Balancing the Past and Present

Life is a funny thing. It throws us curveballs we could never see coming, and it pushes us as hard as it can sometimes, to see how much we can take. And sometimes, it also drops really great things in our laps unexpectedly. Sometimes, they're just that- really good things- and other times, they're basically the best thing ever at first, but there's a timer ticking away, somewhere deep inside and indetectable, that is going to blow up in spectacular fashion when we least expect it. Then there are the times we have to just go find what we want, and make it happen. Yes, these thoughts are a little jumbled, but hear me out.

I remember July 1, 2015 with stark clarity. The Josh Duggar scandal had broken a few weeks before, and the constant chatter about ATI in everything surrounding me, had severely triggered my PTSD, launching me into a deep depression. The previous weekend had been rough, but I had just gotten a puppy, and by the time I woke up the morning of the 1st, I realized I hadn't felt depressed since I had gotten her. Waking up is rough for me- I tend to be in fairly severe pain, and moving makes it worse for the first couple hours, so I can probably count the number of times in the last 20+ years I have awakened feeling optimistic and like things were going to go really well. This was one of those mornings.

What I didn't know was that there was a bomb ticking away in the amazing relationship I was in, and it was mere hours from exploding all over me. When he came to my house and broke up with me over his lunch break, I went from feeling like I could take on the entire world, to feeling like the entire world had suddenly collapsed on top of me. I will never forget that feeling. I could go on about everything that followed- I have already talked about some of it here- but I'm not going to.

It's funny how healing and processing work. As much as we would like everything to just heal and tie up in a nice, neat, package, that we can then put aside, and move on, the deepest wounds rarely heal that way. I woke up this morning, feeling an incredible emotional weight and pain. And it was really difficult, knowing I'm in an amazing relationship with the man I'm going to marry, and am very happy in it, feeling like that.

But life isn't about a perfectly linear, neat progression. It isn't about tying up all loose ends, and depositing them behind us, never to bother us again. If that were the case, we wouldn't grow as people. Both the good and the bad would have little impact on us as we lived our lives. One of the biggest keys to living a functional and healthy life, is being able to move forward, and find and create stability and happiness, despite the things that we haven't been able to fully work through.

Since that day two years ago, I have built a whole new life for myself. I made a lot happen, rather than waiting for things to get better. I moved to Denver, without a job. I found one, and it turned out to be very different than what I had been promised, so I quit. With the help of a friend, I found another job, where I stayed for just over a year. I also finally put myself into the dating pool, intentionally. I had never done that before. I went out and met people, and went on a few dates, and through that, I met Andy. Things progressed, and we made plans for the future and bought a house, and I quit my full time job, to be able to do a few things part time, in order to be able to better take care of myself and pursue other interests, such as this blog.

Our life is amazing, and I wouldn't trade it for the world. I wish I could just brush off everything else. But that's not how the human mind works. I think the key is figuring out how to acknowledge and work through the pain of the past, without allowing it to harm the present and future. It's a difficult balance to find, but the important thing is continuously working on finding it, despite the inevitable wobbles.

Part of living a Dauntless life is being brave enough to continue to find joy and build the life we want, and being brave enough to confront the past as needed, too. That's what I strive to do, and as long as I do that, I think I'll be just fine. 

Women's March on Washington, Part 4

Well, the March is over. I meant to write another post or two the night of, and in the van on the way home, but to say I was too exhausted would be an understatement. And the pain. Oh, the pain! I actually took Tuesday, the day after I got home, off work, just to sleep and recover.

We had been expecting to march along a specific path, towards the White House, but there were so many people, the entire parade route was actually filled with people. Meaning, no one could move! So, we took an alternate route, instead, turning and walking down the cross streets, and then down towards the White House. As we walked, the streets were packed with people for blocks, both to our right and to our left. I had never seen so many people in my life.

As we walked, we chanted, call and response style: "Tell me what a feminist looks like!" "This is what a feminist looks like!" I loved watching the men, Dan included, yelling along with everyone. There were many, many more chants. Some had to do with the planet, some with religious freedom, some with abortion, many, many issues. It wasn't just about plain equality.

This little girl sat and held that sign up for a really long time, while playing on a tablet with her other hand. It was quite impressive.

This made my historian heart happy- the Declaration of Sentiments from the 1848 Seneca Falls convention on women's rights. We have come far, but not far enough.

You can't see it in any of these photos, but while we were standing in front of the White House, a bunch of National Parks Service people started walking across the White House lawn, and waved at us and gave us the thumbs up. It was awesome!

Now let me say something about this picture, because I have been heavily criticized for posting this on Facebook. I actually didn't intend to get the finger in this picture. I had already framed and started to click, and the finger went up. It really wasn't an issue for me, even though it doesn't directly reflect my own views. I do believe in being respectful in my dissent, at least, as much as possible. I don't believe flipping the bird is necessary. However, I am a historian, and this is something that happened. Yes, part of my reason for being there was to participate in the protest. But also, to be a part of unfolding history, and to document the experience. This was part of the experience, so I didn't see a reason not to include it. Approve or disapprove, that's my opinion, and I stand by it.

By this time, we had been on our feet for hours, and were in varying amounts of pain, and we were HUNGRY, so we decided to try and make our way back to the metro. Along the way, there was a fence where people were leaving their signs, and we left ours there.

On our way back, we had to pass by the White House guard gate, and we got stopped by the Secret Service. We weren't sure why, until the Presidential motorcade came out, driving Trump to the Pentagon where he made his infamous speech that wound up being dubbed by KellyAnne Conway as "alternative facts." Yeah, we saw part of that speech at dinner. Someone asked me how I felt, knowing the President was in one of those cars, passing through. I was in easy view of the windows. I said that I felt justified in coming to Washington. If he looked up, he would have seen me. Me. I wasn't way back in the throng of thousands. I was right there. If the President saw me, at least he knew why I was there. And knowing that maybe the President saw my face, and knew I did not approve. And that's way more than I ever hoped for. In a way, I took my protest directly to the President, and that is pretty amazing.

We also passed a LOT of DC police who were totally chanting with us, cheering us on, shaking hands, and asking people to try on their pink pussy hats and take pictures with the officers' phones. It was pretty great. We never saw anything or heard anything threatening or wildly inappropriate from the protesters. The police even commented on how unbelievably polite and well behaved this giant throng of people was.

The subway was still super crowded on the way back. Well, the station was. We stood for close to another hour before being allowed to go to our platform. The trains themselves weren't as bad, as people went to multiple different ones to go to their different destinations. Again, they pushed us through without paying. I sat on the filthy platform floor for a while until the right train came along.

We got off, and went to get pizza for dinner. It was great to just unwind, have some amazing food, and talk about our day. We went to bed pretty much as soon as we got back to where we were staying.

The next day, we headed back to Indianapolis, and we didn't get back until late. Monday morning, Christi took me and dropped me off outside my aunt Terri's office downtown. Aunt Terri is the youngest of my dad's 13 siblings, and she went to the march in Indianapolis. We went to lunch at a little Greek place, and my cousin Eric joined us. We talked about the march, about the issues, about their perspectives. Eric left, and Aunt Terri took me to the airport, and had a bit of a heart-to-heart on the way. It was really nice. I didn't meet her until I was almost 10, because her husband was in the military, and they were living literally anywhere BUT Cincinnati most of my childhood. When my brother died, she was living in Oklahoma, and they came out for the funeral. That's when I met her. And because I'm one of dozens of nieces and nephews, I only got alone time with maybe two or three of my dad's sisters when I was a kid. Aunt Terri and I hadn't ever had time for just us to talk, and it was awesome.

I got home late that night, and pretty much went straight to bed. Yes, I was in a lot of pain, and I had very much stressed my body. This isn't something that would be advised for the Autistic and chronically ill. I went, because I had to do something. I wasn't going to stay silent. It took a lot out of me, but I would do it again in a heartbeat. I went. I marched. And, in a very real way, I conquered.

Women's March on Washington, Part 3

Washington, D.C.

We're finally here. We're literally in the middle of the street, in a major intersection, near the main stage. All we can see is people. People and people and people. I'm on my phone, so I'm only going to get through a few sentences, but I'll finish the rest later. 

When we got to the train station, it was packed with people. Way more than we could count. We got our metro cards, and then got in line to go up the escalator. But they were only letting so many people up at a time, so as to not overload the train platform. They only let people up every 10-15 minutes or so, and every time a group went up, everyone loudly cheered.


 
Left was us standing in line for the metro passes, Right was Christi and me finally on the escalator!

By the time we got to the escalator, we had been waiting for over an hour, and I think all four of us were more excited about getting on the escalator than we ever had been in our lives. The platform was PACKED. Even with transport people limiting our numbers up there, it was a little disconcerting.

While we waited, we checked out the signs, and I took pictures of some of my favorites:

The train was so packed as to be incredibly uncomfortable, and even physically painful, as it became fuller and fuller, and literally impossible to control our own positioning. But the energy was filled with excitement. There were a lot of laughs on the train, and we watched the people on the platforms at each stop, as we got closer and closer to our stop, look at us with wide eyes and shaking heads as they realized they were NOT getting on our train! 

We saw an advertisement for the Amazon Prime show, "The Man in the High Castle" (if you haven't seen it, DO), that was absolutely perfect for the day of the march. We tried to get a selfie with it, but couldn't fit everything in it, so a fellow passenger offered to help.

When we got off the train, that station was jam packed too, and it took us about 20 minutes to get out! The escalator was turned off though, and it was a steep climb of something like 100 steps...and I hadn't worn my knee braces. So Mandy wound up going up one step ahead of me, and pulled as much of my body weight up as she could, so I didn't have to put the stress on my knees. She'd do that a few times before the day was over. Bless her. The end station was so full, the transport people told us not to swipe our cards, just to keep the crowd moving through. This happened multiple times as well. 

We got outside and started our mass trek towards the march. Where we were standing, we could see a little of the Washington Monument, though it was extremely foggy that day. There were So. Many. People. 

We heard Michael Moore, a Congresswoman from California, the female mayor of D.C., and a few others, before we headed to find a bathroom. It took us over an hour to go down one block, and get in to the long row of port-a-potties. Now we're standing closer to the main stage, listening to Scarlet Johansson. The atmosphere is amazing, and I can't believe I'm here. There are people as far as the eye can see in every direction. Women of all ages- some clearly in their eighties, in wheelchairs, a surprising number of men- approximately 25% of our crowd? And entire young families with their children. People of all nationalities and ethnicities...I love this. 

Women's March on Washington, Part 2

Somewhere West of D.C., in Virginia

So here we are. We're all in the van, on our way to the march. We picked up Christi's brother, Dan, in Columbus yesterday, while stopping for lunch. It was completely last minute, but we're thrilled to have a man with us to march for women's rights! 

The car smells like Sharpie. We're writing vital information on our arms. Names, dates of birth, emergency contacts, the number for the National Lawyer's Guild Inaugural Jail Support Line. I also put down that I have Asthma, PTSD, my most important medication information, and, in caps, across the middle of my arm, "I AM AUTISTIC." Damn, I must be crazy. A diagnosed high functioning Autistic person in a giant march, with the possibility of arrest, gassing, violence, etc. I don't think that will happen, but there are no guarantees. 

Traffic is dense, and we keep passing busses. My guess is, they're all going to the march. Over a thousand busses are coming from all over the country, filled with women, driving all day and all night to make a statement in the nation's capitol. Aside from the busses, traffic is surprisingly heavy for 7:45 on a Saturday morning, even if it is the day after the inauguration. 

We're all really excited in the car, even though we're making plans for worst-case scenarios. The fact that we were able to come from four states, from similarly repressed, patriarchal backgrounds, to stand up for what we believe in, is enthralling to us. We don't know what we're walking into. There was violence yesterday, though word is that it was from an anarchist group who was planning this long before the election, and we don't know if it's calmed down or not. But we do know why we're here. Why we're marching. Because we're standing up for the marginalized. For the poor and the non-white, and the female and the disabled. We're standing up for justice. For the right of women not to be assaulted. For the right of women to be believed when they are. For the right of women not to be slut shamed. For the right of the LGBTQ+ community to just...be. So regardless of the outcome, we know we're here on the side of the right. We're making our voiced heard. So many have come before us doing this same thing. Honestly, so what if I get hurt or arrested or anything else? So did MLK and Alice Paul, and yet they both stood firm and made things change. What's the point of me teaching history if I'm not willing to participate in it? What's the good of me praising the activists of yore if I'm not willing to become one when my own time demands it?

I'm here. I will march. I will speak. Come what may. 

Women's March on Washington, Part 1

Central Indiana, 1/20/2017

So here we are, on the road. Christi, Mandy, and I are all in Christi's van, driving east on I-70 through the slight drizzle. It's a typical mid-winter rainy January morning in the lower Midwest: mid-40s, brown, and flat. It seems appropriate for the day and our mood.

However, we're also excited. You know, we make an interesting group, the three of us. Mandy is a 22 year old recent college graduate from Arkansas, Christi is a 31 year old homeschool mother of 3 from Rhode Island, and I am an Autistic, chronically ill historian/telecom project manager from Ohio. What we all have in common, is that we were all homeschooled and raised as girls in patriarchal, fundamentalist Christian families, that all at least flirted with fundamentalist cults. Mine was the only family that every fully joined a fundamentalist Christian cult (a story told in other places). But we were all raised to be meek and subservient girls, always to be under the authority of a father or a husband. To be the mother of a quiver full of children. To not follow our own dreams, ideas, wishes, or even beliefs. We were, essentially, raised to be clones. We were taught that we were put here on earth to serve the men in our lives and raise children. We were also taught extreme modesty to the point of objectification.

We have all broken away from that. We all believe in the equality of women. We are human beings. Therefore, our rights should be equal. And that includes our rights to not have other people harass or assault us, because of our bodies. It includes our rights to follow our own path. It includes our rights to earn a living and shape policy and just...live. And the incoming president is a direct threat to these rights. For us, for our children, for all women and children in this country, especially those who are also not white. Who, like me, are disabled. For those who are LGBTQ+. For those who are not from Christian backgrounds. All three of us have experienced repression due to our gender that fits better with past eras of American history than the time in which we were raised. And for us to be traveling to march for women's rights in our nation's capitol, that's something we couldn't even have dreamed of doing in the past.

For me, there's another element to it, though. Because of a combination of circumstances and health/neurological/mental health issues, this is the first time in my life I'm able to support myself. As I was on the plane last night, I realized something: This is the first time in my life I have paid for my own plane ticket. I've simply never had the money before. I've always depended on someone else- usually my parents- to pay for my ticket. But not this time. When I heard about the march, I asked Christi to come with me, and I bought a plane ticket on the spot, even emptying out my paltry savings to do so. Money well spent, in my opinion. I'm paying my own share of the condo we're renting too, as well as gas. This whole trip, I'm paying for. Me. Myself. Not with help from my parents, not with the use of Christmas or birthday money, me. Granted, we were able to do it cheap, but it's still a huge deal for me.

I'll stop there for now, I've been a little rambly. But more posts will come, and I hope you will follow the saga on here, as we sojourn to our nation's capitol to make a bold stand for what is right and just. 

La La Land

Spoilers ahead. Massive ones. You've been warned.

The English language fails to provide adequate vocabulary with which to describe the depth and breadth of my thoughts and emotions at the moment. I went to see La La Land expecting to see a good movie with good music and a modern on-screen couple that rivals classic on-screen couples such as Bergman and Tracy, Astaire and Rogers, Bogart and Bacall, and I got so. much. more. What I got was the single most accurate portrayal of life I have ever seen. The movie captured the highs, the lows, the fantasies, the romanticisms, the poetry, the indescribable ecstacy, and the gut-wrenching agony of that journey we call life.

Very few movies have made me cry. Even fewer have made me cry for reasons other than my in-depth knowledge of African American history. But this, this movie got me. Life rarely goes according to plan. Sometimes, that's a good thing, sometimes it's not. Sometimes, it's a horrible thing that leads to something good. Sometimes, it leads us away from one good thing to another good thing. Sometimes, that second good thing is better than the first one, and sometimes, it's not. Sometimes, it's just...another good thing.

In the last few minutes of the movie, we see Mia's (Emma Stone's character) life as it became after she rose to fame. She was clearly very happily married, with a small child. But she wasn't married to Sebastian (Ryan Gosling's character). They'd never had a big breakup, life just took them in different directions, and they both followed their dreams. Mia and her husband went out one night, and instead of fighting traffic to go to a play, they pulled off the interstate to have dinner instead. While walking back to their car, they heard music playing in a club, and decided to go in. They sat down, and Mia very quickly realized, this was Sebastian's nightclub. He had finally done it. He'd realized his dream, and it was a hit. While on the stage, he saw Mia, and his entire demeanor changed. He started playing one of their songs they used to sing together, as Mia watched, sadly. The music itself was brilliant, as we saw how Sebastian thought through how he could have done things differently. Differently in a way that would have put him and Mia together. How he could have been less selfish when they first met. How he could have dropped everything and gone with Mia to Paris when she got her big break, and played jazz in nightclubs wherever her acting took her. How they could have wound up married, with a child, and happened into that nightclub together that night, instead of her and her husband. And it was clear, Mia was thinking something along those lines as well. While she was extremely happy with her life, her husband, and her child, that didn't stop her from being sad for the life she didn't have with Sebastian.

A few years ago, I wouldn't have known what to do with that whole idea. I would have struggled with Mia's emotions, as though it were marital infidelity. But the reality is, life isn't that black and white. Sure, had she done anything to act on any of that, it would have been very, very wrong. But as it was, it was simply...real. Just because we're happy with how our lives are now, doesn't mean that some part of us doesn't mourn what could have been. We don't have to recite cliches like, "everything happens for a reason," or pretend that how things turned out is better than how things could have turned out. Maybe that's true, but also, very possibly, maybe it's not. Maybe another possible outcome could have been every bit as good as how things are. Different, but just as good. And recognizing that, and finding that it makes us sad on occasion is absolutely okay. In fact, I think perhaps it's even healthy. It's an acknowledgement of how life actually is. It's not necessarily a series of better or worse choices, of better or worse outcomes, of happier or sadder. It can be, and of course, at times it absolutely will be. But sometimes, it just...is. Sometimes, it's simply one choice over another equally valid choice with an equally good outcome.

Shortly before this end sequence, Mia auditioned for what became her breakout role, and the casting director asked her to simply tell a story. In true musical form, the story turned into a song. In this case, a song about Mia's actress aunt. Never in my life has a song so strongly resonated with me before. And that's coming from someone who is a musician above and beyond anything else. I am a musician before I'm a historian. Music speaks to me in a way that nothing else ever could. And this song spoke to me more than any other ever has. The refrain goes:

                                                                  "Here's to the ones

who dream

Foolish, as it may seem;

Here's to the hearts 

that ache,

Here's to the mess

we make."

As I listened to it, I thought about how heartbreakingly beautiful those lyrics are, and how true. I have often thought that the reason life is so hard is because we somehow have this notion that it shouldn't be. That families should love each other, that relationships should work out, that famines and bankruptcies and wars shouldn't happen. We have this picture of a better world in our heads. Maybe, as C.S. Lewis suggests, it's because we were made for Heaven. Maybe, it's just an evolved concept to keep humanity from completely devolving into monsters that blow us all to oblivion. Or, at least, to keep that from happening sooner than it otherwise could. Whatever the reason, much of the beauty in life comes from those who dream. The ones people told were, in fact, foolish for feeling so deeply and dreaming so big. I spent two years as a music major, and then wound up with a literature minor and a history major, all of which involved a lot of study of art. While many works of art, regardless of the medium, are enduring and meaningful from literally every era of artistic production, it seems to me as though the Romantic Era speaks more to us still, and on a deeper level, than any of the others. The Romantics were the dreamers. They were the fools wearing their hearts on their sleeves, demanding that life be better, daring to feel and daring to believe in something grand and wonderful. The Chopins and the Byrons and the Wordsworths. Like Mia's aunt in the movie, many of them died young, some because of a lack of medical technology at the time, and some due to the risky living that can often accompany those who dream. Of course, not all dreamers make such messes. But humanity does. Sometimes, we make our own messes. Sometimes, other people make them for us. But daring to dream deeply means that at some point, our hearts are going to feel that, and ache. The song continues:

"She told me:

A bit of madness is key,

To give us the color to see,

Who knows where it will lead us?

And that's why they need us.

So bring on the rebels,

The ripples from pebbles,

The painters, the poets, the plays,

And here's to the fools who dream,

Crazy as they may seem,

Here's to the hearts that break,

Here's to the mess we make."

There's so much truth in there. It does take a little insanity to allow us to dream. For us to dare to envision something else, for us to take those leaps, having no idea where those leaps will lead us. And yes, society needs the dreamers. It needs the visionaries. It needs those it often calls crazy. Because from where else would our inspiration come? It comes from the Van Goghs and the Debusseys and the Longfellows. Those who see the world in vivid colors, who hear haunting melodies, and who dare to hear the melodies of the Christmas bells in the midst of a war that pits brother against brother. It comes from the rebels. Those who dare to make something better. Those who rebel against convention or against abusive authorities, taking things into their own hands, gritting their teeth, leaping, and doing their best to make sure things turn out better as a result. 

But what really resonated with me, more than any other part of that song, and more than anything else in the movie, was "Here's to the hearts that break; here's to the mess we make." Those lines, going through my head while Sebastian was envisioning how life could have been different for him, how he could have had Mia, were what made me cry. It's no secret that my heart has been broken many times. Truly, deeply broken. It has been broken by my siblings, by my parents who were supposed to protect me but instead badly abused me, by my hands falling apart and forcing me to move away from music as a career, and by someone I loved more than anyone else who said he would stand by me and love me and support me, and instead, tossed me aside, lied to our friends, gaslighted me, and more. I have had my heart so badly broken, I wound up in the hospital. Barely more than a year ago, I had no will to live. I have spent the bigger part of my life wishing I had never been born. I'm not in a place yet where I can decisively say I'd choose to be born, if I was given the choice. I don't know. 

But here's what I do know:

I look around me, and where I am isn't bad. In fact, where I am is pretty damn good. I have a good job, I can support myself, I am in an amazing relationship, I live in what is basically my dream apartment, I live in exactly the city and state I want to live in, and in general, life is good right now. It's also still pretty raw from the last half of 2015. I think it'll take me a while before I don't have such emotional reactions to everything (and I'm not just talking the end of the relationship...everything). But I do know I'm a much stronger person than I was before. I'm even more Dauntless, even more a warrior. And, in some ways, even more a rebel. I'm less afraid to be who I am, rather than who society tells me I'm supposed to be. I'm less afraid to openly acknowledge the things some say I should hide: my Autism, my PTSD, my chronic depression, my life as a cult survivor, etc. And yet, with that increased strength, my ability to dream has not been damaged. I still dream. I still dream of a life with someone I love. I still dream of having a career as a therapist specializing in PTSD and cult recovery. I still dream of reaching out and touching peoples' lives. That's my whole reason for this blog. And I know that in the last couple months, I have managed to reach quite literally hundreds of people with my blog posts, and impact them positively. The reason I have this blog, is because of some giant human-made messes, and a shattered heart, mended, and shattered again. In fact, the reason I'm living where I am, in the relationship I'm in, and have the current dreams that I have, is because of all of that. The more I'm broken, and the more messes in which I'm entangled, the bigger my dreams become. In reality, the more my dreams are shattered, the bigger they get. 

At the end of the day, my life would be wildly different today, had my first major dream been shattered when I was three years old, and had the same series of broken hearts and shattered dreams and man-made messes not followed. Would my life be better? Maybe. Or, maybe, as in the movie, it would just be different. And I think recognizing and even somewhat mourning the path not taken is part of how we can fully appreciate how things actually are, and the significance of choices and events in our lives. 

So yes, I think I will always say, "Here's to the hearts that break, here's to the mess we make."

Christmas Present

I began writing this Christmas morning, but didn't get it finished until later. This is the first in a series of a few catch-up posts to come:

This morning, my blog post from last Christmas popped up on my Facebook. I showed Andy and had him read it, but I couldn't bear to read it myself. Just the memory of how much pain I was in made me feel like I was going to burst into sobs again. It was so dark. So cold. So sad. I was with friends who had already become family, and Christmas with them was as amazing as it possibly could have been under the circumstances. All I could do was push back the sobs, and hope with all my strength that next year would be better.

This year, I was supposed to go home to Ohio for Christmas, but with the very unexpected, heavily disappointing, and triggering election results, I just couldn't do it. Which resulted with me working from the car via my phone's hotspot, while Andy drove my car up to his family's in Casper, Wyoming. I've met his family before- well, most of them- and I like them and feel as comfortable with them as I can at this point, which is good. But I've never spent the holidays with a significant other's family before, with the exception of Easter with Z's family, but Easter isn't nearly as tense as Christmas can be.

Christmas has always been rough for me, despite being my favorite holiday. But with a brother dead, and a sister out of my life, it's been difficult. And this is the second Christmas in a row I've spent away from my parents. Before last year, I'd never had Christmas anywhere but Cincinnati with my parents and family. Last year, I thought I'd be back there this year. But my world turned upside-down with the results of the election on November 8th, and with Ohio going to Trump, I couldn't bring myself to go back there so soon. Ohio has always felt like home to me. It's felt safe. It doesn't feel safe to me now. I detailed this in my last 10-part series, so feel free to catch up on that if you've missed it. As a result, I found myself realizing that I would be missing my second consecutive Christmas at home.

So instead, here I am, in Andy's childhood home, surrounded by people I've known less than a year, celebrating Christmas. In many ways, it's good, but in other ways, it's its own special kind of stressful. But it also feels...right. Being here, spending Christmas with Andy and his family, it feels like I should be here. Andy has become my family. This is likely the first of many Christmases with him.

Last night, Andy and I went to Mass with his parents. Of course, since I spent my childhood in the Catholic Church, going to Mass always kind of feels like going home (aside from the really odd changes recently made to some of the responses...dude...). The priest gave a homily that sounded surprisingly Protestant in nature and even theology. I don't know many Evangelicals who would take issue with anything he said. He talked about how God loved us so much, that one night, two thousand years ago, He sent his only son to save a fallen world, lost in sin. He talked about a very personal- and personable- God. One who cares for the well-being of every single human being. At one point, he said, "You are each here tonight because God specifically wanted you here tonight, and because He loves you." Which, for one thing, was such a non-Catholic thing to say I had to remind myself I was, in fact, in a Catholic church, and for another, was definitely not said in a way that implied that God didn't love anyone who wasn't there right then. He said it in such a way that I actually responded in my head, "What an amazing thought. If only it were true."

While many of my readers, who are devout Christians, will read that and find it sad, to some extent, I actually find it to be proof of significant healing on my part. Instead of being triggered by the homily, and triggered by the idea that I was there because God wanted me there, I was able to appreciate it as a lovely thought, rather than a threatening one. The very ability to just see it, and process it though my own worldview, is evidence of incredible healing in regards to my PTSD.

So today, I sit here on the couch and watch the snow fall and pile up into the perfectly quintessential "white Christmas." And I am able to appreciate the stark contrast between my most recent Christmas Past, and my Christmas Present. Last Christmas was one to just bear as best I could. This one...well, perhaps I don't feel it to its fullest extent, but there is something that rings true as I watch the snow and the lines of Christmas carols swirl through my head...all is calm, all is bright.