Raising Magnolias

An Anniversary of Grace

Two years ago.

Today.

(Yes I know I started yesterday’s post the same way.)

Sorry. It just that it’s our “new beginning—turned fatal ending—turned new beginning” in Fremont anniversary and I’ve been reflecting.

About two years ago.

Two years of trying and crying and defending and pretending; running and rushing and filling and floundering and not wanting to be still; stand still; hold still, just wanting to move forward; wanting to be finished; yes after months of not eating and not sleeping and not knowing and not growing and yes, after all of that on Friday I stopped.

Because God made me. I swear it’s like he pinched me or something. My mom used to do that in church. We got a look and if the look didn’t work, we got a pinch.

Anyway, the pinch. Pretending to be 20 (something I will continue to do,) I squatted too low; too fast; too slow….I have no idea what, but I heard it.

I felt it.

I’ve felt it before.

Time to stop.

So for the past two days, I’ve gone slightly above the recommended dosage of advil (and by slightly I mean by quite a lot) and I’ve been in bed.

Occasionally I go downstairs for a diet coke.

And I did leave once to sit in a hot tub with my friend Beth.

And it feels like I have the flu. Only I don’t. I’m not sick.

I’m just weary.

In my bones.

I slept until 7:30 this morning.

And took a nap at 10:30.

And then I changed my profile picture on facebook.

And needed another nap.

I seriously cannot remember where I was going with this.

Yes, OK.

Two years ago.

Today.

I walk into the YMCA. Coulter notices some boys wearing Clarmar t-shirts. Clarmar, as in the school where he would start the very next day. They played basketball.

I see their Mom. She is doing side planks and for some reason I remember that.

And she was the first person I met. My first friend. And if I don’t write a book, she could because she knows a lot and she knows it from the beginning.

And she invited me to her spin class. And I thought I would die. I called my husband and said, “I can’t drive home.”

We started coming to the Y. To swim. To play basketball. To exercise.

And I met my second friend. And my third friend.

And the ladies at the front desk called Emma Claire, “Emma Claire”.

Each morning, we would go. Emma Claire would play and I would get stronger. I would listen to the music and feel the steel bar in my hand and I knew I was changing.

From the inside out.

And later, after the unraveling, and on nights when I had to be away from my house; away from my children, I would go to the Y.

It became a place of refuge. For me. For my children.

And it that place we would grow strong and be strong and play hard and play long and in that place I now have a way to provide for my family and in that place I have found a home.

Away from home.

Two years. Reflecting. Because when you stop to remember where you were—where you started—you remember to give a holy hallelujah that you’re not still there!

So there is grace in the pinch.

In the slowing.

In the stopping.

In the advil.

Grace.

Even in the ice pack.

That Emma Claire is now eating out of. Which may sound gross, but I assure you it’s not as gross as the ice she picked up and ate off the ground in the Y parking lot.

I like anniversaries. I like remembering. No way in HALE that I’m going to be able to say “Happy Anniversary!” But I want to say something.

I want to say.

Thank you. To my first friend, to my faithful friends, to my Y family and my covenant family and my never leaving, always supporting Cece and Pop family and I want to say stop and get on my knees and say thank you.

For His Grace.

Two years ago. Today. And I celebrate.

An anniversary of Grace.