Friday, December 30, 2011

My Spock Mode had a glitch yesterday....

Here's where the problem is NOT:

I know that my circumstances are exactly in line with what God has planned. He is never late; nor is He early. He arrives precisely when He means to, as do all of His blessings (including the ones that seem like trials).

I have no problem trusting that. The bigger picture of my life and the timeline are all taken care of. I'm letting HIM worry about that one. So what is it?

I certainly have no problem with His plan. I mean, He's GOD. He's working all things for my GOOD. Anger? No, I don't get angry at God. Like I said, sometimes the good things seem like bad ones but it's just because of forced perspective. It'll make more sense later, when life has given us a few different angles to view from. HE knows that they're good. So that's not it either. So what is it?

Funny how a scent can not only remind you of a place or person but of the state of mind you were in the last time you smelled it. Apparently I was using Midnight Pomegranate five years ago in conjunction with a certain budding relationship. Even as it failed to bloom and gradually withered, I had hope. I had SO. MUCH. HOPE. This is right. This is good. This will work out eventually. This is REAL. This is why people get married. This is what I've been looking for. It could really happen to me!

I came in contact with that smell yesterday at the mall. It was kind of heartbreaking because I was so aware of how long I've been devoid of that particular brand of hope. I have hope for my future with Christ. I have hope that He knows what He's doing. I have hope for seeing the glorious bigger picture one day and am trying just to faithfully live out the daily pieces until then. But hope for things not promised, never guaranteed, and thus far, always disappointing? No. I've lost that hope. Why waste the mental energy on something God's got under His control, something over which I have even LESS control than other things in my life, something that might be after all only a dream that fades into the mist?

But I pitied myself last night for not having what other people have. How illogical! I think it wasn't even envy of their station, what they have, what they have coming... I think it might just be that sometimes the good news of others stirs too violently the memories and brings back the emotional turmoil of when I cared too much about it. Of when I hadn't found peace for where I am now. And it thrusts at my face the reminder that still time goes on. These years of my life, a season of life and youth commonly spent in union with another, are already gone. Never to be shared.

So? They were years I needed to spend alone. I could not be the person I need to be without that time. Yet on days like yesterday, I still want to mourn the perceived loss.

So I think the problem is not envy of what I don't have but a grieving of what I can never give.

Somehow it was all too much yesterday and Spock took a leave of absence.

Now I'm just... sad.