Thoughts On The Corner of W. Sixth & N. Limestone

Let me paint you a picture. 

Today is Saturday. I am standing on the corner of W Sixth and Limestone. The sun is shining and everyone is walking home from the farmers market or wearing blue - cheering from the many upscale or not so upscale bars - after every touch down made by our CATS. There are people with dark skin and people with milky colored skin. They are beautiful. All of them. Young ones holding hands as they sprint across the street beating the fast moving cars. The older ones walk with intention, but some with leasure. After all it's Saturday. The buildings have character and the yards are small. I walked past a public garden in an old abandoned lot. Thriving green in the city brings inspiration.

My hair isn't brushed - I managed to paint my nails around noon. No coffee -  I did order several donuts though. Happy Birthday North Lime. You are like a beacon that calls me home with your typewriter in the corner and The Jackson 5 over the radio. My Old Testament Poerty is spread out over two tables staring at me just waiting to become an exceptional paper... Ha.

I'm breathing in long and slow. I never want to forget the joy this Saturday brought me. How simple. How strong. How the boy on the bike wearing a Brooklyn jersey and beats wave to me made me feel more loved than I have in a long time. Strangers love. Maybe that says something about me. Or how the large, loud, laughing, family across the road waking parallel to me make me want a family of my own. Kids that call me mom.

When I drove through Woodhill baby J jumped in my arms without question. Funny God. I already have a family. A big one. A loud one. A laughing one. A family that goes through the good, the bad, and the ugly. Thank God for the crazy mess we are and the non matching faces who scream they love me from the playground. Sometimes being away makes us forget there are people who would scream they love us anywhere. Or maybe people do scream they love me - I just respond differently with them.
 
Last week was hard. My heart wasn't in good working order. My body was sick. And my mind was full of chaotic thoughts. So here I am. In one of my favorite places. Surrounded by broken glass on this side walk, being healed by the company and the sun. Watching time pass and never wanting this to end.  I don't hate reality. I just like this one a lot more. I didn't take pictures - I was too busy living.

One day the dream, the images, the hope of growing a city full of green life and street lights and kids will become a tangible thing for the doubters. Those doubters will look around and shrug their shoulders and exclaim "This is what she meant all along? This is beautiful."

I am thankful. I am blessed. I am broken and being put back together everyday by the lovely and challenging things around me. Sometimes it just takes driving a few miles and sitting in enough silence on W. Sixth & N. Limestone to realize those things again.

 

Shots Fired

Shots fired.
Not the kind you think.
Lacking in words, and the two finger - thumb combination of a hand gun.
Reality is, it was probably a hand gun.



You say turn it down, I turn it up - maybe you will actually listen this time.
After one glance you make your judgment calls, or should I say it was the way you were brought up?
Still figuring out what sort of jargon to use that describes your offensive opinion - without being on
defense. See what I did there?



Probably not - you're too Great of an American for this to be your sport.
Yet when I step up to meet you at your plate - being on the offensive is considered biased. Huh.
Guess that's why I never loved Baseball - you shouldn't stand on a mound of your own
knowledge and yet unable to make a connection this simple.



I've come to the conclusion that my passions will always draw funny looks.
That your idea of a bad part of town or sketchy neighborhood is what I call home.
I think it's sketchy that your so called neighborhood doesn't have art work on its buildings or
sidewalks that tell a story - but that's just me.



Is it safer to be 'safe' or to walk along a bridge overtop some hard truths in order to reach something
simple and beautiful?
I will never push anyone to live like I do - or accept the things I accept - I do however, refuse to
allow you to tell me what is "right" or "better" just because that's what you chose.
I will laugh and continue on my God created path.



Scrapping up any sort of reason to be present other than when my kids are around.
Struggling to care about what is said in class while this world crumbles before my eyes.
I cringe every time I hear men hunting in the woods down the road and a shot is fired.
I hate knowing that there are children in this world that have known nothing else.



My heart belongs to a world you will never understand, one you will go lengths to avoid, and hand me words of distaste. And that is okay. Because unlike the echoes of the bullets sound through those
mountains, your words, rude stares, and exhaustingly loud silence, will not shake me.

                                                                                                                                                       


The Lord did not gift me with teaching a traditional classroom - He tore down the walls and removed
the desks and said "Be a lesson. Always."

So this is me - changing with the weather - ironically dealing with broken picture frames holding quotes like "Embrace the glorious mess that you are." Getting lost in conversations about powerfully simple things. Organic things.

Some brave individuals have done their best to describe myself back to me. Most are as hesitant to label or define me as much as I am. I refuse to check boxes unless its a shopping list full of essential items like takis, new ink pens, or a pair of Nikes.

And when an unknowing group of students looks to me on how to handle trash pick up in a section 8 apartment complex - I take a deep breath knowing this is my classroom on a field trip - and sometimes the trash on one playground unfortunately doesn't look like the trash at another just a few miles away.

I thanked Jesus more today on our little field trip thank I have the entire month. Was it just the location change? The people? A mix of things? Yes. And when that sweet, white, middle class, East Tennessee woman says "I didn't know anything coming here... I was scared to death, but 7 years later a good friend and mentor of mine has found Jesus and is a new believer. And that tells me something. It tells me if I show up long enough, you get their trust, you help their kids, then the mommas come around... before you know it they show up to bible study on Wednesday."


And that is what I needed to hear. Give it time. Don't give up. And I certainly don't or wont know everything when my time comes to game plan. Noah got some crazy stares too - and look where it got him.

Routine

The clothes are hung (thank goodness) 

The bed in never made. 

Coffee, almonds and neutella have taken over the "food shelf." 

Textbooks, movies, full journals, and picture frames line the walls. 

Lamps and Christmas lights. Anything but those horrible fluorescents. 

The mountains line the background of my everyday walks to class - I find rhythm in the paved sidewalks down in the city. 

My broken window is terribly ironic. 

Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday Thursday | Friday | Saturday 

The routine is coming. So is the cold. 

                                                              -

Missing the ability to play in that dark and dusty old gym without my knee or my heart giving me grief. Needing some sort of outward expression to free me. The sweat and the joy of a challenge. 

Missing my kids. Goodness to I miss those kids. Thankful for my kids here, and how they remind me it wasn't luck, but a calling. 

Seeing ministry come full circle. A seed becoming what it was meant to be and flourishing, repeating the cycle. Praise be to the ones who toiled with us and didn't give up. We won't give up either. And that's something special. 

Too many people forget how beautiful their normal is. I've enlisted myself to show them otherwise. Who knows. Maybe somehow along the way I'll see how extraordinary my messy hair, unmade bed, and loud, colorful life is, even on the hard days. 

 

I'm tired of people coming along with their metaphorical umbrellas. I'm exhausted with wordy songs sung too loud. I just need someone to understand what it means to take off their shoes and run. Or listen to a song with lyrics that take you a long time to understand and even longer to replicate in your own life. 

                                                             -

My routine looks like endless laughs, and constantly - prayerfully asking God to hold my dang hand even when I want to walk alone. I have to dare myself everyday. Not everyone needs to know the origin of those dares. But the product of those dares are what's seen through my actions and words. Hopefully. I'm still working on some things. Add in some tangles, naps for the long nights, text messages about the wind and perspective. That's me. That's the struggling routine. 

I may never fully mold into this scheduled life, but I'm okay with that.