Relationships

I love relationships, the words spoken and the quiet moments between people, the glances and the physical affection, the complete knowledge of another person and the ability to continue to love them through the difficult times...

There's just something so beautiful about how humans interact. Not all the time...we, of course, experience frustration and anger, raising our voices and sometimes our fists, attempting to communicate how we feel and often failing...

But beyond that, focusing on the good things, I love receiving a text from my brother that is honest, him being upset about his girlfriend dumping him, angry and hurt, not sure how to treat her now and choosing to avoid the situation as so many of us do.

Then there's a text from my sister telling me her work schedule for tomorrow, making plans to do some tv watching with me in the evening, discussing what we're doing through the rest of the week...constantly in touch with each other, aware of where we'll be, concern for each others safety and well being expressed through the interest in one another's lives.

Picking up the phone and speaking casually to my mom for a minutes... Trying to decide on what day to have a birthday meal for myself, and she rambles on a bit about how her and dad have agreed to act as Mr and Mrs Claus for the extended family Christmas party. Even though she is upset and disappointed with some of the issues our family has been going through, disjointed and further apart than ever, she makes the effort to remain peaceable and calm. It's difficult for her because she normally expresses herself strongly, but there she is making the effort...

I turn to Janice sitting beside me in the back seat of our friend's car, and we smile at each other, confident and secure in our friendship. I flash back to sitting curled up on a stretcher in the ER, crying and scared, and her climbing up on the stretcher beside me, putting her arm around me, and comforting me...Making a list of questions for the doctor, and staying to talk to the resident with me...

Sarah sends me messages all day, documenting what she is doing with fragmented texts that are most time a bit difficult to understand. "Laying down, headache, stabbing in head." Or "Pancakes just puked". But once in a while they're deeper and darker, telling me about her frustrations with her boyfriend, how she hates being lied to, how she doesn't know what to do so she drinks as an answer.

And sitting here at my desk in the a half lit room, contemplating all the texts I have received today, the people that I have talked to, laughed with, smiled at, I'm filled with wonder at our capacity to communicate and co-exist with each other...The people that we choose to have in our lives, the ones that we pursue to the bitter end, the guys that I dream of and hope for, the friends that have fallen out of my life and that I miss deeply...It's life.

It's life...the beauty of it...people who impact us and speak encouraging and kind words into our lives, people who inspire to move ahead, change and grow, people that we would go the distance for...

When I question my life or ask myself what I'm worth or what I'm doing, instead of reaching for those pithy answers of mattering to at least one person, thinking of all the people who have poured into my life and thinking of the people who I have influence and who I chase...those are reasons to pursue life to the last breath. People, relationships, the ones we love--they're the reason to do it all.

Faith, my faith is about people. God isn't some being who just sits up in the clouds and watches us without carrying...God is our lives, and so that's our model...we need to love people around us, if that's what we genuinely believe in. Instead of acting with act or intolerance, we need to act with love and grace.

Despite the fact that we'll argue, fight, that we'll feel rage and hatred toward people we claim to love...despite the fact that we mis-communicate and it's struggle to make things work... despite the fact that love isn't easy... Despite all those things, it's worth it. If I struggle for the rest of my life with loving people, I will struggle happily, knowing that the fight to love someone is worth it all.

Love will make you beautiful.