Hope?

I've seen glimpses of hope this weekend, popping in short bursts at least once or twice a day and breaking through the storm in my head that has otherwise isolated me from the rest of the world for the past couple of months.

I felt it when I reached the 30-minute mark on my daily walk with Dodger for the first time in months even though all I wanted to be doing was lying on the couch. Or when I laughed when I caught him Friday red-pawed and guilty-looking with a mouthful of dirty socks that were too much for his little mouth. Instead of scowling, I laughed.

I felt it very briefly when I opened my journal and wrote a line here and there. Then I remembered how much I used to love writing and how, once upon a time, my dream of writing a book didn't feel like a dream deferred by hopelessness. I wrote a couple of thoughts I'll probably never finish before slowly closing the cover on the moment of inspiration and staring into nothingness for another half hour.

I was driving home Sunday singing happy songs instead of letting my bored mind wander and review all the people I don't want to forgive and all the situations I'm convinced will never get any better.  But as I was about to leave Pascagoula, I spotted a Christmas decoration and suddenly I was crying all the way home. 

As I said, glimpses of hope. I knew it was hope, because in those moments I could see my life outside of my tunnel vision as something that God cares intimately about and that is made up of the good and the bad. Those moments remind me of all those times people tell me that these circumstances are temporary. 

Against my better judgment, I've been convinced by certain people that gettinghelp from a counselor would be beneficial, because apparently crying multiple times a day every day for no reason, skipping meals because I was always "too tired" to get up and make them and Googling suicide methods and the locations of local pawn shops that sell guns are all indicators that my better judgment isn't even adequate, let alone "better." 

I was prepared to stick it out by myself, but that's probably even more stupid than it sounds written on this blog. 

So now I'm supposed to trust God, stop listening to Satan, take a multivitamin, find some version of fish oil that I can swallow (since I have never been physically able to swallow pills), try not to waste hours staring into space, go into the grocery store instead of sitting in my car for 10 minutes before "giving up" and going home, exerciseregularly, do social things even when I don't want to.

I have hope that, somehow, hope in God will eventually turn everything around.

But as for me, I will always have hope; I will praise you more and more.
- Psalm 71:14