End of year post, aka good riddance, 2020
It feels good to close the door on this year. Holy crap. It was a decidedly horrid year. And now it is in its waning moments. This was the year I ran out of everything. It was like the world stopped. A lot of people know what I'm talking about. Suicides went off the charts. Drug and alcohol abuse soared. People lost hope. And we got to see what the new world order looks like. Will next year be better? We can only hope. And pray. And pray some more. Heads up: this is a long post. Kinda hard to sum up this disastrous year with few words.
I close this year with a confession of error. I was wrong about something very important to me, something which I sought God about literally thousands of times (or, it is possible I was simply unable to do what God told me to do, but the outcome is the same). I am beyond humbled. My consolation is everything was submitted to God long ago. This thing needs more prayer because I'm not settled in my understanding. I have an easier time accepting the explanation that I could not do what God told me to do instead of being in error. But, either way, I want to know. So, I pray. UPDATE: The more I pray about this, the more I feel God is saying I didn't do what He told me to do. I have a folder an inch thick in which I documented many times I fasted and prayed and prayed and prayed some more and what I thought God told me as a result, spanning years. So, my updated statement is I was to blame, but not for what I believed God told me but, rather, what I wasn't able to do. God brought to mind specific instances when I was unable to do what He told me to do. So, the failure is mine. Still, it was one of the hardest things I've ever done, and to do as well as I did was a miracle. Selah.
It seems appropriate to end this year with some prayers, as it was a very prayerful year. I won't be out celebrating, drinking, toasting, merry-making, whatever. I'll be sitting at home, going to bed early, and ending my day with prayer and reading my Bible as always. I pray for my friend Cindy that God will give her the desires of her heart and restore the years the locusts have eaten 100 fold, if that is His will, and however He sees fit. I pray God's will for all our lives. For myself, my prayer is I am faithful. I humbled myself for years seeking Him and have no idea where I went wrong. If I don't have God, I have nothing. If I can't hear His voice, I have no reason to live. He hears me and has not forsaken me, but have I heard Him? Have I forsaken Him? Those are unbearable questions. I pray for my son that he would dutifully follow the Lord's leading. I pray for my nation constantly, as we are on the brink of disaster. God's heavy hand of judgement is upon us. I pray for mercy.
This year brought more tumult in my life (though admittedly not as much tumult as many experienced). I stopped taking college courses (which I opted to restart late in 2019 when I needed something to occupy my time). Then, my position at work was eliminated, and I had to take a different, more stressful job, a job for which I am unprepared every day. I had to let go of so much, my head is still spinning. But there were blessings, too.
My son grew tremendously. I saw him tackle multiple 5-mile hikes in moderate terrain (that is us above, hiking the Hell Canyon Trail the day after Thanksgiving with one of my brothers and his family). His energy and enthusiasm are rare. He meets obstacles head-on. And God put in his heart a great desire to see everyone saved. He often asks his friends and even cashiers at stores if they are Christians, ready to witness. I didn't put that desire in him; God did. I pray he is faithful to follow God's plan for his life. And I pray I am a better father. And God would bless us all wherever we go after leaving this place. He said out of the blue one day he'd like a brother and sister. I may not be able to give him fleshy siblings, but perhaps God will give him many spiritual brothers and sisters. On the downside, my son got into more trouble at school in half a year of kindergarten than I did in all my years of education. He's also a lot smarter than I ever was, but he clearly has things to work on.
I need to take a trip one of these weekends and get away, perhaps to a place I wrote about before. Something is still undiscovered there, some secret left behind, buried. I feel only partially satisfied with the answers I got my last two trips. I was a very smart and wise-beyond-his-years kid. I made the decisions I made for good reasons. Something doesn't add up. Parts of my memory are missing, and many questions remain. And, I would really like to take a bath! It would be worth it just to take a bath, I think. Also, I would like to visit that town in every season, so I need to make at least two more trips (fall and winter). Something to look forward to. That's important.
Earlier this year, I stated I would be ending this blog and wrapping up loose ends (of which there are none, as everyone saw how things went down). That was my intention. However, in light of recent realizations, I must use this space for continued therapy. But pardon me if I take a break. So my updated statement is I reserve this space for my therapy, even though the main themes I dwelt on are wrapped up. I intend to go forward, whatever that means. Given how wrong I was about some things, I have much to figure out.
I mentioned my son growing a lot this year. What else was good about 2020? Strange as it may be, and equally useless to me (hey, that rhymes), my sex drive returned. It is a useless occurrence since I don't have a woman to share my bed with, but it means perhaps I'm recovering in the heart area, which is allowing the rest of me to heal, too. It is conjecture. I don't know why it came back. But I wake in the night often with a reminder that everything works. And life goes on. What is that quote? "In three words I can sum up what I've learned about life: it goes on." The sex drive obviously doesn't have to be used for sex; I think of it as fuel for accomplishing anything. So that's a good thing. But, most days, I feel accomplished just getting off the couch and grabbing the remote. Once upon a time, I had a very aggressive sex drive, so it's nice to see a slight return, that's all. Moving on.
Also, I have a bit of money socked away, I realized. Is that crass to mention? Why are we afraid to talk about money? It may not be much to most (and inflation is higher than the savings rate, so it is depreciating rapidly), but it is a lot to me. I hope to put it to good use someday, or just keep it as savings. Or buy a boat so I can catch a lot of bass. Maybe get a little trailer for me and my son, hide out in the woods, shooting squirrels to survive, spending my days splitting wood and talking to God. Or maybe I'll blow it all on lavish trips to Russia, where men are still men and women are still women, where all the girls look like models and talk like Boris Yeltsin. And they make a mean bowl of borscht.
All kidding aside, this year was hard. For everyone. I'm not going to pretend my year was worse than what others had. But, it was interesting once I stepped back and looked at everyone's reaction to how things went down. The year was par for the course for someone like me. It was interesting to see how others handled things. Not good. Now I don't feel so bad about how I handled my life the last 43 years. Others wouldn't have done better, given the same circumstances. We tend to blame people for how their lives play out, negating the many circumstances they can't control. 2020 taught us we are not in control. I became increasingly despondent, withdrawn, and sullen, which I barely mentioned here (and considering the amount of rejection, heartbreak, and abuse endured in my life, it's okay if I step back). The massive disappointments of this year were cruel. I barely touched on those tidal waves of emotion, but they nearly swept me out to sea, where I would have surely disappeared. Many good things in my life perished this year. Still, life has seasons. Maybe I'll witness another springtime. If not, it was fun while it lasted. Not really.
I often wondered why my life was so hard. Those who knew me often wondered too. I think it has something to do with those original wounds from childhood. There is a picture in nature of what happens to a wounded animal. Those observing can tell something isn't right, distance themselves, and sometimes attack (even their own species), until nature is cleansed of the wounded, weak one. Nature hates weakness, and childhood abuse makes one very wounded and weak. There is a saying that goes something like this: "Psychiatry asks the wrong question. It asks, 'What is wrong with you?' But, it should ask, 'What happened to you?'" What happened to me is the explanation for so much that went wrong in my life. Instead of asking more of the wrong questions, I simply submit the rest of my life to God.
If you care about love languages, consider this: my ex used every single one of them with me, yet I didn't feel it. My primary love language (supposedly, because I think it may have changed) is physical touch. So I haven't felt love in years, certainly not through physical touch. Trauma can rob us of our ability to feel safety and love. It is safe to say my ability to feel love was sabotaged through repeated trauma and betrayal. Maybe the excerpt below says it better than I can.
A good thing about this year is I learned to just let people be. So many things bothered me this year, I felt like I was going insane. But I wasn't the insane one. The world lost its damn mind. Still, fretting about it wasn't doing any good. And I know other people live in a very different reality from me. They don't experience the things I experience. They don't deal with what I have to deal with. I tell them absolutely zero about my life, yet they judge me as if they know everything. (The quote, "Thinking is difficult; that's why most people judge," comes to mind.) God is my judge. Not you, sir and ma'am. My attitude began to resemble the attitude of the ever-amazing Keanu Reeves. I'll let him expound on that below. And then we'll end this post.
I'd like to wrap up this post with lyrics. When I heard this song years ago, I never could have guessed how true it would become (and I'm not talking about only a certain friendship that ended). These lyrics sum up my life in many ways. What bore into me in my youth should have destroyed me. Instead, I leave here a better man — a better man than I should have grown to be and a better man than when I started this blog nearly three years ago. Even in the last year, I saw internal changes previously thought impossible (the only explanation: God). And, I realized somewhere along the line that God will engineer a crisis in our lives — if necessary — to get us closer to Him. It usually means something bad is coming, though, because it is a drastic, painful thing. But it's better than going through whatever is coming on our own. It is humbling. Painful. It bends us in a way we didn't want or expect, and sometimes it breaks us. But it is for our best. Selah.
***
I don't know if I should say anything at all
One day we're rollin' in the clover
Next thing, you know, we take the fall
And the way it might have been without you here
I don't know if words from me can still upset you
But I've just gotta make this memory stand clear
For knowin' you this way
Things I couldn't do before now I think I can
And I'm leavin' here a better man
But I'd never be the one to set you free
Just like some old nursery rhyme your Mama told you
You still believe in some old "meant to be"
For knowin' you this way
Things I couldn't do before now I think I can
And I'm leavin' here a better man
Many were traumatized by what happened this year. I stand with them in solidarity. I pray God will strengthen them. Stay strong, everyone.
Thank you for reading, and God bless.
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