I just kept strumming

Monday, April 25, 2016

It had been a long and productive Monday.
I ran across campus to minimize time spent in the cold, the sound of headphones blaring in my ears and dull thud of my feet on the pavement as the fluff of my scarf bobbed against the top of my chest. The night was young and I was invigorated by the pace of the day. Reaching for my car keys, I decided to reward myself with an evening spent however I wished.

I didn't have to think about it. All I wanted to do was play my guitar.

I got home, put my things away, and quickly prepared and polished off my usual snack of frozen blueberries drizzled with peanut butter and topped with shaved coconut. (I'm telling you. IT'S GOOD.) I had gripped the neck of my guitar, and was teetering a little as I lowered to sit cross-legged on my bedroom floor when it happened--

my D string popped.

I'm not sure how it happened. Don't even remember the exact sound it made. I only know I was in disbelief and, in that moment, pretty stinking sad.
This didn't stop me from trying to play it, though.

Which proved interesting. Because as a novice player, I tend to rely on the relative location of a string to quickly find them. With a prominent string missing (I suppose the fact that there's only 6 makes them all prominent strings), I was suddenly fumbling over songs I'd played dozens upon dozens of times. Out of desperation, I tried to fix the problem by reaffixing and tightening the shriveled string--the spoke groaning as I twisted and twisted, ultimately resulting in a repeat snap. My proud and beautiful instrument suddenly looked like it was missing a tooth, and by the sounds of my fumbling and general something's-not-right of the guitar, I wouldn't doubt if my roommates started to wonder (when I'd stop and) if I was ok.

Someone who has never experienced what I'm about to refer to may think it's a stretch. (Though this is quite possible coming from a mind so analytical, it seems to find life parallels like a middle schooler does gum under a table in their cafeteria.) But as I was trying to adjust to a D-stringless guitar, I couldn't help but notice how much it felt like loss.

You try to go about life as you always have. Sometimes you get so good at it, you forget something is missing, that something was ever there. You always know in the back of your mind that it was, of course; no matter how conscious you are of it--or successful you've been at trying not to be--in your heart of hearts, you know it was. You wonder if it could ever sound as beautiful. But you also know you can't just give up. So you pursue a new normal.




Sometimes others inadvertently remind you. Not intentionally, but with confused eyes that search your casual expression for answers, because it's only their natural response. They weren't expecting it any more than they've come to terms with it; haven't realized the need for acceptance of what you know you can't change like you have.

I suppose if I were to take my guitar downtown like many musicians do on Sunday afternoons when the weather begs us all to get out and enjoy the day, some passer-bys would judge me. They might think I chose to play the guitar that looked and sounded like that. Perhaps they'd wish I'd conceal my scars like the rest of the world so they wouldn't even have to wonder.

Then, of course, you have the ones who don't genuinely care about what you may have been through, but merely stand around and pretend to sift through their pockets and purses for spare change to throw into your empty guitar case until you offer them an explanation that eases their curiosity, at a cost their tattered dollar bill and spare quarter could never begin to pay.

But I'd smile, of course, because I've learned I have nothing when I don't have love--and because those people act not out of malice, but out of their own honest-to-goodness ignorance and immaturity. And that's ok. Because they'll get there. And when I suspect they've already missed that train, I'll still choose to extend grace, because I treated people and their pain carelessly once, too.

You're right. Perhaps it was a bit of a stretch. Because in reality, I can buy another guitar string in the morning, and will only have forfeited a few bucks and a night of practice. But someday, someone might ask me: What was it like when everything was suddenly different from what you knew? And what did you do?

It was like suddenly playing your six-string without it's D. And I just kept strumming.


***

Just be

Wednesday, March 23, 2016

This week is spring break.

Breakfast in CO with my parents.
(Mom: "Take a picture of the food!"
Dad: " 'This is my food as it's getting cold...' ")


Normally I would have something adventurous planned -- something somehow-grand on a Shauna-richter scale. And while I am getting restless for a roadtrip, I'm feeling pretty satiated from my whirlwind adventure to Colorado that I made earlier this month to attend a John Eldridge seminar (still basking in it a bit).
And now I'm content to just be.


Just being has involved


waking up whenever my eyes blink open.

sitting in a cafe and staring out the window as the cars go by.

marveling at how green the grass has been made by the springtime rain.

being early to yoga, and making small talk with the people I lay my mat next to every week, but never get to know.

being on time to a friend's birthday dinner, and not being too busy to bring a carefully selected card,
gift, and bouquet of flowers.

smelling said bouquet of flowers a dozen times before relinquishing them to birthday-friend.

sitting down to play a song on the guitar -- twice a day.

standing in the mirror for ten minutes wearing my cap and gown.

long talks with my parents.

finishing that amazing, but thick, book I started over Christmas break.


Life can be so bittersweet. But you know, when you slow down enough--enough to be aware of what you're feeling; of your breath as it pushes and pulls from your lungs; of the fact that hours go by more like seconds, and years go by more like days--I can't help but appreciate how good it is just to be alive.


East to West

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

The thought occurred to me lately that there's nothing quite like the pang of regret. 

We don't all have stories that would make a highly-rated reality show or best-selling novel. Yet we've all experienced regret. Life's coulda's, shoulda's and woulda's. They're not restricted to well-defined moments or specific events in our lives that cause us to look back and ask what we were thinking; they can be as unsuspecting as something you thought at the time was a good idea, or years of using an approach to life that wasn't doing you any favors. They come in all shapes, all sizes. For me, that week, Casting Crowns' East to West had been listened to on repeat.



HERE I AM, LORD, AND I'M DROWNING
IN YOUR SEA OF FORGETFULNESS
THE CHAINS OF YESTERDAY SURROUND ME
I YEARN FOR PEACE AND REST
DON'T WANNA END UP WHERE YOU FOUND ME
AND IT ECHOES IN MY MIND
KEEPS ME AWAKE TONIGHT...

My favorite regrets (see: sarcasm) are the ones that beg questions with no answers, such as why you didn't know what you didn't know before you knew it. (Please never ask yourself such an inhumanely torturous, insanely asinine thing.) The ways to evoke it are endless; its presence can be relentless. And actually, there's no other feeling in the world that I loathe more.

Unexpected bills for $497 can be an unwelcome distraction, though.

I never should have been charged, and figured it was a mistake. But when preceded with bolded statements like "AMOUNT YOU OWE:", confidence in mistakehood can be shaken. Reaching for the phone to get it sorted out but realizing it was after business hours, I resigned to imagining all the ways I could have spent $497. A road trip; a day at the spa; airfare home to see my family (plus a ticket to Disney World). Oh it was aggravating.

So, I did the only things you can do in such situations: I said a prayer that it'd all work out and moved on with my life. Days passed before I finally got a chance to call.



Turns out it was a simple mistake: A receptionist's typo caused my insurance to refuse me coverage. It was solved in about 30 seconds.

"So this will be completely covered, is that right?" I asked, in my usual leave-nothing-to-chance kind of way. 
"Yes, ma'am."


"So I can tear this up without having to worry about it anymore?" 
"Yes. It's all been taken care of." 

I thanked her, heaved a sigh of relief, and slowly tore up the bill into, ohhhh, 18 different pieces. 

Taking a moment to gaze at the messy, shredded squares of paper between my fingers, I relished the moment of a lifted burden. I went from being in a debt I never meant to incur and couldn't afford to pay, to realizing I didn't have to.
And then the thought came to me. 

As I stared at the shreds, it was as clear as if it was deposited right into mind, and I just knew.


"That's what I've done for you."



Courtesy of Pinterest

JESUS, YOU KNOW JUST HOW FAR THE EAST IS FROM THE WEST
I DON'T HAVE TO SEE THE MAN I'VE BEEN
COME RISING UP IN ME AGAIN
IN THE ARMS OF YOUR MERCY, I FIND REST
CAUSE YOU KNOW JUST HOW FAR THE EAST IS FROM THE WEST:
FROM ONE SCARRED HAND TO THE OTHER

***
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