Wednesday, November 2, 2021

Departure Day Tomorrow

My heart is full of sorrow today. My head aches and I feel burdened by this world of details. Some days are just more difficult than others…

The days before a trip often find me harried and on edge but this time is particularly dizzying. My struggle is all knotted up with my grief. My sorrow swirls around me like a vortex of doom with so many layers threatening to undo me. It would be easy to slip within it’s diabolical web. I am tempted but God brings me a refuge, I discover, as my weary heart begins to sing Psalms 51 like a prayer.

Psalms 51:10-12

Create in me a clean heart, O God,

    and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

11 Cast me not from Thy presence, Lord

    Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.

12 Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation

    and renew a willing spirit within me.

Through my tears, I own how much I long for a reset. How I long for a willing, steadfast spirit, renewed within me. How I long for God’s redemptive power to be poured out to others through my weakness and through Him to receive it back myself.

I don’t feel hopeful or relieved but today I choose to believe anyway. I choose refuge from my swirling sorrow. I choose belief.

I believe You, Lord. I believe. 

So here I am. Send me.

Anne

Let our African Adventure begin…

Thursday, November 4, 2021

I board my first plane today @1045am and I arrive at my destination Friday @845pm…roughly 33 hours later. 

Some have said it’s too far to go and too short a time to stay. Some have wondered if the cost wouldn’t be better spent in other ways.  Some wonder why…

Those always thinking people need a fresh encounter with the power of relationship. 

My most cherished journeys are inextricably bound to those with whom I journey. Do not underestimate the power of connection in relationship. 

My plane ride, long as it is, is not wasted time. For me it is a time of preparation; of letting go of home and expectations and opening to all the possibilities ahead.

Take my fellow passenger seated just ahead of me. She is a tangle of incessant, uncomfortable talking with a hint of psychosis and a love of ‘bad words’. She was escorted onto the plane by the kindest, most compassionate man who reframed my whole experience of her. And then the Purser, apparently the Boss, came and patiently welcomed her like royalty. I had to wonder who she could possibly be until I heard her talking to Jesus and I knew. She is a child of the King, in an interesting package but a child nonetheless.

It’s then that I connected my dots. I was afraid of her at first, especially since I had just appropriated all her pillows, but the kindness of others opened me to the gift, to their power of connection. Their kindness calmed her and me.

It’s a part of why I travel. Loving others will transform the world, one connection at a time.

Anne

“Love difficult people. You are one of them”

I  got a skin check up from my dermatologist the other day. She lightly brushed my skin as she did her exam and I suddenly realized I had not been touched like that all year. The immediate tears in my eyes revealed my welling questions, kinda dumb but real nonetheless: Who will touch me now? Somehow that led into memories of dancing with Philip, and a follow up question: who will twirl me now?

Since Philip passed, I’ve often pictured myself dancing with him in my yard at midnight under the stars.

When we did dance, he would sometimes start slow and sweet but as soon as he felt the beat, we were off, sometimes frantically, twirling me with abandon, sometimes dropping me or throwing me into groomsmen but always locking eyes with me as I locked eyes with him, the one who chose to love me best on Earth. I did not have the stamina that he had but we both shared the unlimited, connecting joy together.

Tonight when I could not sleep, I got up to dance in the dark of my bedroom. I began with music from The Passenger that I ‘randomly’ found looking for something else on YouTube. It was as if it were sung by Philip, himself.

How many times can I tell you?

By The Passenger

You’re lovely just the way you are

Don’t let the world come and change you

Don’t let life break your heart

Don’t put on their mask, don’t wear their disguise

Don’t let them dim the light that shines in your eyes

If only you could love yourself the way that I love you

How many times can I say

You don’t have to change a thing

Don’t let the tide wash you away

Don’t let worry ever clip your wings

Discard what is fake, keep what is real

Pursue what you love, embrace how you feel

If only you could love yourself the way that I love you

And if you ever choose a road that leads nowhere

All alone and you can’t see right from wrong

And if you ever lose yourself out there

Come on home and I’ll sing you this song

So how many times can I tell you

You’re lovely just the way you are

Don’t let the world come and change you

Don’t let life break your heart.

~~

And if that weren’t lovely enough,  my phone followed up  ‘randomly” with music by Bethel Music. It was as if Jesus cut in on Philip and reminded me who wrote my song in the first place. And in so doing, He answered both of my dermatological questions spoken into fear.

We Dance

By Bethel Music

You steady me

Slow and sweet, we sway

Take the lead and I will follow

Finally ready now

To close my eyes and just believe

That You won’t lead me

Where You don’t go

When my faith gets tired

And my hope seems lost

You spin me round and round

And remind me of that song

The one You wrote for me

And we dance

And we dance

And I’ve been told

To pick up my sword

And fight for love

Little did I know

That Love had won for me

Here in Your arms

You still my heart again

And I breathe You in

Like I’ve never breathed ’till now

When my faith gets tired

And my hope seems lost

You spin me round and round

And remind me of that song

The one You wrote for me

And we dance

And we dance

And I will lock eyes

With the One who’s ransomed me

The One who gave me joy for mourning

And I will lock eyes

With the One who’s chosen me

The One who set my feet to dancing.

And I will lock eyes

With the One who’s ransomed me

The One who gave me joy for mourning

And I will lock eyes

With the One who’s chosen me

The One who set my feet to dancing.

We dance

We dance

We dance

We dance

Just You and me

It’s nice to know I’m not alone

I’ve found my home here in Your arms

It’s nice to know I’m not alone

I’ve found my home here in Your arms

It’s nice to know I’m not alone

I’ve found my home here in Your arms

It’s nice to know I’m not alone

I’ve found my home here in your arms.

~~

Dancing in the Dark to God’s handpicked playlist with His handpicked partners answering my questions as He sings over me…

Amazed and we’ll cared for,

Anne October 19, 2021. @midnight

“For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty Savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With His love, He will calm all your fears. He will sing over you with joyful songs.”

Zephaniah 3:17

I went to Haiti in 2010 after a long season of mourning. I shared my losses with the earthquake survivors’ losses and I did, indeed, find ‘a new vision and a new purpose’. And in so doing I was also blessed with a new understanding of Jesus when He said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive”. (Acts 20:35) The brilliant truth of this is that it is also in the giving that we do receive.

It is why God calls us to give ourselves away in His service so that He might make room for the receiving of Himself within us. 

I’m going to Tanzania in November with Developing Workers Global to take care of kids and their families with an extension to visit my college roommates in Amsterdam. 

It is time to ‘get on with it’ and take the next step in the giving circle put in place by God Himself: “For God so loved the world that He gave…”.

Anne

October 15, 2021

Early morning in Rocky Point brings the imperceptibility of sand to water and water to sky. All are shades of blue lavender tinged with the rising sun and distinguished only by their textures.

The cool water laughs on my feet with the quiet giggles that accompany a new day.

The beach reinvents itself as the captured water near shore makes a channel through the sand to the Sea and the tide goes out, securing the rhythm of life.

Anne

October 4, 2021

One of my 15 year old’s songs begins with a line that turns out to be from a poem: “even if you’re not ready for the day it cannot always be night.”

How appropriate on the night before we go to Rocky Point for the first time without Philip. I’ve been dreading it a bit but it can’t always be night even though I may not be ready for the day.  I’m going to face it head on, it’s going to be okay… might even be glorious.

Anne

October 2, 2021

SPEECH TO THE YOUNG, SPEECH TO THE PROGRESS-TOWARD

By Gwendolyn Brooks

  Say to them,

  say to the down-keepers,

3 the sun-slappers,

  the self-soilers,

  the harmony-hushers,

6 “Even if you are not ready for day it cannot always be night.”

  You will be right.

  For that is the hard home-run.

9 Live not for battles won.

Live not for the-end-of-the-song.

Live in the along.

The Progress Toward

October 5, 2021

Philip, you are everywhere.

On the early morning beach at sunrise just as the sun touches the beach with soft hues of awakening. You are in Jeff’s absent coffee in 712 SW. In our afternoon bocce, frisbee, baseball, body surfing. You are the anchor of the Patton’s Phil’s BARge as we gather round listening to Barry’s choice Rush tunes and float easily in our bonds of friendship. You are in the bold, distinct laughter of Casey that echos amid the pounding surf and in the deep sea fishing trip and dance party on the 7th floor fish fry. You are on the evening breezes as day closes with its triumphant blazing color and you continue to ring true in each of us as constant as the waves upon the shore.

I smile, truly, with profound gratitude at those who honor you but my mouth belies an equally strong current of unrest. I miss you. 

My heart continues it’s steady beat and, here in this place, it resounds with it’s repetitive no, no, no. I don’t want to be here…without you.

I am angry. I am tired. I am a hater. I hate that everything is about you yet I grasp at every memory of you as well.  I hate that I am mired in my sorrow and am unable to get past it. I hate that I am not rooted in gratitude for your well lived life when I am surrounded by  friends and family in this beautiful place of memories…

So I walk the beach at sunset and I open my hateful clenched fist, wide handed. I purposefully release part of you to the waters of Rocky Point and I hope, beyond hope. I hope to somehow be released from the shackle that my sorrow has become and be empowered to fully embrace my gratitude of what is, now; To embrace my progress toward and to live in the along.

Anne

October 5, 2021

A depth of foreboding sadness has followed me this past month, unrelenting, strength absorbing, leaving me in constant lament when I am alone. I sleep to assuage the burdensome immobility that results. Formless in the void it has made within me, I have searched for words to capture it but none have come.

Is this grieving? Or am I in trouble of losing myself in such a series of unfortunate events? 

I can pinpoint no discernible trigger though for triggers, there are many…  There’s the breakage: truck batteries, flat tires, refrigerator, freezer, grill, A/C, friends and family…

And there’s the flooring project: new flooring installed after 20 years. My workers have been kind and skilled but the prep has been overwhelming nonetheless. 

Today, at last, as the flooring project came to its end, I began to get it.

I am simply desperate for Philip.

It seems so obvious now but my confusing emotions have muddled it all up.

I am strong and more than capable to supervise this project and all the others but the fact, I now realize, is that I don’t want to. 

What I want is Philip by my side. 

Now there’s a trigger I can pinpoint,

Anne

September 28, 2021

As the birds flew over her head on this sunny day,  Bella, my 4-month-old puppy, started chasing their shadows as if they were bunnies, ears flopping in delight, excitement in her bounce.

It seems I’m chasing shadows these days, as well, only there’s very little bounce in my steps.

Today there are the shadows of a broken refrigerator freezer and a car that needs a jump to add to an already burdensome list.

There’s always something more isn’t there? A series of unfortunate events casting shadows on our well laid plans. 

And there’s the shadow of Philip, as usual. 

One of his favorite days of the year went by without notice, for a week. Opening day of dove season: an event in the Braudt household. The day he would take his sons out of school every year. Highly anticipated, intricately planned, every year for 26 years and it passed by without even a glimmer of a thought until today…And it bothers me that I could be distracted so easily from what was so dear to him. 

The first year after a death is supposed to be the hardest because of all the firsts you do without him. I know that but nobody ever mentions the firsts that come and go without a thought. Those are proving to be insidiously more dangerous to my lengthening series of unfortunate events.

I’m tired. The weather with all it’s brilliance lays like a heavy blanket of oppression. 

Some days I just want to be a shadow myself, blotted out by the cloudy sky for the time it takes for the sun to shine again.

Thank God  for the delight of a puppy breaking through my funk, if only for a moment, to remind me that His grace is sufficient for me even when it doesn’t feel like it.

Anne

September 12, 2021

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. [1]

Psalms 91:1

“When the night is holding on to me,

God is holding on”

King of my Heart by Sarah and John Mark McMillan

So I’ve been in a funk lately, really missing Philip, sorrow bubbling up. The thing is just as I give in to the sorrow, I am reminded that life’s challenges don’t take a vacation when you’re grieving. 

Grief’s sorrow, Breast cancer close to home again, family hunting accidents… It’s kind of funny that I found a house long crack in the foundation of my house yesterday; a bit of a metaphor for my life these days don’t you think?

Fortunately, there is only a crack in my emotional foundation. My true Foundation tells me that when it seems close to more than I can bear, it’s probably true but it is NOT more than He can handle. Another metaphor perhaps because He is the handle I am holding on to… good thing is though, I don’t need to hold on to Jesus because He’s already holding on to me in His sure and powerful double grip.

Life’s challenges meet my Jesus.

Anne

September 6, 2021

There are times I fear I lose myself

I don’t know who I am

I get caught up in the struggle and the strain

With my back against a stonewall

My finger in the dam

Losing strength and going down again…

John Denver’s To the Wild Country

I long for a simpler life. I took a deep dive into obstacles and stymies today; losing strength and going down again.

One task that turned into five more impossibilities followed by another and another. It was too much. Stopped me in my tracks, ransacking my get up and go, which got up and went in a decisive finger pulling from the dam flurry.

It is strange what sets me off; that which I approached with confidence and vigor turned so quickly into disillusionment and seemingly insurmountable dread.

“I should have known” I find myself repeating as if anticipating it would make it less harsh. 

I guess my life is rather simple: The pain of loss is the gift that keeps on giving.

Anne

August, 28, 2021