Dream of my Heart

The dream was always running ahead of me. To catch up, to live for a moment in unison with it, that was the miracle.
Anais Nin

Every once in a while I think I come close to catching the dream. Just when I think I might be able to grab it, it speeds up and stays just outside my reach. There are times I get discouraged even when others think I'm being patient. Sometimes I'm so sure about the dream and other times it disappears like smoke from a candle. I thought I could feel it on my fingertips today but I guess I was wrong.

I really need a miracle.

Turning the Corner

Today is my mother's birthday,and the day she died two years ago. I miss her. Many of the ways I respond on the inside can be traced back directly to both my parents. The way I see myself was created by their words, looks, and actions when I was a child. But I'm not a child anymore and it's time to make some changes. I believe I've made a good start and I offer these thoughts as an example of those changes.

I'm going to Summer Nationals in one week. I will be fencing in the veteran women's epee and as part of a women's epee team. In the team event there are four members on each team, three who fence and one who is the alternate. My coach has been watching us fence each other for the past 2-3 weeks in order to determine who should be the alternate. My fencing hasn't been my best recently and I'm afraid it's going to be me. I'm afraid enough that I've been having dreams about it for the past 2 nights.

Tonight we are supposed to find out what the Coach has decided. My stomach has butterflies even as I write this but I wanted to write about it because if it happens that I'm the alternate, I want to accept it gracefully and without abusing myself like I would have in the past. I don't need the voices in my head that say I'm no good and never will be. I refuse to accept the label I was given in my past, by myself and others, that I am inadequate and somehow defective.

I believe I am a good fencer who doesn't always fence as good as I could when it's for competition. Once we start keeping score or my Coach watches me in order to critique my fencing, my skill level drops. I think what makes the difference between good fencers and great fencers is whether or not they can perform under pressure. Until just recently, I would have said that it will always be that way with me but I think I have turned some sort of "corner". I refuse to let anyone, most of all myself, tell me I'm inadequate. I refuse to spend the rest of my life beating myself up when I don't win, even though I have done my best.

I'm a good fencer...and I'm going to be a great fencer because I have what it takes and I won't let anyone, including myself, abuse or bully me anymore. And if it turns out that I am the alternate, I'll be the BEST damn alternate... because I say so!

A Difficult Week

Today started a difficult week for me. Today is my father's birthday and he would have been 80 years old if he hadn't died of an inoperable brain tumor at the age of 66. I learned about my father's brain tumor when I went to my high school reunion and ran into an old friend who told me she was sorry about my father. I didn't know what she was talking about until she explained to me about the cancer. My mother called me the night he was dying, but only because my aunt pushed her into it. I got to the house 45 minutes after he had died. I hadn't seen him in well over 15 years. I hardly recognized him. He died on the 29th of June.

My mother's birthday is the 27th of June...5 days after my fathers birthday and 2 days before he died. It will be 2 years since she died...on her birthday. My mother had osteogenesis imperfecta which made her bones very,very brittle. Her first broken bone was at the age of 2 weeks. They made a splint for her leg out of half a tongue depressor. I found it when I was cleaning out my mothers jewelry box. From November of 2003, to the day she died in June of 2004, she suffered 2 broken shoulder blades and a major stroke that left her unable to speak, read or write, but able to understand everything. She was just starting to work with the speech therapist and was excited about the things she was learning to write again when she fell and broke her hip. She died of apparent sepsis that they could not stop. She died between 3:00 am and 3:07 am...the only time all of us had dozed off the whole time we were with her in the hospital that weekend.

Despite the painful relationship, or lack of relationship, we had with each other over the years, I miss them both. I tried to be a good daughter and I'm sure they tried to be good parents. We just weren't able to put our differences aside and we've all just had to live with the sadness of that.

My Views

I've been thinking lately about the controversy in the Episcopal Church. There are obviously people on both sides of the issues who feel very strongly about their beliefs and their interpretations of scripture. I suspect there are quite a few who fall in between that don't know exactly what to believe or who to believe.

I have no doubt that everyone from most "liberal" to most "conservative" (or as I prefer to see them as most "contemporary" to most "traditional") are well meaning and would prefer that this controversy didn't exist...but it does.

I read a very good book called, "Church History in Plain Language" by Bruce Shelley. It's obviously written to be an enjoyable read that doesn't go too deep into any one issue. It's mostly an overview that allows the reader to get a broad view of church history without any obvious bias.

I learned two things from that book. One is that each sentence could be expanded into volumes of information and that most of us only touch the surface of what there is to know. The other thing I learned (or was reminded of) was the fact that the church is a living thing and change has been it's history since the beginning of time. Just because I live in the present day where I see things as pretty settled, the fact is, what we have now will continue to evolve and change. Someone in the future will look back and see the changes we can't see now.

So, in regards to the Episcopal Church, maybe what's happening isn't a bad thing. Perhaps what needs to happen is for the most contemporary and the most traditional to separate. The separation would give people on both sides a place to go where they can feel more comfortable. If all those involved wanted the best for each other, concessions could be made in regards to finances, property, and clergy status.

The only other option is discord between God's people, which doesn't benefit anyone, especially those "unchurched" people out there who are looking for a place to learn about and experience God in their lives.

Change isn't a bad thing sometimes and, as history has shown, without change in the past the Episcopal Church as we know it wouldn't even exist today. However, the change doesn't have to be damaging if those involved remember that Jesus died for ALL, not just the traditional and not just the contemporary.

A True Winner

Kyle Maynard was born March 24, 1986 with a rare disorder called, “Congenital Amputation,” leaving him with three joints; a neck and two shoulders. He has no elbows or knees. He measures just over 3 feet tall and weighs approximately 120 pounds. Despite his physical differences, Kyle was one of the top high school wrestlers in Georgia during his senior season. He qualified for and competed in the 2004 Georgia High School Wrestling Championships. Also, he narrowly missed All-American status at the NHSCA Senior National Wrestling Championships.

However, as impressive as his academic and sport accomplishments are, it is Kyle’s attitude towards life that makes Kyle a truly unique person. Kyle does not think in terms of limitations, but only in accomplishments. One of Kyle’s favorite sayings is, “It's not what I can do; it's what I WILL do.”

I saw a story on TV recently (I think it was on Oprah) about this young man. When I think I've done something special by fencing when I'm tired, or my back and leg hurts, or even changing hands to fence left-handed while recovering from surgery on my right shoulder, I know it is nothing compared to what this man has done.

What impresses me the most about him isn't what he's done despite his physical limitations (if they even are limitations to him). When he decided to take up wrestling, he apparently lost one match after another. But instead of giving up, he persisted and eventually became a consistent winner. I understand what it's like to lose more than win at competitions. I hope I have the perserverence he had.

In the game of life, what makes a winner? Is it the medals won or the character developed by not giving up?

www.kmaynard.com

This Spoke to Me

The Journey

One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice--though the whole house began to tremble and you felt the old tug at your ankles."Mend my life!"each voice cried. But you didn't stop.You knew what you had to do, though the wind pried with its stiff fingers at the very foundations, though their melancholy was terrible. It was already late enough, and a wild night, and the road full of fallen branches and stones. But little by little, as you left their voices behind, the stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds, and there was a new voice which you slowly recognized as your own, that kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world, determined to do the only thing you could do--determined to save the only life you could save.

Mary Oliver

Murphy's Law of Words

Words... talking, discussing, arguing, reporting, questioning...on and on and on. I'm tired of words. I'm tired of the endless discussions and arguments that go on in the world, mostly about things that will never change or get better. I hate the inane speculations about which "star" is pregnant now and all the follow-up reports after the birth about the "bling" the baby is getting. Can you say diamond studded pacifier?? What happened to the starving children in Africa??

There are words I never tire of hearing, and in fact, I need to hear them. I need to hear that I am cared about. I need to hear words that tell me that I look nice. I need to hear words that let me know that I am seen as capable, competent, trustworthy, kind, thoughtful and caring. I need words that tell me I am loved.

Here's the twist...the one I need to hear these things from is the least likely to say them. Damn that Murphy!

Old Wounds

Yesterday I was talking with a friend about my fencing. I was saying how difficult it is sometimes to take everything I've learned and do them all together at one time while fencing. The hardest habit for me to break is charging in on an attack even though the other person's blade is pointed right on me. It's as if the other person's attack on me is the "green light" for me to attack back, without getting their blade out of the way. This usually leads to a touch scored against me and a large bruise from my running into their point.

My friend likened it to being a "bull in a china shop". Unknown to him, that was one of the many things I heard as a child that was demeaning and hurtful. All the hurt and feelings of shame just exploded to the surface when he said that to me. Then the tears came and made us both feel bad.

You know, the truth is sometimes I am clumsy,impulsive and bull-headed but it still hurts to remember hearing it as a child. It makes hearing it as an adult more hurtful than it should be at my age. I'm amazed sometimes how fragile old wounds are and how easily they are reopened.