Job.... I Feel For You Buddy

Ever just have one of those days?.... More importantly, ever feel like those days were God's way of saying, "I saw you being happy last year. Nice try."? Well, I think to some extent we've all had our own little "Job Moments". Yesterday, mine was of Biblical proportions. In fact (in due time) I wouldn't be surprised if scientists (or priests... or a modern day Joseph Smith) discovered transcripts written on papyrus, dated long after I die, entitled Mallory, from the New Holy Bible, King Obama Version. Eventually, God will be offering advice to you on one of your "bad" days by saying, "Thou art not yet as Mallory". (You get the picture). I may be wrong, but I doubt it.

And no. I don’t want to explain why. I just told you I AM yet as Job. Put your sad face on.

But through this whole experience I realized some important life lessons.
1. Money really does buy you anything you want, of which I have none
2. High heels really do give you mind-numbingly painful blisters
3. God really is (on some occasions) a mean kid on an ant hill

So, here's to you Job. I raise my glass to your success in paying off the Lord to say all those great things about you, and tell the world of your "long-suffering" "steadfast" "endurance". I salute you. And here's to you God. For not burning off my feelers with your magnifying glass.. just yet.

"Sometimes Mallie Pinches Me And It Hurts"

I thought I'd share a conversation I had with Don last night that contributes significantly to my attraction to him:

Me: Don, what do you think is the best thing about you?

Don: (without hesitation) My body.

Me: *Crushing "No, I'm serious!" look*

Don: ..... and also my dashing good looks, my intellect, my charm....my love for the color orange...

Me: The best thing about you is your love for the color orange?

Don: For the color orange it is.

Me: (between bouts of laughter) You're such a nerd.

Don: I guess it's my sense of humor then.

*****************************************
I love this kid.

So the question now is, what is my favorite thing about Don? Well, I hope you're not expecting much. In fact, to warn you, the answer has a feminine undertone and will probably leave you with the sort of face on as you'd expect to find on someone who just encountered their first "gay sighting".

His laugh

I love the way he laughs. But not just any laugh. The unfortunate part is, the laugh I'm referring to doesn't come about frequently. In fact, the only time I hear it is when he's teasing me (relentlessly) and I threaten to pinch him. But when I do, he can't care that I'm making his skin turn purple because he's "tough". Needless to say, Don has a few bruises... and this is why I now enjoy our love songs on a burnt CD entitled "Sometimes Mallie pinches me, and it hurts".

The End (of unhappy perceptions in love)

I thought I'd start with the end in order to more fully embrace this new blogging lifestyle I've chosen for myself.

Disclaimer: (this one's serious)

I have been trying recently to figure out what it was about having a romantic relationship that made it so appealing. The only answer I could come up with was that people are lonely. We seem to think that all the pain would disappear if we were in one. I disagree. Maybe temporarily the pain would subside... or be partially forgotten... but part of the purpose of a lasting relationship is to bring challenges to the surface. It demands all of our compassion, acceptance, release, forgiveness, sacrifice, and selflessness. When we are truly "in love", we find ourselves in more pain than we ever were before. Maybe this is why so many of us fail. We seem to think that love is the means by which we can be rescued, when in fact, it is the means by which we grow. It isn't the absence of certain people in our lives that causes us pain, but rather our unconscious reluctance to let that growth take place.

Our job is not to look for love... our job is to look for all the barriers we hold against its coming. We seek desperately for the perfect person, but it is that same desperation that leads to its destruction once it gets here. Our real goal in love then, is not to find someone attractive enough to support – but to support someone in being attractive. No one is anything less than the possibility of perfection that lies within them. Here on earth, no one is ever "finished". The top of one mountain is always the bottom of another. That moment we fall in love, is actually the moment a light is cast on the truth about someone in their entirety. And as soon as that light appears, fear does everything in its power to shade it. Our hope for the "perfect person" who just hasn't arrived yet is the greatest form of that shade.

I believe that when you are looking for something perfect, God sends you the exact opposite. He sends you something better: Someone with whom you are given the opportunity to work through the places in yourself that need to be repaired before you're ready for him or for her. Fear would tell you that REAL life doesn't begin until he or she gets here. Yet it persists whether we choose to take advantage of the "northern stars" in our path or not. But when they do arrive, in our moment of greatest preparation, we are given an opportunity to perceive them in a realm of perfection that doesn't exist in fear. It is a place in our hearts where we are able to continually see their sculpture in the unfinished stone. It then becomes our opportunity, whether we are prepared to or not, to remind them of the masterpiece within. The real "happy ending" isn't an ending at all...it is merely an end of unhappy perception.