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The entire weekend after I turned down the job, I wandered the house like a kid fresh off the tilt-a-whirl: I didn’t know which way was up or which way was down. The job had been a chance to return to the “normal” world, where paychecks (however small) showed up as direct deposits and my family would have good health insurance. I wondered if perhaps I had just made a terrible mistake by not accepting the offer.

Worse yet, God was silent on the issue. I couldn’t get a clear sense of the rightness or wrongness of my decision. I wondered if my determination to continue writing for a living had finally meandered into the realm of the irresponsible. There are a lot of people out there who aren’t doing what they love to do, I reasoned with myself. What makes me so special?

* * * * *

In the midst of this, the weight of sadness.

On Friday evening I got one of those texts you never want to get. It was from a good friend of mine:

Hey, man. Just got back from the midwives and they couldn’t find the heartbeat. Please be praying for us.

The next day they went in and his wife delivered their second stillborn child at 20-weeks.

The same night that she was in the hospital giving labor to a child already gone, my wife got a text from another friend. She had delivered a beautiful baby girl that night and couldn’t be happier. This is when the weight descends, a cloud of questions and sadness. I find myself wondering about the role of chance in things such as this. I wonder how to respond when my friends’ lives are racing down the mountain with no emergency truck ramp in sight.

* * * * *

I remember traveling down a mountainside in the Bighorn National Park. It was five days after we lost our brakes in the Teton Pass, and I felt sick to my stomach with a foreboding that our brakes would once again fail us. A Jesus Culture song started playing on the bus, and at one point these lyrics sang out to me:

and your spirit soars in me
to the highest height
from where I’ll not look back, no
I’ll keep trusting you

I’ll keep trusting God.

Really? Did I really trust God? With my family, who had been in terrible danger until an emergency truck ramp came into view? Did I trust God with my finances, which seemed to also be on a 10% grade with no such ramp in sight? Did I trust God with my life?

I wasn’t sure, but I remember singing that song as we swept down the hill, wanting it to be true.

* * * * *

Early during the week after I turned down the job, I got a note in the mail. It was a small card. I opened it and read some very kind words. Inside was a check for $1000.

The next day, while talking to a another good friend, she smiled and with tears in her eyes handed me a slip of paper. It was a check for $500.

In the space of 24 hours I had been handed the same amount of money I would have made in four weeks at the job I turned down. Sometimes it is good to wait, to not make decisions based out of fear or a sense of panic.

* * * * *

I don’t know how to explain it when the emergency truck ramps don’t show up. When the checks don’t appear in the mail out of thin air. When the diagnosis doesn’t line up with our prayers. When the business idea, once so full of hope and promise, leads to financial ruin. When the child dies.

I don’t know.

But I wonder. I wonder if maybe emergency truck ramps sometimes look a little different than what we expect. Perhaps emergency truck ramps sometimes come in the form of a friend’s shoulder to cry on, strong backs to bear at least a small part of our grief. Or a parent’s basement to live in. Maybe what feels like the worst case scenario, like losing a job, is itself the emergency truck ramp.

And death – even death! Could it be that death is the last great emergency truck ramp, leading us safely away from this life and into a place of peace and stillness?

So many questions. But I know this: no matter where I find myself – chugging slowly uphill, resting at the summit, careening down the mountain, or stopped in the heavy stones of an emergency truck ramp – there’s no point in looking back. No point in living with regrets or wishing for a different road.

Anything that might be good about this life is out there in front of us somewhere. We just have to be strong enough to keep moving.

and your spirit soars in me
to the highest height
from where I’ll not look back, no
I’ll keep trusting you

I mostly remember Gordie before his ALS diagnosis as a tall man with a very gentle spirit. Whenever I saw him, he shook my hand (in that large bear paw of his), crossed his arms, sort of leaned back a little, and acted like I was the most important person in the world. He has always been a good listener.

Before his life with ALS he loved to play the guitar, and we watched as he went from standing up, to playing on a stool, to strumming while sitting in a chair. It was a sad day indeed when his fingers could no longer work a pick.

But if there’s one thing I can say about Gordie: in the six years that he has had ALS, his physical stature may have become smaller, but the man has become a spiritual giant in my eyes. I know he has had his share of depression and weariness. I’m sure there are days when he wants to give up. But he doesn’t, he keeps going. And I think we can all use that kind of inspiration from time to time: someone who forges ahead, believes, and fights, even in the midst of overwhelming odds.

Here is a video of the speech he gave at a recent fundraising event. He can no longer speak, so he used a computer program to deliver his words to the crowd. Please take a moment and listen to a very wise, very strong man.

“Adventure is not outside man; it is within.” David Grayson

I was nervous. A reporter from the local news fidgeted with my mic then attached it to my shirt. I sat down under the glare of those huge lights that look like silver umbrellas. The cameraman watched us through his lens, then turned to the news anchor.

“We’re good,” he said.

For the next ten minutes or so we talked about the four-month trip my family had been on: life on the bus, life on the road, the places we’d seen. I thought we were finished.

“One more question,” he said. “Did you change on this trip?”

Did I change on this trip?

For the first time during the interview I was speechless. My glance slid off to the side. I kind of held my breath.

How did I change on this trip?

* * * * *

You can’t go on a 10,000 mile trip without changing. You can’t visit thirty-some states, or see Native Americans living in poverty, or see joy light up someone’s face when you give them a quarter without feeling something crucial slide inside of you, like the shifting of continents. You can’t get a 40-foot bus stuck in a ditch, or arrive at Yellowstone late at night only to discover you have no power, or lose your brakes at 8400 hundred feet while crossing the Teton Pass, without changing.

I knew I had changed. But how?

I stared at the news anchor, took a deep breath, and I stumbled through my answer. But the truth was, I couldn’t identify it. I knew I had changed: I felt differently, I thought differently, I looked at the world differently. Yet beyond those huge generalities, I couldn’t verbalize the specifics.

* * * * *

For the last week I’ve thought back over that question, and I’m still struggling to articulate the answer. How have I changed?

I’m less inclined to give in to the pressure to live a life resembling everyone else’s.

I’m less concerned about the future than I have been for a long time (most days).

I’m more open to embarking on mini-adventures during a typical day – I used to feel rather glued to the comfort of my desk chair or, in the evening, the safety of the living room.

Still, I search myself for further evidence of change. I wonder if the space given by more time will help me see more clearly.

How have your adventures in life changed you?

* * * * *

This post is part of a blog carnival about travel stories over at Prodigal Magazine. Check out the other contributors HERE.

1) Pictures that Will Restore Your Hope in Humanity (via Jason Boyett)

2) A preview of the upcoming movie based on Tolstoy’s novel, Anna Karenina:

 

3) The preview for The Great Gatsby:

Which movies are you most looking forward to seeing?

There are so many great blog posts out there in the winternets. Here are excerpts from five that caught my attention this past week(ish):

* * * * *

“And the truth is, I don’t understand the relationship between bad, painful things and a loving, all-knowing, God. Ask me about earthquakes. Ask me about cancer. Ask me about starvation and genocide and those beautiful Invisible Children, and all I can do is shake my head and cry and not know.”

“All I can say is this: the God that I believe in calls himself Father. Calls us his children.”

* * * * *

“Soon, they roll out into the sand where people like me scour that field of tiniest glass beads to find their larger cousins. I fill my pockets with shards gone soft, and I carry them home – from Canada and Scotland and Italy. I lay them out, reminders that everything is repurposed – into words, into stories, into scars that mesh perfectly with the wounds of those we meet.”

* * * * *

“Yes, I know what you’re probably thinking: ‘Katdish, we KNOW you hate everything remotely related to grocery shopping. Shut up already.'”

“And to you I say, NO.”

“You’re not the boss of me.”

* * * * *

It can be an act of faith to take a punch, to believe that the pain of the moment is far better than the pain, distraction, and distress that come from jumping into a fight. I know I’ve gotten it wrong plenty of times. I know I’ve responded appropriately other times. And I know how easy it can be to obsess over criticism, an argument, or a perspective that I find faulty.

* * * * *

“Noah and ‘Lil Blue bound safely onto the opposite bank, but when I glance behind me, I see Rowan tilting dangerously to one side of the saddle as ‘Lil Paint labors, half-swimming across the raging stream. Rowan’s eyes are wide as he looks straight at me, his two hands white against the reins.”

* * * * *

(Brought to you by Addie Zierman, Andi Cumbo, Katdish, Ed Cyzewski, and Michelle DeRusha)

What’s the best post you read this week? If you’re a blogger, what was your most-read post from this past week?

I saw the name in my email inbox and immediately my heart sank. I wanted to read it, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to avoid it, but I couldn’t. There was great potential there for happiness, and an even higher probability for disappointment.

It was an email from an acquisitions editor I had been speaking with regarding her publishing house printing a book about our trip. I had been waiting for a few weeks. I knew this was the yes or the no. With great trepidation I opened the email.

It was a “no.” It was a wonderful, kind, encouraging “no” from one of the most successful, respected editors in the industry. But it was a “no” nonetheless.

* * * * *

I’ve started recognizing the pattern that I go through in dealing with rejection. Even really wonderful rejections (for more on wonderful rejections, check out my E-book Building a Life Out of Words, in which published author Stacy Barton talks about the importance of wonderful rejections).

But I’m sort of early in the rejection-receiving phase of life. I don’t deal with them as well as she does. Here are the stages I go through:

Stage One: I Am a Terrible Writer

This stage is characterized by a clamor of internal voices disparaging my writing, my choice to write, my previous writing, and any future writing I might ever do. Depending on my mood, the availability of my wife to talk me down from the ledge, and the accessibility of ice cream, this stage can last from a few minutes to a few days.

Stage Two: The Other Person Has No Idea What They’re Doing and Have Obviously No Business in the Publishing World

This one feels good for a few minutes because it is self-righteous and self-justifying. Me against the big bad world. But it’s never been true in any of the rejections I’ve received, and it’s NEVER a good place from which to write reply emails.

Stage Three: Life Sucks

Depending on my then-current level of self-pity, this one can hang around for a few hours. Until I think of my many close friends who are terminally ill or battling cancer or have experienced terrible abuses in their lives. Then I remember that I have lots to be thankful for. Gratefulness is a cure for many ills, rejection included.

Stage Four: Enlightenment

At some point I realize that no instance of rejection, especially from someone taking a quick look at my writing or considering a project proposal, is meant to be a sweeping indictment of me or my writing ability. Almost every writing rejection you or I will ever encounter is a very isolated assessment of one thing made up of an endless number of factors, all converging in an instant where someone must say “yes” or “no.” It is the judgment of an instant, upon which so many variables are weighing.

I’ve started to realize that I have (incorrectly) given the same weight to rejection as I have to acceptance, even though their value is not inversely proportional. Confused yet? Me, too.

Stage Five: Work Harder

Finally I arrive at the final stage of rejection, and there is only one thing to do. Work harder. Write more. Analyze more closely what I am doing. And, ironically, open myself up to the possibility of even more rejection.

How about you? How do you deal with rejection? Which phase do you occasionally get stuck in?