Kindness in September

According to calendars and Starbuck's pumpkin spice latte availability, fall has officially arrived.

September is depressing when you live here. Day after day of ninety-something degree heat, and then factoring in humidity that adds insult to injury, summer is long and fights to the death to stick around.  The only sign I really have that the seasons are changing is the way the sun shines through my living room window.  It happens every September and nothing is more glorious than this autumn light.

See?  Glory.

When you live in the south, autumn is a season that you have to make yourself, something that must be created.  The other day, I put out all of my pumpkins, fall foliage and warm colored decorations.  The pillows were changed, the shelf above our TV got its seasonal face-lift and my kitchen was spruced up for the season reminding us of the themes of harvest, gratitude and thanksgiving.  Even my six-year old noticed it the moment he walked in after being gone.

"Yay!  It's fall!  I love when you decorate for fall.  It's so pretty!"

My decorations signal the things he has come to count on this time of year:  Pumpkin pie.  Our annual pumpkin carving party.  Being tortured at the pumpkin patch so I can get cute pictures. Dressing up for Halloween.  Getting in the car and possibly not getting third degree burns from sitting on black leather seats.  But even he knows, autumn is something we create, something we do and make together, because it certainly does not feel like fall.

If we don't usher it in ourselves, it's almost as if the season won't come. We are in the throes of Christmas and holiday cheer before autumn truly arrives with it's quietness in December.

I was actually reluctant to decorate for fall this year, which is unlike me.  Usually, I take things out before the month begins and start it off with all of my pumpkins and ritualistic September watching of You've Got Mail.  But I've been in something of a funk for longer than I care to admit. And I knew if I waited to decorate until I felt like it or was in the mood or the weather finally shifted and cooled here, I wouldn't be true to myself or what makes me who I am.

So I decorated out of hope, that my heart would follow me into autumn.

Last October, I completed a half-marathon.  It was one of the best and hardest and most fought for things I have ever done in my entire life.  The whole experience grew my faith and love for Jesus, but after it was over I didn't know what to do with myself. I had just experienced something huge for myself and for my faith, but I felt off and empty.  Two months later, Sarah's mom died.  I wasn't able to go to the funeral and I felt like I should have been there.  I coudn't make it work and I was lost in my grief of both losing her and that I had to be absent while those I loved honored her without me.  Sandy wasn't just my best friend's mom, she was my friend and a mother to me too. A routine check up at the end of the year, left me feeling shamed and humiliated by a nurse I didn't know well as my doctor was not able to be at my appointment.  Voices of accusation and lies about my identity and who I was, or rather who I wasn't, were loud that day and I believed every one of them.  After the new year, my RA became aggressive and very active again.  I both started and failed an intense diet where I had worked up the guts to see a doctor about it.  I started out brave and ended as a coward.  I'm still ashamed of myself.  Two months ago, I started a heavy medication which resulted in my husband needing a vasectomy.  We weren't necessarily planning on more children, but the finality of closing that door left an ache in my soul.  And then our church split and God called us to stay where we were.  And this world - I feel incredibly weighed down by current events, an overall darkness and sadness of the state of our world.

I can hardly breathe writing all of that out.  I've been spinning in all of these places, taking horrible care of myself and having little regard for what my heart, my body and my soul are needing.

The day the light came through my window and I sat in its familiar warmth and glow, I felt like I was able to calm down.  All of these things I have been living and believing and struggling with suddenly halted in a few quiet moments with the beauty my Savior gave to me.  I realized how I could always count on this moment to come.  This silly infatuation I have with the light and my window in September.  I count on it.  It always comes.  And how many things can we always count on?  How many things really don't ever change?

He doesn't.  He never changes.  Yesterday, today and forever.  Jesus is the same whether I'm training for a marathon or if I'm lazy on my couch.  He is same whether I choose to have a salad for lunch or a cheeseburger.  He is the same if my friend lives or if she dies, whether my disease is active or in remission.  Even if our world changes or grows darker or scarier - He is the same.  And I forgot this.  I forget His consistency.  I forget that He is faithful and unchanging and unwavering in His love and presence and affection for me.

I give my feelings more room and space than they deserve.  I give them so much power that they take over and dictate what I'll do, where I'll go and how I'll show up to others.  And for the last ten months, I've let my feelings rule my everything, forgetting how much they deceive me.

Maybe it's a silly analogy, but if I waited to decorate and usher in fall until it felt like it outside, I would miss the whole thing.  If I wait until I felt ready to pick myself back up again or when everything that felt out of place in my heart was tidied up, I might never get back up.

Sometimes you have to do things because it's time, not because it feels like it.  Sometimes you have to do what is necessary and trust that your heart and feelings will follow.

That's where I've been this week as I've made my green smoothies for breakfast.  Last year, it was a small and easy way to add greens and other nutrients to my diet and something I can easily do again that doesn't make me feel like I'm dieting or being punished for where I'm at right now.  I'm choosing to take the boys outside and walk the block and play in the sunshine in the afternoons, even if I'm slow and my back hurts from the weight I've gained.  I'm choosing water over soda and taking my vitamins.  I'm saying no to the things in church that I really want to say no to.  I'm being honest with my friends about where I've been and where I would like to be.  I'm discovering again who my really, real friends are - the ones that stick around after changes and hurts and awful church splits.  I'm accepting my husband's pursuits of me when he leans in to kiss me and invites me to intimacy.  I'm choosing to write over watching TV because I can't numb out when I'm writing since it's one of the places I feel the most alive in.  I'm choosing to cry and let feelings pass rather than inviting them to stay.

I often mistake violence for pleasure, and indulgence for need.  I'm discovering how to choose kindness for myself all over again.  It's amazing how quickly you can forget how to be kind to your own soul and body and heart.

I decided not to wait until I feel better or until I've somehow graduated out of this ten-month long funk.  I'm trusting the One who doesn't change.  The One who always sends magical sunshine through my windows in September.  The One whose kindness is so great, it leads me to repentance even if I don't feel like repenting.

That's the thing about God.  He can be found in every season.  I'm grateful where He reminds me of His faithfulness in something like autumn colored leaves - even if I bought them at a store and put them in a vase to look at.  I'm thankful for where He continues to invite me to Himself, using September skies lit up to remind me that He really is always there.

I am choosing kindness for myself, in hopes that my heart follows me into autumn.