It’s been eight years today that my world came crashing down on me. I can’t tell you how many dozens of times today I have already counted and recounted on my fingers to make sure that “8” really is the magic number. I’ve never been that great at math, so I keep doubting myself, but I know that from 2009 to 2017 is 8 years. 2017-2009=8. It’s really been eight years. To be honest, deep down I absolutely know it’s been eight years. Although time goes on, you just don’t forget. I’m still hurt but I’m not angry. I understand why it happened the way it did. At least for him. I don’t think I will ever understand why God allowed mental illness and suicide to be his journey. I don’t think as long as I’m on this earth I will ever understand the need for that. I try not to think about that part of it because it’s still easy to get angry at God about it. He was tormented, suffering, in ways I won’t ever really understand and he just needed to make it stop. It seems weird to say, but a part of me is at peace with it and I can honestly say “it’s ok”. It really isn’t, but yet it is. You do desperate things when you are trapped.

Last week, I got a message from an old friend that another old friend had passed away in an accident. I hadn’t seen this person in a really long time, but I had some good memories of him when I briefly dated someone in his circle of people. He was one of those guys everyone just knew. It was a shock to hear of his passing and brought a lot of reflection on my own life and thinking back to my previous life (before husband and kids) and all the people who were in it then who aren’t in it now.

Two days ago, I saw a post from a childhood friend about the passing of her best friend. I have known both of them since they were little girls. They were only three years younger than me which seems not much of a difference now, but back then they were so little. I still call them “girls” which is kind of an insult to the full lives they have lived with marriages and heartache and kids and all the adult things that I do as well. My friend that passed had become a woman in her own right but in my mind I will always see the wide eyed, naive, crazy haired little girl who used to follow me around in junior high and high school. At one time, she had most of the people at school convinced that my parents had gotten a quiet divorce and my dad and her mom had married so we were now sisters. I went along with the farce for about a week until a teacher asked me after class about my parents getting a divorce. I had to come clean about the real story at that point. Later on, she still had this idea that we could become sisters and tried to set me up with her older brother who lived in a different town. It didn’t go very well, so we agreed we would just be sisters in name and leave it at that. There were several occasions over her younger years that I was around to dry her tears over boys and give her advice. I was around for a few things that created a bond between us because she relied on me to be there for her…just like a big sister. Being the youngest in my family, it meant a lot to have someone that looked up to me that way and trusted me with more intimate details of their life. One of the last private conversations we had on social media we had talked about grief and how hard it is to move forward. I talked about my cousin who took his life, she talked about her Mom who died unexpectedly. Over the last few days, I’ve found myself suddenly breaking down…asking God why this would happen to her. To know that she would be in such a place in her life where she could possibly decide to end it..I just don’t get it.

I just saw on Facebook where an acquaintance of mine is also gone, leaving behind a husband and four kids. We weren’t close friends, but we met online from being involved in the same company and we clicked. She always encouraged, supported, and had a big, bright smile for the world. She was proud to do the work she did, and was dedicated to helping other people live a better life. I don’t know what happened, but I know a lot of people are better for having her in their lives and a lot of people are grieving for her now that she is physically gone.

It seems my whole life is spent yearning for something more than where I’m at. There’s always room to improve. There’s always something else to do. I have never been to Scotland and my soul eerily aches to kiss her ground. I have so many plans and am SO bad at the execution of getting those plans accomplished.I think it’s fear. I’m afraid of not doing it right. I’m afraid of the work it’s going to take to do it. I sound like a broken record to those who know me on social media, but the last few years I have spent in a proverbial cave licking my wounds and shutting out the world. My heart hardened to the outside and I used discernment as an excuse to stay away from people because they just didn’t fit in to what I thought I needed in my life. I think there is definitely some good that’s come from this, because I now have a red rope policy for who I allow in my circle of influence. However, I don’t want to use that to allow myself to stay in a cave forever.

I’ve had some major reminders this week in what happens between the dashes of my life. We are born, we live, then we die. James 4:14 says, “You don’t even know what tomorrow will bring–what your life will be! For you are like smoke that appears for a little while, then vanishes.” (Holman Christian Standard Bible) Peter reminds us that in the time-scheme of heaven, one day there is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day. There is no time in heaven….and if our lives teach us anything, there really is no time on the earth either. The time is now. I think a lot of us can be found in the comfort of our own caves, away from who or what makes us uncomfortable. It’s time for us to come out. Stretch your body, wake up, take in the sights around you, and move on. It’s time to stop wondering if we are loving other’s enough and time to just love more. It’s time to stop focusing on “doing enough”, time to stop toiling in the sun, and time to refocus on knowing the DNA we hold (Christ’s DNA) and let it do it’s work. Just be. It’s time to LIVE in this blink of an eye that lies between the dashes. We are born, we live, then we die. We have no control over when we are born or when we die, but we do have a say in how we live. It’s an anointed time to release our fear and do it!