Small Town, USA: I Owe You An Apology

I never felt comfortable in my home town. It never quite felt like home. My skin would crawl when I had been there too long, and my heart seemed to ache for all the places I had never been… but never for home.

As a teenager, I was terrified of getting trapped in my small town. I thought small towns were for people with small dreams, small talent, and small wallets. I made sure that no one and nothing could tie me to the quiet mountains I was taking for granted.

I think I subconsciously maintained that attitude for years, but as visiting there becomes more of a rarity, my reasoning for getting out has changed. I realize now that Small Town, USA can’t provide the occupational opportunities that I’m both skilled at and passionate about. In fact, there are days that I wish it could, and I’m beginning to understand that there is nothing wrong with that place, and there’s nothing wrong with the people that live there.

I went to church with my mom this weekend. When I got there, my eyes immediately found the back of the head of the only boy who’s pull on my heart has ever been strong enough for me to even day-dream about a future together. My heart stopped beating in a way that was unexpected and completely new to me. I was knocked breathless, and in my search for oxygen, all I could see were these twenty-something married couples who were praising Jesus like they really believed in him and smiling like it had never occurred to them that they were settling… because they weren’t. I was astounded because I was jealous. I was angry at myself for my own choices, but also for my own judgement of these people.

The pastor began preaching on “how we can know the Bible is reliable.” As soon as I heard the subject, I kind of tuned out. Anyone that knows me knows I consider myself to be a spiritual person in relationship with Jesus, but I don’t find apologetics to be useful in matters of faith, because there is simply no way of convincing anyone that the giant book that contradicts itself in a few places and contradicts science in a bunch of other places (depending on your interpretation) is “reliable.” Not to mention the fact that Old Testament God and New Testament God seem like completely different beings. I’m not here to slam Christians and the Bible in general, but what I’m saying is, I have questions. I have doubts. And I’m sure the citizens of my home town do, too, but I’ve chosen a life in which I have to answer those tough questions because people are asking. I’ve chosen a career in which I have to justify my beliefs, because people are skeptical. I know it’s not easy anywhere in this world, and I guess I have a grass-is-greener mentality to a degree. I don’t have the privilege of, for the most part, being surrounded by like-minded people. I am more often surrounded by people who make me doubt than I am people who encourage my faith. And that doesn’t make me better or stronger, but it’s something I rarely dealt with at home. It’s different. Here I am, jealous again, because I can’t help but wonder if maybe I’d have more peace if I had stayed.

I wasn’t even to the car before the tears were dripping off my chin. I had left before I had the chance to attack that curly-headed boy with a marriage proposal. I think it would have gone something like this:

Hey, I know I exploded on you for treating me badly a few months ago, but I’ve been thinking, and I’d like to quit everything I’ve been working for my entire life and get married instead. To you. And you can work. And I can blog and take care of my dog– our dog. What’s mine is yours. Whaddya say? 

Because what if picking a mate for life isn’t settling so much as it is having someone promise to stick with you through the shit that is imminent?

What if staying in your small town isn’t settling so much as it embracing a peace that only comes from being surrounded by your tribe?

I’m not saying I’m gonna drop everything to go back home and give up on what I feel is my purpose. I rode that emotion out, and I still landed in 30308. I’m just saying that the people at home have a purpose, too, and maybe their path to fulfilling it has a different terrain than mine– with its unique advantages and disadvantages. It might be quiet and less crowded, but there’s an incline I don’t have to deal with while I wait behind a billion other cars whose drivers are flipping me off. That path leads to somewhere. God, forgive me for ever thinking it didn’t. Help me to trust that I’m on the right path, and please, let that path take a detour to the mountains every once in a while.

Difference and Oneness

I called my best friend a few nights ago to discuss a few different things. New Year’s, new boys, new dreams, new ideas. I scurried into my bathroom, closed the door, and sat on the floor just like Mama taught me to. It’s my safe place. Always.

I asked if I could run a few ideas by him. I told him I’d been overwhelmed by recent inspiration, and that I couldn’t decide what to start writing about first. He listened quietly, giving encouraging responses as I glazed over Jesus and the importance of empathy, Instagram culture and our incessant need to control others’ perceptions of our lives at the expense of living, and a couple of other pieces of my life, taking up space in my mind, making it impossible to concentrate on anything or anyone.

I think he just recently started reading my blog. I didn’t ever really expect him to, considering we don’t necessarily believe in all of the same things, and I write a whole lot about what I believe in. He listens to me talk about God like a real person, like someone I know, and he still takes me seriously. He still loves me and values me and thinks I’m brilliant. I listen to him talk about science like there’s no room for God, and I still take him seriously. I still love him and value him and think he’s brilliant. We are every bit as different as we are similar, and that is one of the most beautiful elements of our relationship. 

He told me he enjoyed my last blog, and I told him that I wasn’t really pleased with it. The idea had been marinating in my mind for so long, though, and I had spent so much time putting it into words that I just had to get it out. 

He said, “Like a word turd?”

That’s why he’s my best friend. Here’s another word turd for you. A certain phrase has been tattooed on my brain for a couple of days. It haunts me while I try to clean, it distracts me while I try to drive, and it excites me when I’m near my laptop.

Difference and oneness. Difference and oneness. Difference and oneness.

I look up at the sky and say, “Great. Thanks for that. Please show me more.” And my God laughs because he’s shown me and all of creation since our eyes met the world. In the way that he carefully painted the shades of our skin, and crafted the shapes of our noses. In the way that the sky reflects a rainbow of every beautiful color that we see. In the way that music makes my heart dance and dancing makes my sister’s heart sing. In the way that we can have our breath taken away by snowy mountains or white beaches. In the way that people of all tongues will praise his holy name. There can be difference and oneness. It’s not just okay. That’s how it’s supposed to be!

These, friends, are some of the most tragic lies we will ever believe:

Acceptance requires conformity.

What is foreign to us is sinful.

There is black and there is white and there is nothing else.

But God’s glorious rainbow defies cultural norms and expectations. It listens and learns and loves just the same. It is anything but black and white. It is vast and varying, with lands yet to be discovered. 

If we are made in the image of God, who thought and felt and dreamed everything we’ve ever thought and felt and dreamed first, we have much to discover about ourselves and about him. Therefore we cannot continue to draw lines in the sand and stand on the side that looks whitest to us. Polarization is an adventurous spirit’s death! We cannot only accept those who fall on our side of the line between Republican and Democrat, Baptist and Methodist, Straight and Gay, Content and Curious, Rich and Poor, Wrong and Right. 

Made in the image of God, we are more than that. We are to see beauty in the differences between what we know and what we do not yet understand, and when we do, we will be more like him. In our difference, there does not have to be polarization.

There can be oneness.