You have had that moment, when you say something only to hear a response that you didn’t expect to encounter. I grew up in a household where the last word carried authority and weight. It was seldom a positive moment yet a many times that second defined who won a battle… thus who was the victor. I never was sure why my parents fought nor did I ever understand who won, if either. What I knew was someone always had the last word.
I can still hear those words ring out like a shot being fired from my steel mouth toward my mother as a teen, ‘I hate your guts!’ I think I meant everything in me hates everything in you and me at this very moment, even your bowels. Truth was I just hurt. Hurt that I had learned how to fight as a young child a battle I knew wasn’t worthy of my young warrior heart. I hurt over feeling emotionally abandoned and betrayed by those closest to me. I hurt over being a teenager. And as hard as being a teenager simply is I was a teenager who had moved almost every other year. I felt like a vagabond moving most of my life like I was a fugitive being sought after by the law. I hurt that my mother hurt and her hurt though spoken at times had a depth that was unspeakable. That was the truth no one dared speak about.
I once heard about a daytime soap opera actor who had written into his contract the stipulation that he would have the last word in of the scenes where he appeared. At first, I laughed thinking about how trivial this was and also how smart it seemed. Getting the last word has a claim that you have the last say… so it must be where the strength lies. Or maybe you are saying what matters to you is being the last remembered and therefore if you have the last say … you will have had the most influence.
When I stop and think about the last word, I’m not sure that the last word is always the best word. The last word always seems to be shared from a place of strength as if you are making the definitive statement that matters most. Yet, I tend to think the opposite is true. The person who doesn’t need the last word is the one with the most control. The person who has the most compassion and depth sometimes is the person who is able to see the big picture and know within themselves the best word spoken might be no word spoken. Self control is seldom seen when it comes to matters of the last word.
Years ago, I ended a relationship with a boy and before I headed to my car I said, “I think you can only walk away when it isn’t love.” As I turned to walk to my car, I listened for the last word. There was none that time. I wasn’t sure if I wanted there to be. I was young and yet I knew that there was something more to be had in relationships and I was holding out for that something. In the long run, I was better off walking away from something I believed wasn’t true love even if I was walking toward something that wasn’t right in front of me… something if I were honest I hadn’t actually witnessed. I was walking toward something that I dreamed could be and something if I was honest I wasn’t sure was even real or available. I was walking toward a future where the last word is really overrated. My husband Ron is the one who taught me such a silly notion. He has watched me not only get the last word but has seen me burst into flames, fume over the trival, fight with myself in his presence and say what I think will win me the argument. Early on in our relationship something changed. I changed. I saw what love can do. How love can melt the coldest moment and free the caged prisoner from the walls built by the past. I have seen how gentle silence can speak louder than any last word or clever thought that I believed would steal the show and ensure my victory. I have seen how grace overcomes the awkward and invites us all to bask in the present moment of peace.
My mother always got the last word. And in the end she always won and my dad lost. And in the end she had all the power, and my dad had none. And in the end, the end came and was the end. What I think more than the last word… she wanted something so much more… she wanted love. Funny, she already had it but she couldn’t, wouldn’t, didn’t see… it never was found in the last word. I wanted and still want my story to be different and I now see how maybe in a small way it could be.
So, I now raise my flag too and beacon to all who would be last word followers.
We are the strongest last word in and of ourselves. Our breathing in those moments… our being aware that neither hate, nor fear, nor power, more desire for approval by our shouts, whispers or simply words could ever speak as loud as who we are and how we were created. If I were honest… more than trying to be right with my stating one more last thing… I am trying to be loved, accepted and wanted. And one last word won’t make it so. I am… simple and true. So next time you and I come across that moment, you know that moment we wanna be right or we just feel we need to say one more thing… just breathe and remember… something might be spoken louder if you don’t speak.
celia anne
Author: Celia
once upon a time
When I was a kid, I loved stories. I loved being read to at night and I especially loved made up stories my dad used to tell me. He made up these nightly adventures of a country mouse… each time he started each tale with once upon a time. I waited impatiently for him to weave a tale of enchantment, adventure and endearment. The mouse would find small ventures around an old farmhouse and each one had the little mouse using his wit to outsmart some obstacle faced. The mouse would find cheese, or make a friend out of the farm animals, or uncover a hidden treasure as he outsmarted a barn cat and retired couple living in the farmhouse. Each time my father told the story of the little mouse, he would end each tale with a cliff hanger that would have me more wide awake than lulled to sleep. Thinking back, I can’t say that my dad told this story every single night, but I have a vivid memory of these moments in my childhood. I looked forward to each encounter with my dad and would hop into bed eager for a bedtime story… even past the age where bedtime stories were considered a part of a child’s nightly routine. I don’t remember when he quit telling me the stories but I wished they’d never end. We moved quite a bit, and those stories were one of the few constants in my life. I believed at an early age, I could over come any cliffhanger in my life. I, like that mouse, could make strangers my friends. I could problem solve and find solutions in the midst of insurmountable odds. I believed that though alone, I didn’t have to be lonely. It was so small now that I think about it, yet it was a huge lifeline for me. My father’s voice was like few times I heard in my life time. In the pulpit on Sundays preaching to the morning crowds of soul seekers at church, it would raise and lower with intensity. It was unlike interaction with my siblings or my mom in which he always seemed engaged in some battle of sorts and was defending, always raising a voice to defend something in his life that seemed sacred. During story-time, his voice was tender and calm like someone with a newborn who is enthralled with the newness of life. The only other time I heard this hushed storytelling voice was years later when he took me hunting a few times the year before I married. In those woods, he seemed to harken back to that soft tender voice as he directed me to the deer stand, to climb over a log, or to duck under a fence. His voice in those south Louisiana woods was sacred and sincere and held a tenderness I only heard again in the last days of his life on earth. When I would sit by his bed as he had mine, holding his hand sharing Psalms, old songs and hushed stories of a mouse we both knew long ago. He whispered to me in a heart felt , longing voice, “Sweetheart… sing me a song… tell me a story.”
Three words
Boiling my life down to three words that people would us to describe me was interesting, moving and heartfelt. See what I did, yea I like a little humor mixed in. This week, I watched “The Fault in Our Stars” and was moved by the before-death obituary scene. Set in a church two friends stand at the podium and eulogize their friend soon to die of cancer. I’ve always thought, why wait. Why wait to tell a loved one what your thoughts are for them? Why wait to share your true feelings about a close friend or family member. Why wait? I think the answer is we think we have the time to tell them. We live in a realm of reality that falsely makes us believe that we have all the time in the world to share something with someone… there will be plenty of time. Another reason, is we don’t want the awkward moment. I know, I hate and love the awkward moment. You know that moment when we say the thing and we aren’t sure how it is received. But to me, that is the most sacred moment of all. That chance taken is pure and beautiful and full of wonder that we all long for in our lives. Real. Real and present. The two things I know life yearns for yet we have seemed to make more of life avoid both of these with great gusto.
Today, I asked friends, acquaintances, family to respond to the question, what three words come to mind when you think of me… my writing, my singing, my spoken word, my life. To say I felt like Gus in Fault in Our Stars is an understatement. Such kind and thoughtful words were shared… but the ones I most appreciated were these: passionate, authentic, contagious. When and activity presents itself like this one … I tend to think of the words that represent my short comings and wonder if those will be lifted up… absent minded, scattered, doubtful. I feel sometimes like I’m absent minded because I am so passionate about who I am with and what I am doing that everything else fades… sometimes that might be other appointments.. keys… the coffee I stepped into the grocery store to buy… sometimes the small things get over looked for the what’s right in front of me things.. and I love that part of who I am as well as see it for the challenge it is. I sometimes feel scattered and yet I am so open to sharing that with others. I feel comfortable sharing the pain, sharing the I don’t know-s of life, sharing the obstacles and let others see that scattered is really an ok thing to be at times. I am not perfect and the older I get, the easier it is to embrace the me who I am as well as push toward the me I want to become. Finally, I realize I am doubtful at times… only because I sometimes feel I share the too real thing and share it with enthusiasm and a deep desire that others will join my rag tag life parade. At times, people don’t want that much real and they sure don’t want to be asked to be that themselves… thus the doubt. May I should tone me down. A toned down me wouldn’t be me and so as I accept these amazing words of how I have impacted others…I heard these words myself. That raising the banner of Love, Hope, Joy are good and true virtues and I deeply want others to see those aspects in their own lives. Passionate…authentic… contagious… healing… love… faithful… joyful… comforting.. gusto.. care.. enthusiasm.. with heart… heartfelt.. witness.. fully… unconditionally… inspiring… hopeful… motivating… blessed.. bountiful… engaging.. uplifting… dynamic.. enchanting… Godly… grace… truth… beautiful… inspirational.. genuine…
After reading the words spoken… I thought of three words myself… thank you all!
Full Sail Living
hey from me…
If I were to boil my writing (and my life) down to a single focus it would be “Full Sail Living.”
Full sail Living is about recognizing abundance and celebrating all that fills my cup in my life. If I were to hang my hat on one thing that I am passionate it is this… “what fills my sail?” What I love about this subject is how small the answer can be that fills a massive area of my life. Seeing those day to day moments and sharing those stories that I have been told or that have happened to me is more than inspiration. It is changing and shaping my life in ways I must share with others with hope that their sail will be filled as well.
The theme that is naturally emerges from full sail living is inspiration. Where do I see it and feel it and how can I recognize it? Who inspires me and who do I inspire is a question I have always been captured by.
My deepest desire and objective for the blog challenge I’m taking, as well as my life as a whole, is every person would know just how loved they are. Seems simple. If we did… if we believed that we all, each of us, are loved… our response might be to live our lives out of abundance rather than scarcity. Love creates love… I believe we were made from love and we were made to love.
I could write about that for a lifetime.
celia anne