Wednesday, February 22, 2006 | by nathan

When The Bad Thing Happens

Believe it or not I don’t blog about everything. If you are reading this blog, chances are you are someone about whom I care deeply, because I do not hold out the pretension that total strangers (or the growing number of people who do not like me) are wrapped up in what happens in my life.

Still, I do understand that blogs are public forums, and as such, the information contained in them is public information. (see here re: the whole "Nathan plagarized the idea I made up but which is every damn place in popular culture" debacle). Chances are if you are someone I would consider family (that’s right, I said it again) that you hear about the things that are going on in my life in a way that this blog does not convey, as you know a more fully realized version of me than I am able to convey in this half-hearted way I have on the Internet.

Confused yet? Understandable, as I have not said very much.

When I was a kid and bad things would happen to the people I loved, I would secretly fear it was because of what bad people we were. It was because we had pissed God off, or that He was mean, and because  He did not have our best interests at heart. I believed this because a lot of religion has become superstition, and in middle America superstition and morality get all wrapped up together, and being raised in the Church of Christ, well…

I went to bed last night and a bad thing was happening, and I didn’t even know it. I woke up this morning and for a little bit the world might have been ending, until I realized that the bad things have happened before, and we all got through it by clinging tightly together. And we all lived through today, and we’re fine, thank you, not great but working on it, and I am going to go home at 7:30 p.m. and cling tightly to the man I love.

The moral is that God isn’t mean. But sometimes we are - to each other, and to ourselves.

Case in point. There is a guy in the lab who is being really obnoxious, and I kinda want to hit him. Am I going to? Maybe. But I’m going to try not to. I’m going to pray for patience and forbearance, because I am obnoxious too, because I get the sense the people often want to hit me. So I’m going to try not to hit him, just for today. If he’s in here tomorrow, he’s probably going to get it. But for today, I’m going to try.

It snowed here, and was foggy for several days, and there was a smell in the air of something like Ireland, like something I haven’t inhaled in the five and a half years since I got back from Greystones. Soon the winter wheat will start coming in, and the entire landscape of western Oklahoma will be a shade of green so vibrant that you think your limited human irises might not be getting it all, like they are going to burst with it. I need to get new tires on my car so I can go for a day-long drive into the plains.

Life is meant for things like that. Wanna come with?

All your better philosophers would say that we imbue the world with meaning, that it has none on its own. I’m not sure that the bad thing always means something, in that whole "God is angry" way, or that whole "this happened so that…" way either. I think it happens, and that we get to react to it. Because I believe that life is fundamentally about hoping in the good, clinging tightly to the people we love, and taking tender care of one another, I’m going to spend the next little bit doing some incredibly clumsy, awkward, and very intense good hoping-in, tight clinging, and tender care-taking.

Also, I am going to get some good sleep, and hot baths, and warm tea, because it is still cold outside, baby.

It snowed here, and was foggy for several days, and the air is clear now, and I can breathe, and am not sick, which is a Miracle. Capital M. I worked out the past two days but ate horribly - all McDonald’s and Thai food, which was wonderful. Family Dinner is this Saturday at mom’s house, and I need to invite Laurie and Jaye, and Brett, and Erica and Alex, because I think that there are few things more awesome - and I mean that in the fearful Greek/Biblical sense - than a family (mine especially) huddled together over food. 

In other news, everyone be sure to read Speculations and Such today. Good, good stuff. 

This I Believe, It's Not Right But It's Okay