Messy

Sounds about right. If I had to choose a word to describe myself today, that would be it. Scratch that, I'm pretty sure I'm a big mess every day.
I keep coming up with a million tasks around my house that need done and making a list, and then proceeding to waste my time on facebook, watching a movie, etc instead of doing the projects that I dread. I know that once I've finished them, I'll feel sorted out, accomplished, and on task. It's just the getting started that screws me up.
And then there's my heart. My stupid, aching heart. There are 2 major struggles I'm dealing with right now regarding that blood-pumping organ. The first is an issue of forgetting or lingering. I don't know what to do with John. His physical body is gone, but his presence in our lives feels like something I have to decide what to do with. Invite it in? Ask it politely to leave so I can move past the pain? Set up a tribute to him on my dining room wall and put his guitars out for display? Or simply accept his presence in our family pictures as a part of our lives in the past? Put all his things down in the basement so that I don't have to look at them, or unpack his clothes and hang them in my cloest so i can feel like something is normal for once?
As with all areas of life, I'm certain this comes down to a balance. I know that it isn't all or nothing, pain or letting go, forgetting or filling my life with pieces of him. I know there's a middle ground, and that time and perspective will help me find it. But patience is a virtue that I haven't mastered in the least. I just want all the answers now! I want to know exactly what to do, and then i want to be given the perseverance to follow through and carry it out!
James 1:2-4- "Therefore, my brothers and sisters, consider it pure joy whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."
Have I ever EVER lived this out more exactly? (the trials and need for perseverance, not the being mature and complete part)
The second issue is one that I'm not ready to share, but suffice it to say, I need some prayer, patience, and perseverance desperately here as well.
Well, here comes the part where I live out the ideas that I post - since the reason I post them is so that I might be more inspired to follow through. I guess I'll get up and move to the first project on my list, it being the least detailed or extensive - cleaning my room.
Until next time,

Me.

Sunday

There's too much to say. There's too much not to say. There's too many opposing sides to every view, too many warring factions inside my own head, too many reasons I already know but don't listen to.
I'm just so tired. Usually I'm pretty much sunny-side up, and too often lately I've felt discouraged, sad, impatient, confused, and ready to somehow start over. I just wish I could be done. Geeze, I've never been so sure that this is not my home. Heaven is calling for me and I wish I could just go home where there is no darkness, no weeping, no pain, and no death. There's just so much left here for me to screw up. Friendships, relationships, family, children, health, home, I feel so inadequate, so inept.
What makes that feel so disturbing and sad is that I know what it feels like to feel on top of it all. Okay, not everything, but definitely the majority. I was very happily married, loved my role as Mom and Wife, experienced contentment in almost every area of my life, held no grudges, had no enemies, continued to learn from and draw closer to Christ, and loved the adventure of Army life - traveling, making new friends, being a part of the aviation community.
Where is my identity now? My family has been ripped apart, my home moved, my heart destroyed. I'm picking up the pieces and carrying them all in front of me in my arms but pieces keep falling out of the cracks. I can't do this on my own. More than that, I don't want to.
I'm clinging to the promises of my God and Savior. I'm asking Jesus to be my strength. I'm living in the knowledge that he'll never give me more than I can handle, and that through Him I can do anything. And while that knowledge, that trust doesn't take away the doubts, doesn't make all my choices for me, doesn't immediately make everything sunshine and rainbows, it is the rock I stand on, it is the truth I cling to, it is the hope I have for the future.

Holy Father,
I come to you, crawling on my knees. I am unworthy to stand before you. But you invite me in. You tell me you'll carry me when I can't carry on, and God, I'm holding you to that promise. I can't do this on my own, but I have never been alone. You are always with me. Thank you, God for being my father, for offering me hope and salvation in your Son. Thank you for giving me John for those 6 short years, and thank you for taking him home to you before he saw too much heartache, disappointment, worry, and fear in this world. Thank you for his full life - for his love for me and our girls, for the joy I witnessed in him every day. I am a better person for knowing him, but everything that I am is from you. Please....please help me to make it. Help me to hold up through the storm, to hold my children tightly and to show them You at every possible moment. Help me to place my priorities in the right order and to live out the convictions that I hold in my heart. Be my everything.
I love you,

Amber