Good Lord.
The Killers are the soundtrack today; you know the drill: open this link and listen while you read.
You know, artistic choices and stuff.
When there's nowhere else to run
Is there room for one more son?
I'm warning you all now: I'm experiencing a bit of virtually every emotion on the spectrum today. So brace yourself. Here goes.
Becca told me once, "If they can't accept you at your worst, they don't get to see you at your best."
But for me, it's about being accepted at my best. And I don't quite know why that is. I get to the top and somehow throw others down to the bottom. Stay with me...
If you can hold on,
If you can hold on, hold on.
I'm going through some things, and in the last 72 hours have been filled with love and heartbreak and angst and grief and shame and pain. Overall, I'm overflowing. And at the same time I feel a little empty inside. Like there's this swelling loss so big that it's taking up all the space inside my insides, and it's pushing my lungs up out of my chest and it's hard to breathe and eat and sleep. And I only stop thinking when I'm sleeping.
I'm hurting, because I was called fragile.
Fragile is one thing I am not. Never have been. Never will be.
I wanna stand up, I wanna let go.
You know, you know - no you don't, you don't.
I wanna shine on in the hearts of men;
I want a meaning from the back of my broken hand.
No.
I have
faced abandonment and abuse, divorce, depression, hatred, loss.
I have seen cancer and rape and violence.
I have been hit
and hurt and cut and thrown aside.
And what hurts most of all of it is the thought that I might not be able to handle any of it again.
Another head aches, another heart breaks.
I'm so much older than I can take.
I'm not asking for it, of course, but in life there's one thing I've learned again and again: Man will not save you. Man will not hold your world together.
You know you gotta help me out.
Don't you put me on the backburner.
You know you gotta help me out.
You grab your satchel and your wheelbarrow; you load up your skeletons, and you call on your God to get you through. Because no one can carry the burdens of your heart but you. You set off along the railroad tracks, another tramp in the haze of a southern summer and you go make your own story. You march, crawl, scramble, amble, sprint: to your hurdles, your loves, the moments in time when you stand and point to the first person in the room who catches your eye and he changes your life.
And then you go to the next room. And you point out someone else. And someone else changes you, too.
But you never let those cards--the Jacks and Queens that float in and out of your hand through the trick, through the game, through endless turns and rivers--the cards never play for you, never throw your ante into the pot, never raise your stakes, never hold themselves up at the table.
You hold your own. You tramp along, another game awaiting your bid.
It's a valiant knight who makes the attempt to pull you onto his horse and carry you along. But there are some pieces of your life in that wheelbarrow (your family, your desires, your memories, your insecurities) that you cannot leave behind. And in his armor, he will try to lead his horse while you ride; he will push the barrow. And you're there: just riding along.
But eventually you both realize he has done too much. He has carried all your weight. You wrap your arms around the neck of the steed, laughing at the irony of a man so strong who has worn himself so ragged. You tell the horse to carry his master home. You thank the knight for the beauty of his heart. You give him one last look while the rider mounts, and you say goodbye, and thank you to your dear, dear friend.
You know you got to help me out, yeah.
You're gonna bring yourself down
Yeah, you're gonna bring yourself down
And you pull your satchel back over your shoulder. You say a prayer of thanks for the kindness of a wildcard in a moment of need. You realize you lost the hand, but the Dealer is still at the table, and He's got another trick for you. And all the cards are back in His hand. And you've learned another secret of the game.
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier.
So many metaphors. Sorry if I lost you. That was maybe more for me than anybody else. And I feel good about it. But here's where I wanted to end up...
I am a strong, strong person
You're gonna bring yourself down.
And I am resilient.
Three weeks ago I was at the
bottom: emotional, frustrated, hurt, trapped, angry.
But I built myself a
terrace; I climbed my way out. No one else did that climb for
me.
I had plenty of concerned hearts on the outside cheering, but for years now I've been
the one to pull myself from the hole.
But this time, at the mouth of this crater, I was careless. I saw a hand reaching in to pull me out, and what I thought was one quick pull turned out to be much more, and when I regained my footing, I saw I had thrown the body of that salvation into the place I had only just left. I made a martyr of the grace I was given.
Over and in, last call for sin
While everyone's lost, the battle is won
With all these things that I've done
All these things that I've done
I didn't realize how tired the knight had become until I saw him fallen and bloody at the the bottom of the hole I'd dug I never
wanted that. No one should ever work so hard only to come out feeling like a failure; like I feel now.
So, I shovel another heartache into the barrow. I say my prayer of thanks, remind myself of the lesson I keep relearning: man will not save me. But oh, it is a beautiful ride when he tries. And for that, I stay grateful, and with grace, I stay away while the knight picks himself up from the pit, rebuilds the terrace, climbs his way out.
If you can hold on
If you can hold on.
