Lila ~ May 7

 

I don’t know where to take my writing for the next few weeks. 

I signed up for the May Mazurka because even though I will be travelling alot in May (The Called to Peace Retreat in NC, as well as some upcoming field trips which I am chaperoning for the school to D.C. and Philly, and to South Dakota to visit family) I didn’t want to miss out on an opportunity to write, to share to generated new material.  FOMO drives many of my choices.  Fear that I might miss the right prompt, or the right phrase or the right nugget of inspiration to generate the right material. 

There is so much I want and need to say but I can’t ever seem to say it.  So many complex realities stewing inside of me.  My psyche is congested. 

Writing about trauma, mental health, psychology.

Anti-Semitism and the legacy that we see rising around us.  

There was a reason  I began the Mazurka with the story of Jephthah and his daughter.  An innocent girl who suffers at the hands of an irresponsible man.  When I first read that story in church ( I never learned it in Hebrew school growing up, we didn’t get too far beyond Genesis and Exodus, and Leviticus and the Laws of Kashrut). There must have been a reason why it stuck in my head. A poor girl, doomed to a life of singleness and loneliness and childlessness because of a stupid vow that couldn’t be undone. 

“Do not vow a vow that you can’t keep “ says King Solomon in the Book of Ecclesiastes. 

What if that was God’s will for me?  A life of singleness, for the sake of serving Him.  They way my own father’s absence put a dent in my capacity for love, my ability to enjoy a healthy interdependence with men.  The way it isolated me, left me feeling cast aside, exiled. 

It’s been 24 this month since my dad ended his own life.  At this time 24 years ago, I hung in limbo, not knowing what would happen between my mom and dad, if they could get back together or if he would come home.  Like Jeptha’s daughter, I guess, I was, in a way, sacrificed.  

Or the woman with the flow of blood.  I did not have a literal flow of blood. But an emotional wound, that wouldn't stop bleeding.  Or the little 12 year old girl, Jairus' daughter, who died.  A part of me died, and went to sleep, and she woke up later on.