Tender

So I’m writing to you here, from my sofa, as a girl in slow motion, praying for her coffee to kick in. The week has caught up with me, and I’m not sure what to do, because for me, the week is far from over….

So I will try to keep my disciplines and I will start by writing today, even if the thoughts are running slower than ever.

Today is Five Minute Friday, where The Gypsy Mama invites us to stop, drop, and write for 5 minutes without over-thinking or editing or backtracking. Today, this could be interesting :).

So here it goes:

Tender

Sometimes life causes us to callous. It causes us to crack and bruise and grow hard shells. It causes us to build walls triple our size and manufacture sentences so when people ask the “how are you” questions, we don’t really have to tell. There are events that can change us, that when paired next to the grand, beautiful moments of life, these hard ones take more stalk in our spirit. Why is that? Why is it that I look at the lovely parts of life and they matter, but the hard ones make weight? Why is it that when my dreams take over in the middle of the night, the regrets play out again and again, not the cherished moments that I wish I could relive? Why is it that the vulnerable, bruised parts of my soul, need protection and covered, so that I don’t feel I will break at any moment?

And he sees this, the man I have committed my life to. I’m not sure he realizes, but he’s the one who gets the brunt of it. The defensive mechanisms, the angry reactions, the parts of me that don’t want to let him all in. But it’s not because of him. He is wonderful and he loves me, and I don’t tell him enough. I blame him for not fighting for me, for not breaking down my walls, for not trying to be my hero. But how can he when I just build more? How can he when he doesn’t know they are there?

And it’s not his job to do these things, it’s his job to love and its my job to nurture and if I’m waiting around for him to do his part then I never get to doing mine.

And so I must open, I must grow. I must crack and show these bruises, these heartaches, so that we can live life, so that we can live whole.

I must learn tenderness, and I must overcome my defenses. I must grow softer, and more gentle, because in that I will find fulfillment and in that he will rise up. These are the hard parts. These are the parts they don’t tell you.

Oh tenderness, rise up in me. I want to learn what this grace means.