Love, Hurt and Gods Will

Where do you begin when you feel as though the world is crashing down around you and it will never be the same again because each moment of each day, every decision, or lack of decision changes the course of your life and the lives of everyone around you in one way or another forever? 

The tears today are pouring longer, harder and faster than they have in years. I feel so broken down knowing that things are rapidly changing, people are moving, others preparing to die, kids are growing up and nothing is the same today as it was yesterday and tomorrow things will be different than they were today. 

I don’t know how elderly people did it. They went from horses and buggy’s and corner stores and crops to cars, condos and chaos. They watched the King die and our Queen take over, they lived through oil lights and outhouses to TV, colored TV, and computers and phones and technology and for the most part they have all adapted to their new surroundings and faired rather well. They have watched senseless deaths, lost parents, siblings and children and as they age their friends drop off so quickly slapping them in the face with the realization that they are staring their own mortality in the face yet they manage to wake up each day and move forward. I envy that.

“Well your faith was strong but you needed proof”—Leonard Cohen

When Christmas came this year I was so not prepared. I literally had been up for several days and had gotten nothing done. After the holidays were over I crashed. I stayed home for nearly 8 weeks without leaving for any reason. Something in me changed this year. Maybe the realization that everyone has grown, maybe my realization that I have been so naïve all these years and listened to the church and the Bible instead of my own soul about things, or maybe it was just the fact that I know that these are moments we will never get back and that I am quickly aging and going nowhere fast.

Love is beautiful, it is painful, sad, happy, tragic and yet we crave it, we need to be loved and to give love in return because it’s those people whom we love that we can truly be ourselves around. You can break down and cry your heart out, you can say hurtful things and be forgiven before they escape your lips.

Love, real love, is unconditional, it is like a ring, it never ends, it goes on forever and ever and ever, even after the loved one exits the physical realm for the spiritual one.

Johnny cash says it best “love is a burning thing and it makes a fiery ring… I fell into the burning ring of fire I went down, down, down and the flames went higher…”

Does love hurt? You bet it does, but god it is worth it. The Bible tells us love is patient and is kind. I don’t know if I agree with that or not. After all, love proves to result in a lot of abuse and a lot of pain in many cases; does this make the love any less real? No, because we wouldn’t tolerate pain and suffering from those whom we don’t care for. Love is stupid, it is careless, it can be negligent. It is selfish and selfless. It is every emotion one can feel all rolled into one and that is why it is confusing and can cause so much pain. Even the best moments can hurt because that ring of fire burns hot, every single day of your life, and after the ones you love die the fire does not go out.

I have posed this question to many of you in the past, but I am thinking about it again now and figure I will put it out there, regardless of the fact that no one has an answer. Not a viable one anyway, only speculative.

I know that the first humans on earth, cavemen or whomever worshipped light. They scheduled their days and night by the sun and the moon and stars. They used fire to cook and they revered it. They knew the sun and the sky was responsible for their foods as they travelled about. So my question becomes, when did man put a face or a name to the fire/light that they worshipped and why? Was it self-proclamation that one was a god or was it far before that we began to pray and ask an unseen force for these gifts of life, offering sacrifices of thanks, to appease the gods, and as a way to pray. When and why did we make this leap from simplistic sun/light worship to giving it a face and a name? Did angels walk among us then in a far more obvious way then they do now? Anyone knows me would know that this question is driving me nuts because I like to know why. I understand faith; I understand believing with no proof other than what you know in your heart. I merely want to know how and when we made the jump.

Today, my heart was shattered and I fear that things will never be the same again. I know deep down that they won’t be, they can’t be. The house is gone, the yard is gone. Everything changes and as life moves forward I have come to realize that the only guarantee is death. Which is the one thing I want to control, I want to face on my terms, not on gods, not on doctors, but on my own. I want control of my death because I have never had control of my life.

Insha’Allah

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