The Safety in the Setting

There are certain events that still exist so close to the surface that to pull them out with words would be akin to itching a dangerous scab. Words work best on scars, not scabs; on the parts already cut and healed and marked, not on those so fresh that to prod them is to open up the bleeding. Scars are set and there is safety in the setting.

Much of 2010 is still scabs, those wounds where I’ve managed to stave off infection but haven't yet dealt with the long-term. All that is to say: I can't quite write about this year, because much too much of it is still too close. There has been progress and for those progressions I am thankful. I've built rich and meaningful friendships in places I didn't expect and have gotten better at my current job and my career. I found a fantastic church body and have relished getting to know it. I became more secure in my faith. But I make no bones: it's been an exhausting twelve months. The quaint, quivering little heartache that started the year seems so comical in light of the thunderous and lead-filled bombs of the summer. They simply can't compare.

I learned that there are as many ways to die as there are to live, and that death changes the core of those left behind. I know it's changed me. I learned that death takes bodies and leaves souls but depression takes the soul and leaves the body and no matter which robbing occurs there are those left to deal with the newly empty space. This year both of those losses found me.

I have a coworker who has been a sort of pen-pal these past few months (he works at another office) and lately we've been discussing the concept of community. He brought up the idea that communities are just like ecosystems: there are those who are consumers and those who are providers, and without a balance the community (and the individual) crumbles. I'm struck dumb by his use of ecological terms to describe one's place. 2010 has been a year where I've been a straight consumer. I haven't given anything to anyone this year, and I usually love to serve. I haven't had the energy to encourage or empathize or work at relationships or pursue friendships, haven't had the emotional capacity to look outside myself and I know that I—and those I love—have suffered from it. (To those who stuck with me this past year I offer my deepest gratitude and love. It didn't go unnoticed.) At the beginning of 2010 I predicted it'd be the year of sweetness. I just didn't know the sweetness wouldn't start to come until the very, very end.

2011: the year of renewal: of the mind, of the spirit, of the soul. Let the transformation begin.

This Steady Scenery

I bought a whitewater kayak this past week.
An old one, which in kayaking terms, is 7 years.
How appropriate. 7 years ago is when I was told I wasn't “allowed” to paddle anymore.
I had just finished college and was packing to move to New Hampshire, to work in my friends' kayaking shop on Lake Winnipesaukee. I was to teach flatwater and whitewater paddling for the summer, and possibly extend the work into a permanent position. I'd had back problems for about two years at that point, and finally went to a doctor to get it checked out.
He told me he feared that the problems were structural and that paddling could prolong or even worsen the issues. He told me I shouldn't paddle anymore.
There went my future, my plans and part of my identity.
Since then I've only paddled a handful of times; I haven't attempted to roll a kayak and have stuck to mostly easy runs. Life kept moving while that love in me was left in that moment, as if an anchor had been set while the ship above kept trying to sail. Later I found out that paddling wouldn't cause any more structural damage, rather it would cause blinding, debilitating pain.

I've recently begun a rather aggressive chiropractic treatment for my back. It is a process; some days the pain is dramatically less, others it is just as bad as it has been. What gives me hope is that there are changes; that the pain isn't the maddening hum of years past. There are changes in the steady scenery of pain. Maybe this time I will get better.
But then again, maybe the pain stays.
I bought a boat because I don't care anymore.
If I am in pain, then I will stick to the small kayaking runs.
If I am in pain, I won't paddle much.
But I've let pain keep me from something that brings me life for far too long, and in this, the year of sweetness, I'm willing to try anything. I want to lift that anchor, bring it with me. No matter how little, how infrequent or how minor my paddling ends up being, I'm willing to try. I'm smart enough to know I should.

(Older posts about this: Here, Here, Here, Here)