...is blowing in the wind.I woke up this morning to the sounds of birds chirping loudly outside the window and my three-year-old daughter, Nora, saying, “I just love you, Mom. Let me give you a hug.” I wish that I could reproduce in words the sound of her speech. It still takes some deciphering; her “r’s” are a bit skewed and Elmer Fudd-like, but adorable to hear once I figure out what she is saying.
A few evenings ago, I was in a rather dark conversation with my oldest daughter at the dinner table, discussing the future, etc., and Nora, I suppose sensing distress touched my arm and said, “God is touching you. God likes you a lot.” I was so shocked. I didn’t know where she had come up with the words, the thoughts, until I remembered she had attended Vacation Bible School at our church earlier that day. Wow. Three-years-old. Being on the receiving end of her words – I felt as though God had indeed touched me.
Have faith. Easier said than done, that is for sure. Yet, the few times that I have actually lived according to my faith (I can count those times on one hand, by the way, the few times I am can recall relying on my faith), “the risks” were as easy to make as breathing out.
But then again, when I think back, what have I ever really risked? Are things like moving far from home, attempting a career as an actor, risky? How about saying “no” to a marriage proposal, but “yes” to four others, while meaning it only once -- and then I only knew him for three days. When I drove my old beater of a car a distance of 1,300 miles with an engine that needed a quart of oil every 150 miles, was that living on faith? There was the time I moved into a transient hotel, and the other time I took an out-of-state job to work as a live-in maid/cook for two men, one of them a paraplegic -- I found the job listed in the newspaper – was that living on faith? I could add to the list: skinning dipping in the Blackfoot river by moonlight while drunk. (I can do the sidestroke, that’s about it). Taking refuge with people (boys) that I hardly knew at all, riding my bike without a helmet from Korea town to the beach via Santa Monica blvd., going back to school to earn my degrees, fighting school administrators over the well being of my son. Driving. Flying. Hugging strangers. Starting two so-called production companies-- Uh, yeah. My goofy list could go on. It's not like I've gone skydiving, bungee jumping or hitch-hiking across Europe or something, but I have done things that could have turned out far differently I suppose. The risks I took, if you can call them risks, were not acts involving some sort of reward or failure. I just let the wind blow me around like a leaf. Following whims like tufts of feathers floating in the air is not living on faith – it’s just dumb.
Now, here I am a bit older, yet not necessarily wiser, pondering my current list of goals. I have promised that I would write them out, but my lack of faith has stalled me. I fear that if I write them down, claiming them as my own that they will become like so many other thoughts of mine or like my trunk full of Affirmations.
It was easy to let the wind blow me around, but produced little – Wait; I take that back. It produced an 18-year marriage, a bevy of beautiful children, and larger trunk of bad poetry and half-written stories and scripts.
Tonight, I found these notes stuffed in my wallet; something I had written to myself to remember: 1) Either Make Films or Shut up. 2) Do it or Shut up. 3) Quit talking about it – Do it.
Though redundant, I think my point to myself was very clear.
Now all I have to remember is that God likes me very much.
