So I got her to plan a Facebook event: Skating at Hawrelak Park. I figured she would be less likely to suspect anything if it looks like I didn’t take part in planning anything at all. The day arrives and we carpool out to the park. I had to drive a bunch of the guys and she had to drive some of the girls, making it pretty easy to bring everything I needed in my car. We get to the park and lace up our skates and head out. It’s been a year since we last skated so she took some time to get used to her skates again. She isn’t a very strong skater, only taking small steps every couple seconds, head down, and looking no more than a couple meters in front of her. We skated around for awhile, waiting for the others to arrive.

Eventually, everyone is out on the ice and the plan is put into motion. I had given my keys to one of the girls earlier so they could get the banner I left in my trunk. She quietly disappeared to go get it. When she got back, she promptly took it behind a small island. We were skating facing away from the island at the time, so she didn’t see any of this happening. When we finally turned around, we caught a few stragglers heading towards that island. She decided we should go see what’s up, so I suggested we go around the island from the other direction and meet up with them in the middle.

Now we were pretty far from the island, so it took us a good 5 minutes to make our way to there (or so I’m told, it didn’t feel that long). We skate around the corner and her head is down, looking at the ice. I see our friends and her head is down, looking at the ice. We continue skating and I see them pull out the sign and her head is down, looking at the ice. I say out loud

“She doesn’t even see it!”

and her head is down, looking at the ice. Then someone yells

“Dorcas!”

She looks up and freezes, bringing her hands up to her face. I get down on one knee, holding onto her jacket to slow her down, but she is still moving. At this point I was too far away so I put the other knee down and crawled forward a bit. When she stopped, I took up my previous stance and was kneeling behind her, holding out the ring. She just stood there with her back to me for what felt like an eternity. A voice from behind the sign belts out

“Dorcas turn around!”

She’s been crying quite a bit, so I offer her tissue and reiterated the question, awkwardly holding out the ring. Another eternity passes and she says

“Yes”

Unfortunately, I missed the part where I was supposed to put the ring on, so I’m actually still holding the ring (and tissue) behind her. Then we all stood around talking and laughing, taking pictures and photobombing pictures. They inform me that they waited for ~5 minutes for us to come around. Eventually someone (not me) realizes that I’m still holding onto the ring and tells me I should put it on her or something. I told them I didn’t know if it would fit, since I didn’t get her ring size before buying it. But the ring fit me so it should fit her too. So I take her hand and slip it on.

“It fits!”

Nothing better than hiding behind grass and eating it.

Yay I can move everywhere now! And without breaking things!

… that really (like, really really) describes me lately. Word for word, this is what was written by John Wesley (bolding added by me):

Here is one who has not made shipwreck of the faith. He still has a measure of the Spirit of adoption, which continues to witness with his spirit that he is a child of God. However, he is not going on to perfection. He is not, as once, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, panting after the whole image and full enjoyment of God as the hart pants after the water brooks (Psalm 42:1). Rather, he is weary and faint in his mind, and, as it were, hovering between life and death.

And why is he thus? Because he has forgotten the Word of God, which says that “by works faith is made perfect” (James 2:22). He does not use all diligence in working the works of God. He does not continue instant in prayer — private as well as public. He has slacked off communing at the Lord’s Table, or in hearing the Word, in meditation, fasting, and religious conference. If he does not wholly neglect some of these means of grace, at least he does not use them with all his might.

Why does he not now continue in prayer? Because in times of dryness it is pain and grief to him. He does not continue hearing the Word at all opportunities because sleep is sweet, or it is a cold or rainy. So his faith is not made perfect, neither can he grow in grace, because he will not deny himself and take up his cross.

Finding the problem: ~4 hours.
Fixing the problem: 6-8 hours.
Lines of code: 1
Finishing it before the long weekend: Awesome!

This was what most of today and yesterday looked like. Can you see what’s wrong?

Crying.

It feels as though I’ve shed more tears over the past couple weeks than I have my entire life. Tears come in several forms: tears of joy, tears of pain, tears of grief. Nothing dries you up like tears of grief.

February 22
On the evening of February 22, I learned that someone I knew died in a car accident. Of course, I didn’t believe this at first, so I went to check her Facebook page (I know… what a world we live in right now). That only further confirmed what I was told and slowly it began to sink in. My friend had passed away.

I haven’t talked to her for three or four years now. The last time I remember spending time with her was in Cameron library a few years ago. She needed help in physics or chemistry or something and I tried my best to help. I did a pretty lousy job from what I can recall. Couldn’t answer some of the questions; made up math for the other ones.

In a way, I guess you could say we were never that close. We didn’t talk too much, essentially never saw each other. I remember thinking that this tragedy shouldn’t hurt too much because of our lack of relationship… but there’s something about growing up with a person that just links you so much tighter than you realize. We grew up together through elementary and junior high and parted ways when high school came around. She was one of like eight people who actually signed my junior high yearbook.

February 23
A long day at work. If my mind wandered, it always wandered over the same topic. I don’t think I got very much done that day. At some point, I thought about how it would be possible for me to forgive the person that had caused the crash. If I met this person, could I tell them, in all honesty, that I could forgive them? Because this is what we are told to do:

“Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.”

And on went my thoughts… if it was difficult for me to forgive, how much more impossible is it for someone who had lost their cousin, their niece, their daughter. This burdened me until prayer meeting. That night I prayed for everyone to have a heart of forgiveness, that this tragedy could be used to further God’s kingdom, that it would be used to bring others to know Christ. I prayed with Auntie Carol and Auntie Charis and I was moved to tears. These were tears of grief.

February 24 and 25
I don’t remember much about these days. Just waiting for Saturday to come. I think it was at this point I started hiding away. When I get upset, whether it be anger or sadness, I always try to seclude myself. So if I’m mad at you, I won’t talk to you. If I’m sad about something, I don’t tend to want to talk about it. So my praying had started to dwindle.

February 26
The day of the viewing. It started at 5pm. I ducked out of fellowship early so I could get ready to go. This was my first viewing so I didn’t really know what to expect. Sad people and a lot of people I used to know from elementary I guess. The mood was more somber than I expected (I suppose I expected less because of my inexperience in such things). There was lots of hugs, lots of crying… Partway through, her mom started crying. Everyone was giving her hugs. I won’t forget when I hugged her how tightly she hugged back. There was just so much pain in it. I cried after hugging her. Tears of pain.

We spent hours there. A lot of the time was spent just sitting in silence, each in our own thoughts. My mind always wandered back to the same things. How unfair this. How unreal this is. How crappy her family feels. All negative thoughts.

Eventually, a group of us decided to go. We had not eaten before we came, so dinner was in order. So 14 of us jammed into a Chinese restaurant and ate. There were nine people I knew from elementary, two from junior high, and three from uni. This group of people had pretty much fallen out of each others lives and yet everyone was so comfortable around one another. We talked and we laughed and had a good time even though this time we spent was sandwiched between a viewing and a funeral.

Eventually the night ended and we all went home.

I didn’t pray that night.

February 27
The day of the funeral. The funeral home was packed. Between the speeches, the crying, the singing, the message, something snapped. I felt that God wasn’t there. He had no reason to be there. This was a girl who has went to church once, twice? By God’s rules, heaven is not for her. How many people here were going to listen to the message and get anything out of it? Her death is not going to be for any furthering of God’s kingdom.

On and on the list went. I started to doubt. Is this God’s mercy? Letting someone die, at the beginning of her life. There was so much more life for her to live. Is this God’s love? To condemn someone to hell because they had not done the one task of believing. You could have someone who has done infinite good in their life and still be denied entrance into heaven because of that? How is that fair? How can I believe in a God that seems unmerciful and unloving?

On the other hand, maybe God is merciful and let her in anyways. So for this case I argued, why should I be going through all these motions if ultimately they aren’t needed to get into heaven? That line of thought wasn’t comforting either.

These thoughts simmered throughout the day and would only get worse. I was upset and I needed to seclude myself. I skipped fellowship that night. In the morning and afternoon I had wanted to go, but by the time it came around I wasn’t up for it.

February 28 and March 1
Nothing was getting better. I stayed off msn, I stayed off facebook. I didn’t want to talk to anybody. Not even God. If prayer came across my mind, I would vehemently decide against it. I hated it.

March 2
Prayer meeting again. I came solely with the intention to complain. I couldn’t do it in front of everyone though. I didn’t feel very much like talking. It didn’t come out until we had split into groups. I poured out my anger and distress. Tears started to well up but I didn’t let them fall. I had no interest in prayer and I made that clear to my group. I said that I had nothing to give thanks for and nothing to ask for. I wanted to leave when they were about to start praying but Paulo insisted I stay. Lesley prayed for me. She cried to God for me, but I wouldn’t realize how much this meant until later. At that time I couldn’t feel anything towards God. No tears. Nothing.

March 3 and 4
Status quo. Nothing really changed. I think I finally logged onto msn on the 4th? Didn’t initiate conversations though.

March 5
Today was Walk through the Bible. The idea of going to church wasn’t very appealing to me. I didn’t want to be there that much. But I paid for this so I should go..

I guess it was kinda fun, but it certainly wasn’t fixing what was broken. By the end of it, it was just a drag. My mindset certainly wasn’t right for spending hours at church. What’s worse is I have to prep for Sunday school the day after. The only thing good about that time was that I got to not talk to people.

So let’s recap! At this point I am:
- not wanting to talk to people
- not wanting to go to church
- definitely not talking to God
- worse than spiritually dry
- pretty irritable

Looks pretty bleak doesn’t it?

March 6
I was ready to teach Sunday school the way I always do: by pointing out facts and stuff. Only today, there was something different. We had another boy in our class! (after all the boys left for the catechism class). For some reason, Uncle Ken joined us that morning. On a sidenote, I had already decided that morning that I didn’t feel like singing during worship. Why should I be singing praises to God?

Anyways, the class went well. I made some mistakes but Uncle Henry was there to correct me. Then something amazing happened. I wrapped up and we just started chatting. Well mostly the uncles anyway. But somehow the conversation got to the topic of funerals. Uncle Ken brought it up out of seemingly nowhere. I could only think that this was the reason he was in our class today. He shared about his struggles. I reiterated my troubles over the past week and tears welled up, but I didn’t let them fall. I barely remember what was said. Then I asked the question, “What’s the real reason you’re here?” In my mind I had already decided it was God’s doing, but I guess I just needed one more sign or more assurance or something.

He pointed up.

And I cried. Here I was, so far away from God, the furthest I’ve ever been since before church ever became a part of my life. I had not prayed for a long time. There was anger and hatred and so much negativity. Yet, God did not let me out of His sight. Despite all of my antics, He led those who prayed for me. He sent Uncle Ken to come get me. I cried tears of joy.

I guess what I’ve learned from all this is that: when you need it the most, God will fill you up and He will do that through those around you.

It feels as though I’ve shed more tears over the past couple weeks than I have my entire life. Tears come in several forms: tears of grief, tears of pain, tears of joy. Nothing fills you up again like tears of joy.

Crying.

Constant
Reminder that
You’re
In
Need of
God.

Why is it that I always find myself needing to do anything but sleeping when really I should just be going to bed?

Occasionally I get this wave of maturity/responsibility or whatever it is that actually makes me get a proper night’s rest, but that usually lasts only a week or so. I reason with myself sometimes: it makes absolutely no difference putting off for tomorrow what unproductive things I could do today, therefore I should pass out now and continue with whatever the next day. Because the activity is unproductive, it carries no urgency, thus putting it off causes no upset in the flow of my life. So my brain has this all worked out and yet I am still awake now, contradicting myself.

My excuse for tonight was changing how my tumblr page looked, even though I never use it for anything. Other times the excuse will be to play games because that’s more fun than going to sleep. Sometimes it’s even because I’m reading, which doesn’t happen very often since playing games is more fun.

Baffling.