True Religion is This. . .

I slip an extra pound note into his hand and watch as Radjo, the gas station attendant, adds it to the stack of paper bills he holds to make change for customers. I hope he gets the tip. I hope it helps him in some small way even though with inflation now, it will be just enough for a bag of bread. I hope he understands that I am not trying to buy his loyalty to get a full gas tank when others are just getting a quarter or so because of fuel rationing. 

I give freely because I want to give, not because I am a millionaire but because my heart is broken by the sadness I encounter every day. Young men digging through putrid garbage trying to find a bite to bring home to their families. Mothers with little ones on their knee as they sit sweltering in the summer sun by the side of the road and wait for a handout from a passerby. I carry food bags in my car to hand out where I can, not because I expect anything in return, but because I am loyal to helping others. 

And therein is the catch. Sometimes loyalty can be bought. If you have enough money, if you have enough pull to give privileges in your sphere of influence, you can give it away “like it’s extra change,” always knowing there will be something coming back your way in return. 

The paradigm that I grew up with, while I understand it, goes against everything I believe in. It’s almost as if I can feel the atoms in my body linking hands, resolutely refusing in solidarity to approve of it. I hesitate to take. But I never stop giving. It is what God asked me to do, to share my bread with the hungry and give clothes to those who need them (Isaiah 58:7). Perhaps this is why God describes this type of giving as true Christianity. Because He knew that if I gave to those who could not give in return, I would understand what true loyalty is.

Shrouded Paths

I don't trust God. I'm honest about it.

Please help me to trust You more.

If God was taking care of my worries, I wouldn't be here.

It seems God does answer prayers. 

The see-saw goes up. And down. And up. And down. Each time it swings one way, my fragile trust seems to swing with it. Like the simple folk in Jesus' time, when I see a miracle, I believe. When life gets too difficult; I lose all hope. 

The day started out rough. I'd been up for more than 2 hours in the middle of the night worrying. Worrying about fuel, worrying about groceries, worrying about health, worrying about the economic situation, worrying about family, worrying about our future. Off I went to work, in my usual foul mood as Monday mornings and first official day back to the office were not a good mix. I unlocked the front door to the building, wondering how I had managed to be the first to arrive. After logging into my email and quickly scrolling through headers, I realized why. Today was a holiday. It had been announced late Sunday evening. So, everyone else, who dutifully checked work email over the weekends and late at night, had slept in while I had dutifully come in to work. Alone. 

I had a lot to catch up on after a month away so I started working through emails. Soon enough, there was chatter in the hallways as those without a life started to trickle in, dealing with emergencies or simply feeling important. I kept my door closed and ignored the small hubbub outside. 

Later that afternoon, as campus residents exchanged commiserations in a WhatsApp group about the heat and lack of a/c because we were on generator power again, my husband sent a picture of three loose wires sticking out of our living room wall. Here is our air conditioner he joked after remarking that we knew for the past 2 years how hot it could get. Moments later he received a private message from the powers-that-be informing him that this was not the channel to complain in. He was not complaining. He was simply stating a fact. But the higher-ups, seemingly embarrassed, chose to make him feel bad when we had been silently suffering for the last two years through the insufferable summer heat. 

I sent an email. The powers-that-be, after I had sent countless emails, suddenly said there would be an a/c installed that week. Whether it was my friend who had been telling everyone he met that we were the only apartment on campus without a/c or whether it was my husband's innocent joke, somehow the a/c was magically materializing. Too little, too late, however. 

I sent a list of things that I was thankful for, in our group family chat. I had resolved to stop burdening my mother with my worries, none of which she could do anything about and would end up just being internalized which was not healthy for her. Even as I typed, I thought, Am I trusting God more because the a/c is suddenly being installed? Or do I trust God less because it wasn't here when the heat was beating down and my husband was recovering from surgery, alone, in a room with just a fan? 

I didn't have an answer. 

As I bumped along on my transatlantic flight the week before, I had felt particularly close to God. I had seen Him working it out so I could board my flights, albeit without the requisite QR code on my negative PCR test, and I was trusting He would get me home safely as I prayed each time I undertook the long journey from coast to coast. Then I landed in the hellhole I had left just a month prior, only now it seemed 10x worse, and fear and anxiety overwhelmed me. I cried, I journaled, I read my Bible, I vented to my mom and sister, I got upset with my husband, and through it all, I questioned my faith. I lay in bed that night thinking, I don't even have that mustard seed of faith. 

It was true. I'd told my husband at suppertime, as I cried into my cucumber sandwich, I don't see any hope! Trapped by circumstances, there seemed to be precious little left to hang one's hopes on. Fun activities, intriguing ethnic restaurants, jovial outings, jaunty international trips, even simple things like a carton of soymilk had all vanished overnight to be replaced with heat, isolation, uncertainty, and crisis after crisis. I had depleted my emotional resources long ago, as I stood frozen in the pasta aisle in the grocery store, unable to make a simple decision as to which pasta to buy because THERE WAS NO CHEAP PASTA ANYMORE. 

I compared my month in sunny, though smoky, California with my dreary life in Lebanon and my soul shriveled up inside. Two more years of this seemed impossible. Even counting down the days seemed endless. Then after this, there were 6 more years of enslavement to the system as indentured servants. 8 more years. 8 more years struggling to find a speck of hope; an eyelash of purpose; a spot of joy. 

This life is taking all my energy just to survive. So don't be surprised if I retreat from all responsibilities and from most of life. I'm just trying to manage. Trying to find a reason for trust. Because this faith? It's brittle and fragile as century-old parchment from Pharaoh's tomb. 

He tears me down on every side till I am gone; He uproots my hope like a tree. ~Job 19:10

My Heart Breaks, Too

 It was 5:30 am on a Friday morning. I'd closed my eyes to sleep just a few short hours earlier, at 1 am, after a long day of sorting and organizing and rearranging. I checked my messages and sent a quick one to my husband. I deflected a work message that made my blood pressure rise. I hated it when I was on holiday and people asked inane questions but my husband had taught me to deal with things right away so I wouldn't have to linger on thinking about it later, so I did. 

I should have dropped off to sleep again, after all there was a lovely soft morning breeze that just barely lifted the lace curtain and I had an eye mask to block out the light. But then I started to think. That was always my undoing. 

And I started to cry. 

God, why does it hurt to love someone so much?

The day before, I'd done a 30 minute video call with my husband who was recovering from nasal surgery. Not wanting to stress me out, he had gone and done it while I was away, on annual leave, out of the country. Now he was feeling pretty miserable as he could not breathe through his nose, his mouth was dry, and he was all alone. He had been quite chipper the first time we'd talked, the day after his surgery, but as with any illness or major event, the 2nd day is always worse and I could hear it in his voice. He was not so energetic and was talking less and after 30 minutes he was ready to say goodbye. We hung up and I cried. 

I started to panic, thinking he was dehydrated and worried that, because he was alone, he would not recognize the signs of dehydration and get seriously ill or even go unconscious and nobody would even know. I worried because I was not there to check on him in the night, make soup for him during the day, put a cold washcloth on his head to cool him down, and keep him drinking water. I worried because I could not lie next to him and check that he was still breathing. Being apart from him, across oceans and time zones, made it that much harder and the worry was much greater than if I had been with him. I always told him, I'm not good with medical stuff, but I was finding out that I was even worse with distance. I knew he was a careful person, I knew he had a strong body that would recover quickly because of his many years of being an athlete, I knew God would take care of him, but I still worried. 

After talking to my best friend who was a nurse and also married, I felt better. She reminded me that while we as women are nurturers, who care deeply about our husbands and want to take care of them, men are independent and want to take care of us but they don't know how to be taken care of. It helped me understand why my brave and stubborn husband had driven himself home from the hospital after a surgery with general anesthesia, filled a prescription, and changed his bandages without help from anyone. Then I started to cry again. I really really wanted to be with him. 

As I cried, the tears started to come from a different place than the usual one. I noticed my body almost shaking and I felt the fear and pain emerge. Two days earlier, another best friend had listened to me share how I had kept myself a bit emotionally distant from my husband since our marriage, somewhat aloof, but it was a protective mechanism. I could not allow myself to really love him, to open up my heart and be vulnerable, because then God would take him away just like He had taken away all the other precious people in my life and I could not handle one more loss. I had reached my breaking point before I met my husband so though I fell in love and I loved him rationally, I had stopped myself from opening up my heart completely. I could not because the prospect of pain was too much. 

Yet I knew that had to change. My mother had reminded me that it was better to love someone completely, even with the risk of loss, than to keep a closed heart. So I had decided to try loving him more. Then he went and did the nasal surgery and I found myself in a very vulnerable place, being so far away from him and unable to care for him. I was so scared that something serious would happen to him, because I tend to overthink far too much and always imagine the worst, and in my moment of vulnerability, the pain was intensifying. The fear collided with pain and I cried out to God to help me. 

Eventually I calmed down. I worried again that evening a bit but was able to sleep. Until I woke up and started thinking about everything and feeling sad again. Now I was not as worried. My husband had reassured me that he was drinking and I knew that each day that passed, he would get better. We had exchanged fun text messages before I'd gone to sleep and I was learning to encourage and build him up. I had not shown him how seriously it had all affected me; he hadn't seen the current of tears. Now the tears came, though, because I felt sad that he had to be all alone during his time of pain. And I cried out to God again.

Why does it hurt so much to love?

The answer came immediately. This is how I feel. Every day. Remember how Jesus died of a broken heart on the cross? It was not the nails whose pain He felt; it was the pain of billions of people who rejected His love and rejected His care for them. We are love. We don't love; we are love. Let that sink in for a moment. What you feel; We are. I don't tell you how I feel because I am God; I can handle the pain. But when Jesus died; His physical heart could not handle the pain. That was how great it was. The pain of love. 

You ask me almost every day, how can I watch these horrible things happen to innocent people, especially children, and not do anything? You don't understand. My heart breaks when I see those atrocious acts. It breaks because I loved the perpetrators; they are my children. They were born out of My heart. Don't listen to anyone who says that people are born out of accident; each person's first breath is placed there by Me. I love and care for each person and then, they turn away from Me. They reject me and they try to do things on their own and they don't care about Me anymore. My heart breaks because My love, which is What I am, cannot penetrate their stubborn cold hearts. 

I hurt when I see innocent ones in pain. I feel their pain just as deeply because I created them and they are part of Me. I know it is very difficult for you because you want Me to end their pain, especially the pain of the children. I cannot explain everything to you now about how sin and the end of the world works, because there are many things happening in the unseen world that you would not understand completely. It does seem like you are simply a puppet on the stage, strings being pulled, no choice about whether to live in this sinful world. But My child, you were born out of My heart. I would never, never do anything to hurt you. I use all My power to protect you and care for you. The pain you feel when you see your loved ones hurting? I feel all that pain and so much more when I look at you. Because I know you are hurting. I feel it in My heart. I love you far deeper than any human can love another and if you experience pain when your loved one is hurting, so do I when you are hurting. 

It seems strange, doesn't it? To imagine Me in pain. I don't want you to focus on that, though. I want you to focus on just one thing--My love for you. This love is what will carry you through all the pain in life. My love is more than an expression or feeling; it is Me. I will carry you through the difficulties; I will carry you through the sorrows. I cannot protect you from every pain in life but I can love you with the fiercest love that exists. I will take the pain on Myself and I will worry about everything. I will be the barrier between you and sin's worst pains. I took that responsibility when I created you and I will always be true to it. 

All my life I have been struggling to understand Who God really is and to reconcile what I see with what I read and know. With what I want to feel in my heart. God has no choice about being vulnerable or not; He cannot close His heart to love because His heart is love. Now that I understand a little more, my heart is calm and still. As much as I love my husband, God loves me and him even more. So I can rest in that knowledge because I know He will take care of both of us. 

I led Maria along with My ropes of kindness and love. I lifted the yoke from her neck, and I myself stooped to feed her. ~Hosea 11:4

Take 2, or maybe Take 59. It doesn't matter in the end, anyhow.

Today is not a good day. But then again, I cannot remember the last time I had a genuinely good day. 

Dear God, today is not a good day. I whisper it under my breath, thankful for the mask that muffles my voice so nobody hears me mumbling to myself in the middle of Ross. 

I've been working my way down the aisles, women's shoes to handbags to sheets to frying pans  and now I am staring at a rack of dresses. I feel a bit panicky but hope it will pass. I take 2 bras off the rack and head to the fitting room. Thankfully one fits.

Later, I realize I haven't looked for sweatpants. I hunt through the small selection, discouraged that I am now an XL, and finally find one that looks decent. In the fitting room I try it on. I peer into the mirror and see the tears starting. I don't have a tissue so I wipe my nose on the back of my arm and my eyes with a corner of my soft gray-blue pilling blouse. I sit down and whisper again, I'm not doing good today. 

After a few minutes, I manage to collect myself. I meet my mother in the clearance section and we both ponder our potential purchases. She agonizes over a soft pink day bag for work. I look at 5 boxes of discount headphones, the black sweatpants that don't fit perfectly but will do, and a snappy pair of cute beige heels. I add it up in my head. My monthly salary now worth $315 flashes like neon lights in my mind. I have the cash but spending it on things I do not need, like a pair of heels when I have a closet full back in Lebanon, heels I haven't worn for a year since the pandemic began, seems frivolous. Never mind they are comfortable and would look perfect with the flattering black dress my mom found for free in the mailroom. Or that they would match every outfit I currently own. I look at the 5 boxes of headphones. My head hurts just trying to think about which ones to choose. I hate having to buy for other people, namely a very picky husband and SIL. 

After standing frozen in the aisle for more than 5 minutes, I grab the fitted sheet set and the bra. I leave the cart full of carefully chosen purchases behind. Today, I cannot deal with them. I cannot deal with life.

I go home and unfriend most of the people on my Facebook page. I choose 5 books from a bookshelf packed with books that I spent hard earned money on but are now worth pennies on the dollar, and I tell my mother she can take what she likes. I will donate the rest of the 100+ books. I battle with myself to reach the mental state I need to just throw everything out. To forget my past self. After all, who cares about that person from before? Nobody, so why should I? I have to continually reinvent myself each time I move and I am sure I will be cursed to keep moving several times more, so now is as good a time as any to forget the Maria before. I do not need to bring her into my new life. 

Tomorrow I will start on the cupboard. Maybe, if I can manage it, I will be able to throw everything out. There can be no regrets. Only resentment. And anger. For the rest of my life. Because this life is not a good life.

Be thankful, they say.

Be thankful, they say. 

When you sit in line for 1.5 hours waiting to get 1/8 a tank of gas and finally reach the front of the line, only to be told they have run out of gas for the day and to come back tomorrow. 

Be thankful, they say. 

When you go to the grocery store and the prices have tripled in a week. When nuts, soymilk, whole grain products, and most fruit are out of your budget now.

Be thankful, they say. 

When everything is sold on the black market at 12x the original price from shoes to soap to shampoo. 

Be thankful, they say. 

When hospitals stop accepting your health insurance and you have to drive to multiple places to find one that still does. 

Be thankful, they say. 

When a simple burger with fries costs $25. 

Be thankful, they say. 

When a car repair takes your month's salary. 

Be thankful, they say. 

When sanitary pads cost $11 for a package of 16. 

Be thankful, they say. 

When you have been informed that the budget does not allow for the a/c that was promised more than a year ago, until after the hot season is over. And your apartment only has 2 fans.

Be thankful, they say.

When friends share their worries with you about medical bills, when you see the anxiety on people's faces, when gun fights at gas stations feature prominently in the Telegram group you follow, when mothers are afraid they will not be able to find powdered milk for their babies, when old people beg at street corners for a bit of money and young men dig through garbage dumpsters looking for a bit of food to feed their families. 

Be thankful, they say. 

Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, “Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well”—but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? ~James 2:15, 16

Just as faith without acts is a dead faith, so too is telling someone to be thankful when they are faced with extraordinary difficulties. Not only are we struggling with the pandemic everyone else is struggling with, we are facing an economic crisis that is "among the world’s three worst since the mid-1800s" according to the World Bank and The New York Times. How can you look someone in the eye, who does not know if tomorrow their salary will cover their essentials because the prices are skyrocketing out of control, and tell them Be thankful? How can you say, Others have life more difficult than you, when this is possibly the hardest that person is experiencing right now? 

What do we need? Understanding and empathy, above all. Then let's work together as best we know how to help each other. 

*Note, Prices have been calculated based on a median average salary and official syndicate rate.

The Last Goodbye

Would you like to have kids? Are you guys planning to have kids? When would you like to have kids? Would you want a boy or a girl?

Just the other day, a good friend of mine posted on Facebook wondering whether it was a safe place to be open and honest. I pondered his question. I was all too familiar with people who used Facebook as their mental regurgitation space to share all their personal and often dramatic issues. There was a reason I had less than 150 friends now on Facebook. On the other hand, he had a legitimate question. Could we be honest or was Facebook just another place to show a perfectly-lined-up life, just like when we came dressed in our Sabbath best to church?

Speaking of honesty, there is one thing that has been bothering me immensely lately. Just as people are ambivalent about whether or not to receive the vaccine, I have been grappling with whether or not to have children. I married late and am now in my 40s. Until now, God has not blessed us with children. At the same time, I have not been very proactive about following up with a fertility specialist or seeking fertility treatments. In all honesty, I am terrified about the thought of having children while I equally long to hold a little one in my arms and know they call me, and not some other woman, Mommy.

Before I met my husband, I was really good friends with Karen who had twin boys. I helped her take care of them since they were premies and had just come home from the hospital. We built a special bond and those little boys knew they were safe with me. When we would go to church and some loud woman would reach to hold one of the boys, they would bury their little head in my shoulder and I would calmly move out of reach. I watched them walk their first steps, rocked them to sleep, gave them their bottles, and held them on my lap when we went for a drive. I held their hand as they toddled about after church, played the fishing game with them, and helped decorate for their first birthday.

I was never one to go and pick up random children in church or stop and say hi to a little one I was passing in the grocery store, which my husband is constantly doing to my extreme embarrassment. I didn't want to disturb any family dynamics so I just watched wistfully from afar and wondered what it would be like to have my own little one. I marveled at how new mothers seemed so natural at what they did. Then Karen gave me the gift of spending time with and taking care of her twins and I realized that I could, indeed, do this.

I married. We talked about kids but never really seriously. Both of us coming from broken homes, both of us disenchanted with life, and both of us very much aware of the enormous difficulties in life, children were seemingly never in the cards for us.

I had known other couples who didn't have children and I had never asked them why they didn't have kids or jokingly suggested it was time for them to have kids. Yet the community around me was not as thoughtful or sensitive. For some reason every single person felt it was their God-given duty to ask me about my reproductive goals. Was I going to have kids, did I want a boy or girl, when did I want kids? It made no difference if we were just acquaintances; the questions came regardless.

Most of the time I dug my fingernail into the fleshy part of my thumb until it hurt so I would not cry. Then I would usually reply with God knows or look at them until they became as uncomfortable as I felt. I could not tell them honestly that I had dreamed of being a mommy since I was little. That I wanted to have twins. That I was terrified of trying to raise children in this impossible economic situation and in this world where abuse is rampant and morals have flown out the window.

Often some insensitive soul would look at my belly, the 12 kg I had gained from stress-eating during the pandemic's multiple lockdowns and economic crises that led to fuel and groceries skyrocketing, and remark, Are you pregnant? Not only did they remind me that my arms and heart were empty, they dug and twisted the spike with a comment that reminded me of my lack of self-control and poor eating habits.

I can honestly say I am thankful God has not given me a child because I would want to be able to guarantee them a comfortable life without too much pain or suffering and that I cannot do. I could not raise a child who would turn to me and ask, Why did you bring me into this difficult world? I could not be certain they would make right choices and live an upright life. I would not be able to raise a child who had serious health challenges and having a child at an older age significantly increased that risk.

Not every woman is comfortable to be honest about how she really feels. As women, we are taught to be subservient to all others around us. If someone asks us piercing personal questions, we feel we should answer them, rather than politely state that it is not their business to know. We worry more about their feelings when we do not consider our own. While it is true that when we actually speak out, it is not that difficult to be open, it takes courage and a safe space to speak. Even in my own openness, I have had well-meaning people try to justify others' questionings or tell me that God can bless me with a child if it is His will.

What if it isn't His will? Or what if I exercise my free will and choose not to have a child because I am thinking of the long-term consequences and how difficult this life will be for them? A child is not like a puppy who needs a little training, food and water, and love and then they are content. A child has to be intentionally nurtured and brought up to be a good citizen in society. I cannot choose to have a child just because toddlers are so cute.

So this is where I am. Caught between a longing and reality. Learning to be honest about what I wish while recognizing what can be. Struggling with the likelihood that it is too late. Then again, the TCK life is one of unfulfilled dreams so this is just another one I can add to the valise, then shut the lid and lock it tight.

One more goodbye.

Greatest Expectation

I managed to get him into a second doctoral program. Fully paid for. He beamed up at me as he shared what he felt was really good news for G. It was good news. I was happy for G as he was a personal friend of mine. At the same time, my heart crumbled just a little bit more. 

Some people have all the luck, flashed through my mind. I knew it wasn't true. Most people have difficulties in life but oh how my heart yearned to get into a doctoral program. I had so many ideas, so many directions I could go, so many areas I was passionate about. I had recently discovered that I loved teaching but was limited by my graduate studies as to what I could teach on the university level. I contemplated more master's level courses but found myself irritated and bored in class so I quit. I was ready for a challenge. I knew I could meet it and I knew I would grow immensely from it. I was confident that if I had the chance to complete a PhD, I would actually use the knowledge I had learned and continue building on it to thrive mentally and emotionally. 

I missed that. For years now, I felt stuck. The greatest expectation of me was being able to print business cards or schedule a Google Calendar meeting. Every now and then I joined an online webinar from another university—a writing workshop, a seminar on architecture and glass, diplomacy in the Middle East. Some were in my wheelhouse, others were completely foreign territory, but I reveled in the mind-stretching exercise to learn new terminology and expand my awareness of other topics. For an hour or so, I felt intelligent. 

I guess I cannot complain. There are many who have not even completed their bachelor's degree and are desperately searching for opportunities and finances to do so. I should be thankful for what I have earned. Yet the desire doesn't go away. I want to write books, read books, delve deep into psychology and understand adult TCKs and identity. If I could do anything in the world, I would complete a PhD in Psychology with a focus in TCKs so I could lecture, write, and counsel in a way that would give them tools to manage their many complexities born out of a life they did not choose. 

But that is just a pipe dream. For now.