At least I didn't kill Ed...

It is about gratitude.   It is about fear of self.  The self you don't really know is there.  Or the self you know is there and you are too afraid to admit it.  It is about looking at life with a wider lens because if you don't you get to a place where you almost kill someone who just happens to be in your small line of vision.  It is definitely not about Ed.   Unless you are Ed and didn't know about your possible fate, sitting just inches away from me one Sunday.  If I were Ed,  it would be all about me.   I hope Ed never reads this.  But in case Ed, you do.  I apologize from the bottom of my heart.  I promise it really isn't about you.

I sat in the blue chair one day while I explained that I was horrified with what had almost REALLY happened.   What I had almost REALLY done.  For all intents and purposes, I considered that I HAD done it.   It got inside my head and then there was the fact that there was that second where I moved forward,  absolutely no one else could have seen it, it was so tiny, but every sinew of my body reacted and moved me a tiny bit forward before the rush of shamed shock and horror engulfed me.  True horror at myself.  And shame and embarrassment.

The blue chair tells me that at least I didn't do it.  That I could choose to be grateful that somewhere inside of me I had enough humanity and knew right from wrong and could control myself even if murderous thoughts got so close to the surface.   I was not having any of it.  I remember tearfully saying how pitiful and small I must be if THAT was the only thing I could say about my character.   I was grateful I didn't  kill Ed.  I started to look for a rock to crawl under.  And waiting for the guilt police to come to take me away for the crime I almost REALLY did commit.   It didn't take long for guilt police to get there.  But instead of taking me away to my cell,  they stayed.  Settled in as if I had invited them over for coffee and a danish.

I, still in turmoil, sought out more counseling from my pastor.  She saw how stunned I was.  We talked about the safe places we all have and expect to always have and when it is violated it can be frightening and confusing for our spirits.  She also mentioned that I hadn't been the only one who had experienced a jolt in our spirit over the whole ordeal.   She mentioned that I should consider, once I had  brushed the gravel off my knees, that I should sit and share with Ed, the affect that horrible Sunday had on me.  She also mentioned that I might not want to explain, in detail, what could have happened to him had I been of a different constitution.  Good plan, we both decided.

I remember sitting there after having these conversations and I was still disgusted with myself,  I took a recipe card and wrote,  "I Didn't Kill Ed"   I stuck it on the long mirror in my bathroom.  This mirror reaches from one end to the other.  A huge space, yet this note card, as small as it was seemed to be the only thing I could see.  So big and horrifying, I couldn't even see my reflection for a long time.  It was there to satisfy my sense of irony.   My desire to beat myself up over and over again and to mock myself at how truly small and stupid my attempts at living a grateful life were.


“I thought such awful thoughts that I cannot even say them out loud because they would make Jesus want to drink gin straight out of the cat dish.”   -Anne Lamott-