Here's What's Going On...

I mention in passing that I won't be around at the end of school, and the woman looks at me curiously. I'm gently rocking a sleeping baby in my arms - not mine but I somehow am lucky enough to be able to borrow him every week at church - and this is the third or fourth Sunday in a row we've been shyly trying to make conversation, to delve a little deeper into each other's lives.

"I got in to Little Red Riding Hood," I state, not sure if she knows what that is or not.

"Wow...that's...Where is it?" Such short acquaintance does not fast friends make, and she's really trying to find something to say.

"Logan," I shrug, "I entered the lottery, didn't think I would get in, but did. I have done the 100 mile women only bike ride benefiting cancer research before. Only this year they had a lottery to get in. The sign ups filled up in 45 minutes last year."

She smiles, as I'm dancing the familiar holding-a-baby slow waltz. "My daughter rode her bike in Goldilocks last year and loved it. A Century Bike Ride...it can be a life changing experience!" she says, the last words curling, almost becoming a question, and I suddenly see that we both know the familiar thread of promises pulled taut, stretched and left frayed and out of shape.

I'll be at Little Red in three months. That it is a life changing experience remains to be seen.

Here's a life changing experience:

I'm in Heber, it's late at night and I'm washing dishes, with a steel wool pad and hot soapy water. I'm standing by the sink, scrubbing the turkey pan. The kitchen at my parents house is painfully noisy, with some movie playing on the television. My sister Monet is telling the story of one of her professors at the community college asking her to think outside the box. She called it a Lateral Thinking puzzle. She said:

You are driving down the road in your car on a wild, stormy night, when you pass by a bus stop and you see three people waiting for the bus 

An old lady who looks as if she is about to die. An old friend who once saved your life. The man you have been dreaming about.

Knowing that there can only be one passenger in your car, whom would you choose? 

Monet said that the hint was given that you can make everyone happen with the right solution. After giving everyone time to think and explain their answers, she gave the correct answer: 

The old lady of course! After helping the old lady into the car, you can give your keys to your friend, and wait with your dream man for the bus. 

Ben came into the kitchen and I asked him, "Is that what you would do?" (Thinking he, of course, would know that I meant his dream girl-me, would be waiting at the bus stop.)  His answer will forever be embedded in my brain. Somehow I felt like I was watching the tears plummet from my face, dropping in little droplets into the dish water. 

My husband has just told me something that make his words thunder to earth inside me, in contradiction to the sarcasm he used to deliver them, and I feel the planet I lived on shift beneath my feet, starting to crack and twist apart. My temperature dropped and shivering I grab my sweater. Shock, a tiny voice said, will do that. Ben's words still whirled past, assuring me that it was all going to be fine. 

Suddenly I needed to leave. I held it in until after the long drive home. As I was walking down the stairs after tucking the boys into bed, the picture of Christ hanging on the wall seemed to be staring at me. It dropped off the nail it was hanging on when I walked by and broke a corner of the frame off. I asked Ben if it was a sign that our life was falling apart. I couldn't hold in the tears anymore, hair caught in my eyes and my runny nose and I knew God was watching. Was aware of my tears and panic and devastation and I stood in the hallway, feeling broken and frozen and loved all at the same time. 

*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^

I've just spent the last 20 days going over my handwritten journal of the events of that year, leading up to that night. The pain and hurt in every word is awful, and reading it now still hurts like being punched in the chest by a fighter. 

All that, and Ben hadn't even told me the rest of it. I now know you can have several life changing events happen, all in the space of a couple of hours. 

I'm not expecting to go to Little Red and have a life changing event. Some days (minutes) the only reason I'm going is because I've paid for it. Some days (hours) I look forward to it because I will get to see my little Connor man and Jossy. I'm looking forward to having time when I am not working, can't do housework and won't have my boys with me. I may even squeeze in a movie before I drive home. 

I'm going because I'm obedient. I'm not going to race, or get the t-shirt, or impress/appall people with my fitness level, flabby legs or pale skin. I'm going because I promised God that I would go to whatever opportunities open up for me, and he made it clear that He expected me to keep it. (I asked). 

Maybe it's because hockey season is coming to an end, that all these memories are jumping up at me, yelling for attention, or sneaking up on me on an ordinary Wednesday with sharp angry teeth against my beating heart. Maybe it's because I'm trying to get the last bloody string of Christmas lights down without a ladder (Ben got that in the divorce) or because I'm trying to change a stupid, frustrating bike tire on Max's bike without a wrench (Ben got the tools too) that the whole mess is getting me with hopes that I can survive the worst emotional disaster of my life, or at least be able to breathe through it. 

Maybe it's because conversations at baseball sign ups have been raised that have me poking the sensitive areas, checking that the damage has been contained, that there's no rot or decay to dig out, and realizing again that hope really does float, just as promised.  

Maybe it's because I'm still quietly terrified that I'm not going to get in to nursing school, that the notice I received today that I am an alternate, I'm remembering the catastrophic potential of caring about something. About choosing to take risks. And having the possibility of not really knowing what will happen at all. 

Maybe it's all of it.