My emotions betray me when I read conversion stories like Anne Lamott's in Traveling Mercies. I'm not jealous, I'm...wistful, I think. She didn't find God; he found her. In the middle of her drug and alcohol induced fog, her feminist intellectualism, her strident disdain of all things Christianly, he used everything from a Bat Mitzvah to Kierkegaard to appearances in her room, and he found her.
I've never been chased like that. I know in my head that he loves me with an everlasting love, that he would pursue me if I ever tried to run. Maybe that's why I feel like this. Maybe it's simply because I never ran. I've always been one of the ninety-nine, the coin in the purse, the brother at home. Of course he wouldn't chase me--I'm right here with him.
But another part of me feels like he's never chased me because I'm in this great, big crowd. These people hem me in, lest I dream of running, and he can't chase me because they won't let him get close to me. I know he's there, at the edge of the crowd, but I'm pressed in so tightly I can't quite get to him. What I know and what I trust will have to be enough for now. I know he's there and I trust he hears me over this crowd. A crowd which seems to have everything solved. They've agreed not to ask any questions, and instead spend all their words on praises, constantly gushing that he's just so good.
But I can't do it.
I know he must be good, but for reasons I can't identify, I can't raise my voice with theirs. I hope he sees my frantic eyes. I hope I don't just blend in and am thus overlooked by him. I hope he hears my one discordant voice. It's soft, but imploringly hopeful: Please, I really want to know you.
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Ceridwen--you speak to me more and more every time you write. I think you are writing more boldly these days. Keep it up. As one who has been blessed by your laser beam and one who also cries out in the crowds. . . thanks for letting me know I'm not alone.
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