The pages of my book

There are few people here who know more than I've lived in NC, NY and NZ. Some know I have siblings, and some have no clue at all. Some know my parents are alive, and some don't care. But few, very few, know anymore than the surface stuff. My life is an open book, I just hide it in the corner. It's not on the bestseller list, and you have to want to find me to locate the shelf I'm on.

The pages inside may be torn, ripped apart, burned, cut, splattered with ink, and just generally awful, but I'd like to think that the cover is beautiful and the binding is strong. I never said it would be easy to read my book, I just said it was open.

Lately there's been a lot of mourning, unloading and fear going around. The impending good-byes coming up have some people close to me really worked up. We're not meant to have to say good-bye. We aren't meant to have to deal with death. We weren't created for it. But unlike so many other things, it is now the certainty of life. We will forever be saying goodbye. And this particular person had to say goodbye to someone close to them at a very young age, and is now guarded because she knows that eventually, she will be saying goodbye to everyone else.

Another friend of mine is scared to open her heart because of a recent past relationship. She gets giddy around someone but is terrified about anything past that. She is scared to open her heart up for fear it might be hurt.

But what are we doing if all we are doing is guarding ourselves? What are we doing when we build walls to keep people and pain out? It's one thing to learn from the past, but it's another to lock up your future. (A reflection a little later: Sometimes blood, sweat, and pain paint the most beautiful pictures. Just look at what the blood on the cross bought: Salvation and Lives for those of us here on earth).

In the past week I've revealed deep parts of myself to two people here. stuff that most don't care about. Stuff that I don't bother revealing in most cases, because too often, people define you by your past or make judgements that are unjustified. No matter how much I don't define myself by what's written on the pages in my book, other people don't see it that way.

Some people turn to the current page and look at the picture and see a fat girl. (Someone actually asked me about my weight in the staff lounge a few weeks ago). But I see someone who does not define herself by how she looks. I see someone who worked hard to be okay with where she is so that she is emotionally healthy. Who works to be fit even if that means she's not skinny. And I'm okay with that. That doesn't mean other people are.

There are many chapters in my book that deal with the eating disorder I battled for 10 years. But you don't know that looking at me. You only see what is in the now. Not the pain and obsession and starvation that for so many years was my life. And that's okay. You don't need to see everything. But you need to understand that every mark, line, color and gold lining on my cover comes from somewhere.

Every word in my book, has become some part of that cover. Whether it's the chapter dealing with depression or rape or sickness or love or moving to New Zealand, there is some aspect of it on the cover. It may just be the background that taints everything and makes the bright stuff look brighter, or it may just be the feather on the wing of the bird flying in the corner, but it's all there; somewhere.

So while the pages of my book may be awful and intimidating and scary looking and sometimes overbearing, it has made me into something with a beautiful cover. How hate and fear and depression turn into beauty, I don't know. All I know is that it is the grace of our God that has turned ink stains into beauty, and I pray that it never stops. That every little thing that comes my way, and every big thing that comes my way, and every person, just goes to making the picture brighter, more colorful, and more full of our Lord.