did not come on. It was already dark outside. You picture a library full of patrons and especially children, how they might react. Thankfully one of my co-workers, Sally (yes, another one!) was with me and I took our one flashlight to where I knew there were more. After some time, we evacuated the building. At six, Sally and I left, since our shifts were over. The six o'clock people would stay until all the kids waiting for rides had been picked up and then the library would be locked and left for the night.

I had no idea if there was electricity in Highland Park, and I knew that I didn't have food in the freezer even if we did have light. So I had dinner at Taco Bell, where I did my Beth Moore homework. And I commenced my drive home. And just as I was cresting the hill on McKnight Blvd, where there's a church with a Nativity scene up front, I turned off the radio and started praying. God, I know that you love me. God, I know that you won't test me beyond what I can stand. And I started repeating scripture and recalling promises God has in his Word. And at some point, as I crossed the Allegheny River on the Veteran's Bridge, the words to the Twenty Third Psalm came to me. "He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake." "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of Death, I will not be afraid." And I could say these verses, which have been locked in my brain as a memory of that sad summer, smiling, laughing, singing.

And I sang praise songs all the way home.

We serve an awesome God--if we would only humble ourselves before him, he will lift us up.

I suppose I knew that someday God would return that Psalm to me, that someday it wouldn't taste like sawdust on my tongue. It was a complete and utter surprise to me when the words just came to my mind and I could feel the joy bubbling up.

It's only six verses. But how powerful they are:

Psalm 23 (RSV)

A Psalm of David.

1The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
2He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
3He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
for his name's sake.
4Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

5You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies;
you anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD
forever.