On Seeking Purpose and Not Finding It

I’ve been thinking a lot about purpose lately. About how we all have one. About how maybe we live it out, in spite of our mistakes and our best intentions.  In spite of ourselves.

About how we are all chosen for a purpose … and how we foolishly think we have a say in how everything is going to play out.

About Why.

And as usual, the hazy chaos of my thoughts finally settle like dust and find truth in the familiarity of a corral.

The gate fell open with a creak and the metallic chime of chain against pipe. All heads raised at the sound, ears swiveling inquisitively toward the source.  A lanky sorrel with a crooked blaze took one shuffling step forward to greet me. I slid my hand under his chin, up around the strong curve of his jaw to his ears. He nuzzled my shoulder affectionately. I ruffled his mane and ran my hand along his back but passed him by.  He was a good horse – had a nice smooth trot that covered the distance without reorganizing your organs, but a little bit clumsy at times. Definitely not suited for the job at hand. 

Next to meet me was the stocky roan. This bad boy had a chest deep enough to drive a Mac truck through.  He was my first choice for pen work but his hooves were soft. Even with shoes, it would be unkind to take him up the canyon. Maybe even a little dangerous – nobody wanted to take a spill onto a solid sheet of rock and I sure didn't want to take the chance of hurting him. So, I passed him by with a pat on his butt.

I needed a specific horse today because I had a specific purpose.

I found him standing quietly in the corner, hip cocked, head down, eyes deliberately averted, pretending he was not The One. A black tipped ear tracked my approach and at the last moment he took a step to the side in a half-hearted attempt to escape. An unspoken disapproval was exchanged and he halted, turned to face me, let me slip the rope under his jaw and around his neck.

To anyone watching it would appear the choice was random. In reality, it was anything but. I knew the bay: knew he had a trot like a jackhammer and could be stubborn. I also knew his hooves were like iron and he was sure footed as a mule. It might not be fun, but he would finish the job.

Though our lives may appear to be random, I don’t believe they are.  Just as the bay didn't choose me that day, the Bible says we did not choose God.  God chose us for reasons known only to Him. He knows things about us that even we don’t know.  He knows our strengths.  He knows our abilities.  More important: he knows the job that needs to be done and selects us with that specific purpose in mind. 

There are so many things I don’t understand. Why am I alone at this stage in my life? Why do have this sudden exchange of people I interact with daily? Why do none of them speak the languages in which I am fluent – Horse, Ranch, Art? What is my purpose in this place that is so very foreign to me?

I mull over this particular quandary a lot. On the drive to work. On the drive home. On weekends, when I hide in my apartment because I'm weary of the very strangeness of my life. I am like a dog, turning in circles, trying to find a place to rest. In the end, I have to admit – I have no clue. I simply don’t know. I can't know. I'm not equipped. That’s the point where faith comes in, I think.  Faith in something bigger, something smarter: I thank God for that faith because it is the only thing that gives me rest. 
And like that bay, when I feel his approach in the dusty corral I can turn away and try to escape or I can stop, turn, let Him slip that rope halter around my neck and follow him into the next great adventure.

In the words of Rich Mullins - I can’t see how you’re leading me unless you’ve led me here. Where I’m lost enough to let myself be led… and so you’ve been here all along I guess. It’s just your way. And you are just plain hard to get.

We All Need a Hero

Returning to the workplace after such a long hiatus, you see things with fresh eyes. My heart isn’t hardened to The Way It Is yet. I see people struggling to balance the responsibilities of family and work; people who are afraid they aren’t getting it right; people who hurt. And it really bothers me. These people need a hero. Maybe not the kind with the cape, but at the very least, they need someone who can fly, you know?  Someone who can show them it’s okay to be wrong sometimes. It’s okay to fall down and skin a knee. It’s okay to fail.

In my office, I am the resident One Who Has Failed.

There is a large sign hanging over my desk. It reads: Ms Knowitall. Underneath that sign hangs another, smaller sign with the word Logic with a circle and a line drawn through it in the universal language that means ‘Hell No’. And beneath those two signs is a third, even smaller – a picture of a bat wearing eyeglasses. The fourth says Bullshit Taker Miracle Maker. And last but not least, my name. Not one of these names or signs were created by me. They have all been assigned by coworkers.

People coming into my office for the first time stare, but don’t often ask for an explanation and I don’t often offer one. It has been an evolution of identity and I leave it there to remind me I wear many hats, and not one of them is professional. I am not so vain as to think there’s a single thing I do, one single task I perform that cannot be performed by someone else. Someone younger. Someone smarter. Someone cheaper. Someone more experienced. Someone (let’s face it, I’m in a man’s industry) with a penis.

I lose keys. I am voraciously sarcastic. I have pranked every single person in the office to the power of 10. I am perimenopausal so I am either cold or hot but never allowed to touch the thermostat. I purchased a voodoo doll, clearly labeled, and hung it by the neck until dead on the wall over my boss’s desk.  Frankly, I’m not sure why I’m still employed.

But I am. And so long as I am, I will pack my Supergirl lunch box, don my hardhat and steel toes, and show up with a smile. Because there’s a job to do. There’s a problem to solve. There’s a team that is missing its court jester.

See, I used to think my job in life was to Be a Christian and Change the World for Christ. Then I thought it was to be a Mom and change my kids for Christ.  Then I thought maybe I ought to just work on changing me for Christ.  

Two years in Vegas and I realized something. I think I’m just supposed to be Me.

I mean, if Jesus wanted to change me, he would’ve done it himself, right? Before I was born and before I caught my clothes on fire during a meeting with the NRCS folks, before my static-cling red panties fell out of the bottom of my jeans in public, before I renamed that poor subcontractor “Hymen” on - God help me - every document known to mankind.

This whole stint in Sin City has been an identity crisis in reverse for me. Instead of concentrating on all the things I need to change about myself and others, maybe I ought to take a lesson from the bat with the eyeglasses… Bats don’t use their eyes to fly. They use the magical, mystical powers God gave them to navigate the dark night.

My magical mystical power is the Power of Laughter. Great Big Belly Jiggling Laughter. Nehemiah said it best. “The Joy of the Lord is your strength.” And you know what? I’m perfectly okay with that.

Because when you look down and see your panties hanging out where your feet go, you can either laugh or you can cry.

And I am done crying.

The Worm and I

Skepticism is not overrated. In fact, it ranks up there with breathing and not walking in front of trains when it comes to self-preservation.

For the record, I am a life-long skeptic.

I’m a skeptic, dammit. I don’t order diet pills or vitamins. I don’t even listen to AM radio.  

I just don’t do these things.

Liposonix. Non-invasive weight loss. No diets. No exercise. No way. Who buys that kind of malarkey?

Apparently, me.

It doesn’t hurt… that bad. It’s just a little burn.

Bull shit. It’s a little bit of a burn like when I put the cattle prod on my own foot and pulled the trigger. Yeah. That’s what it’s like. I raised a finger, signaling for the technician to pause in her torture before I twitched off the table like a fish flopping on the shore.

I drew a shaky breath. I don’t think this is going to work for me.

She actually seemed surprised. Clearly, she has not sampled the wares. Why not?

Because if you touch me with that thing again, I’m going to have to kill you.

Either the conviction in my voice or the drool dripping from my chin convinced her. Oh. Okay. Hmm.

I laid my forehead on my folded arms and felt the electricity leaving my body in jaggedy sparks. Holy hellfire it hurt.

You could try the coolsculpt.

What’s that?

It freezes the fat and explodes the fat cells.

Exploding fat cells works for me. I only have this one day off and I am already here, already on the table…already have the squares mapped off on my flanks like a Google grid. If at first you don’t succeed, try something else. That’s how I roll.

She scooted the machine over to me and drew out one long hose. I tried hard not to think of how much it looked like an alien worm, with its fat gaping mouth as she prepared my flesh for the suction cup. The worm pressed its lips to my flanks and began to inhale. I had to look away. It was just … wrong.

The technician asked me if it hurt. I shook my head and put in my earbuds, cranking up Joss Stone. After near electrocution and setting myself on fire, pain was relative. She dimmed the lights and left the room. One hour later, she was back and prying the worm off of my butt. I made the mistake of looking over my shoulder. 

For real. 

For real, there was a stick of butter beneath my skin. Frozen butter. Technician began to knead. The tickling sensation was unbearable. I pressed my face into the towel and banged my fist into the table, giggling like a sugared up five year old.

Roll. Reattach the worm on the other side. Repeat.

I woke up this morning and prayed no accident befell me on the way to work, lest I end up in the hospital. Because I’m not sure they’d believe THAT is how I got two giant hickeys on my ass. 

It can take up to 12 weeks to see the results. At that point, I'm supposed to be so impressed I will want to suffer through another session.

I am... skeptical.

Just Look At What You've Done

I found out this week I’m going to have another little granddaughter. Each of my other two have had such individual personalities, it’s hard to imagine they even carry the same genetic suitcases. According to my daughter, the newbie is following suit. Like her sisters, she is determined to blaze her own trail.

I can’t help but wonder what she will look like. The oldest is faerie-fair with eyes of jade set against the palest of skin and golden hair that spins gold like cobwebs in the early morning sun. She believes in magic and mermaids and Grammas who control the weather with a twitch of the nose.

Next came the little firecracker of the family: Her red curls embracing a heart shaped face with a smile that hints of more than a little devilry. When asked if she was being a good little girl, she confessed with what seemed like more weight than any three year old could carry. “Actually, Gramma. I’ve been mostly bad.” And then she giggled.
And now there will be three.

Will the new one favor one or the other? What exactly has God packed in her little genetic suitcase? As I ponder these things, I can’t help but remember my own mother, sitting in a pottery class, surrounded by an array of daughters, granddaughters, great granddaughters. Loud laughter formed a parenthetic circle – a hug of creativity and joy dotted with smudged noses and splattered paint. She clapped her hands together gleefully at the chaos. “Just look!” she declared. “Look at what I started!”

As I peer into my granddaughters’ eyes, I see mischief and innocence, intelligence and naiveté, great beauty and strength and my heart is filled with gratitude for so many, many things in my life – the good and the bad – that led to this place. And I smile.

Look at what you started, Mom. Just look at what you’ve done.

Right Job, Wrong Tool

Yesterday afternoon, while I was sitting at a red light, it occurred to me how often I make things harder than they have to be by trying to do the right job using the wrong tool. Butter knives as screwdrivers. Shoes as hammers. Not always with good results.

I don’t know what made me think of it - I hadn't done anything particularly stupid that day. 
It was at the corner of Maryland and Serene and I was idling along about midway between the beginning and the end of a long line of traffic waiting to make a right hand turn. There was road construction on Maryland but there wasn’t an arrow and I always forgot how long the line grew between greens. I had one foot on the brake the other on the clutch as I waited for the car ahead of me to inch forward because God forbid I not take advantage of four inches of progress. The cars behind me might self-combust with honking indignation.

Anyway, I was staring through the windshield thinking how I needed to wash my car but it was monsoon season so that would be a waste of time, and watching the clouds drift behind the tall steeple of the LDS church on the corner, when a guy on a crotch rocket got tired of waiting and cut across the parking lot. There wasn’t an outlet on the Maryland side of the church, but maybe he didn’t know that. Maybe he was going to jump the curb. I didn’t know. It crossed my mind to follow him.

That’s when I thought about Cissy.

She was a blood bay. I always had a soft spot for bays. Crooked streak down her face, ending in the black velvet of her muzzle. Liquid eyes. Old timer snorted at her. Said you can't ride pretty. I knew that. But dang if she didn't make me want to try.

Backing up a bit, the first dozen years or so we lived on the ranch, we rode ranch horses. This stock was not a bunch of pets. Hell, they were barely horses. They did not approach to be petted. They barely stood the indignity of grooming and even that was a quick once over with the curry comb. They were work animals, nothing more than tools. I tried to love up on them at first but it only made them nervous and the men laugh, so I gave up. So there I was in 1983. And that’s how I learned to ride…on a beast that tolerated my presence only so far as my skill allowed. Get off balance a little bit? Any one of them would be glad to help you the rest of the way out of the saddle and then leave you there to walk home. Talk about an incentive program that worked.

And God forbid you take them out for anything less dignified than moving cattle. They were NOT (all caps, emphasis on the not) trail riding ponies - which was okay for a cattle ranch, really. Except they weren’t exceptionally cowy either. They were too long legged to squat, their necks tied in at an odd angle so they couldn’t really round their backs and most of them had clean throats but they were too hard headed to tuck their chin.  But seeing as how that’s all that was on the menu, we made the best of it for a dozen years or so.

Until Cissy. That little mare was about as pretty as a piece of apple pie. Only five, somewhere along the way she’d met already up with a bit of bad luck: her front right fetlock was circled with angry scars that looked a whole lot like the work of barbed wire. She was funky about standing tied. She’d do it, but it made her nervous. Men made her nervous, too. But women and children were welcome in her world which was fine with me because that’s why we bought her.

The first time I worked cattle on her, God, I remember like it was yesterday-we were in the pasture around the hill-a big old full section and a half with cuts and draws and old downed fencelines that shoulda been cleaned up a hundred years ago. It was rife with mesquite. Not little bushy stuff either-the tall as a tree version with branches big around as a man’s leg just aching to drag you out of the saddle and thorns like a ten penny nail. 

The cows in that pasture weren’t exactly social. Oh sure, they were friendly enough all winter when the feed wagon went honking, but come spring when the grass started greening they were done with the small talk. It was less like herding cattle and more like hunting.

I got sidetracked, sorry.

 Anyway we set out after this yella charolais with a big old white steer on her and she hightailed it into the mesquite. I’m not going to go all Louis L’Amour on you but it got really western for a while. When it was all said and done and the yella cow and calf were tucked back into the herd and my legs expanded in rhythm with  Cissy’s ribs, she snorted and gave a little jig and I slid my hand under her mane, resting it against the sweaty hide on her neck. She calmed back to a walk and all I could think was how different it was to ride a horse that worked with me and not against me. How much easier it was. How much more fun.

See, I didn’t know working cows could be fun. I thought it had to be all about getting yelled at and bucked off and then yelled at some more.

Damn. I wasted a lotta years riding knotheads.

Back to the corner of Maryland and Serene and the maverick on the crotch rocket – he was probably going to cut across the parking lot and then out a back road on the other side and then back on to Maryland on the other end of the construction. Not a bad idea, altogether. If I had been driving The Beast, maybe I’d a followed him… but in the little car? No. Right idea. Wrong tool.

I think maybe there’s a lesson in all of that. One that I need to apply to relationships. If I figure it out I’ll let you know. For now I’m just not going to take Serene.