Disillusionment

I'm up early or in the middle of the night whichever you want to call it. I guess if I can get myself back to sleep it will be the middle of the night - otherwise just up early. I always think of Sully when this happens. I was awake so many times at odd hours through my pregnancy with him. The beautiful thing about these hours is the intense stillness and quiet. My thoughts seem so much clearer, like I have the space and time to let them work themselves out without any of the distractions of the normal waking hours.

I had been thinking about the title of an entry - perhaps "Retreat into Normalcy" or something of the sort. As I get comments from people or clips of my writing mentioned through others so often there is misinterpretation or just the strangeness of people knowing more about me than I might tell them on my own. I suppose that is the nature of writing in a public space. I've often thought about making a private blog. But then, I hear of someone facing a similar situation who was able to read through those Sully days of ours and find some comfort even in knowing they are not the only ones to walk through such difficulty, and for that reason I know I can't close down this space. And then, there are those dear souls who read and do get it, and do offer such encouragement and beautiful insight and for them I am so thankful. I suppose a blog is just like life, full of the ups and downs, those who get you and those who don't, full of the great moments and also the moments of disillusionment.

That is where I have been lately with relationships in general, maybe with life in general thus making for the relational difficulty. Disillusioned. There are certain gifts of friendship in my life that have stood the test of time, been through struggle and still come through as solid, beautiful relationships. I think for most these types of friendships are fewer and thus all the more valuable. Yes, we do things in those relationships to foster their growth but there seems to be a certain naturalness to them that can't just be recreated in two people who might not "click" quite as well. Yet that's not always the case. In one of my dearest friendships there was never an initial click but more of a gradual growing together. Or maybe there is an initial "click" but time reveals that the connection lacks depth and so you both move on. In the dearest relationships, is there less expectation and thus the opportunity for relational freedom and growth? No, I think my friends and I expect certain things from one another. Perhaps, because of the connection and the longevity there is a large well of love to draw from, offering one another forgiveness or a willingness to overlook certain things. Or that could also be part of the "click" - that your personality doesn't rub that other person quite as raw as it might someone else. So it seems you have to have both connection and depth for the making of a true friend.

But why is it that in the people you hope most for closeness and deepness there seems to always be disappointment? After years of tensions and in the middle of grief and now carrying a new child, I just find myself too tired to want to try anymore. I feel so disillusioned. Life has not turned out as I would have hoped, people are not who I hoped they would be, I am not able to respond as I would have once hoped I could. All "illusions" are shattered.

And then I read by Dietrich Bonhoeffer that if I am ever to have knowledge of genuine fellowship, "so surely must we be overwhelmed by a great disillusionment with others, with Christians in general, and, if we are fortunate, with ourselves...Only that fellowship which faces such disillusionment, with all its unhappy and ugly aspects, begins to be what it should be in God's sight, begins to grasp in faith the promise that is given to it."

So maybe this is right where I'm supposed to be. Maybe in this disillusioned state I can recognize the limits of certain relationships and just allow them to be what God intended them to be (instead of all I had intended them to be). How foolish of me to believe I could have or expect to have with everyone the depth of closeness and friendship I have with a handful of cherished souls. But this does not mean that I cannot love in those relationships; in fact, I feel like it gives me a freedom to love by letting go of the expectations and false hopes to which I once clung. And it gives me freedom to just be where I am and who I am. Maybe this is all a part of Sully's gift to me, part of learning to live in the wake of his absence, part of accepting the brokenness in us all.