“You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want. There’s still lots of good in the world.” -S.E. Hinton, The Outsiders
I didn’t realize how fully exhausted I was until I slumped into the back seat of a taxi on Thursday night, fifteen American dollars worth of groceries next to me, and almost cried when the radio started playing “Hotel California.” I didn’t want to cry in front of this random taxi driver, so I laughed instead.
“Tu gustas la music?” You like the music, strange woman laughing in my backseat?
“Si, mucho gusto. Mi padre gusts la música, y mi también.” Yes sir, I like this song very much, because it reminds me of Mom and Dad, and Texas, and driving to Denton with Alex at sunset, and not being sick, and being able to explain this to a stranger because we speak the same language. Yes sir, I like the music.
I got in the taxi because my stomach started cramping on Wednesday morning and didn’t stop until I went to bed that night, causing me to spend most of the info meeting about my team’s trip to the coast doubled up on the bathroom floor. Our host asked me to only to go to the coast if I was feeling 100% better- if not, it was best if I stayed behind. He waited for my answer as we stepped outside the kitchen I’ve worked in all month, squinting in the sudden bright sunlight.
“Well, if the options are being 100% better or not going at all… I guess… I should stay behind,” I said, and he nodded.
The truth is, I haven’t been 100% in a long time.
At one of our debriefs, someone described the Race as a marathon, not a sprint. But that’s not exactly true— it’s actually 11 sprints, back to back, haphazardly shoved into a marathon label because there is no other way to run this without collapsing. We have been running hard for almost nine months now; even in the months when it feels like nothing is happening, but especially the months like this one, where I leave the house at 7a.m. and don’t return until 7p.m., where I don’t write because ministry is a fire hose turned on full blast and pointed straight at me.
It’s month nine, and I’m tired.
It feels like a defeat to admit that, when this is supposed to be the trip of a lifetime and I’m supposed to be relying on the Lord to fill me up or whatever. It felt like a defeat to say goodbye to my team Thursday night at Pan de Vida, where they waited for the bus to pick them up at 11:30 to head for the coast to aid earthquake relief efforts.
Instead of going to the coast, I re-read The Outsiders. This is what I do, when I feel defeated and exhausted and numb: I read to make myself feel something again.
Because it’s month nine, and I’m tired, and it’s way easier to turn off all the emotions and exhaustion and just get through. It’s how I made it through debrief with an ear infection and four Skype interviews. It’s how I make it through every day at Pan de Vida, even though it is one of my favorite months of ministry. It’s how I’ve lived my life, for almost as long as I can remember: the girl with deep feelings that no one ever gets to see. Turn myself off and keep walking, one foot in front of the other.
But in The Outsiders, that’s what the Socs do so they don’t have to deal with how unhappy their ‘lucky’ lives are. It’s what Dallas does until the only thing he ever loved dies. Ultimately, turning off hurts worse than the exhaustion and feeling the sting of defeat.
I don’t want to end the Race this way. I don’t want to look back on this year, with all of its deep hurts and crazy highs, and realize that there could have been more.
To quote Aldous Huxley, “But I don’t want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.”
I want whatever is going to make me feel things deeply, every day for the rest of this Race and the rest of my life.
In a nutshell, I want Jesus. Real, raw, Jesus, in a way that makes me uncomfortable.
It’s month nine, and I’m tired. But there’s still a lot of time left. There’s still a lot of holiness to experience if I only let the Lord in.
