500 Days of Summer is a hard movie for me to watch (ever but especially) right now (everyone feels this way because everyone has been Summer and everyone has been Tom); particularly the scene where Summer and Tom are at the movie watching the scene of the bride and groom waving enthusiastically behind them as they drive away. In the scene, they turn around and sit forward--literally facing their future and driving away from their past--and you can see the excitement and happiness drain from their expressions. Their faces become tense and almost sick. You can see the panicked questions etched above their heads: What have I done? What happens now? Where am I going to? They don't touch, don't glance at each other. They are so newly united, so freshly waved goodbye, then the horror of permanency sets in and they are more alone than ever before. Summer, watching the movie (meta!) weeps and later when Tom asks her why she refuses to tell him. I felt like I might know. I remembered the chapter in Persepolis as well where Marjane gets married and described it as a door slamming shut. The comic showed her peeking out between bars of a cell.
These are the kinds of thoughts that plague me. They appeal to me because they feed my ugliest fears, they have elements of tragedy and drama that are tantalizing in their hideousness. These thoughts hurt me, they are cloying, they are based in deep wounds. As my anxiety has been increasing, I find myself more susceptible to cynicism and fatalism than I have been in months. It's been rough. It's not my best self. The other day I was driving, and this magical thought occurred to me: Why am I dooming my relationship to inevitable misery? Why don't I fight for it? Why am I giving up now, in my mind? I know Jonathan, and I know he will always fight with me. One of the reasons I respected him and found him so trustworthy at the beginning was how he advocated for choice. He helped me see the truth about myself, about situations I'd been in that I'd learned to describe in pretty cobwebby ways, as though I and the other poor players were mere puppets controlled by our emotions. He schools his feelings, I let passion shatter reason's tower. We've both helped each other change in that regard. I can't speak for him, but I know the changes in me have been infinitely right. He loved me for "having a lot of feelings" but he also expected things out of me, held me accountable in ways that others hadn't. Those things I learned from him, that spun my world out of control at the beginning, are what I am leaning on now to help me recognize how silly I am (my tendencies, my dysthymia). My life won't be ripped from my grasp--I have it in my hands always. Jonathan and I are the creators of our home, our family, our relationship. It doesn't really matter what other people's experiences have been. I can make something destructive, crumbling selfish and small, or I can make something beautiful out of this. That's my best self. My best self is faithful and grateful. So thankful for the sweetest moments imaginable. Like today: we went to Northampton with Katie to take bridals and we saw each other dressed up in wedding finery and my knees shook because I felt so humbled by this, why would I ever be disdainful of such a blessing? I love Jonathan so much. He is so good. I get annoyed because he likes to be John Marsden and whoever he'll be in Starcraft 2 but when I listen to him talk about Christ and pull out the center and the intentions of any form of communication while I wander around in the wilderness of detail, I am amazed. He understands about the People and lifting the hands that hang down. I really believe we're going to do great things together. So when we wave goodbye to the celebration and turn around, I want to look up into his face and be glad together about the opportunities we have to do good. That's all we are here for, not to fret about shallow things. We're here to follow Christ and to love the loveless, and to love each other. So instead of a door slamming shut, it will be a door springing open, like he told me once. I'm excited about walking through that door. There is nowhere else I would rather be.
4 comments:
Rachel! Thats the sweetest thing I've ever read. Also, it's insanely comforting to know that aside from occasionally feeling like your world is caving it, you are willing to see that it isn't necessarily true. We are the masters of our destiny, our choices will form our lives! Lets be good together!
Rachel That is awesome. Im so excited for you guys
(third time is the charm)
Rachel my love your thought and writing sounds much like what i to was going through right before marriage.
Secure and confident in your choice of a partner, yet struggling with the world's view of marriage as an institution- chalk full with it's unfavorable statistics etc.
I also battled that i was giving in, getting married to young, loosing a part of myself, not knowing how many compromises are healthy or hindering.
One day it hit me that i was more scared of marriage because what the world told me than i was about the man i choose or the support system the church provides us to succeed.
Take the time you fret over the "if's, what's, and how's" and create them into questions of how can i show him i love him more than life itself? what can we do together to strengthen our marriage? and How can we become the strongest couple in the world so we can fulfill the mission the lord has in store for you two.
Because believe me, he has BIG plans for the two of you.
BIG. HUGE. Think MEGA-HUGE plans.
i'm just sure of it.
okay, stick with me for this one. i'm gonna have to explain...
i am re-reading "the hiding place" right now. last night i read the part about corrie asking her father what "sexsin" (haha) was. when i read this i thought of you (and me, and all the others like us):
"'Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger you can bear it. For now, you must trust me to carry it for you.' And I was satisfied. More than satisfied-- wonderfully at peace. There were answers to this and all my hard questions-- for now I was content to leave them in my father's keeping." pg. 27
so i get that the feelings of your post likely do not directly relate to some of the feelings and questions we have shared and talked about, and i know the corrie ten boom quote doesn't fit perfectly, but somehow to me, it still applies.
the truth we have felt--whether it be about the gospel, womanhood, marriage, etc.-- those beautiful, shining moments of gold and peace, those are the things that are worth clinging to. those are the times that our souls are seeing clearly and we are moving in the right direction. when other stuff creeps in, and that confusing pit starts to form in your stomach, and you start to question the direction you are headed, even though you may have just barely been in one of those golden "knowing" places, that is when you (and i) have to make the choice to let our Father carry those things, to know that there are answers to all our hard questions, that little by little the confusion will dissipate and all that will be left is the truth. but until that, we hold on to the glimmers of gold that we have-- that you and jonathan are beautiful together, meant to be together, and that if you work at it, you will create a lifetime of happiness while slowly chipping away the confusing stuff to reveal the golden underneath--and leave the rest in our Father's keeping until the time comes for all our questions to be answered.
this makes more sense in my head. but i think you will understand what i am getting at. i love you, dear rachel, and am so happy for you to find out how incredible being married to your best friend really is. there is nothing better. nothing at all. and you will be so happy and you won't feel empty. hold on to the moments where you know. let the rest go, and move forward. so excited for you guys!
Post a Comment