so grand and subtle...

After talking with one of my still single cousins today, doing my best to remind both of us that God has not forgotten we're on the face of the earth (and in fact lovingly has us in this specific place and circumstance for a reason), I thought more about things that I'm trying to make sense of. I have been trying to make sense of my life more lately, which has resulted in me being less content, more easily misunderstood and less understanding of others, especially of others who are experiencing what I long for.

I think trying to make sense of my life can be a good thing, as long as I'll follow it through to a point where I am okay with not understanding everything. It's just that getting past the (sometimes bitter or angry) point of "why is it like this?" takes some patience. Patience isn't something I've had a lot of lately, which is funny, because I've had a lot more time on my hands than ever before in my adult life.

I'm a person who loves the adventure of traveling around, seeing new places, revisiting old ones to reconnect. Constancy is good, but it's not a high priority for me. I do, however, need alone time to recharge my introverted side, and when I'm constantly around people, I can get irritated more easily. But after about five months of being a vagabond - staying in other people's houses and going wherever I'm needed or wherever the next thing is happening - I need a place to be mine, to unpack and settle again. That might not come for a few more months (hopefully I'm still dealing with months and not a longer time frame!), but I'll sure be grateful for that space when I can have it again. There's a part of me that won't get to unwind until then.

I am getting to a place, though, in my mind and heart, where I am grateful again for the time I have here. I'm getting to a place where I am happy with my purpose here again, which (like I've probably said before) is actually not different from my purpose overseas anyway. Some people have told me that my recent blogs have been depressing. (I actually thought they've at least ended upbeat.) This reflecting, while not always positive, is leading me and others to a deeper understanding of myself, and I think that's part of the reason I'm here (in this place and in these circumstances) for now. And instead of impatience, I'm going to try to patiently delve deeper into whatever understanding I can get.

A quote from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, the Annie Dillard book I'm currently (joyously) wrapped up in:

"God is subtle," Einstein said, "but not malicious." Again, Einstein said that "nature conceals her mystery by means of her essential grandeur, not by her cunning." It could be that God has not absconded, but spread, as our vision and understanding of the universe have spread, to a fabric of spirit and sense so grand and subtle, so powerful in a new way, that we can only feel blindly of its hem. In making the thick darkness a swaddling band for the sea, God "set bars and doors" and said, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further." But have we come even that far? Have we rowed out to the thick darkness, or are we all playing pinochle in the bottom of the boat?