Stationary, in motion.

I’m traveling a lot these days. Long, early days. Short nights. It keeps me from a faithful relationship to flibbityfluence. No excuses, though. No guilt here, either. I want this as a constant invitation from a friend.

I was reading something today in Newsweek about steroids and disgraced baseball heroes. An article on why/how Jesus became the Christ, or “anointed one.” There was a small side-bar about Jane Fonda’s history with some French guy that was really mean and abusive to her. Boy, did she try to keep him happy. Sandra Bullock is turning 40. She’s happy about getting older. Robert Blake has transitioned into O.J. land. He most likely killed his wife and his future. I don’t know why all that strikes me as it does, but it seems like no one is safe from life.

Looking back, I’m pretty sure that my heart has been under-grown by the constant flow of choosing to bounce from parent to parent through divorce, trips 3 hours up north to see the friends, the high school love interests and the mentors in the big city, a quick, theological mind-twister of a year at college, and falling into a business I found to be a fast track to an even more intense displacement. I don’t think I’ve ever really known home as a true, safe place to crash. It’s always felt in motion. Now, I’ve helped make a new home that isn’t a soft place to land for others. That makes me angry with myself. On my worst days, this feeling dismantles me.

Graciously, I see before me some opportunities to undermine a lot of those rickety beginnings. That’s probably what growing older means. That’s probably why so many parents freak out on their kids. Kids are a perfect target to bear a parent’s shortcomings and unresolved wounds. I want to raise children that know this world is broken, but are able to recognize authentic hope. Brokenness framed with compassion.

There is a lot of undoing to be done. It’s probably going to mean sitting in the awkwardness and emptiness more than would feel natural.

I want to know this pain in a way I can name it, and be present enough to emerge from it as someone still with something to offer family and friends. This feels like it might require getting a really good rocking chair for the front porch. Probably two, for communion’s sake.