The shape of my eye changed because of a physical hardship: I hit a toilet with my head, with my eyes open, and my eyeball got smashed. I don't know yet if the effects are permanent, but I do know one thing: it has changed my focus. Literally. I focus my camera just as I always have, but because the "perspective" in my eye itself has changed, what I see looks...different. There is more blur. Almost like I am less attached to the subject. Yet more art?
I've admired a few photographers for years: the one I love most is Amy Glover, first a professional alliance, then friend, then the woman who discipled me, and now fellow artist. The allegory between art and soul is so complete, it's almost too good to be true. Just as I've followed the "perspective" of her soul, that complete lack of anchor to the here and now, the throwing of herself completely toward heaven, laying up treasure only there...now I also follow her art, and see things in her photos I try to emulate, to this point very unsuccessfully.
Just as her life conformed to Christ through searing loss, so Christ draws me closer through all these trials that He says to count as joy. My eye changes shape, and headaches persist, and I am brought to my knees. But here, on my knees through the very results of this painful event - hitting that toilet with my skull - I am changed and the treasures I lay up here are less, and the treasures I lay up there are more. It even shows in my photos: a blurriness, lightness, whiteness, that wasn't there before. It's not something I could do by myself. I tried and tried.
Here, on this terra firma, toilets collide with heads and eyes are smashed and blood vessels explode; brains are infected, and electricity goes wild, and seizures steal synapses (moth and rust destroys, and thieves break in and steal). Even on this cursed clod, I see His redemption as He shows me beauty through the smashed eye and in the seizing girl and the life of chaos and calamity. Yet, in heaven, with each day of bent knee and bowed head, with each day of silently acquiescing and calmly submitting, the rubies there in heaven pile up (where moth and rust do not destroy, and thieves cannot break in and steal). Whether it is
not cursing the pharmacist who dispensed the wrong medication and caused my blood pressure to drop and my head to hit that enameled toilet tank;
admitting I failed my comprehensive exam because I didn't write well enough and refusing to resent a committee that did me justice;
praising God for each of the 1,000+ days I've had with Amelia as I scoop vomit from her throat and beg that she be spared, refusing to curse Him for allowing this seizure, this pain...
I send my heart to heaven along with the treasure I lay up there. I loose my hold on earth and eyesight, dreams and jobs, children entrusted for now to my care, and children I dream of someday caring for. He knows, and He knows best. I only see darkly, as through glass. I thank God for the times He gently changes my perspective through days and weeks spent quiet in study; and for the times He sends change abruptly, through emergencies and sudden events.
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I completely realize that I was wrong yesterday. Apparently, I still need to write, even in a week packed with academic work. :-)
