More Than Muse

I've come often to the edge of telling, and for close or distant relatives of fear, I retired to safer stories. But this one changed my life.

So much to say about this woman. Where to start?

She's the person I want to call when I fail, and I fail frequently. She's the person I want to call when I win. She's the person I look into the audience hoping to glimpse. I know she's not there, but I still look. She, the laughter that fades beyond earshot.

A few years ago, I realized that I compare all women to her. I'd meet a woman. Confident, kind, pretty. Almost right. Only one thing wrong with her. She's got NS. 

She is Not Suzanne.

At first I didn't realize what it was, but then I began to catch on. It's an Epidemic. As vision develops, I see the letters branded on their foreheads.

Spectacular, magnificent, elegant, but . . .  NS

Compassionate, accomplished, intelligent, but . . .  NS

Conscious, spiritual, radiant, but . . .  NS!

My heart's a weird heart. It's got a space in it that only Suzanne fits. I've lost interest in trying to fit anyone else.

A single phrase to describe to describe my friend Suzanne Palanuk: My Favorite, my only favorite.

Ridiculous!

I have too much to say. 

I'm dying here, cause it's not yet time to say it all. 

Still, I can't just say nothing...

photo by Zoe Pamintuan

I'm thinking of the song "I am a Friend of God" by Israel Houghton, which includes the line "He calls me friend."

I'm thinking that in a blog about my life experience as the summation of my friendships, this is a friendship I gotta talk about. I am having a day I cannot explain to you. I would break confidences and betray trust if I told you the details, but I can't just say nothing. 

God is ridiculously good to me. Ridiculous, I say. As in, stupid crazy Good. Make-no-sense kinda Good. Completely-lost-his-mind Good. That's the kind of Good I'm talking 'bout.

I'm thinking of the phrase "goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life" and I picture myself as I often do, hunted. Followed, searched out, pursued. There is ruthlessness and a relentless intent about the way Goodness follows me. I cannot explain it. I cannot avoid it.

What's interesting is that I would ever run from it. Hunted, as I was by circumstance, and running, as I would from fear. It makes sense to run from fear, but who in their right mind runs from Goodness and Mercy? 

I'm not gon' preach right now. But it's coming soon. I'm gonna tell a story about a man hunted all his life by Goodness and Mercy, until one day he stopped running out of sheer exhaustion. 

And got caught by a ridiculous God. 

photo by Darlene Taylor

A single phrase to describe my friend God: Ridiculously Good!