I “wrote” a blog not long ago and entitled it “Shattered Glass”. “Wrote” is the operative word because there were no words. I couldn’t seem to find words to describe accurately what I was feeling, so rather than try; I encapsulated my emotions in a pictorial. Then today as I was driving there was a song on the radio and as I listened I realized that he was singing what my heart had been unable to verbalize. He wrote the missing lyric to my blog. Granted, I didn’t completely understand everything that he was communicating through the song, but then again I don’t even really understand what I am trying to communicate! There was one phrase that posed a question that resonated with my soul. I have no answer for it….maybe there is no answer for it….or maybe there is, but I just don’t know how to get there.
How many times can I break till I shatter?
Every broken heart, every lost dream, every bitter disappointment, every loss, every rejection…..every time you wonder…..just how many times can I break till I shatter?
In a way, I need a change
From this burnout scene
Another time, another town
Another everything
Is that what I need? Or, is that running? Will change protect or just be a delusion that eventually leads back to the same result?
How many times can I break till I shatter?
Over the line can't define what I'm after
I always turn the car around
All that I feel is the realness I'm faking
Taking my time but it's time that I'm wasting
Always turn the car around
Where do these words fit? TRUST, FAITH, HOPE, BELIEF; these are amazing words! They illicit peace, confidence, assurance, rest, comfort, and security. Why is it so difficult for me to simply turn the car around and point it towards them instead of being consumed by the fear that the next broken whatever could be that time that I shatter? What would shatter….me, or just my hopes and dream? Or, do my hopes and dreams define me and thus shattering them is shattering me? Does it even matter? Should it even matter? Maybe we are meant to shatter so that Someone can pick up the pieces. The truth is….do I trust what He will do with those pieces? Maybe I can’t turn the car around because I am not meant to drive. Maybe you have to “shatter” to finally figure that out.
Monday, July 7, 2008
Friday, July 4, 2008
Happily Ever After
“…and they lived happily ever after.” So many stories that I read as a child ended with that phrase “and they lived happily ever after”. Much of my DVD collection is filled with movies that take me through the emotionally exhausting journey of relationships that eventually end with the blissfully satisfying “happily ever after”. Unrealistic as it may be, I think that I am not alone in harboring the desire to want to secretly believe that such a state of being exists. As one who believes in the promises that God has for us in His Word and the truth that He exposes about the earthly existence in this world in which we live, I logically understand that this “happily ever after” is meant for a future time. Yet there is something about the dream that beckons my thoughts to the possibility of this unrealistic “Garden of Eden”. Last night, in the most unexpected way, I was brought back to reality. I love the Olympics. I have watched them every four years….winter and summer….and imagined what it would be like to achieve that amazing goal of standing on the podium having reached the pinnacle of achievement. I have competed as a track athlete. I ran sprints and relays and as I watched them, I lived vicariously through their stories of triumph over tragedy. Okay, so my “career” as a track athlete ended after Junior High, but was it really my fault that there were no competitive girl’s sports in High School at that time? Well, realistically even if there had been that whole “big fish in a little pond”, “little fish in a big pond” thing probably would have been the rest of my story. But, since it wasn’t, I can still dream of what might have been…that “happily ever after”. So, I settle into my comfortable chaise each evening to watch the trials as they select the team that will represent our country in the upcoming 2008 Olympics. I was doing just that when two of my worlds collided and in the wake, lying exposed, was the dashed hope of “happily ever after”. I mentioned in an earlier blog that one of my favorite songs of this past year was the sweetly simple Plain White T’s song “Hey There, Delilah”.
This acoustic baring of the soul where he lays his heart on the line in an expression of undying commitment to this “soul mate” named Delilah made my heart melt. How lucky this “Delilah” must be to have someone care that deeply. It was the perfect expression of “happily ever after” in musical form. Then suddenly, in the finals of the 3000 meter steeplechase for women was the intersection of my musical world with my world of sport. Lining up at the beginning of the race to determine the team for the first ever 3000 meter steeplechase competition for women in the Olympics was “Delilah”….the real “Delilah”, Delilah DiCrescenzo, a Columbia University graduate, and steeplechase runner who had trained and was now trying out for the 2008 Olympics.
Tom Higgenson of the Plain White T’s had met this exotic beauty, who he described as the most beautiful girl in the world, through a mutual friend and in an attempt to win her affection he said that he would write a song for her. It took him a year but he finished the song. There was one catch, her heart belonged to another and he had to write the song expressing what he would want to say to her if he actually was with her. After 5 years of playing it in clubs and bars on tours the song became a hit and was nominated for "Song of the Year" and Delilah agreed, with the blessing of her boyfriend, to accompany him to the Grammys.
The song didn’t win a Grammy, he didn’t win her heart and in the Olympic trials Delilah came in dead last. There on the finish line lay my dashed dream of “happily ever after”. But then again maybe it wasn’t “happily ever after” that was dashed, but only my unrealistic perception of “happily ever after”.
This acoustic baring of the soul where he lays his heart on the line in an expression of undying commitment to this “soul mate” named Delilah made my heart melt. How lucky this “Delilah” must be to have someone care that deeply. It was the perfect expression of “happily ever after” in musical form. Then suddenly, in the finals of the 3000 meter steeplechase for women was the intersection of my musical world with my world of sport. Lining up at the beginning of the race to determine the team for the first ever 3000 meter steeplechase competition for women in the Olympics was “Delilah”….the real “Delilah”, Delilah DiCrescenzo, a Columbia University graduate, and steeplechase runner who had trained and was now trying out for the 2008 Olympics.
Tom Higgenson of the Plain White T’s had met this exotic beauty, who he described as the most beautiful girl in the world, through a mutual friend and in an attempt to win her affection he said that he would write a song for her. It took him a year but he finished the song. There was one catch, her heart belonged to another and he had to write the song expressing what he would want to say to her if he actually was with her. After 5 years of playing it in clubs and bars on tours the song became a hit and was nominated for "Song of the Year" and Delilah agreed, with the blessing of her boyfriend, to accompany him to the Grammys.
The song didn’t win a Grammy, he didn’t win her heart and in the Olympic trials Delilah came in dead last. There on the finish line lay my dashed dream of “happily ever after”. But then again maybe it wasn’t “happily ever after” that was dashed, but only my unrealistic perception of “happily ever after”.
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