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23 August 2012

Etching

I went away and came back with words written on my arm. They're in me now, in my skin, the skin that is me, and that's how I want it. I need them close, need to see them every day, so that I can live them and breathe them until they're more a part of me than my skin.



She saw them almost as soon as she saw me. "I want you to talk about the words on your arm," she said, and so I did. Happily. (And yes, she can have some of her own someday, with my blessing.)

I told her where the words came from, how Dame Julian loved God so much that she went to live alone so she could talk to Him all the time, and how she wanted to share God with other people, too, and so she wrote. Some of what she wrote, one small part, began to etch itself on my heart the first time I read it. "All shall be well . . . "

Then I told her how T.S. Eliot borrowed the Dame's words and added to their beauty, if that's even possible. And still they called to me.

And then my season of worry, of anxiety and learning how children make me vulnerable and fighting to come to terms with that. This season of knowing, eventually, that I have so much and that I cannot live on the edge it all hangs on. And these words, they remind me . . . remind me to return to myself, to my family and the kids, that I don't need to be afraid and so I can stay here, find gratefulness, and remember my calm.

I wanted them before my eyes, wanted them closer to me than I could get with writing them on paper or putting them in my phone, and so I had them inked under my skin. Already they help me breathe, help me remember and reorient in a way that nothing else has.

She doesn't understand, not yet, but she keeps asking for the story. I tell it, like I tell her the story on my icon and read her Bible stories, because I know understanding will grow as she does. And maybe, with these words etched on my arm and etching themselves on my heart, she will grow up breathing them like she breathes air.

6 comments:

Misty said...

yes, of course. i have stories inked on skin, too, and i love that they tell about me, and i can tell about them, too. did you see sarah bessey's post, too?

p.s. which ts eliot repeats the same? i'm going to assume prufrock or wasteland?
love this

Sarah said...

I didn't see Sarah Bessey's post, I don't think. Do you have the link. And it's in The Four Quartets, Little Gidding V.

Sarah said...

I didn't see Sarah Bessey's post, I don't think. Do you have the link. And it's in The Four Quartets, Little Gidding V.

terri said...

I love mine too. I not only think of Jesus, but I also think of you when I look at my etching. :)

christianne said...

So beautiful. So often I read your words, and that is all I can say in response. So beautiful.

Lisa said...

really kind of speechless as I pause and think of watching this etched into your skin, and the reminder it is for my own battle with anxiety, and of the telling and retelling of this story for Mirren's heart to hear.

love you!