This one feels magical to me.

Maybe it’s the mystical way this year my age matches the date.

Maybe it’s because I watched Mr Magorium’s Wonder Emporium last night.

Maybe it’s because a birthday wish came true.

Maybe it’s all the well wishes from family and friends.

Maybe it was all that fried chicken.

Or maybe more than ever I am aware of the miraculous way my life has been redeemed and I am weightless with gratitude. Yeah, I think that may be it.

You see, no matter how much you are loved (and I am and I always have been), there is a cross that every illegitimate child must bear, an ambiguity that haunts the mind and heart:

Am I an accident?

Maybe its because I woke up this birthday with my answer.

I’m not an extra piece of the puzzle that left the Creator bewildered and in His grace and mercy He found a place for me. I was meant for such a time as this. In His sovereignty He created me, He orchestrated my conception, He himself chose the day of my delivery, He hand-picked my mother and my father. In His heart-stopping goodness, He composed the story of my life from start to finish, and it is a resplendent thing.

Thank you Yahweh for the gift of my life and the beauty of my days.

Thank you Christopher for loving me the way Yahweh intended for all daughters to be loved.

Thank you Daddy for making me your own, raising me to love what you love, and baptizing me into generosity and simplicity.

Thank you Mama for good days full of love and light and fun and femininity and sisters.

Thank you Emma, Luke and Lydia for the purpose that shines so brightly from your perfect eyes that no darkness can withstand it.

 

I love this day:

This marked day, on which, for a moment

the universe clicks its great eternal gears

into place,

and feels right,

and it sees itself –

in a mirror, across the room,

and smiles across the black and starry foreverness

to see a bit of its own beauty –

its most dark and lovely wonder –

twinkling bright and strong in her place among the stars –

sees itself and smiles at this day.

The universe sees you, and seeing,

knows that it has done well

lifts up your soul in its arms,

fetches you up like so many black-eyed susans,

carries you up up up through the sky

to where only He sees –

and shows Him

and reminds Him

what only His voice can make.

I love this day:

This secret day, unlikely, unexpected…

on which the unplanned arrival

of a southern girl’s baby girl

whispered in a secret of eternal glorious magic –

unfolded the lace-thin veil,

parted imperceptibly

by joyous air escaping infant lungs,

resonant still with Heaven’s purest air,

brushed aside the veil unseen,

and with the air and breath and sound

called in unnoticed

a silent and beautiful stranger

into that Louisiana March

a dark and lovely magic.

The Beyond came over

to us

to live with us

to love us

to save us.

I love this day:

This happy day and all it proves –

That His voice still makes gardens and moons

and dark lovely beauties –

That the magic of Heaven walks among us –

That life is never an accident –

That love is indestructible –

That the best of creation walks and talks and sings,

has curly brown hair and long legs

and dark shining eyes –

has my heart

and my love

 and my soul –

Always.

 I was an uninvited but welcome addition to a house of struggle. Come on in, girl, and struggle with us. We’ll keep you safe, and we’ll love you fierce, and we don’t care how you got here, because we know who sent you.

 That kind of love will get you anywhere you want to go…that kinda love got me where I am today. But between here and there was a whole lot of beautiful struggle. Love is what makes the struggle bearable. Love is what makes the struggle beautiful. Love is what brought the burly hard-hearted man to the altar, love is what toppled the levee and unleashed the flood into that dessert we called family. Love is what makes the struggle worthwhile.

 Obedience keeps the rain falling. Truth drives the locusts away. Repentance keeps the soil fertile. And struggle mends the fences, hoes the weeds, plucks the bean and shucks the corn. I love the struggle. There’s a place where struggle and peace meet, like two seas. Strive to enter the rest. I’m not trying to find a place where struggle doesn’t exist, I’m finding my peace, my calm in the storm. Don’t wake me up when the wind starts howling and the waves start building, let me sleep. I know who creates the wind, who drives the rain. I know who rocks the boat. I’m not afraid, I was born for this.

I spent most of 2013 waiting for things to magically happen for me, which led to a lot of unfulfilled expectations. I’m beginning 2014 with the realization that good things don’t come to those who wait, they come to those who DO. So, everyday I intend to do at least ONE thing in pursuit of a dream. That may be something as simple as pinning a beautiful farm table on my dream house board, or cleaning The Daddy’s office, or choosing baked over fried. But everyday I will DO ONE THING. And something tells me that good things are coming my way!