“When you are most homesick, inexplicably
for some places you’ve never even lived,
an unexpected ocean breeze salts the heavy air,
stirring everything.
It says: your happiness will return to you
like the prodigal son, having spent
your inheritance of expectations extravagantly,
but ready now to do the work of joy.
Have faith.
The signs of life gather themselves in any darkness.
It’s a rebirth, a rebuilding, of what was never really destroyed.
In what is its own kind of starlight,
a thousand bright minds flicker on,
our imaginations like flashlights,
searching for a path,
blinking in the dark.”
-Mindy Nettifee
Wow. I found this poem recently and it really speaks to me. Even the seemingly random title is fantastic. I love the idea of an “Earthly mallet”!
“Your happiness will return to you like the prodigal son”…and “It’s a rebirth, a rebuilding, of what was never really destroyed.” That sounds a lot like hope. I can have faith, but hope –it scares the hell out of me. I’d like several things about my life to be vastly different from how it is now. I just don’t know how to make it so. I’m relatively smart, so you think I’d be able to figure this out by now. If I’m honest with myself, my greatest obstacle is fear. In so many areas of my life I’ve been quite brave. But there are still a couple of things that I’m stuck on. Because of the horrible experiences I’ve had in the past in relationships, I either self-sabotage or just avoid them completely. Honestly, that’s getting pretty old and it flat-out sucks.
Sigh. It’s precisely moments like these that my mother would say that I think too much. It’s also moments like these that she’d be right.
November 6, 2015
You ARE brave. You are also smart and beautiful. I know why you are scared and that is why you do what you do. But—I’m going to be brutally honest with you here– what you are doing is not giving you what you want and most of all– what you deserve. If you had a daughter, what would you tell her? I’m guessing something along the lines of you deserve a man that is proud to be with you and lets everyone know it, a man who is there for you, one who wants to build a life with you. I know, I know, I’m going off on you. But I love you and want only the best for you. <3