I'm Going to be All Right

I have a few posts swimming around in my brain, and hopefully I'll eventually get them here in one form or another. Some are funny accounts of the antics of DramaBoy and The Widget (someone should turn them into a comic book--they already have the names!); others are more philosophical, literary, and/or religious in nature. So far I haven't been able to do more than sketch them out roughly in my mind.

It's been a rough few days emotionally. I'm finding it hard to write, as a result. Time was that emotional torment (or rather, angst, as this was when I was a teen) triggered production of countless poems and the occasional journal entry. In more recent years I've found that the words dry up instead. Perhaps a better term is bottle up. It's the verbal equivalent of one's throat knotting up behind a great lump of pain that won't allow weeping; that burning in one's eyes that sears tears to salt before they can spill over.

I've been playing Sara Groves' album Add to the Beauty daily. This CD is yet another in one of the God Tracks that I have been unable to ignore lately. I have a feeling there have been others along the way for years; I just haven't been willing to see them.

(I could write a whole post on the irony of this, comparing it to the irony in Oedipus Rex--that he who was lauded for solving a riddle none other could was blind to the riddle of his own life. Like I said, some of the posts I've been writing in my head are literary in nature. I'm a literature teacher. Comes with the territory.)

I travelled to Boston in February over Midwinter Break to visit my sister. My parents and I drove there--or rather, my father did, as any offers to take over the driving by me and my mother were gently dismissed with Oh, I'm fine. My mother handed me Add to the Beauty to play as we set off on the second day, part of the meditation she likes for early morning car trips to replace her regular devotional. Wary, as usual, of Christian music, I was set to read instead and put up with the same-old-same-old praise music and songs that all sound like every other Christian band out there.

And heard Sara instead.

Her sound is more my cup of tea (or at least, certainly has a strong showing in my eclectic mix of musical taste), and she may as well have written three out of the first four songs for me. Others have come to mean a great deal as well. At the time, feeling quite desolate as I travelled ever farther away from home on Valentine's Day, a physical reality of the distance in my marriage, I felt like someone had torn out a piece of my soul and put it to words.

So I stared out the window at the snow-dusted fields of New York and cried, avoiding any sound or movement that might betray me to my parents. I couldn't have borne their sympathy at the moment. And when the CD was over, I reached over and pressed the button to play it again.

I'll likely write about certain other songs some other time, but I thought I'd share at least one song with you today. So many people--friends, family, coworkers, even people I've never met but know online--have extended such love and grace to me in the last few months. I wrote about it earlier this month, and as I've waded through my sadness of the last few days, I have realized yet again how much a difference opening myself up to those around me has been. I may be sad; I may be struggling with my words; I may feel the tears welling within me. But I am not alone.

This is the fourth track on the album, and it not only means so much to me in terms of a message of hope, but also as a representation of how those friends and loved ones have come to me.

To hear the song (along with some art drawn by the person who posted it on YouTube) here's the link.

It's Going to be Alright* (Sara Groves)

It's going to be all right
It's going to be all right

I can tell by your eyes that you're not getting any sleep
And you try to rise above it, but feel you're sinking in too deep
Oh, oh I believe, I believe that

It's going to be all right
It's going to be all right

I believe you'll outlive this pain in your heart
And you'll gain such a strength from what is tearing you apart
Oh, oh I believe, I believe that

It's going to be all right
It's going to be all right

When some time has passed us, and the story is retold
It will mirror the strength and the courage in your soul
Oh, oh, I believe, I believe
I believe
I believe

I did not come here to offer you cliches
I will not pretend to know of all your pain
Just when you cannot, then I will hold out faith for you

It's going to be all right
It's going to be all right

Thank you.

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*Apologies to Ms. Groves and her editors, if she had any: while I kept the title the same because, after all, it's the title, I couldn't resist making small grammatical and spelling corrections to the lyrics. It would have hurt me to leave it be. No offense meant!