That’s the Way Love Goes

It's been awhile, I know.  I meant to post this on Thursday.  Think of my absense as building suspense.  Or demand...lol...

My latest tattoo is healing up nicely. It looks less and less like raw, pink, self mutilation every day, lol. Sabin, my tattoo artist, goes to my church and assures me it will get darker (well, whiter) after the second round. I might want black ink after all, we’ll see. I figure, if you’re gunna make a statement, why whisper it? The idea came to me in a day and I think I gave it maybe 12 hours of thought, truth be known. I had planned to have something completely different put on a completely different part of my body. But what can I say? When lightning strikes…

I got the tatt during another emotionally complicated episode this year (man, 09 has been full of 'em!). I gave my life to Christ and things sort of hit the fan - coming at me all at once. The infamous MSO (My Special One) had found me again, 3200 miles away, but was drifting out of my life for the third time & I was wrestling with the fact that I was actually encouraging it! For various reasons, my mother is physically and emotionally unable to “be there” for me the way a mom usually is. I suspected coming to the west coast wouldn’t change our relationship, but I’d still hoped. Now she was proving my suspicions to be fact. My grandfather had a heart attack, followed by the news another relative has brain cancer and I was barely receiving updates on either of them when, a few days later, I learned several members of my family (my grandparents included) belong to either a religious cult, or a religious sect (more on that later - you can bet that's a blog post!). I felt totally overwhelmed.

I knew one thing, though: I was done chasing love. I was done being understanding and supportive of men like MSO, while giving away all of me. I was done projecting perfection to my gramma to earn her approval, I was done pretending text forwards from my father suffice for a relationship and I was done always being available for my mother, who never follows through anyway. I wanted a reminder. “Love” on the tender inside part of my outstretched arm. Reaching, always reaching. Until now. At the same time, I felt God reminding me that faith without deeds is dead. Love, on my outstretched arm. Reminding me to do. Both, from now on.

The dot, dot, dot is an important part to…it reminds me that one way or another, my lesson on love – my “love story” – isn’t over yet. :)

Love y'all,

~M~