I can hear my computer buzz. Its sounds vaguely, faintly
like crickets. I like crickets. One time I ate one. It was covered in chocolate.
I won a $5 gift card at Coldstone because I agreed to have it mashed up in my
banana ice-cream. It tasted like a crunch bar with a zingy aftertaste. I can
still taste it. I can still taste the water I drank ten minutes ago. I can still
hear Moana’s theme song “It’s calling me” dancing in my head. I see the silhouettes
of her ancestors. I still feel how my heart ached—I felt it ache, like someone
was wringing it as a wet rag to make all the feeling, sadness and compassion
drip out. “Be patient,” I hear. Patient with myself when I can speak and share
the messages of truth and love that are inside of me. I wonder how long it will
be. I have so much to share. So much that I hear and feel and know. Not
arithmetic knowledge or history knowledge, school stuff like that. But
knowledge that comes from faith and fighting with faith for a long time. And
not sure how to even begin speaking. I still find myself filtering everything I
say. I don’t want to. I just don’t know how not to. I don’t know how to not be
what I have always been. Or at least for ten…fifteen years. I don’t know how to
say and speak what someone might disagree with. It’s a disease. An addiction.
Of agreeing. Of protecting myself. But I don’t care. I don’t want to care. That
is not true Rachael. I know who I am. I know I am a leader. And a speaker. I
know I can love from a place that is more pure than this world. I know where
that love comes from: God. The Father of us all. It’s just tricky is all. Unlearning. Or learning what is
healthy. After all the unlearning that is unhealthy. Sometimes it is
exhausting: being trapped inside. And waiting until she, me, is free.
I
liked Moana. I am babysitting. (Which, I hear little voices peaking out from
upstairs when said little voices should be zzzzzz-ing. Hmm…). It was my first
time watching it. I liked the end. When the shell of the lava monster came off and
we realize it is the beautiful goddess. The molten crusted-rock falls once her
heart is placed back in her. That is how I see people. That is how Christ sees
people. (And any clear vision on my part is because of Him). What makes me sad
is that many might watch that and feel a real sense of love, peace, and divine
beauty but quickly discard that as a myth. That “the world is an ugly place,” or
“you are what you see and there is nothing else.” When that divinity really
does live inside each person. It’s hard to believe in such a noisy world where
the visual stimulus is so oppressive. But that spiritual element—a more true
identity than anything seen with the eyes—is absolutely real. I have come to
know that for myself. I have hope that the love that people are dying to feel
will be recognized as the never-ending love of God. I know that Love heals. I
have felt it.
There
is one lady who comes into one of my Harris Teeter stores. She is not well. Her
body is disfigured. I see her bones pushing through her skin. Her baggy size 0
jeans are held up by a belt; her femurs and tendons with minute flesh are
swimming inside. Her body looks
like a scarecrow and the skin on her thin face is stretched like Saran wrap. Though
her lips move I see the clear wrap tighten around her throat and mouth like she
is being strangled by a vacuum sealed bag of her own perceived worthless-ness.
When she smiles though…I would give all I have to see her smile. I would give
all I have so her reality isn’t one of abuse and horror. How she is, has been
treated, and how she treats herself now (because of her experiences) is written
on her body. She asked me, after I hugged her (I don’t know if she gets many
hugs from anybody), “do you have memories that, if you remember, they will
destroy you?” That was a heavy question. I wondered how long she had been
carrying it. I replied I did. I told her though of Jesus Christ. Of His love.
And how He has helped me forget. That as I spend time with Him, and how
preciously He treats me, I change. Am ennobled. Become more beautiful. More
intelligent. More confident. More peaceful. He has put my heart back into me,
free from hate, bitterness, and pain. I told her how much He loves her. And suffers when she
suffers, AS she suffers, and can hold her through it. That there is hope. I saw
light come into her eyes as we spoke. That is when she smiled. We hugged again.
Then
I went into the bathroom and cried for her.
Here
I am two weeks later, at a random lady’s house, crying as I type the memory. I
think of the lyrics of a Josh Groban song, he is quoting the Lord, Jesus
Christ, from Isaiah. “I have heard my people cry. I have set a feast for them.
Who will I send? –Here am I, Lord.” I imagine myself saying that. Raising my
hand real tall, Dory-style, “send me!! Send me to help! I want to help so bad.”
I
know Jesus is with us. God hears the cries of His people. And pleads with us to
turn to Him. So He can send us. Send you. Send me. To recognize and love those
who are dying inside. And bring them to Christ. Our Healer, Master, and Friend.
And,
just like in Moana, person’s scabbed, callused, molten shell will fall away and
reveal someone truly divine.
My
friend from the grocery store, her smile…I wish you could have seen it.
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