That One Time At Church

You wake up at 6:30 in the morning and lay there looking outside through the small corner that the cardboard on the window doesn't cover. You rub your sore back remembering the routine each night. The many times you twist and turn and readjust your pillows to a position that will give your back and neck the least bit of discomfort. You remember how you lay and wait until that moment of defeat creeps in; when the exhaustion becomes stronger than you and you drift off. Your dogs now knowing you’re awake come to the front of the car where you lay to greet you good morning just to then crawl their way into your blanket to get warm again. Your body resists the coming moments of beginning the day but your bladder is screaming at you otherwise. Everyone is awake now and the process of folding blankets and stuffing pillows into a corner begins. You drive to a park nearby where plenty of other people just waking up without homes go as well. You walk rapidly to the restrooms to release. You then begin the search for an outfit with the small amount of wrinkly clothes you have stuffed into a bag. You’re tired but the suns shining and the breeze is soft and cool so you look up to the trees then keep going. When you are all done eating cereal and getting dressed you all hop into the car and drive. And so then the day begins.

This past Sunday, I went to church, even though I had already given myself permission all week before hand not to go to but for some odd reason I woke up with this tickle inside me that kept on nudging me into the direction of church. I walked in and stood in the back as per usual. The toddlers scurrying towards the snacks then to and away from their loved ones while the bigger kids paint and color. Then as the worship band began there it was. I felt as if my heart had been replaced with a 40 pound brick. OH, I thought to myself this is the same heaviness poets write about. It’s not as if I've never felt it before it’s just that this time around it was much different. I had felt this deep, sad, heaviness and instead of feeling like I was drowning a strange thing happened; I felt peace releasing itself into my veins. I don’t know how sadness or pain happens to you but mine doesn't usually come conjoined at the hip with peace. After it all maybe sure but never with it. I felt so still and safe inside myself; inside the chaos, the sadness, pain and disappointment. I stood in confusion and great fear for the rest of the service. A few friends came up to me before, during and after service each of them with their kind eyes and gentle smiles. Each one insisting they just wanted to see and hug me. One after another as if taking turns they’d come to me and deliver to me love. Each and every time reminding me why I believe in friendship so fiercely. Reminding me why when I leave I always come back; for the snacks, of course. I don’t think I could ever tire of those people and their gorgeous smiles coming to hug me. I don’t know why or how I came to feel this stillness in the middle of chaos but it’s one of those great beautiful mysteries I’m just going to let the universe have; right alongside Beyoncé and pie.

Perhaps that was the divine itself giving me a hug or maybe it was me losing my basket of sanity muffins, I don’t know. I do know is that when the lyric came on screen about waiting for God to come rescue me I did not sing along. I stood there by myself in snotty silent protest. I remember a time I did believe in a rescue of sorts but then I woke up to the reality of being in the same spot. I don’t believe that God wants us to believe that we aren't strong or brave or bad-ass enough to get through really tough times. The days of believing in being rescued are long gone for me. I believe in my friends and their friendship being the stitches that hold me together when I can’t stop falling apart, that’s Gods will to me. I believe in rising up to the fear we tinker with and then no longer letting it control you, that’s Gods will to me. I believe in myself and my ability to get through some really overwhelmingly difficult crap. That God knows I can rescue myself time and time again from the pit holes of life. I believe God is betting on me, on us because he knows just how much shit we can go through and come out of, alive and well.

I'm tired and I'm ready to give up. Yeah, it doesn't get much realer than that. Earlier this week I had a long moment in which I considered giving up. I thought what if this is it?? What if it never works out or gets better?? What if my efforts will never be enough?? What if all our hopes of things like SSI for my mom and Celest don't work out and what if I can't get past all my fear from past traumas. What if I get a quick job and end up going into deep depression again?? So many what ifs and all I could think was yeah I'm ready to give up, I'm ready to give in, to surrender, to admit that I've been defeated. I even stared at a beer bottle a second too long and it terrified the crap out of me. This wasn't who I was. I don't run from things and surely do not give up because its gotten too hard. Its gotten to that point where I've honestly considered giving in. I remember thinking to myself "HOLY SHIT! I'm losing my grip. I'm losing my grip on hope." Hopelessness could easily be a couple steps to my left but I wouldn't know that because the lines are all blurred. I am walking by faith believing that a creative solution is out there waiting for me to discover it to get us out of this. I'm stumbling my way along. Finding my way through the fog all while fighting quite fiercely the urge to give up, to give in. Because this will not be the end. This will not be what becomes of my story.

Friendship is my most treasured possession. It is the best way for me to describe the divine here on earth. Even though I love to be by myself I am so obsessed with connecting  and being with my people. That is what makes me shake off the thoughts of giving up. Sometimes friendship is what saves me. Its what opens my hand and allows me get a better grip on this hope thing.

That peace I felt streaming through my veins was just what I needed. It reminded me that I GOT THIS. I am doing just fine. Peace is not as far away from me as it can sometimes feel. Its right here, flowing inside my veins. Pumping itself through that beating heart of mine. I GOT THIS. God knows that, in fact she sends me my friends to remind me of it.

“You are meant to fight. When you are sick, your body fights for its right to function. When you hold your breath, your body fights for its right to breathe. There are billions of tiny events—from the surface of your skin, down to the very cells of your body—that have to happen in order for you to be simply sitting here today. If your most minuscule parts haven’t given up yet, why should you?”
--N.T.

“...and then I remembered this basic religious principle that God isn't there to take away our suffering or our pain but to fill it with his or her presence...”--Anne Lamott

Heart Bursts.

Life is hard and sometimes it just gets too hard and before you know it your sadness outshines the rest of you. You talk, laugh, make sarcastic comments. You engage but still somethings amiss. Thats real. Thats the truth, sometimes. But every now and again something incredible happens and you feel so much you feel like you've bursted on the inside. As if you're heart cannot contain it so it overflows. When it happens you awaken and realize that not only are you engaged but your soul is as well. And if you're anything like me you'll begin to make these half kidding half serious weird crying faces. You'll put a hand over your heart and feel a rich goodness seeping into your pores. A moment like that just happened and I felt the need to share.

I was getting into my car after the school bell rang and I left Celest to line up with her class. I sat down and as per usual my two pups were overjoyed with my return. I had just noticed a bottle of lotion spilling so I got frustrated but then i heard a knock on my window. I turned and it was a father I see everyone morning. Oh hello. He raised a plastic bag and I opened my door to see what was happening because at this point I was very confused. He handed me the bag, smiled then told me in Spanish it was for the dogs. I thanked him not knowing what exactly I was grateful for and closed the door. My mom came in just as I was about to look inside when i told her what happened. We looked inside to find a brand new toy and bowl set. My mom found the receipt inside. I sat in confusion trying to process. Then it hit me like a lightning bolt jolting my body. He knows. He knew I kept telling myself. He knows our situation and instead of making judgement or making himself feel like a super good person, even though thats all the makings of a decent human being. He felt empathy so in turn felt compelled to do something. To do what he could. Because one of the things I've learned is that most of the time people just give what they have. I'm no longer concerned with the rest.

They give what they have.
Thats beautiful.
That is all, carry on.

Raging Against The Whispers

How often do we compare and contrast stuff then make ourselves feel terrible?? Often, lets say often.

I have a default trait to isolate myself. I am at a constant push and pull of isolating myself and reaching out all my peoples. Not dogs. Dogs don’t count I’ve realized. I tend to roll up into a ball and sit in denial believing the worlds stopped for me even though I know it hasn’t. I am like a rolly polly in that way. Personally, I struggle with people living at me.  Every time someone says they are going on a trip I want to roll up into a ball because WE aren’t going on a trip. We never go on trips, what a disaster we are! When I see photos of friends having fun with actual real live people AND sometimes even with dogs, BOTH at the same time!! I freak out over that too. Stupid over achievers. When I hear about people having fun and looking happy, I stuff my face with food and tumblr, pinterest the shit out of the rest of my day. I can’t handle people constantly LIVING  AT ME!! This is much too much.

One of the main reasons this has become a problem of mine is because when you’re homeless there is no such thing as normal. The weight is always there and you are always hurting, aching, longing. Its going to be one year in April. One whole year of living in our car and trying to keep our sanity. Yes, I am having an extremely hard time with it.  So many stories, tears, screams, and SO much fucking frustration. This has been happening for a whole year now guys. All of it, for a year!!!! Are you having trouble swallowing that? ‘Cause I sure am. It doesn’t seem such a long time ago when I was writing about only three months and the stupid sand getting in my contacts case. There are times I get lost in a day dream and think what if its all been a dream??  Yeah just wait, soon someone is going to come to wake me up, pat my back and tell me its all been a terrible, no good dream. But of course that doesn’t happen. I don’t get to experience the sigh of relief that I’ve been desperately hoping to feel. It’s not a dream and I am already awake. Its hard, this whole life thing.

I tend to get stuck in this phase of feeling like people are gone living their lives and I’m here waiting for my life to begin. It’s hard not to get stuck in that place because things are ten times more easier when you have a home and stability. I keep telling myself that when I get a place I am going to do this and that and be all around super awesome.  I can’t keep up with daily routines if every day is uncontrollably different. If I don’t have the simple luxury of a place to live then yes naturally I will feel defeated and sad and stressed. I will feel all the stuff there is to feel but when I really think about it every day for the rest of my life will be uncontrollable and hard. I will always feel many things, all at once too. Emotion has never been a lonely street for me. Stuff will always get lost, broken and I will try to learn to carry on anyway, one stupid limp at a time.  I have absolute no control over the universe and the happenings it sends to me. Things will continue to not work out no matter how much better I try to do things. People will always seem happier than I am. People will always seem to have good stuff happening to them. All those things will continue to be true and weigh me down but if I just stop focusing on everyone elses life and how much more good things seem to be happening to them then maybe I can be awakened from my fear. Instead I should try to focus on how much good stuff is happening to me, in my life, right now. Good things happen to me too. All the time. I just need to be awake and paying attention to feel it. Be present, Analaura. Do what you can with what you got, yeah that.

About maybe two years ago, we had a place. It was a wonderful two bedroom apartment with a long patio in the back. It was near bus transits and the freeway. We moved in and I began to decorate it into a home, our home. It was everything that I wanted coming together. I thought to myself this is it, this is when things fall into place and become perfect and normal like everyone elses. My mom had just transitioned into working in a new office with one of the lawyers shes known for years. Celest was doing well in school. Things were supposed to be running smoothly now. I was wrong, of course, within about two weeks I began getting these outrageously strong stomach pains and extreme nausea. My plans to get a job and maybe a couple college classes went straight into the garbage disposal. It got so bad that I couldn’t smell any food or eat it because of the extreme nausea. That was the worst because throwing up is horrible but wanting to throw up without actually doing so is torture. I woke up at 5 every morning crouching and moaning in pain. I lost about 20 or thirty pounds. I was in and out of the emergency room every week or so and since this was before Obamacare I had no health insurance so the bills were stacking up by the thousands.  We brought my grandma to stay with us for a while to be with me the days my mom couldn’t. I was in horrible health and I spent my days reading, sleeping and humming to myself from pain. They couldn’t find anything wrong with me and all they prescribe were strong nausea pills that put me to sleep for hours at a time so I refrained from using them. My mom couldn’t concentrate at work because of it all so she ended up quitting in order for her to take care of me and her sanity. I was in the hospital many Saturdays and still trying to go to church every Sunday. Still trying to show up, hiding all the IV bandages with long sleeves. I would try to show up for lifes stuff in hopes that I would get better and be able to get back to my plan of stability. I was sick for almost a year. I hid it very well though from friends and since I never talked to extended family that was a non-issue. It all went exactly how I didn’t plan them to. Awesome. NOT. Things never work out the way we plan for them to. Things go wrong all the time and we have to continue to keep re-adjusting. We eventually moved out of that place and then transitioned into a trailer in some ones backyard. Then from there we get to here, to now. I have recovered since then and still to this day don’t really have a clear idea of what went on with my body. I was told by a holistic doctor who is now practicing in modern medicine that all the stress and feelings I had with me while being homeless for whatever time were being released from my body. She said our bodies go into survival mode when we are stressed which only lasts from a couple minutes, to a day, maybe weeks but my body was that way for months so now that all that stuff was no longer needed it was trying to release it all.  It had to re-learn how to function without survival mode. My body was trying to recuperate but had trouble in the process.  Did that make any sense?? Point is, I did what I could with what I had then. I don’t know if we get a place once again my health will spiral again but I do know, well what I’ve learned and learning is that no matter how many times things go wrong and they are plenty that will, I will still be here tomorrow. I will make it through even though sometimes it feels much too hard to. I will make it to tomorrow. I am so much more resilient than I remember to give myself credit for.

The thing about my life right now is that it’s happening so there is no waiting for it to begin. I tend to go into that state of mind where I sit and wait and watch life happen to other people then get even more depressed because I want to be experiencing life like that too. Oh how often I forget that I am already in it and living it. I’m alive, damn it! I can’t continue to wait for things to stop falling apart because I will be left waiting for the rest of my life. Fear and pain and the mess of life will always be here. Glennon was right; my friends aren’t living AT ME but maybe possibly trying to live WITH ME. They are right there feeling all the stuffs. Coping, re-adjusting, creating, doing what they can with what they’ve got. I am practicing to not retreat into my default of isolation and spread those wings of mine and realize that good things are happening to me too not just to other people. I don’t have it down but the more I practice moving with life and its people the more I am able to get through all the pain that’s demanding to be felt in me. The more I am able to feel all the good things.

I will still be here tomorrow.

 I will still try to show up for life’s stuff with IV bandages and limps and tear stained cheeks and sad eyes. All of that and more.

 I will readjust and resist the whispers that tell me to surrender.

“You will know me,

Constantly blooming and never surrendering”

(excerpt from Lullabies)

The two photos below are from two different friends at two random times many weeks apart but they carried so much love during times I had returned to isolation. They were sent to me completely random but the moment I got them was absolutely magnificent. These women reminded me that what I've been doing with what I've got has been enough because I've kept making it to tomorrow. I beat myself black and blue so so often and then retreat because I can forget how much strength I've had to have in order to keep on moving forward. I kept showing up for all of lifes stuff and for that I am one hell of a bad-ass. I forget that much too often.  WE forget that much too often. We keep on making it to the tomorrows when some of the todays are unbearable. That’s bad-ass. If anything I am overachieving just by still being here tomorrow, still alive and moving forward.

Still soaring and raging against the whispers of surrender.

“…because its easier not to try again, its easier to hide whatevers left of your heart and soul, its easier to pretend that you are eternally broken than to risk being broken again, but you know what, that’s okay, because things get worse and then they get better and then they get unbearable and that’s life, you end up getting unbeatable, you learn to duck when you must and dive when you should, you learn to live expecting death around every corner, and you learn how to come to life every time death slaps you in the face. Just trust in yourself more than you trust in sadness or in happiness all the same, trust that life is worth the risk and the resistance, and you- you- will be ok, even if things fail to be.”

 --Vazaki Nada

“You are so good. So good, you’re always feeling so much. And sometimes it feels like you’re gonna bust wide open from all the feeling, don’t it? People like you are the best in the world, but you sure do suffer for it.”

-Silas House, This is My Heart for You