This story means a great deal to me, so since I am a somewhat better writer than I am extemporaneous speaker, I wanted to write it down. That gives me an extra chance to savor it, and at least try to pass on the depth, beauty and peace that I experienced.
I thought that I married fairly late in life-I was 27. I had my first child at 31. I had tried very hard to find a perfect husband and father, and I didn't really believe in divorce. I tried to organize-actually to control-my life, mostly for the sake of my children...I felt that it was extremely important to try to give them a "perfect" childhood, with a mom and dad, a thoughtful upbringing, and whatever material advantages I could provide. I had started my daughter's college fund before she was even conceived...
Somehow, the happiness that I tried to create just fell apart. And it came, unbelievably, from me. Through a series of sort of random events, chance meetings with old friends, and probably the exhaustion of having two small children 19 months apart, my orderd world turned claustrophobic. I don't know whether I was starting to suffer from depression, but I was overwhelmed, and I ran away.
I rented a peaceful cabin by the lake. I took the place for 6 months-from October 31 through the end of April. It was such a simple little place-the girls shared a pull out bed on the sleeping porch. I had a bedroom with a big sliding glass window overlooking the lake. I could watch the mist dance in the morning, the snow fall (and there was lots of it that winter). I fed the swans, and the birds at a feeder.
I reawakened my artistic and spiritual side that winter. I bought drawing materials. I found a Yoga center, and took a wonderful and transforming T'ai Chi class. I also went to church. Church was something my husband did not approve of, but it was somehow important to me. The little stone church reminded me of the one I had attended as a child, with my grandmother. It was down the street from our house-we walked together to the 8 o'clock mass. It was one of the only things I walked to, as a child-being a suburban family, we were big on driving...
This was the first time my girls participated in organized religion. At Christmas, they were "aisle angels" in the Christmas pageant. In retrospect-I did not become part of that community-church was a very solitary experience for me. I am incredibly grateful to that church, though, for existing as the house of God, and providing me with a place to speak with God and experience God in my life at that time.
As Spring approached, I faced some difficult and agonizing decisions...when my lease was up at the end of April, did I go back to my "home" and husband, or find a way to continue where I was. My brain told me that my husband was my "home"-there were some ways that we were so close-but returning felt so wrong, somehow. Yet I felt so incredibly guilty leaving-with two small children, that felt like the most irresponsible thing I could possibly do. I kept telling myself that there must be some way to do this within my marriage-to keep my spirit alive. I had tried some counseling with my husband. I tried to talk myself out of this reawakening I was having, telling myself that my time was over-I needed to focus on my children-that leaving my marriage was a sin. I can't really explain what I was doing or why-I was just taking steps, but every day I was wrestling with myself, telling myself that this journey out of my marriage had to be sinful and wrong for myself and my children, because I was married and that is supposed to be forever...
It was around this time that I experienced my own personal miracle. It happened while attending church during holy week. I was on my knees, in the state of sadness and uncertainty that I increasingly felt-feeling like a "sinner". Suddenly I looked up into the quiet, simple beauty of the church, and it was then that God spoke to me, very clearly. "Let sin die". I didn't really understand the meaning of this, at first. "Let sin die". The words resonated in my head.
I felt, suddenly, that God was calling me to let go of the old concepts of absolute good and absolute evil-black and white. I smiled, and I was filled with peace, and a feeling of love. My eyes filled with tears, as they have become wont to due at moments of great beauty. I felt, then, that sin was an over-simplification-life was much more complicated than that-much more complicated than the way I had been living. I felt that God was somehow giving me permission to move on with my life.
Although I have lost my way at times since then, on that miraculous day, God became a living presence in my life rather than an abstract concept. I no longer found God only in church, but potentially in every minute of the day. In a smile, in a moment of peace, a cup of tea. God allowed me to let sin die, and awake to life.
