sorted

Have you ever had the sensation of watching yourself fall in a dream, and not being able to do a thing to stop it? I have. You're falling, you're falling, you're searching frantically for anything that might save you, there's no one to catch you, nothing to break your fall. When you realize this, the reality of your situation comes into focus: there will be impact. And seconds before you hit the ground at top speed, your acceptance comes, crystallizing into one last lucid thought before your inevitable annihilation.

This is gonna hurt.


Last year, in my life, the proverbial other shoe dropped. I generally try to approach things from a positive perspective. But I am here to tell you, those months were the scariest of my life, and I wasn't sure I'd survive them intact. During the day, I stayed busy, had lunch with friends, took care of the WP, wore my bravest face. But at night, when everything was quiet and it was dark, I really struggled. I didn't always handle myself with grace and serenity. Sometimes I was angry and edgy and withdrawn from people I love. I prayed a lot. I often felt alone. And tired. And white-knuckle scared. It hurt like hell.

More conventional wisdom: This, too, shall pass. But will there be anything left of me by then?

Another friend of mine saw me a couple of months into my freefall. I gave him the brave face. He cut right through it. "You look tired." Uh, thanks, man. Appreciate it. But he did share something that stayed with me. A trapeze artist, he explained, has to completely let go of the bar she's on, in order to catch the bar that's coming towards her. If she grips too tightly, of course, she'll miss the approaching bar as it swings her way. In between, there's that moment in which she's got nothing to hold on to. If she doesn't catch what's coming, she'll fall and die. But it's in that moment in between that she's flying. (This guy never met a metaphor he didn't like. Name the situation, and this cat has a metaphor. I tease him relentlessly.)

Pretty good imagery for someone in between bars, though. Of course, you have to assume that a trapeze artist can at least see the next bar coming. If I was the trapeze artist in this scenario, then fine, but to me, it felt like I was doing my act in the dark, and with no visual lock on the next swing, no assurance that it was actually coming. Sometimes it really felt like I would hit the ground and liquefy. But I didn't. The swing eventually came. The bar swung my way, just as my friend had always known it would. And the time in between, the terror and sadness and emotional exhaustion, every one of those days spent suspended in air was teaching me about faith, how little I had and how much I had.

Suddenly, the freefall was over. There. Sorted. And with that resolution, a wave of gratitude that I can't put into words.

I tell this story partly to share my experience, but mostly, I tell it in order to provide some context for my expression of profound gratitude and joy that a friend of mine recently caught a bar that swung her way. She remained suspended in air twice as long as I did, and during that time, lost a parent, had health concerns about a family member, stayed up nights with financial worries, and fought off despair as hard as she could. Hopelessness was imminent. You could see in her face how hard she had to work to stay brave. She had a really long and scary freefall. I, like her other friends, tried to be supportive and love her through it, but none of us could take away her fear and pain. Damn it.

But out of the blue, she caught the next bar, a really gorgeous, fantastic break that no one saw coming. From out of nowhere it came, and presto, she caught it. There. Sorted!

So really, this long story ends with a prayer of gratitude...for the next swing, of course, but also for the time in between, the scary time, the dark time, the repeated-steel-toed-boot-to-the-gut time, because that's where the grace lies waiting, and all the lessons are learned.