525,600 Minutes

I often think of the themes in my life as acting like boomerangs. Something may happen to me–a great pain or loss–that sends out the very best of me scatted against the wind, but eventually they all return to their rightful home within me. This last year has been full of this kind of scattering, and if you have ever read my blog, you know what I am talking about. A year of more challenges and stress than my body, mind or spirit could handle, and a heart so broken I thought it was beyond repair for most of this year.

Now there is just something about a list that I dearly love. Lists organize my life! I have running lists for the things I need, the things I want to accomplish (like having more sex in the coming year–twice in 12 months is just not enough!!!), lists of places I want to experience, lists of problems I am facing, and, well, the list goes on and on and on… This blog has been full of some great lists:

• A list of my experiences right up to my blindsided break-up: Post-Mortem: My November
• A list of the reasons why I am a good girlfriend: 40 Reasons I Make a Good Girlfriend
• A list of all diseases, losses and freak-outs of the last year: The Stress Mess
• A list of why I don’t trust men in tank tops (and my personal favourite post): Tank Top Wearing Man Candy?
• Not to mention the list of all the men I loved before (go on and hum it, you know you want to): The Dating Game

So in honor of my little list making fetish, I offer up on my one-year anniversary since this unbelievable year began with my emergency root canal the following list of all my gratitude for what this last year gave me–in no particular order:

1. My Ordination. This day was full of more love than I could have ever imagined, and I have drawn deeply from those waters this year.
2. Surviving This Year! If you read “Posting My Big Secret” and “Shift Change” you know that this is an ACCOMPLISHMENT all by itself! Not only do I feel I survived, but I feel stronger, happier and more at peace with who I am than at any other point in my life.
3. EMMA! Gotta love Miss Puppy Girl. She is my joy. We have really fallen in love these last few months, especially after her mean cousin Morgan left! Morgan, my niece, is part of the Puppy Gestapo. Her departure turned on the “My Mommie is not a meanine.” light over Emma’s head. Plus, she is FINALLY growing up…a little bit. She still has to wear a leash in the house–all the better to catch her and take my stolen bra out of her mouth with!!

   

4. Paparazzo. I have said it before, and I will say it again: I do not know how I would have made it through without him. I tease him that he is always “pulling my pigtails,” i.e. driving me nuts just because he can. Yesterday morning while doing crunches on the living room floor, Emma bit my ponytail and pulled hard. The more I would go to stop her the more she would pull. I ended up in a pool of tears and laughter! No wonder the two of them love each other so much–they are cut from the same cloth!
5. Casa Derby. I lived for 2.5 years without my own belongings, so coming home in February filled my heart in ways I cannot even describe. I missed my Red Turkey Rug! I missed my books, music, bed, sofa and enough dishes to host a party for an army. How sweet it is to be home again. Moving home also brought new friends and neighbours. They met me mid Apocalypse and adopted me straight away. I needed the affirmation of new friends, and so I am grateful the latest incarnation of Casa Derby came with some.
6. My Mama and My Sista. These two continue to show me love, love, love, even when I am only full of fear and despair.
7. My Work and Team. I get unbelievable joy knowing I am doing the kind of work that crosses the religious divide and finds people right where they are and ministers to their hurting hearts in that place. My patients and their families are my teachers, and I value their lessons. Ministering to my atheist patient this year, and the work in general, has given me my inspiration as I apply to Vanderbilt’s PhD program. I also have a wonderful team to work with, but especially my manager, my social worker, my secretary, and my nurses Wendy and Lisa. They all make each day a worthy sacrifice. (Trust me! At what I make, the word “sacrifice” is perfect.)
8. My Bereavement Group. If I ever have a friend go through a crushing break-up, I will immediately buy them Alan Wolfelt’s book Understanding Your Grief: Ten Essential Touchstones for Finding Hope and Healing Your Heart . Working through this book with my group, and the group’s grieving processes in general, helped me to identify that what happened to me was just the normal grief one experiences when someone you love dies. I suddenly no longer felt so isolated in my grieving, and listening to them give voice to their mourning, gave me an opportunity to accept my own. Once I got that the person I knew and loved did in fact die–metaphorically and literally, in as much as that person was no longer real or real in my life–I could finally find the courage to accept the past as it was, accept the me that I truly am, and move on towards my own best future.
9. My Bike. My Bike. My Bike. I love my shitty bike, and I am accepting cash donations (through PayPal of course) towards my next ride. It may just be one of the crappiest bikes on the planet for someone to ride 50-70 miles a week on, but she keeps on going strong. I love waving to the guys mowing my golf course at 6:30 in the morning with their headlights shining out in the dark. I love riding with Emma! I just love riding her period. Giant, Specialized and Cannondale may get quite a bit of my internet window shopping, but she gets my attention day-in-and-day-out. I would have gained a TON of weight without the bike given my knee, so I am so appreciative to have this bike even if it is not all that good of one or all that cool. She does what she is supposed to do–for the most part–and I am grateful.
10. My Blogs. Writing has given voice to my despair and to my hope, both of whom are constant partners in my dance of life. The affirmation of my faithful readers and the new friends I have made as a result, gave wings to the fact that I did in fact have a meaningful future without the one I had loved. He and I began a conversation–an important one for me personally and one of importance for the world in which we live–and when it ended abruptly I feared the conversation died too. In working on this blog and Don’t Be A Christian (which will be more fully operational January 2008), I found new partners in that conversation, found I could do it on my own (dammit!!!!), and the impetus to be bold enough to go after a PhD. I was once sent an email from someone wondering if this blog was the beginning of something else because she could sense something brewing in me from my writing. The truth is the blog began as a way to show photos of my new puppy! What it has become astounds me, but I also know it has been central to my healing and to my reaffirmation that indeed my middle name is hope.

There are certain songs that have supported me too, but especially the words to two Bjork songs: The whole of “All is Full of Love.” I keep reminding myself that I am full of love to both give and receive, and although it may not come from the places I expected, it is always right there within me and for me. The other song is “It’s Not Up To You.” The lyrics are amazing. She sings, “I wake up and the day feels broken. I tilt my head. I’m trying to get an angle…if you wake up and the day feels broken, just lean into the crack…notice how it sparkles.” This has been a year of leaning into the crack, and much to my surprise it has sparkled in ways unimaginable last year. Me too. I still sparkle.

With gratitude for the 525,600 minutes of this last unbelievable year,

Rev. Jacqueline Hope Derby

Photo Credit: PAPARAZZO