7 Takes: The Blame, The Cat, and The Disappointment

One

The cat Gloria (also called GloriaBill) has taken to coming into my bed around 4 am and arranging herself around my head and nose and mouth while I’m sleeping so that when I wake up, I’m always sure I have, during the night, contracted the Rona. But then eventually I remove all the fluff from my eyes and nose and mouth and discover that I am basically ok. When I finally do drag myself to fuller consciousness, she sits on the bookshelf and circumspectly pushes all the things I have there for my own comfort (toothpick, thyroid pills, pen, books) on to the floor one by one, chirping in a pleasant and friendly way. If I seem more incoherent than usual, don’t blame the election, blame the cat.

Two

I think that’s one of the most important ways of coping in life (think of it as self-care)—being able to assign blame. If you know who’s at fault, you can deal. But if you don’t know, that’s so disappointing.

Three

For me, this week in particular, I really feel that God was to blame. God—who could give us a party and a good time—keeps taking nice things away from people I like (including myself). And the thing that’s so wretched about it is that—because he knows everything—he particularly knows the impactfulness (at some point I’ve got to stop using this word because it will have merged over from joke into full-blown ordinary usage) of the taking away. If he knows you perfectly, and he does, then he will know precisely what it is that the taking away accomplished, in every kind of horrifying detail. It’s not like when I throw away something that looks torn and destroyed only to discover it was the treasured possession of one of my offspring, how was I to know? On the contrary, God does know what will be the sorrow and pain of that person.

Four

I get that one is supposed to find that a comfort—God knows–but that is the kicker, he knows and doesn’t do anything. ‘Lord,’ you might say aggrievedly, ‘if you had been here, my someone or something wouldn’t have died, least of all me, who am now also dying from grief.’ Looking in from the outside, one wonders if this doesn’t count as sadism. Looking at it from the inside too, the word “cruelty” hovers not so subtly in the air.

Five

The chief consolation, I suppose, of the Christian as opposed to the wandering person of the world who has no faith and no hope is that God is not in the business of ever saying anything like ‘Be Quiet’ to the disappointed and dying. God is not totalitarian, though he is the ruler of the world. He is not Jack from Twitter, rushing around to make sure everyone is saying the things he approves of. He doesn’t have to play God because he is God, and is not anxious or worried about the kinds of things we might say and feel. You are allowed to say to God, “If YOU HAD BEEN HERE” and his response is not to cast you into hell for wrong-think, but to stand by your grave and pull you out, in the myriad and sundry ways that he does that—literally, metaphorically, emotionally, spiritually, eternally, bodily…all of them.

Six

I suppose that’s why the gospel is so dangerous. If you are already in a grave, you really don’t have anything to lose. You can go after other people who are dying without any overwhelming fear. You can just say whatever it is. You can say it to God, who rescues you, and then you can say it to other people. No amount of censorship can really quiet the curious realization that God—who knows everything, as I said—has already gone into the depths of the thing and come back out.

Seven

This is a horrible line that I happened upon in the Bible this morning, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word.” And, “It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I may learn your statutes.” You know what, I’m not going to read any more psalms today. I’m going to eat chocolate and read a novel. #selfcare #thanksGod #wheresmypartyandagoodtime

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