Tag Archives: Earth

Trying Not To Be Pathetically Codependent — And Obviously Failing Miserably

Posted on by Standard 54
a beautiful macro shot of Crystal Methamphetam...

a beautiful macro shot of Crystal Methamphetamine in a black background (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today has already started out crappy, and I’m going to write about it with the hopes of getting a grip on myself.

I can’t seem to escape the hell that is Chef right now. I made it a whopping 24 hours of ignoring him before I broke down and answered the stupid telephone. Why???? It never works out well for me!! As usual, he starts off with, “I’m just making sure you are doing ok.” What a load of nonsense! Because it was quickly followed up with, “I can’t get my modem to work.” I didn’t care about his problem, and told him he’d have to call the people he got it from and get them to help him. After a few minutes, when he realized I really wasn’t going to drop everything, run over, and install his modem for him, he hung up. This morning, it was that he needed a shower..could he take one here? I reluctantly agreed, and guess who he brought with him??? T!!! So much for the break-up. Needless to say, he didn’t get to stay and take a shower. What on God‘s Green Earth am I doing here? How do you make these people go away?

Of course, I can be mad at him all I want, but the sad reality is that no one was holding a gun to my head, making me answer his stupid phone call. I need to know— does one ever get over this codependency crap, or am I doomed to be used by this person forever????

Sorry for the anger, but it is directed mainly at myself. I’m a weak idiot.

– Bird

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Seeing the Surface

Posted on by Standard 21

 

Today, I feel like a miner stuck underground after an explosion that cuts him off from the surface of the earth. I would imagine there is a terror that people might not know that you are still alive deep down under the earth, and the hope must feel horribly painful as you strain to hear signs of help. I would imagine that every sound is judged throughBig Wall Geology

 

that filter of hope, and dashed when no other sounds join the chorus to indicate someone was looking for you. I think time must pass by slowly, enjoying every cruel minute, prolonging the terror. You are not dead yet, but neither are you alive either. And like the voice of angels, you finally hear the sounds of help far away, and your hope rises again and falls again, for yes,  they are looking for you, but they had not found you yet. At last, you can see your help breaking through the crust of the earth, and though you are not out of the hole that has become your prison yet, you see that the odds are in your favor that you soon will be. That is how I feel today.

 

The ghosts of all I’ve been through are still here, lined up all around me. There is still pain, sorrow, grief…but there is a peace also with the acceptance that I’m getting ready to travel to the surface. There is a peace in wiping off the dust of this journey from my face and from my feet. There is rest and lodging and healing soon; I only need to be patient a little longer.

 

– Catherine

 

Why Should I Trust You Again? Then Again, Why Shouldn’t I?

Posted on by Standard 61
Aurora during a geomagnetic storm that was mos...

Aurora during a geomagnetic storm that was most likely caused by a coronal mass ejection from the Sun on 24 May 2010. Taken from the ISS. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today, I had to deal with my own trust in the Lord. He has never let me down even once, and yet, faced with fears of losing, or even just changing, something I find priceless, I found myself still trying to control the situation. Again, He directed me to Job 38. To me, it is kind of God’s Resume…

Job 38

New International Version(NIV)

Lightning bolts hitting Atlanta skyscrapers

Lightning bolts hitting Atlanta skyscrapers (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Lord Speaks

38 Then the Lord spoke to Job out of the storm. He said:

2 “Who is this that obscures my plans
with words without knowledge?
3 Brace yourself like a man;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.

4 “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
Tell me, if you understand.
5 Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?
6 On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone —
7 while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels[a] shouted for joy?

8 “Who shut up the sea behind doors
when it burst forth from the womb,
9 when I made the clouds its garment

Black-chinned Hummingbird -- Moab, Utah, USA

Black-chinned Hummingbird -- Moab, Utah, USA (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

and wrapped it in thick darkness,
10 when I fixed limits for it
and set its doors and bars in place,
11 when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther;

Pleiades (M45, Seven Sisters) open cluster - i...

Pleiades (M45, Seven Sisters) open cluster - infrared image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

here is where your proud waves halt’?

12 “Have you ever given orders to the morning,
or shown the dawn its place,
13 that it might take the earth by the edges
and shake the wicked out of it?
14 The earth takes shape like clay under a seal;
its features stand out like those of a garment.
15 The wicked are denied their light,
and their upraised arm is broken.

16 “Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea
or walked in the recesses of the deep?
17 Have the gates of death been shown to you?
Have you seen the gates of the deepest darkness?
18 Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?
Tell me, if you know all this.

19 “What is the way to the abode of light?
And where does darkness reside?
20 Can you take them to their places?
Do you know the paths to their dwellings?
21 Surely you know, for you were already born!
You have lived so many years!

22 “Have you entered the storehouses of the snow
or seen the storehouses of the hail,
23 which I reserve for times of trouble,
for days of war and battle?
24 What is the way to the place where the lightning is dispersed,

Job's Peak

Job's Peak (Photo credit: glenngould)

or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth?
25 Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,
and a path for the thunderstorm,
26 to water a land where no one lives,
an uninhabited desert,
27 to satisfy a desolate wasteland
and make it sprout with grass?
28 Does the rain have a father?
Who fathers the drops of dew?
29 From whose womb comes the ice?
Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens
30 when the waters become hard as stone,
when the surface of the deep is frozen?

31 “Can you bind the chains[b] of the Pleiades?
Can you loosen Orion’s belt?
32 Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons[c]
or lead out the Bear[d] with its cubs?
33 Do you know the laws of the heavens?
Can you set up God’s[e] dominion over the earth?

34 “Can you raise your voice to the clouds

The Earth seen from Apollo 17.

The Earth seen from Apollo 17. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

and cover yourself with a flood of water?
35 Do you send the lightning bolts on their way?
Do they report to you, ‘Here we are’?
36 Who gives the ibis wisdom[f]
or gives the rooster understanding?[g]
37 Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?
Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens
38 when the dust becomes hard
and the clods of earth stick together?

39 “Do you hunt the prey for the lioness
and satisfy the hunger of the lions
40 when they crouch in their dens
or lie in wait in a thicket?
41 Who provides food for the raven
when its young cry out to God
and wander about for lack of food?

My dad told me this story about when I was little:

“When you were little…about two or three, I’d say, I came home, and your mom was just tired. You’d talked her ears off all day. So, I said to myself, I’m just going to let her talk until she wears herself out. I said to you, ‘“Cathie, come here. We’re gonna talk.”’

A long time later, you were still going. I thought to myself, ‘” If I cover her mouth, her little rearend will blow right off.”’  Who knew I still wouldn’t be able to shut up, even today.

I’m sorry, Lord. You’re right. You have been the most trustworthy being in my entire life. I’m sorry that I am struggling with this doubt and fear. I will continue to trust that You know what is best for him, and for me. I will be quiet….even though my butt may blow off from the effort!!

– Catherine (Bird)

I’m A Casualty in my Husband’s War Against Time

Am I Happening To Other People?

Posted on by Standard 17

This evening, as I was driving home from having dinner with my daughter at my husband’s restaurant, I listened to a song that really made me think. I don’t know who sings it, or what its name was, but the jist of the lyrics was “Poor Me. Everything bad is always happening to me. And it is always someone else’s fault. Poor Me.” Those aren’t the actual words, only what the singer was trying to convey, and he wasn’t being funny, either.

I would imagine that for any person who has been the victim of a trauma that has been devastating, Poor Me is

Everyone Has A Story...

a pretty understandable reaction. And it was no different for me. It seemed in my late teens and early twenties that all kinds of bad things kept happening to me. I was being cheated on, served with papers for child support because my husband had gotten someone else pregnant, finding jobs working for complete assholes, being treated like an outsider by my family….the list goes on and on. And Poor Me was a pretty powerful excuse for trying whatever drug I felt like, or for starting an affair with someone. I mean, seriously. How can you blame poor molested me, right? Poor Me.

But, I had a real war waging inside of me. It seems that no matter what I did, or how I rationalized what I was doing, my conscience was relentless, refusing to acknowledge Poor Me at all. It was the realization that everything wasn’t just happening to me; I was happening to other people, that snapped me into my Fix Me mode. I had three kids to think of, and I needed to decide who I wanted them to see — Strong, Healthy Me or Poor Me. In the end, I wanted them to respect me, so Poor Me was going to have to go.

Therapy was a big, fat joke to me. I’m not saying it doesn’t work for other people, but for me, a guy sitting behind a desk encouraging me to blame other people for my bad behavior wasn’t what I was looking for. Was I affected by childhood issues and trauma? Yes. But the Blame Game came easy for me, so I didn’t need to pay someone to make me feel better about blaming everyone but myself. I have literally walked out of therapists offices based on the atmosphere of the waiting room, once because of lecture on billing procedures, and another time because of their waiting room reading material. Seriously. What can I say? I know when I’m wasting my time. I may have ESP…. One of them rubbed me the wrong way by merely starting off the conversation with a breathing exercise. I know how to breathe. Thank you for your time. I’m outta here…She sat in stunned silence when I grabbed my purse and split. No, therapy is not for me.

I have had one doctor now for 4 years, and he is just my regular doctor. He is the only one that earned enough trust in my mind to talk me into trying antidepressants. I was on them long enough to barely get them going in my blood stream before I threw them away. No way. This feeling is worse. In the end, I go to Jesus when things get rocky in my head, and He helps me through it…without drugs. But He is a pretty straightforward, no-nonsense Therapist. And that is really what I needed.

When I first seriously started dealing with fixing Poor Me, I had to look at what I was doing to those around me. For instance, my poor ex-husband. This man was a really nice guy. He did his very best to be a good husband — at first. But I knew when I married him that while I liked him okay, I didn’t love him. Not the kind of love that would last. But in my mind, I wanted to get on with life, and being married would probably make me more responsible about the things I did. Uh. Nope. Instead, I hitched this guy to my shooting star and took him down my painful paths with me. Yes, he cheated. But I had emotionally kept him away from myself, and he was lonely. I happened to him. I had no business trying to have a relationship back then, because I hadn’t done the work necessary to actually love a man the way a wife should. And he paid for it.

Jobs? I was always imagining that these employers were plotting against me. If I made one small mistake, my mind would panic, and to stay in control of the situation, I would defensively find reasons to hate them. Finally, when I have enough reasons built up in my mind, I’d quit. They always seemed surprised to see me go…but of course, I thought they were being insincere and phony. Again, I was happening to them…

I wish I could say I have a tiny list of these, but I don’t. I have negatively impacted a lot of people, and if you are one of them reading this, I hope I’ve said I was sorry to you. Most of them now I have addressed, and my conscience is resting comfortably for the moment. And because I have acknowledged my part in their pain, I’m now more careful to tread lightly on other people’s lives.

As long as we are on this earth, we are practicing living, and hopefully learning more about ourselves and the people around us. Even when it comes to the people who have caused the most harm to me personally, I have to try to see them a different way. For instance, who on God’s Green Earth would choose to be a child molester? They are the pariahs of our society, safe nowhere once their secret is out. And more than likely, that perversion was introduced into their lives at an impressionable time as well. They probably have a Poor Me story, same as mine.

I think we all have some level of Poor Me in all of us. And depending on the level of pain and anguish experienced by an individual, the more rooted that particular mind-set can be. We all heal at our own pace. But if I were to be able to take the hand of someone sincerely stuck in that horror of pain, and give them the road map I used to get out, it would be to let Poor Me go. Start fighting back when your mind goes skipping down roads to hell. You can only do it one decision at a time, but even if you fail two out of three times in a day, that one victory can really make a difference. Before you know it, you are re-training your mind to see things clearer. You’ll feel stronger, healthier. Some one asked me recently if I hate the person that hurt me. No. I don’t at all anymore. I can be angry at someone and not hate them. But even now, the anger is gone. I simply don’t care that much anymore. What’s done is done. Today is what matters.

I couldn’t do it 20 years ago, but I can now remember good things about him too. He was just broken, like me. He was something bad that happened to me. I forgive him. No, I don’t want to be friends with him, and I don’t want to pretend things that happened never did. But I’m not giving the devil that button to push anymore either. Jesus says that it is better to have a millstone hung around your neck, and be dropped in the deepest part of the ocean than to hinder His little children. If anything, I feel sorry for that man, because I would hate to have that little nugget from the Bible haunting my sleep at night!

I know this is kind of morose for me to write about, but once in a while I need to be reminded that we all are bouncing around on this earth, bumping and crashing into other people’s lives. We should take care to be gentle  with each other, as none of us are getting out of life without some scars….

– Bird