Meds And Gym And Shows And Van

I didn't realise it had been so long since my last post.

I'm still on the meds. No side effects, and the faintest whisper of actual effects. The pharmacist told me straight-up when I filled the prescription that I probably would need to bump up the dose. I did notice slightly less resistance to switching tasks in the beginning, and I have managed to stay on top of the household chores since I started taking it -- this is something that has never happened for longer than two weeks. I had a doctor's appointment on Monday, and we have increased the dose slightly.

I also got a gym membership at the end of January, and have kept it up so far -- I'm literally only using it for access to the dance studio. Tap shoes aren't allowed, but $48 a month is still a MUCH better deal than the $40 PER HOUR that it costs me to rent the local dance studio.

 

We are officially halfway through our current show -- my first show in the major city I've been trying to break into since 2018. My husband is also in this show and he's grown so much already as a person and an actor. It's in a beautiful old venue (over a century old) that's just packed with character and stories. The people have been lovely so far and I'm having a lot of fun.

 

An undercurrent to all this has been vehicle drama.

 

On 15 February, on a routine trip to the grocery store, my van suddenly gave a 'reduced engine power' message and did exactly that. Even pressing the pedal to the floor barely coaxed it up to 40 km/h.

 

I limped it home and my father-in-law (our unofficial mechanic) took it to his garage, where it sat in varying states of disassembly for over a month while he cleaned, fixed, tested, waited for parts, installed, tested again, repeat. In the meantime, he graciously lent us his old truck (which, it should be noted, has SIGNIFICANTLY more kilometres on it than the van does) as I was opening a show the following week and was in rehearsal for two others.

 

This was all well and good until the truck requested an oil change. We returned it to father-in-law's place, where he discovered a bad axle and recommended that we not drive it on the highway.

 

Not a single one of these shows are in the town in which we actually live. The literal only thing I was doing with that truck was highway driving.

 

He gave us this diagnosis on a Saturday afternoon. We had a rehearsal 150 kilometres away in less than 24 hours -- the final rehearsal before tech week, and our first in the performance venue. We couldn't miss that rehearsal. My husband despaired, and I, out of some old dusty reflex, began praying of all things. This is something I have not very seriously done since the night my cousin died -- fast approaching ten years ago.

That same Saturday night, I had been asked to work an event (in town, thankfully) at a performing arts venue I occasionally pick up hours at.

 

My former boss (from my last fast food job) was attending this event, and over the course of conversation, our vehicle troubles and the impending rehearsal came up.

 

"Do you want to borrow a vehicle?" he asked.

 

Arrangements were made, and the next morning he dropped off a very nice GMC (which, I noted, also had a lot more kilometres than the van). We made it to rehearsal and back, and within the week the truck was highway-driveable again (which was more than could be said for the van, which had already been declared repaired and highway tested once only to melt down dramatically again the second I touched it).

 

As I write, my father-in-law has taken the van to two separate repair garages in an attempt to figure out what's wrong, as by this time he's replaced almost every component in the thing with no success. The first garage followed a red herring, but the second garage discovered a catastrophic electrical failure (I'm surprised the van was even turning on at all based on the description I was given) and, at last report, were waiting for a replacement part to come in. We will be on the hook for over $800 by the time that part is installed (and we can only hope that solves the problem). That old prayer reflex kicked in again.

I put out a single plea on my social media, linking to my Ko-fi page. We received a decent donation right away, but then it sat for a week... until I woke up Sunday morning to a $500 donation.

All these years I thought maybe I had misunderstood God's calling -- that I had mistakenly attributed my love for performing to Him when it wasn't from Him at all. But He got us to that rehearsal, against all odds. He has brought us over half of the amount we will need to pay for that repair, and is there really any reason to believe the remainder isn't forthcoming?

And, looking further back -- He has provided not one, but three pairs of tap shoes when I needed them. I have not paid for tap shoes out of pocket since 2012.

I let that stupid 'Christian' college convince that God did not care about my pain and was only interested in my pre-existing happiness. I let the ones who claimed to trust God tell me that my 'talent' was only in my head and that I'd never be any real use to anyone -- in performing or otherwise.

 

This does not mean I'm over my cousin's death. I don't think I ever will be. But maybe I can find a way to live -- albeit differently -- in a world without her.

Music Day - Kyrie

 How have I not featured this one yet?

Yeah, okay, it's more well-known than 99% of stuff I post on this blog, but that's for good reason. This song -- as the kids say -- slaps. This is the song that inspired my best novel. This is one of the most soaring songs from an entire decade defined by music that soared. How in the world have I not featured this?

If you, like me, were sheltered as a child, you may not know of this song, and that's okay. In fact, that's great, because now you're old enough to remember your first time hearing it instead of just always sort of being aware of it, and that's honestly a really special thing. Get comfortable. Relax. Take a couple deep breaths. Prepare to be enchanted.

The song starts out with Richard Page calling out the title exactly as the original Greek intended -- as a plaintive cry of the heart, soft and distant across the desert of life. God have mercy.

We get a percussive synth buildup, a guitar hit, and glorious big drums. The verse is great. Page has the perfect smooth-but-passionate voice for a harder pop song like this, especially one with more introspective lyrics. But the real magic happens once you hit the chorus.

It's big. It's bombastic. It's shimmering. It's looking up at a thousand stars at night and pondering the galaxies beyond -- an exercise that might inspire one to echo Page's heart-cry. God have mercy.

God have mercy down the road that I must travel

God have mercy through the darkness of the night

God have mercy -- where I'm going, will You follow?

God have mercy on a highway in the light...

This is not a party-pop song. This is a song written by a pensive person reflecting on their life -- both what has come and gone as well as what lies dimly ahead. The chorus is literally a prayer -- a rather upbeat and danceable one, but a prayer nonetheless. The fact that they took a lyric like this and made it into one of the biggest pop-rock anthems of the decade (as track 7 on a vinyl album to boot) is a testament to the band's skill. (It was not a fluke either -- see also Broken Wings.)

And just when you think that spine-chilling chorus literally cannot get any better, all the instruments drop out except those phenomenal drums and those soaring band harmonies, crying for mercy like the monks in the choirs who first put those Greek words to music, but even earlier than that, like the tax collector named Zacchaeus who not only repaid what he stole, but quadrupled the return payment, like the woman clothed in little more than jewellery and makeup as she dumped perfume on Jesus' feet, like the ragged scrap of skin writhing on the cross next to Jesus as he asked to taste a small morsel of the Kingdom.

It was a well-crafted pop hit, to be sure. But it came from a place of honesty that leveled it up above anything that today's carefully-curated pop songwriting teams could ever hope to attain. Skill and experience certainly helped this song -- there's no question that Page and co. have copious amounts of both -- but those alone can seem sterile when not taken into the stratosphere with a gut-level lyric like this.

Listen and be amazed, whether for the first time or the thousandth time.

Title: Kyrie

Artist: Mr. Mister

Album: Welcome To The Real World

Year: 1985

iTunes here; YouTube here.

When I was young I thought of growing old

Of what my life would mean to me

Would I have followed down my chosen road

Or only wished what I could be...?

On The 'Guarantees' Of Christianity

I've noticed a theme among my parents' and grandparents' generation of Christians -- those aged around 35 and up.

They seem to have this idea that Christianity is easy. That if you're being a good Christian, everything is perfect and you're rich and comfortable.

And they wonder why their children, faced with an increasingly hostile world with pressures from all sides and all people -- including these 'well-meaning' Christian authority figures in their families -- turn their backs so vehemently on Christianity.

This Christianity that guarantees health, wealth, and happiness does not fit with today's world of anger and war and pressure and financial instability and political tension. Those of us who were raised in a Christian environment, saturated with this 'Christianity makes everything better!!!' mindset, quickly come to the conclusion that if God did exist, He would fix all our problems the second we pray and ask Him to. After all, how many women's studies (to call them 'Bible studies' is a bit of a stretch) guarantee this? 'If you pray for five minutes every day for a week, watch how God will change your life -- He'll fix your marriage, make your children little angels, provide money for the best food and brand-name clothing and that Caribbean cruise that you so desperately need to relax and get away from it all.'

Your children and the young people in your churches see that mindset and, however unconsciously, they buy into it. If that is what Christianity does, great. So they pray to God for the first three days of every new year and wait for the miracles to start falling in their lap.

But the miracles don't happen. Because -- news flash -- that is not and has never been how God works.

But my generation doesn't know that, and, naturally, we get disillusioned when we don't get the riches and abundance we ask for. You, Christian, told us it was our birthright. Just pray, you said. Just pray and everything bad will magically disappear. Just pray and it will fix everything. Just repeat these empty words, this carefully crafted mantra/phrase, and watch your heretofore abysmal savings account soar into the stratosphere. I guarantee that...

But the guarantee doesn't work. Because that is not and has never, ever been how God works.

Do you even know, Christian, how God works? Do you remember that out of the remaining eleven disciples after the resurrection, all but one were killed for following Christ? Do you remember all the years during the Depression and the dust bowl, when the crops of honest, God-fearing people failed just as badly as the crops of their heathen neighbours'? Do you remember that the apostle Paul, a man who you would probably list as your hero, died in prison (in the greatest and most politically and culturally with-it city in the world at that time) for telling people about God?

Ask them if Christianity made their lives easier.

And then, ask if Christianity has changed in the last couple thousand years and, if so, did it change before or after all the persecution that has happened (and is still happening) in places like Asia, Africa, and the Middle East? When did it change to Cloud Cuckoo Land and why doesn't it work for all Christians? You say 'you don't have enough faith?' Did Paul not have enough faith? Did Peter not have enough faith?

You who wonder why your children are walking away from the faith, ask yourself what they're walking away from. If you're peddling a false gospel, maybe it's better that they do walk away.

I Lost A Bet

On 28 April 2002, I was baptised.

On 28 April 2015, I lost my faith.

No, I do not have the dates mixed up.

You've all heard the story; I rehash it every year. How my cousin suddenly had an asthma attack and was taken to hospital where she died. I entered into the story between the hospital and the death when my aunt called and told us the situation and told us to pray. We did pray as a family that night, collectively and individually. I vividly remember saying to God, "If You love me, let her live."

In the years since then, I've had so many people -- pastors, student theologians, Bible study leaders, fellow Bible college students, even people who no longer adhere to the Christian faith -- tell me how badly my theology was flawed that night. They tell me how ridiculous it was for me to base my entire hope and faith into one miracle. They tell me it was wrong for me to hinge His love for me on one prayer, on one human life.

I can follow where they're coming from, but I cannot understand their logic.

If God really is as great as they say He is, why then can't I do that? If God is capable of using a donkey to accomplish His purposes, why can't He reinflate dying lungs? Even modern medicine can do that nine times out of ten, why can't the God of the universe even manage that 10%? If God is so great, how is it wrong for me to bet the farm, to hinge my entire faith on one crazy possibility? Isn't that the very definition of faith? I believed so much that God loved me that I bet my cousin's life and my entire faith on it. They make entire blockbuster films on the stories of lesser bets.

Oh right -- the ones in the films usually pay off.

I made a crazy bet based on crazy faith -- the kind they begged us in youth group to have -- and lost. Yeah, yeah, maybe it was wrong to bet with God, but if He loved me -- if He really loved me -- why wouldn't He prove it? I have spent the last five years in a pit of numbness, knowing that I should love and serve and be faithful to Him, but also knowing that He was fully capable of saving my cousin and proving to me that He loved me and He did not do it. 'Ask and you shall receive,' my foot.

You know if it had been a degenerate -- somebody addicted to crack who'd gambled his entire life away and made a hobby of murdering children for twenty-five years -- God would have done it. If that 'degenerate' had pleaded for the life of his own nine-year-cousin, using the exact same wording I did, God would have done it. And it would have sold millions of books and packed out arenas to hear that testimony. What makes me any different? Why can't I ask the exact same thing? I'm really no less of a degenerate in my soul. Am I not evil enough for God to bother with me? Is that not 'bad enough' for me to get a prayer answered? What do I have to do? How bad do I have to be?

I've lost many people even closer to me than my cousin, but my cousin's death is the one that I keep coming back to, the one that continues to infuriate and flummox me.

I asked for one thing -- one thing. I had a hell of a lot of faith -- it takes a certain amount of chutzpah to bet my entire faith on one person's life. I didn't ask for new shoes or a better-paying job or more friends or anything frivolous. I begged for someone else's life. Is that not a noble thing to ask? All I wanted was my cousin to live, and I wanted it so badly that I exchanged my relationship with God for it.

How is that not enough? Nothing I do is ever enough for humans; I've known that for years. But they always told us God was gracious and while we would never measure up to His standard, He had this really great thing called 'mercy' because He loved us SOOOOOOOO much. I bet a hell of a lot on that mercy and that love that night.

And it failed me.

I Am Trying, I Swear

I picked the literal worst year in the history of Alberta to get married.

I've had almost ten other perfectly good, not-economically-abysmal years that I could have used to meet him and get married. But nope, dumb Kate has to pick this year, of all years. Nobody in Alberta has money, and even less people in Alberta have any sympathy. Alberta is a province of hard, determined workers who will themselves into a job and have exactly zero sympathy for anybody who's struggling to find work. It is worse in Alberta to be on financial assistance than it is to be a Nazi.

It's so frustrating. I only moved back to Alberta because I got no paying work after two years -- read that again, two years -- of job-hunting in Saskatchewan. I have applied for I swear every single job in Alberta. Every single one. I have applied for everything I may be even remotely qualified for, and even quite a few jobs that I am not qualified for. I have applied for everything, in pretty well every field of employment. Cashier, food services, waitressing, construction/contracting, sales associates, secretary, janitorial, grocery clerk, post office, farmhand, dishwasher -- you name it, I have applied for it. I promise. I have applied for all of the above in five different towns/cities in the past two days, in fact.

I cry a lot nowadays -- half because I miss my sweet fiancé so much (stupid long-distance), but half because I can't fund my own wedding and I'm losing to ability to convince everyone else that I really actually do want to help finance my wedding. Even his family seems to think I'm expecting a free ride somehow but I swear I am not. I am trying as hard as I know how and if there was a way I could be guaranteed a job, I would have done it already. My parents are experiencing their absolute worst year financially since I was a very young child, so they can't afford to help me out, no matter how much they would love to. I swear I'm not being lazy. I would absolutely pay for this entire wedding out of my own pocket if I could. If it has to be, I will go beg on street corners to get the money together for this wedding without asking any of our family for any more help. I am NOT lazy, and I am NOT looking for a free ride in anything. I know it takes hard work. All I'm looking for is a job.

It would be so easy to just move in together and call it done. It would be a hell of a lot cheaper and way less stressful. But I really want to do this right. I want to have an official Christian wedding. I want to be married before we live together. I want to do the right thing.

Yes, we could sign documents, get legally married, and have a party later -- but we all know the 'have a party later' thing never really happens. If we don't pull together the money for it now, will we really have the discipline to pull it together later, after we're already married? What's the point of it then? People won't take it as seriously then and then they're less likely to come celebrate with us anyway.

Sure, we could postpone the wedding a year or two -- but I hate this long-distance thing. I hate being apart from him, and I want to be with him as much as possible as soon as possible. (For the record, we already have postponed our wedding three months.)

We've cut down the budget as far as it can go. We got our wedding down from an initial $10,000 projected budget to $4,000. We are getting a lot of things at a reduced rate due to networking. There is nothing else we can cut... except the dance.

I never planned out my future wedding as a child, a teen, or even a young adult. I didn't have a dream venue, or dress, or flower arrangement figured out, or a Pinterest board of decorations, or a playlist of songs I wanted. The only thing -- the literal only dream I had about my future wedding (if there even was one) was the dance. I wanted a dance.

I was flowergirl in my aunt and uncle's wedding when I was young. The only thing I remember about that wedding -- besides cupping my aunt's face in my little five-year-old hands and telling her she looked beautiful -- was the dance. I watched all sorts of people get onto the dance floor and dance to the music and I loved it. From that age, I knew that if I ever got married, I wanted a dance at my wedding. That was the only dream I had about my wedding before my engagement. The only one.

And of course that's the most expensive thing. That's the easiest thing to cut, financially. Both the hall and the DJ are big-ticket expenses, and both are dispensable. This puts me into a state of extreme stress (even more than unemployment already has done)...

I want a dance. It's my only dream.

But it's expensive.

But that was the only thing I ever dreamed of having at my wedding.

But you could cut the budget in half if you dropped it.

But it was my dream.

But you don't have a job. You can't fund it. And you can't in good conscience make everyone else fund it when you're already contributing diddly-squat.

But I've always wanted a dance.

It's not like it's a necessity. Grow up.

But I'm only ever going to have one wedding...

And now I'm crying again.

It's starting to feel like God made me defective. Literally all my passions are the exact things that western society will not pay for. Even my artistic siblings have jobs, side passions that fit neatly into a trade or at least something that will pay them minimum wage. I'm willing to learn stuff outside of my passions -- I already have for previous jobs -- but first somebody in this God-forsaken prairie has to actually hire me.

I pray so much about this. I beg and I plead and I yank desperately at the hem of God's cloak but still He is silent. Just like He always has been toward me when I have been in need. I try to do the George Müller thing and not ask anybody else for money and just trust God for it but then my gas tank is empty again and I have rehearsal in literally forty-five minutes and I have no choice but to beg my friends and family on Facebook for money again. And I feel like scum doing that. I feel like the worst specimen of humanity when I have to beg my friends for money just to put gasoline in my vehicle. A lot of times it does feel like I would be better off dead -- I wouldn't cost anything anymore. The literal only thing that stops me is the thought of how devastated my fiancé would be.

I hate that all I think about now is money. I hate that everything is so tied to money. I hate that I'm obsessed with it now, but I have to be -- you cannot exist in western society without it, even if your tastes aren't expensive and you know how to stretch a dollar. A dollar only stretches so far before it breaks.

Everyone talks about the faithfulness of God. Everyone else talks of His miracles of provision. I can't even tell you how many people just in the past week have said to me, 'just let go and let God,' or 'just pray more, and I guarantee...' You don't think I haven't been doing that? You don't think I have prayed my face off for the past two years of my unemployed (and therefore worthless) existence? I have confessed sins, I have prayed for guidance, I have taken risks, I have worked hard, I have tried. What yet do I lack? What magical ingredient am I missing that God still requires from me? I thought His grace to us was just that -- grace. Not based on our merit or our works, but our need. Not once have I pointed to my Bible college degree. Not once have I pointed to a lifetime of church attendance and tithing. Not once. All I have said, over and over and OVER again, is, 'God, you know I need to be able to pay for this. Please help me. Please provide.'

And He is silent.

I have great need, God -- and only some of it is financial. Do You care or not?

Spots Of Light and the Deepest Dark

27 May 2016, 2.25am.

Is it better to be consistently depressed, with no bright spots at all, or is it worse to hope and hope and hope for something... only for it not to happen?

I have such a vivid imagination (or at least I did...) that I can imagine any number of ways God might answer a prayer. So I think on the myriad of creative ways He could help me... and He doesn't do any one of them. In fact, He doesn't even come up with an alternative that I hadn't thought of yet. He just doesn't do anything.

Which is worse, an imagination so beat down by society and circumstance that it no longer functions at all, or an imagination that supplies hope that will always be in vain?

Music Day - War Games

This song is literally my entire life for the past year and a half.

Title: War Games
Artist: Keith Green
Album: Keith Green Live
Year: circa 1975, released 2011
iTunes here; YouTube here.

Hey God
Where were You today?
You didn't answer my prayer
Seems like
I pray and I pray
And lately You are not there...

This is quite a departure from the in-your-face Keith Green of For Him Who Has Ears To Hear and it is many miles away from the joyful psalm-singing Keith Green of Songs Of The Shepherd. The rich emotional vocal style is the same, and the lovely sweeping piano work is the same, but the lyrics are very different, both in topic and in affect. Keith tackles the frustration that comes with being a Christian and seeing your life fall to pieces around you despite allegedly having the all-powerful and all-loving God of the universe on your side. This is one of the very, very few songs recorded by an artist with a Christian worldview that outright asks 'what's the point of being a Christian when I have to depend on myself for everything anyway?' Even Daniel Amos -- who do not shy away from controversial depth and frustration in their lyrics -- never (to my knowledge) come quite this close to that question.

It may be worth noting that this song was apparently written before Keith actually committed himself to Christ, but I find the pain and anger in the lyrics can be quite accurate. Sometimes you do just feel like screaming at God -- maybe it'll get His attention.