Don’t Lose Heart!

I lost my car twice yesterday, and gave thanks to the maker of the clicker that allows me to honk the horn when I’m close. Both times I couldn’t help but flush with embarrassment. What sane person forgets where they park, not just once, but twice? It’s not like I was parking somewhere foreign, like the airport or a shopping mall.

The first time I got lost in the parking garage at work. The second was in a very small grocery store lot. I felt as if everyone was looking at me as I approached the wrong car, turned in circles several times, and then resorted to the clicker again. Obviously my brain wasn’t functioning correctly.

After I found my car the second time, my eldest son gave me a stern lecture over the phone about how I never listen to him. I had dared to ask if he was coming home for dinner which resulted in a, “Mom, I told you I’m at Grandma’s house! Don’t you remember?” I just had to sigh and tell him the truth; no. My brain has been in idle for several days and won’t click into gear. Such is the drudgery of depression, that sickening darkness that swamps my body in a thick haze while I slowly suffocate.

For the past week I have been moving forward one painful step at a time, each task deliberate, if moderately unsteady. I do the things I know I need to do whether I feel like it or not. I continue to eat healthy meals, exercise and sleep… and cry while I wait for it to end.

I have been making conscious decisions to do what I know to be right rather than seek comfort in empty frills. Yesterday this culminated in reading scripture over and over. I could barely understand what I was reading, until I came across a few sentences that reminded me of the comfort I have found there before. “So we do not lose heart, though our outer self is wasting away.” I had memorized this some time ago, and as I read the words they penetrated the scar tissue over my heart and massaged the weak muscle beneath. In that moment I felt the blood flow again to that numb and half-dead part of me and I remembered the grace given to me countless times before. Let me be clear, I did not feel better. But God reminded me that his promises to me ring clear. His words have a power that mystifies me.

This morning I made an impromptu decision to ride my bicycle. I had planned something different but I felt a calling to go into the outside world and breathe in the cool air. I had an idea that maybe there was something I needed to see and experience that would not be found on my usual routine. I pushed through the numbness and into the colorless world, seeking out beauty in the darkness with my headlamp. 5:00am is a very dark time indeed. And this is what I found…

I found a sunrise that splashed color across the horizon in layers of color that were not unlike a sky-wide rainbow that became more brilliant with each second until the sun crested. On the side of the road I happened across the most beautiful red fox I have ever seen.

He trotted beside me for a few seconds with this regal plume of a tail and I was transfixed with him as he slipped into the brush. I wandered into the wetlands and discovered a big blue heron who seemed not at all anxious to be so close. He lifted his head and pushed into the air with a graceful sweep of his wings that fills me with a sense of rapture even now as I write this. The sun was barely up as I pushed along the bike trail and saw two little heads moving through the water with a distinct wake behind them. Otters! Their whiskers were heavy with water as they paddled furiously to escape the alien creature who was encroaching on their territory.

And then I saw it, the most curious bird I have ever seen. It stood in the water, black and tall, and I was so filled with wonder that I stopped my bike to stare. He saw me too—entirely too close for comfort—and he peered at me through the reeds, obviously trying to decide if I was threat enough to make him abandon his breakfast table. His silhouette reminds me of the grace that is given when we choose to follow the spirits leading. We wonder if we should stay or go, run or walk, lie down and die or push forward into the unknown. Creation provides a canvass for my questions, and while I don’t always find the answers I seek, I find comfort in knowing it is never unsafe to ask.

I don’t have my depression figured out. Sometimes I can guess at triggers, other times it creeps up and whacks me over the head while all I can do is nurse the bruise. Today I found real relief and I am so grateful to God. His comfort is real and enigmatic and I never take it for granted.

II Corinthians 4:16-18 “So we do not lose heart, though our outer self is wasting away. Our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. As we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but things that are unseen are eternal.”