Just a heads up so you don’t all think I’ve died or something. I’m not going to post on here much for a while. I’ve created another blog solely for my MA journey and will be updating there mainly instead. If you want the link just let me know.

I will however, say that being back in the UK is so far not what I expected. Winton at least does not feel like home. Though this may be cos I haven’t seen much of it yet and my room is tiny and closet-like. But I suspect the less than desirable-ness of my flat and the town will help me focus on why I’m here instead of me just getting lost in the pretty… or something. I’m excited to properly enroll in person on Monday and dive into things on Tuesday. I’m also eager to get my student loans form signed and sent off so that the money can get into my bank account. Being a student means I am poor again. Poor and in debt. Whee! I’m very nervous but excited.

It’s still the beginning.

This week has been tough. It’s been emotional ups and downs and all arounds. On Monday I had lost all hope of getting my visa, nevermind getting it on time. But today I heard the five words I had all but lost hope of hearing… “your visa has been issued” just days after a scary notice of deferral. So long as my passport gets to me through the mail on time (it will), I will be flying back to England a week from today.

My goodness. I am still shocked. And still so elated… and tired because I am in the middle of a 7 days in a row work week with the Festival and I have so little time to prepare but I will and it’ll be fine, good even.

I’m so thankful. And when I take the time to really think about it? I am flipping excited to see where this path goes.

Ooh, I met Douglas Coupland yesterday. I also met Seth.

I am still waiting for my visa to come. It might not. But I think it just might. As soon as I sent off the application and knew I had done everything I could do a weight lifted off my shoulders and I was at last able to breathe again, to relax.

On Friday night I was taken out for dinner by my co-workers from the Arts Club. It was a fantastic evening and reminded me in one evening how blessed I’ve been to work in this city, with these people, for the past 7 months. It’s not lost on me, the miracle of finding a dayjob with great people and a great company, and where you are valued more than you think possible. I sat at this table at the Earl’s on Broadway and Fir, hopping around the table to hug and catch up with those I haven’t seen for a while since I moved to my position with the Writer’s Festival and when a few of them hugged me I felt such overwhelming joy at knowing these lovely people. And such overwhelming gratefulness for what has happened. For this time.

And this morning it started to sink in that I am leaving, probably/most likely, very soon. And it’s still very odd that I am sad about this. I’m excited but sad to leave before Kyla’s baby is born. Sad to not get to hug Bekah again for a while. Sad to miss the shows, and seeing Kholby dance around and sing showtunes between phone calls and customers. I love these people. I’ve learned how to love without strings or expectation. Holy crap.

And now, I have seven days of work in a row. The Writer’s Festival. Douglas Coupland may have to put up with me hugging him. And C.R. Avery is bound to astonish me with spoken word brilliance. There will be more and work and putting out fires too I imagine. But after that? A day off. An Ani Difranco concert with my brother, then… packing and leaving before I can properly assess the fact that I will be in England, diving into a very intense MA program.

Life is insane. And when I can calm my aching muscles and speeding heart down enough to absorb the incredible adventure of it, I am very very thankful. And I sometimes even laugh between the tears.

Wish me luck and that my visa/passport makes it to me in time so I can board my ship/plane and sail forth.

10 days and counting…

There’s this thing that happens. In most every good film, story, TV show. As our hero is about to make a giant, scary decision/movement toward their destiny, when they are so close to crossing into new once only dreamed of territory  that they can taste the glorious newness and dreamspace on their tongue, they take a step… and all hell breaks loose.

They are crushed, beaten, worn out, torn down, faced with their most dreaded fears, doubts and worries, everything seems to go wrong and the hero begins to lose hope. It seems they will never reach their goal.

There’s a reason stories are like this.

There’s a reason we believe and love these stories. It’s because whether or not we are fighting dragons or giant corporations or our own psyche, all of this happens in real life. Metaphors or no.

This is how life is. You get close to your dream and the universe throws daggers. You have to be ready, after all… to win your prize. It never comes easy. If it does come easy, it wasn’t your true dream. Or… you won’t recognize the gift and you will squander it. Unless of course you’re a very particular, special sort of person. But that’s another post.

I think that right now I am nearing one of my most pivitol and precarious thresholds in my journey. I think that is why I feel beat down, hopeless, worn out, and like the obstacles I am facing have grown ten thousand times higher than all others before and why despite this I cannot give up.

Ladies and Gentleman, the stories we hold most dear, are at their basic root true. This is why I love to write. This is why I need to go on and not stop till I get there.

This is why, despite the urge to throw in the towel, I have no choice but to fight until I can’t.

It’s been a while since I posted here. And I don’t know how to sum up the last month and a bit or how to explain all that’s inside me and all that’s happening. So much has changed and so much still needs to happen. I’m working for the Vancouver Writer’s Festival for another 3 weeks and at the end of the 3 weeks I’m supposed to be flying to England. But I still don’t have my visa. I do have an appointment about my visa next week but I’m still waiting for everything to come together, in particular I am waiting for my loans to come through. Regardless, I’ve paid tuition and am starting my course via correspondence while working full time. I have come so close to having a nervous breakdown it’s not even funny. I have never known stress like this and it’s definitely taking its toll.

But I also have never learned trust like this, without reassurances. I’m standing on the edge and feeling a little too much like Joseph in my soul. I’m not in prison and there’s no reason I should feel the need to sing “close very door to me…” but my heart and soul has felt that lately. Mostly because of fear and because I know that just before the big reveal things tend to get pretty shadowy and dark. I’m beginning to trust without reassurances. Trust purely based on the character of the One who loves me enough to tell me to become a prodigal in order to return. Now that’s a whole new kind of trust.

In the midst of all of this chaos I am finding freedom and truth and love like I have never known. I am so alive and so close to crossing the threshold into a new place in my life journey that to describe the intensity would diminish it. I am afraid, no, terrified, and excited. I am breaking apart and coming together all at once. The most significant word I can think of right now is : returning. And I don’t even know the depth of what I mean by that yet.

We are returning. We are getting ready to cross over.

And I am shaking in my boots and laughing and crying too. I can’t wait till this is over. But I’m scared of what’s on the other side because I have no idea what it will be like or who I will become when I step across this line.

I’m not technically a ‘Christian’ anymore but I still love Jesus.

I almost walked away in anticipation of Him not coming through. Now, I’m waiting for a miracle, my selfishness crushed to death under a heel of hope. I am waiting for a miracle and trudging forward on the hope others have for me, the belief they conjure for my sake that for the first time I have not had to fight for. It just is.

There are cobwebs in my mind as I fight to reach the other side, pushing through the sticky substance to find the release and the destiny I must meet.

So much has changed in the last year since my last birthday. In a week I turn 29. I finally grew up. I finally became whole and here we are waiting precariously for the promise to arrive on my doorstep just in the nick of time.

Waiting for the God you have no name for other than Love… waiting for the fulfillment of the promises He already enacted the moment He said yes. A strange place to be. Strange indeed.

In the rise of the tide I wait for the undoing of my soul. Feet wet, sinking into the ever dampening age old rocks between my feet. Rocks now crushed and defeated but made beautiful in their unity to each other and the shores. I cry from deep within and do not know why. I am mourning… cracking open deep inside and unable to express it except through tears after midnight under the stars. And in this quietness I feel a sense of peace as I find a pause in the melancholy and find the courage to accept the arms of my friend so I can cry some more.

I know that this is the beginning of freedom. But I can’t quite fathom the miracle itself. That nothing has happened to provoke this and yet everything. But mostly? It was the arrival of a soul friend.

I am learning that it is not about me but about others. Others help me become me and therefore it is about me. And we go in circles but only because this is how it was intended to be. Too soon I can forget. It’s hard to deal with decades of lies and religious lines drawn into my heart, skin, and thinking. Too comfortable to conform again without noticing. So how do we move forward fully?

We keep going. Together. Knowing that what will be will be and that itself is blessed.

But today I feel like a supernova. And all this pressure is pushing out and out and out and soon I’m gonna just blow. And there will be galaxies and new planets in my wake…

Right now everything is hot, and bright and precarious. And I can feel it pulling and stretching. I think there will be more tears. But hopefully they will move from mourning tears to tears of joy and victory.

I am no longer interested in what was, only in what is.

I have entered the wild place where freedom is a river constantly bathing me in light and spilling over to those I love like waves of thirst quenching wonder.

I am no longer interested in the shadow that stood and mocked. I am only interested in what is. In the now.

I have stood for years with stone arms, hands, legs, shoes and eyes blinded by the sin coloured glasses I bore–glasses handed out in the sanctuary as we sang freedom standing side by side, all lined up like dominos ready to lean back and surrender to the fall– I thought I had to wear the glasses. But the prescription was wrong!

Jesus stood waiting for my sign with a smile and I tore down the fence I had been building for decades, painstakingly painting a perfect shade of white. At long last I lost my truth. (The light says go)

I am no longer interested in the settling places I cloaked around myself, the heavy things which made me slouch and hide or choose relationships not good, not good, not good enough… and the places where I lied. I am no longer interested in what was. Only what is.

What is… it is nakedness, raw honesty. The freedom to yell “fuck or “shit” or “please” or “whatever” or “I don’t know” or “I LOVE YOU” or… “WHERE should we go today?” The beauty is we could go anywhere and You don’t care if I swear or drink or kiss a stranger in the rain. You only care that I love and live with intention, embrace the freedom You devised since the day I was concieved and little tiny incomprehensible pieces formed in the dark.

Gone are the days of thinking my uniqueness and my beauty are somehow shameful.
Gone are the days of feeling guilty for each step, breath, and moment.

I am arrived and arriving and desperate to unravel some more.

The past is no more.

This, this is the beginning of freedom.

So this morning during coffee with God, I’m pretty sure the Holy Spirit tore my clothes off.

We were running and He derobed me. Seriously. He came up behind me and just tore everything away. I became this intensely fleshy pink thing running along laughing. We were all laughing, the Three and I, all naked… running down the street with the sun shining and the wind blowing.

Fucking brilliant.

Don’t you love how God, being the Creator of life and all, can just turn EVERY single thing on its head all while laughing hysterically alongside us and pointing out or silly small-mindedness without even being judgemental?

Oh the things we could learn if we simply let go.