The Gardener.

"What I cannot now comprehend – be it mine to wait the disclosures of that blessed morning when, standing at the luminous portals of Heaven, I shall joyfully acknowledge that, 'You have done all things well!' I look forward to that time when all Your inscrutable dealings will be unfolded, when inner meanings and purposes now undiscerned by the eye of sense – will be brought to light, and all discovered to be full of infinite love! Other refuges may fail – but I am as secure in You, as everlasting love and wisdom and power can make me."

John MacDuff

"Some of the greatest discouragements will not come only from those who are against you, but those who are standing beside you."

Tim Chaddick

This year has had two major themes running throughout it, woven with golden and grey threads. 

Beginnings and grief. 

Many a wondrous wonder has happened in my surroundings these past few months. I have seen friendships blossom and deepen, hearts and hands and bones and flesh become tied together and one, new life be created, stories shared, arms extended, mountains crumble, and long, slow days seep into gentle evenings shared with kindred spirits. It was oftentimes easy to say, "There is no valley here."
But many a trial has come as well. The valley seemed to stretch for miles and miles and miles some days. And silver linings were scarce to nonexistent. I didn't understand a lot. I felt lost as that grey thread knitted itself into my chest cavity and brought me to my knees. I felt betrayed. Angered. Sorrowful. Hopeless.

I hate goodbyes.
I am terrified of them.
And I have had to say a lot goodbyes this year.

The Maker is good though. He is such a gardener in character. I have seen Him till the rocky soil of my soul, felt Him press the seeds of grace into my disillusioned being, listened to His gentle whispers as He fed and watered and cultivated my heart. The Maker knows all. And thus, I trust Him with His trowel. I allow myself to be planted. I am ready for His design.
I partake in the goodbyes.
This last month, on a lonely, grey summer day, I was sitting on my back patio repotting my houseplants. I was covered in dirt, the knees of my jeans stained with soil and the thighs with white gouache, my hair pulled up, and my hands cradling my lavender plant, and I had been busy arguing with Christ about whether or not I should be able to understand why everything happens the way it happens. I was near tears, and so frustrated, when I heard Him.
I know all, He told me.
That's not enough, I retorted. Why shouldn't I know it all too? Why can't I? 
And I felt His calm presence, His reassurance as He said again, I know all. 
I slapped my thighs. But I want to understand, I said.
You will, He encouraged me. But right now, that is not necessary. It's not part of my design, it's not part of my plan. 
I did cry then. I don't understand that either, I confessed.
You don't have to, He said. Because I do. I know all. And that is enough. 
And I lost, there in my backyard, having one of those conversations with the Gardener of life that you can never win. I'll confess I was still angry for a while after that, just sitting there in the dirt, tears trailing down my face. I wanted to know. I wanted to know why all of the bad things that had happened this year had happened. Loss. Tragedy. People leaving, choosing not to stay. Feeling isolated. Those goodbyes. I wanted to know what they all meant, what they were all for.
But I don't get to know.
And I don't have to.

Sorrow will be nonexistent in Heaven, but the point of sorrow I think will be fuller. It'll be a culmination of incandescence when we get there. We'll look at Him after it all and say, Oh. Oh that's why. And it'll be more than enough, that knowledge then and there. It won't hurt. It will just be. The goodbyes will finally have reasons behind them.

I feel like I'm not an easily discouraged person. But for some reason this year has just found me with a lesser helping of faith, a more trying demon on my shoulder, and I constantly seem to be knee-deep in mud. I know that it's preparation for what's to come. I understand that. But it's been a lot of goodbyes, and a lot of them were ones I never imagined I have to say. There is a part in Jude that talks about awaiting mercy and how love is on the way. After a lot of these goodbyes, I've found myself dwelling on that. There was even one grey day when I was so desperate I wrote the words above the crease of my elbow.
"Await mercy. Love is coming."
I didn't believe them at the time. I've found that I do that when I face a trial or suffering attempts to consume me. I press hard into the Gardener's promises, even though there is no solace there for me at that moment. But I know, I know that there will be. I know the truth even when I call Him liar.
These are good lessons He is giving me this year. These are difficult times He is pushing me through. These are worthwhile.

The other morning I sat in my kitchen on my counter, and I was okay with not knowing, so I told Him. And I confessed that at that moment, I was awaiting mercy. I did believe love is coming. And I closed my eyes and wrapped my hands around my warm, white mug full of tea and He whispered into my spirit.
He said, I know all. Yet still, child, you know some. 
So I went upstairs and put a label on a jar full of coins and dollar bills, because I do know some things. That is something new he is showing me. That I do get to know some things, and those are the ones I should be concerned about. My plans to be in the dirt – with Him, the Gardener – reaping and sowing and blooming and ripening are things that I do know. My focus and presence should be towards them, those little seeds of plans.

Because hellos are coming too.
Jude tells me that, and the Cultivator of my soul assures me of it.

Wendy

My father and my little sister just walked out the door and drove off. They are going to Romania. Some 7000 miles and more, away. For two weeks, and then for three months.
And then I am going.
Four hours from here. From this little white house. From the peach and the plum trees. From the hens. From the books and the memories and the dreams. From childhood. From youth.
From my family.
Four hours from my family for two years.

I cannot even express the pull on my heart right now. How many salty tears are trailing down my face. How my hands are shaking.

I have never loved anyone so much as I love my family.

I have always been Wendy. It became so obvious to me last night as I wrapped myself in a quilt and wrote letters to my father and my sister and I sobbed. I was always Wendy. With the flying and the stories and the loving of Peter. The full heart and the tears and the responsibilities. The stubbornness. The thimbles and the little house. The fascination with fairies. The mermaids. The dreams.
I stood on the cusp of womanhood last night. Peter pulling on my nightdress. Saying, come with me. Fly away with me. Come back to Neverland. 
But I couldn't.
I am already grown.
There are lost boys Peter, I told him, more of them than your's. I need to find them. I need to help them. I need to help people. And he cried. Loud, ripping sobs. And so did I.
The moon even cried with us last night.

We cannot always stay young.

This is the hardest thing I've ever done. Saying goodbye, but also saying, I'll be back. I promise I'll come back. My mouth is full of salt and tears. I've never had that happen to me before. And I have cried, I have wept my heart out. But never this, this taste. Mingled with my breath and the blankets I press against my mouth as I try to catch the scent of my favorite girl, the one flying across the world. Part of me says that I can't do it. The little Wendy says that. Barefoot in her nightgown. Trembling at the window. I just want to sit down and give up and quit. I just want to stay. I can't do this, she says. And it's the truth.
But then I look in the mirror.
And she's already older. She's already a woman. She has to do this. She couldn't even remember how to fly if she wanted to. It's all gone now. And so, she can do this.

I can do this.

When I was tiny and smaller and little, I used to wish my heart out to leave this place. It seemed lonely and godforsaken. But I was just selfish.
Now I wish I could take all of that back.
Can I just say that? Can I just really be honest? This seems too big. This seems too hard. God has captured my heart so kindly and gently this past year. He has shaped me and directed me in a new way. He has pushed, with a strong hand on the small of my back. He has led and guided me in a beautiful way. And now my eyes are open. Now I am less selfish. Now I see where I am supposed to go, what I am supposed to do, this mountain I am climbing. This mountain I am to move.

Today that mountain seems too big.

And that's okay. I am learning that. I am learning it is okay to doubt. To think you can't do this. To just fall on your face and weep. I am learning it is okay to miss people before you're even gone. Because God is with me. He is building me, growing me. He gives me things that seem too big.
Because nothing is impossible for me.
Even when I am that woman-Wendy, and I run back to the nursery in fear that someone will tell me to grow up. Someone will dare me to move, to change. Someone will make me. And so I sit in the rocking chair with my knees pulled to my chest trying to make myself smaller, trying to will myself to fly. Trying to disappear. I know, even then, that nothing is too hard for me. That nothing is too big for me. That nothing is impossible for me. This threshold I have to cross over is huge, a gap that is yawning, a chasm that is wide. But it is not impossible. It feels that way, but it is not.

I laid in my bed last night and tried to remember everything. All of my best and greatest moments. All of the loveliest times. It is so important right now that I do that. This change, this transition, is heartbreaking. It is gut-wrenching. It is full of sobs and blossoming with newness and aching in my bones with growth. To remember right now makes it even harder, but it also speaks to the gorgeousness and the grace of this. I am not alone in it; I am never alone and never have been. There are people near and dear to me who feel the same things. Who suffer through these changes with me. And it is that mutual suffering that makes this state of being all the harder and all the better.
I need to make room in my heart for new memories. For new people. For new friendships. I am not saying goodbye, I am only leaving for a little while. And then I will come back with all of them, and share and share and share. We go on adventures to tell those that we love about them.
So I am reminding myself of that. And I remembering everything else.
It is very possible, that I have lived one of the most magical lives. One of those itseemstoogoodandtooperfecttobereal lives. The ones with forts in the backyard and rope swings in the maple trees. With hours of searching for fairies and days of living in palaces. A life with a hundred books. A childhood with a million dreams. Years of discoveries and experiments and challenges. With butterflies collected in teacups and dragonflies hidden in pockets. With secret meetings in the pear tree. With stargazing on the roof. With picnics in the hot sun on a quilt your mother made. With hands pressed in the cool dirt, the earth, as you plant tulips in a row. A life of mystery. A childhood of pages and pages of poems. Years of love and love and love and friendship. The sweetest friendship with your sisters and your brother.
A life of togetherness.

And then there's the salt again, in my mouth.

I never thought I was Wendy. That's probably why this is too hard. Why this mountain is too big. Five years ago, if you would have looked at me and handed me "Peter Pan" and said, it's you. You are her, I would have scoffed. Threw back my head and laughed. Now I wring my hands and cry. Because it would have been the truth you told me then. I am so pitiful I did not even know myself.
This is the best thing about me, that I cherish like this. That I love this hard.

I am Wendy Darling, and I never want to be anyone else.

I miss so much this morning, that pushing mountains is something I won't do today.
And that is okay.
I am fine with that.