Cum se cum sa

Translated from French, it means "like this, like that", or the more familiar English phrase "so-so". Often accompanied by a shrug, it is the only way I really know how to answer that nagging introductory questions we Midwesterners always ask after we say hello to someone, "How are you?" How am I? Well, at the moment, I woke up from a nightmare and I'm brooding. Do you really want me to say that? Or should I just say the obligatory, "Fine"?

I sit and watch the wheat grass wave in the sunset, all lavender and pink, and my heart breaks for beauty, and I cry for that.

I hear of a friend's consuming troubles and sleep that night through nightmares of all kinds, waking at six o'clock to calm my nerves. And there are the misty hills, all lavender too,  floating in the morning mist. A verse springs to mind: let my teaching fall like rain and my words descend like dew, like showers on new grass, like abundant rain on tender plants. (Deuteronomy 32:2) I grab my Bible and go out to my porch swing and read the other verse when God compares the morning mist to our love for Him - fleeting and quickly disappearing (Hosea 6:4). Is my love for Him fleeting? Is this why the rollercoaster of emotion?

Five months ago, my eyes were dead, my laugh was silent and my heart was dry. Today I can laugh - belly laugh - enjoy hours on end without any numbness, silence, or tears. A sure sign I am getting better.

I praise God for the capability, in the midst of PTSD and depression, to enjoy life. While my social anxiety gets worse in large groups, I hide behind my camera and capture the beauty and joy to look at again later, when I am calm.

The brother who didn't know if he'd ever be a father holds his double blessing, like Job, and I wait for mine. I see signs of it's coming: a job offer better than I hoped for, writing up my dissertation, being capable of homeschooling the kids through it all, retreating less into self.

There are times I am just tired, and my eyes are dry again, although my heart aches. I sit in my swing in the last breath of twilight, and hear the lone cricket singing his last serenade of the night, all others silenced by the autumn, quietness beginning to blanket the black earth as it prepares for snow. The trees rustle with their bright, dead leaves, and the last pink of sunset is barely visible above the hills across the valley. I cry again, for all this beauty, and wonder at my tears.

It won't be easy,

you'll think it strange

when I try to explain how I feel

That I still need your love

after all that I've done

The truth is I never left you 

All through my wild days 

My mad existence I kept my promise 

Don't keep your distance 

 And as for fortune and as for fame 

I never invited them in 

Though it seemed to the world 

They were all I desired 

They are illusions 

They're not the solutions 

They promise to be 

The answer was here all the time 

I love you and hope you love me

(don't ask me why, the song, "Don't Cry for Me Argentina" comes to mind as I write this.)