Sheep C: You, Alone

The Sheep have been having a conversation lately. This is news, because we’ve all scattered or, at least I have scattered. Sheep M bleated a call to return, and began an e mail conversation which eventually led me to observe that we’re just—each of us—on our own.

Careful, now. I have a tendency toward the bitter because of my recent marital woes. One of the things I have realized—and railed against—is that I am on my own. And, I repeat, that is true of us each and all.

Alone except, of course, for God…but I’m still mulling that one over, and that’s another post.

The sign in the picture (if you can’t read it) says “Life’s Highway.” That’s what the sheep is on—alone. Others can watch, but they can’t travel it.

Sheep M struggled with my saying this. She has been through similar trials a little ahead of me and assured me that the initial period of separation is, indeed, fraught with loneliness, but that it passes. She added that now she is happier than ever, surrounded by loved ones. No longer lonely.

She misunderstood. Do not confuse what I am saying with “loneliness.” In fact, I am not lonely. I, too, have supportive family and friends and am thankful for them all. What I mean is this: That, in the end, only I can make the decisions for my own life and only I will live with them. Only I can feel my own pain, only I know what reaction helps or exacerbates it. No one, not even those closest to me, can step inside my skin—or even my shoes—and know my problems, their solutions.

I don’t think this is deniable. Just think about the basics: stump your toe and your friend says, “Oooooo, that hurt!” Well, she may know that it hurt her when she last did it, or she may imagine that it hurts, never having experienced a toe-stumping, but she does not know, really, how badly this time hurt you or, indeed, if it did. President Bill Clinton’s famous, “I feel your pain,” was just so much rhetoric.

I did not always feel so. I once felt like a part of a “marital team,” feeling for all the world like whatever came to us, we would face it together. Ooops!

Husband grew to feel differently, and he never shared that he did until he walked out the door. No one else in the family had a clue of the betrayal scheme; he was alone in it—well, except maybe for his girlfriend. But the point is, that you never know what’s in another person’s heart; we are stand-alone units.

I confess that I worry about myself sometimes; am I hard-hearted? I thought about the pain in Haiti and in Chile from the earthquakes, to be sure. I watched in horror, like you probably did, and I gave money to help. But, I’m gonna go out on a limb here, and confess to you that none of that horrific tragedy kept me awake at night. Did it you? Am I just a heartless wretch?

I’ve though it over and realized that I really can’t feel their pain. And I don’t think I’m meant to do so to much more degree than I do. I think of the character, “May” in Sue Monk Kidd’s novel, The Secret Life of Bees. May had the torment of being able to feel the pain of others-including strangers-to a much greater degree than do most. And, in the end, it was her undoing. We just can’t do it. The load is too great for our spindly legs.

And so, how does the flock fit into this stand-alone world? Good question, for it surely does, and we are surely meant to be flock creatures, not alone. Too many wolves outside the flock. If you look you can see the eyes of the wolves of depression and despair in the darkness outside the cote.

I’ll get back to you more on that flock thing…in the meantime, what do you think? You, alone, know—until you share. C

Sheep C: A Peek Inside the Cote

I hosted a slumber party this weekend for eight of my favorite Ewes. Sheep M was there, too, so there’s a clue for those of you wondering who the male member of our trio is. Most of us were fifty-somethings, Sheep M being the young chipper of the crowd, and we had the distinct pleasure of an eighteen-year-old who joined us for dinner and breakfast.

We had the best time! We ate a wonderful dinner, had rich desserts, got little gifts, and lots of wine and cranberry/pomegranate martinis. We stayed up late, late, watched Where the Heart Is, identifying with Novalee’s and Lexi’s poor choices of men, and generally were totally hedonistic. We crashed all over the house about 3:00 a.m., sleeping in every available space, including the couch and two cots.

When the breakfast hour came, we all trailed sleepily into the kitchen for coffee, settling around my breakfast table for biscuits, bacon and fruit. After a night of light-hearted fun and, I think, bonding, it was amazing to me that talk on its own shifted to the serious. It wasn’t planned, and it wasn’t a downer. It was just where everyone wanted to go at the moment and, as I said, it was amazing…

I don’t want to disclose the nature of the troubles, because the subject of those worries might just peek into this blog (we hope so), and the Sheep’s Cote is a sacred thing. It is a place of safety, somewhere to come into during the dark night of life. (Oh, my, am I waxing poetic here!).

Quite literally, we talked through present life for several hours. Each one of us has either gone through some life-devastation or is going through it right this very moment. We were able to vent honestly, to ask “What am I to do?,” to share what we have done in similar situations in the past, and to say, “Well, I know what I would do—I wouldn’t put up with that, not one more minute” (Tuff Talk!)

This last strong outburst made us laugh (Confession: it was me, the "Tuff Talker" who said this). We all agreed that it was the right advice; we also all agreed that we can sure talk tough when it’s someone else’s life. Execution of same was going to be much harder than speaking it! So, we head-on talked about whether we should even have been spouting this tough talk when we all knew that dealing with a loved one is a complicated task. What we came to was this: Yes, we should issue this sound-but-hard advice within the fold, but we also needed to give grace to the Ewe involved as she faced this serious situation. One of us spoke up with this wisdom (borne of her own similar past pain): “You are just going to have to move as God speaks to you.”

In the end, we knew that we had not actually solved any of the problems presented, but we sure had allowed for honest airing. We had given each a safe place to which to return for support and the benefit of hindsight on our own past messes for guidance.

I was reminded of how our ultimate source of both guidance and comfort is God Himself, and how we are supposed to share those gifts of help from above with others:

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. Corinthians 1:3, 4 (NIV).

And this is exactly what was happening around my breakfast table! It was a natural, non-contrived occurrence because this is just what happens within the fold. It is one of the great purposes of the flock. – Sheep C, 12/14/2008