Years ago I quit allowing myself to rent movies or check out books from any library. I was never responsible enough to get them back on time and the late fees usually amounted to me being able to just buy the movie/book for cheaper. So you can imagine my joy when Netflix arrived and I became Amazon.com’s best customer for my reading materials.
Then we moved and I discovered the closest library does not charge fines for overdue books. Oh the elation. Instead they have on the counter a “Guilty Conscience” Jar. How great is THAT for a girl like me, I thought to myself. BEST LIBRARY EVER.
Well, a year later now, I realized WHY that is not so great for a girl like me.
I am a person who feels guilty for EVERYTHING. I could live on guilt. Chicken with a side of guilt is usually on the menu for dinner at my house. I have learned I’d rather just pay a set fine now than a fine determined by my own guilt. I throw change in that jar every time I walk into that building! I don’t even have to have a book checked out and a quarter goes into that jar, because I’m sure I’m guilty for something! I feel guilty if the person before me had 10 books overdue and did not feel guilty about it. I pay their fee. And if I DO have a book overdue, since we now have a one day a week visit to the library, what goes into that jar is most likely far more than what the actual fine might have actually been.
Maybe it’s a mom thing. Aren’t we always thinking we should have, could have, would have done better if we could just get one do over. Or maybe it’s a woman thing, I’m 45 lbs overweight and I just ate 4 chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. (Can anyone say EATING DISORDER). I really could consider myself bulimic. Except I binge but never purge. Throwing up is the worst possible thing I could think of doing. Not to make light of eating disorders in anyway…oh man, I’m sorry, … the guilt. Or, I just bought a sweater, I don’t need, doesn’t fit me, but IT WAS ON SALE!!! Then we start to feel guilty for feeling guilty.
Maybe it’s just a Becky thing….but it’s a never ending cycle for me. So I decided I am going to blame my guilt now on the Library. Well, that didn’t work, now I’m blaming the library for my own hang-ups. OH THE GUILT.
It’s just been one of those weeks. I have said the wrong things and done the stupidest of things yet again.
I am taking two different classes at my church. One is a Breaking Free by Beth Moore women’s Bible Study. It is all about how to break the chains of captivity to truly living freely in Christ. You want guilt….well this has loaded me up. I now know however one of my main obstacles to living free is Prayerlessness. I’m not a great prayer. I want to be a good prayer, but I just am not good at it. When I start praying in my head quietly, pretty soon I’m distracted by something, next thing you know I’m talking to the cat or thinking about the bathroom in the lower level that probably should be cleaned. My mind is constantly distracted. I can’t stay focused. But it was what I decided I needed to work on more. I do great with a prayer journal. I call them my letters to God each morning. But well, some mornings I don’t get up when the alarm goes off and I’m running behind and I don’t’ sit down later to write my letter. OH THE GUILT….
The following night I have membership classes at church, since I am changing to a new type of church all together, I have to take the course that teaches the doctrine of the church. I absolutely enjoy the class each Tuesday night and am meeting some very nice people there. Amazing, for being so unsociable for so many years, I am starting to learn to LIKE meeting new people again, hearing loss and all. For years I was afraid of looking stupid because I didn’t hear something right and responded completely wrong, only to get that look of “HUH?” Yes, it’s happened a zillion times. Or afraid to fall over from a drop attack in public. THE HORROR. And then when I didn’t hear someone greet me and I didn’t hear them, I just looked like a snob….and I felt guilty for looking snobby, even if it was out of my control. I holed myself up for years and only stuck with the few people who knew my illness and understood it and we didn’t need to talk about it or go anywhere. Years later I have finally taken the step to try and meet new people, new friends, etc. etc. People laugh when I say I’m kind of shy, but really I am. Or was. Or maybe just reserved. I don’t’ know, what do you call a person like me? OK, don’t answer that.
Anyway, this week after class I asked my pastor how his wife was feeling. I knew she had been ill and wondered how she was fairing. (Remember the night before I just realized my obstacle ,prayerlessness). We were all walking out and I just stopped and asked him how she was, and went on to say that I think of her every day. She and I had been introduced months earlier and we had a great conversation and that I really understood where she was at to a point with her “hidden illness being a sufferer of one myself. So I just wanted him to know (and her I guess) that she was on my mind daily. Another lady, nearby also told Pastor that she also was thinking of her and prayed for her every day. Here is where it gets sketchy….open mouth insert foot. I nodded at her and looked at Pastor, who clearly I think wanted to just get home for the evening and said, I don’t pray for her every day, but I do think of her. The minute it was out, I was pleading in my head, like Rose to Jack in the Titanic. “Come back….COME BACK”. I needed the words to go back into my mouth and not have come out. SERIOUSLY? DID I REALLY JUST SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT TO MY PASTOR? Well by golly, yes I did. I was mortified and I knew there was no time and really at that point no use in trying to explain my obstacle, but I tried anyway by just quickly saying “it’s something I’m working on” and humbly walked to my car just kicking myself again…and the guilt, oh the guilt. I just told my pastor I wasn’t praying but worse, I wasn’t praying for someone he loves. OH man, WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?
Let’s go back just a half hour to an hour earlier when it was asked if anyone needed someone prayed for in the class and a lady said yes, I do, and told who that person was. Pastor looked around the room and said “Who will pray for this young lady?”. I immediately said I WILL. But then, I realized, he wanted me to pray right then and there. Well, now wait a minute, I first am terrible at public speaking. It was the college class I HATED the most. Probably would have been my downfall had I ever become the lawyer I dreamed of being. What did I do? Well, I said, “Well, no I’m not going to do it NOW, I will do it at home”. The chuckles went around the room and I was like oh for crying out loud Becky, can you EVER keep your mouth shut. Only later, of course, for this woman to hear me tell someone else, well I think of her but I don’t pray for her. She probably thought. Nice, who is this freak? Believe me folks when I say I will be praying for you, I really am sincere and each morning (MOST MORNINGS) I am sitting down writing a letter to God because that way I need to stay focused and I have my list of friends and family who I need to be praying for along with their friends and families and when I sit down to write that prayer, EVERYONE is included. I PROMISE, my progress is coming along. REALLY.
Well, Wednesday I figured was a new day. The events of the night before played over and over in my head and I just kept thinking, I am a total dork. Just an idiot and I need a mouth filter. I decided I needed to not dwell on it. I planned to get Lane off to school and get right to my morning personal Bible Study. But while I was waiting for him to get ready, I felt a spark in me to start singing. And singing loudly, making up a song as I go. If you are my facebook friend, you know I tend to do that every now and then. Just make up stupid little jingles here and there. So, I’m just singing away some song about Fall and Leaves I stop to take a sip of coffee and I hear HELLO? HELLO? I accidentally made a call to my sister and it was on speaker phone. I started to sweat, uhm, hello…..I think I called you by mistake. “Yes, I think you did”. “Did you just hear me singing?”. She started laughing and said uhm, NO. Oh thank you…oh thank you thank you thank you thank you. Relief never felt so good. I am a dork, I know it, and usually embrace it, but I have my limits. Got Lane to school safely (imagine that) and came home and got right to my study and my written letter to God. Afterwards, I looked out the window and saw the big patch of weeds in the front yard.
The weeds had been there long enough. It was time to clean them out. So out I go. I knew I had work ahead of me and I wasn’t feeling well, but figured I’ll just mow them all off. I took out the few stepping stones that had been laid when I had great visions of a beautiful flower garden in that spot and crawled on to the lawn mower. First row through my “garden” and there is a CLUNK and the whole mower SHUT OFF. OH boy, I’m in trouble now…..and I couldn’t get the lawn mower to start. Oh man, Dave is not going to be happy with me now! SIGH….10 minutes of trying and then it just becoming a challenge I was going to get that lawn mower started. We could NOT afford to buy a new lawn mower and I could not afford the guilt of breaking it. Amazingly enough, all I had to do was push in the button for the blades and it started right up. 10 minutes later, the front half of the weed patch was mowed and I was satisfied and I put the lawn mower away.
Mind you, while all this is going on, I’m not feeling well this week. Meniere’s has reared its ugly head making life wobbly and foggy at best and on top of it I have a head/chest cold. So tonight, I decided I was going to pay a visit to my neighbor. She is so busy all the time, I thought, I’m just going to go over, spend a few minutes chatting and catching up with her and then come home and go to bed. (oh, now that I typed that I feel guilty I was going to go over to her house sick, possibly infecting her family, oh good gravy). I go to the garage and tell Dave, I’m heading over there and do not plan to be gone long so am not going to take Lane. I also said, I think I’ll drive the lawn mower over there. He said … “Why? Why not take the 4-wheeler.” Me, “Well, the lawn mower will be easier to get out of the garage and between the van and the truck, it’s smaller”. So I hop on and back it up and turn it around and start heading out of the garage. What comes next? CRUNCH, CRUNCH SCRAPE, SKPSKSKSKSKKSKSKSSSSS. I stop. Turn around and look back and there is Dave with his head in his hands. I look down and the small wheel on the thing over the blade part of the lawn mower is underneath the siding on the garage. Oops Yes, I broke the edging and then proceeded to get the wheel stuck beneath the piece of siding and it was pulling it off. I didn’t know what to do then…back up…go forward. I just stopped, shut it off and sat there. He said “Go forwards.” I said, “From here that doesn’t look like that is a good idea.” But neither did going backwards so he had to come and pick the lawn mower up and pull it out. Yes, that is where my night should have ended. I went to the neighbors anyway, only to find her not home but her husband there. He immediately said “What you been demoted to the lawn mower?” I just shook my head and said, well, for now yes, but when I get home…I am pretty sure I’m going to only be allowed to ride the TRICYCLE from now on…..
Happy weekend all. Enjoy the beautiful weather and don’t forget to Praise God for all He has blessed you with and I really am praying for you! REALLY I AM! I am a work in progress, and I am pretty sure I will always be....but hey, every morning I smile and thank God for another day to try and get it right. And maybe, just maybe someday I will, but I won't hold my breath on that and I will always thank HIM for His mercy and grace because I really rarely get close.
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