Thoughts on Hope
Or, the loss of.
Hope is a palpable, living emotion. You can feel it, sometimes only by its absence.
This is so true.
It got me to thinking about the little silver medallion from Catherine. The first thing I thought of when I pulled it from the package was, "She sent this to me, because she's not using it anymore". Hope, that is. She's lost hers. And so have I, in many ways. As I clench the cold metal in my hand, it warms slightly, and I'm left feeling confused, sad, and detached. I can hold on to hope only as long as I feel obligated, committed, compelled. Soon, I find I need my hand free. I need to move on, to get busy living life. My life. Whether or not that life holds every single dream I've dared to fancy for myself or not. The quality of my existence is what I make it to be, what I strive to achieve, what I can control. Does that always turn out the way I had intended? Do I still mourn my losses, my failures, my shortcomings?
I'm so tired of being force-fed the Big Plan the universe supposedly has in store for us. I honestly do feel that life is a big series of unmitigated random events that compile into what choices we next make.
If I had been 5 minutes later arriving at my friend's house that day, I'd have not met her brother's friend, whom I later married. If I would have accepted the invitation to attend OU and play my clarinet in the marching band... If I would have moved to Stittsville... If I didn't have passive restraints in that old VW that got totaled... If I didn't recycle that old psychology paper just to get a passing grade in a rhetoric course... If Nicholas would have been born.
So many things that would make my life different. Some regrets, some not. Some decisions, some just chance. Some would call it fate. Perhaps. Who really knows?
I will place this hope on the mantle among the angels residing there. I will hold it, I will set it aside, I will cling to it, I will remember the sentiment, and I will always wonder at the "what ifs".
When hope is removed, the air is violently sucked from the environment leaving an oppressive stagnation in its wake.
The atmosphere becomes heavy.
You become numb and your knees want to buckle under the weight of the anvil on your chest.
You stop breathing. For a minute.
All the stress leading up to that moment shows its effects in your face and the exhaustion that has been building, repressed, flows to the surface.
Questions are asked. You answer them, but you don't remember what you said.
You begin to dread what you now know will happen.
Your body still functions. You walk, but you don't feel your legs. You cry, but the anvil stays firmly in place. You try to sleep, but you are too exhausted. You haven't eaten in three days. You aren't hungry.
The questions begin. Why? What if? How?
Questions that will often be unanswerable.
Hope is a palpable, living emotion. You can feel it, sometimes only by its absence.
This is so true.
It got me to thinking about the little silver medallion from Catherine. The first thing I thought of when I pulled it from the package was, "She sent this to me, because she's not using it anymore". Hope, that is. She's lost hers. And so have I, in many ways. As I clench the cold metal in my hand, it warms slightly, and I'm left feeling confused, sad, and detached. I can hold on to hope only as long as I feel obligated, committed, compelled. Soon, I find I need my hand free. I need to move on, to get busy living life. My life. Whether or not that life holds every single dream I've dared to fancy for myself or not. The quality of my existence is what I make it to be, what I strive to achieve, what I can control. Does that always turn out the way I had intended? Do I still mourn my losses, my failures, my shortcomings?
I'm so tired of being force-fed the Big Plan the universe supposedly has in store for us. I honestly do feel that life is a big series of unmitigated random events that compile into what choices we next make.
If I had been 5 minutes later arriving at my friend's house that day, I'd have not met her brother's friend, whom I later married. If I would have accepted the invitation to attend OU and play my clarinet in the marching band... If I would have moved to Stittsville... If I didn't have passive restraints in that old VW that got totaled... If I didn't recycle that old psychology paper just to get a passing grade in a rhetoric course... If Nicholas would have been born.
So many things that would make my life different. Some regrets, some not. Some decisions, some just chance. Some would call it fate. Perhaps. Who really knows?
I will place this hope on the mantle among the angels residing there. I will hold it, I will set it aside, I will cling to it, I will remember the sentiment, and I will always wonder at the "what ifs".
When hope is removed, the air is violently sucked from the environment leaving an oppressive stagnation in its wake.
The atmosphere becomes heavy.
You become numb and your knees want to buckle under the weight of the anvil on your chest.
You stop breathing. For a minute.
All the stress leading up to that moment shows its effects in your face and the exhaustion that has been building, repressed, flows to the surface.
Questions are asked. You answer them, but you don't remember what you said.
You begin to dread what you now know will happen.
Your body still functions. You walk, but you don't feel your legs. You cry, but the anvil stays firmly in place. You try to sleep, but you are too exhausted. You haven't eaten in three days. You aren't hungry.
The questions begin. Why? What if? How?
Questions that will often be unanswerable.
posted by Julie at 8:52 AM
5 Comments:
Or maybe...you just take hope with you to another...different...adventure. That doesn't mean you don't mourn those you have had to leave behind (for whatever reason). But you still carry hope with you...for tomorrow...for something. It's not what you planned. It's not what you can control entirely. And you can mourn and wail at the unfairness of it all. But you can still find hope somewhere. You can still use hope in your life. We all can.
I'm glad you have hope Julie - we should all be so lucky.
I think the day you truly lose hope is the day you die. While you expect that next breath to happen, you either hope it does, or hope it doesn't. And if you don't have to think about it then the future is bright.
I know the feel of that anvil but I every single day I hope it will dissappear one day. *I* think that when it feels like there is nothing else left worth living for, when it feels like all hope is lost - that's when we hope hardest.
Thanks for this post:)
I often wonder when it is that we get feel that Hope is a good thing. Doesn't it sometimes feel like we shouldn't dare to? Or that by doing so, we automatically void it?
I hope Catherine is right, and that the Hope gets to be a part of our lives, just in a different area, and that it doesn't leave us altogether.
"You now dread what you know will happen."
So true. I think that was weighted me down more than anything.
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