In All Honesty, No

I had lunch with my mom this weekend, and it came out that I have a negative self image. I personally have known this for a long time, but I guess that was the first time I expressed it to my mom in so many words. So she gave me this book to read by Josh McDowell called His Image...My Image. The end of each chapter has application points to work through, and being the underachiever that I am, I just give them a cursory glance and half answer the questions in my head. Chapter 3's question talks about Psalm 139:13-16:

For you created my inmost being, You knit me together in my mother's womb, I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made, Your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

It then asks if you believe this of yourself, if you can "honestly thank God for making you the way he did". And then I realized it: my answer, in all honesty, is no. I can thank Him that I wasn't born with some kind of debilitating disease, that I'm not confined to a wheel chair, that I'm relatively normal; but I can't thank him for making me just as I am. There is deep seated pain, bitterness and frustration at God for making me the way I am. Why couldn't I have been born with normal bone structure? Did I have to be this big? Why did I get fat? How come I'm not as smart as my brothers? Why did I get the high blood pressure genes from Mom's family, were the bones from Dad's family not enough? Why should I thank God for all the things about myself that I despise?

I have been lying to myself for a long time. I've been asked before if I was angry at God for everything that's physically wrong with me. I've always said "no" and talked about Amy Carmichael and how I knew God made me this way for a reason. And I do know it. I just don't believe it. My brain says "no", my heart and every fused bone in my body says "yes".

I want so dearly to make a fist, and snap my fingers the way everyone else does, and go to the store and buy shoes with a heal, and not have to worry about the width not being right, and eat salty food and not have to worry about my left ventricle. I thought I didn't have a problem with it, but I guess I do. I can't thank Him...at least not yet.

Memories

I was sitting on the couch this evening, thinking about how I should be upstairs working on a paper (theatre history, ick) when one of my house mates picked up a house photo album from my first year of college. Flipping through the snapshots I was reminded of all the good times with the girls in the house. From K.'s 21st birthday dinner at Chili's to the end of the year party in the limo, (the end of which found me and one other person sober) it was good memories all around, even the frustration with the couches was a blast.

So I just thought I would share a picture that I find particularly enjoyable from that year. I think it's one of those that requires a little bit of explanation. If you are among the millions of Americans afflicted with poor eyesight and can't see, it reads: "Laura-Stop stealing my underwear and eating them! Please. -heart- Mo Dude" My reply reads: "Mo, I'm sorry. I was hungry. -heart- Lau[squiggly][squiggly]" I don't remember how that joke got started, it certainly was not rooted in fact. Whatever the case, it still brings a smile to my face, and an ache of nostalgia to my heart, or stomach, or phalangeal nerve. It's funny how random things become when you live with people, but I guess that's why God made Eve in the first place.

It's hard sometimes, remembering how much fun we had my freshman year of college, and then being harshly reminded by my current situation that the good times are over, but I guess it's better to not focus on the fun that we had and look at the fun I can still have with my current roommates (despite the deplorable lack of certain amazing roommates due to marriage/graduation/natural progression of life).

Anyway, I hope you've had an enjoyable time trodding down memory lane with me and seeing a stick figure picture depicting my underwear eating self.

P.S. Sorry I haven't posted anything substantial in a while, I did write a soul-baring post, but it wasn't very complementary to someone, so I felt that I really shouldn't post it for the world to see, not because I didn't want to express my frustrations, but because I didn't want to speak ill of someone in public (I don't know why I think that makes it okay that I totally thought what I did, still do to be honest, but well, you know what I mean). Oh yeah, Mississippi was great, but I will wait on my pictures (which have yet to be turned in for developing, but I'm lazy, what can I say?) to post about it.