Through My Eyes: A Journal

By Liz Root

Contact Liz by emailing her at liz@vagrantcafe.com

Click here for weekly archives

8/23/2002
hi. um...life is kinda weird right now. my house of cards is tumbling down so to speak. i could tell you all the specifics and make you feel really sorry for me, but i won't. because i don't want to focus on it all anymore. i mean, i'm not going to ignore my problems...but i'm just tired of them. tired of the cycle.


- liz r. - 8/23/2002

8/20/2002
i wonder about beauty sometimes. i think it's beauty that creates this constant feeling of homesickness in all of us. we see beauty in some form, and we are tired of only observing. we are weary of being the constant onlooker, never the participator.

is this why so many of us have begun to see beauty in pain? we watch movies where everything doesn't work out in the end. we read books that offer no answers. we write in our journals and ask mostly questions, rarely trying to answer them. these things are beautiful to us, and why?

why do i sneak peeks in downtown windows, hoping to get a glimpse of someone's every day life? for as much as i try to be "an individual", it's all a sham. i don't want to be alone in this. i want to see someone i don't know feeding the cat, paying the bills, throwing leftovers in the microwave. i want to know that i'm not the only one who feels like somehow, i'm missing out on something that's quite bigger than myself. but in the morning..."Sometimes I wake, and, lo, I have forgot." -George MacDonald.

Simone Weil says that the only two things that pierce the human heart are beauty and affliction. it's true. these are the only places for common ground we find with others. why do you think that people talk about the weather so much? or their failing health? beauty and pain are the only things we can unselfishly share with others. we see beauty, and we wish that someone was there with us to see the way the water flows around the rock in the stream. someone experiences pain, and we wish for all the world that we could bear the pain for them instead.

beauty and pain undo us. they leave us with no other options. they give us everything. we sit on the banks of rivers, we walk the line "where the ocean hits the sand just like we're walking on a wire at a circus", we drive through the mountains, we stare at the stars over the plains, and all riches are given to us. at that moment, we have all, and give no thought to how much we spent on the shoes on our feet.

someone breaks our heart. our world has ended. nothing makes sense. like zombies, we go about our days, and they are without direction and purpose. we lay on our beds for hours, without any thoughts at all. nothingness descends upon us. as we slowly resurface back to life, we realize that somehow we've gained some clarity. we still ache, oh how we ache. it undoes us. and we need it. the old temptations no longer satisfy. the solution? beauty.

i cannot tell you what beauty is. would i need to? you know what it is. it's what makes you come alive. it's what helps you to remember.
- liz r. - 8/20/2002

8/19/2002
sometimes there's so much inside of me that is begging to come out that i feel like i'm just going to burst right open. a friend of mine told me today that a friend of his died. i'd never met the guy who died, but it got me thinking, as death often does. it made me wonder how i'll be remembered. how many people will know me well enough to have memories of me. and it made me realize that i don't open up nearly as much as i should. will i wear my heart on my sleeve? no. but it just makes me realize that while i don't need to be best friends with the whole world...that there is so much of me i keep to myself for purely selfish reasons. and i think it's good i have this journal here, because it helps me get what's inside of me, out.

so. what's inside of me today? it would be hard to narrow down just one thing, but i'll try. and of course i'll probably ramble on into a million other things. but basically, one word seems to be coming to mind more and more lately. that word is Eternity.

any time i try to understand it, my body starts to shut down. i teeter on the edge of a panic attack. my brain hates the thought of the word "forever." i have to continually remind myself that eternity has nothing to do with time. and that heaven is basically beyond the scope of my imagination and understanding. i take a deep breath and i try to "think happy thoughts." i know everything within me cries out for eternity, even though i'm almost always unaware of it. it cries out when a two and a half hour conversation with a good friend ends, and i find myself alone again. it cries out when i read a book where the author has found a way to connect with my heart. it cries out when i drive through the backroads, and i see the old men who sit on their porches with their cigars.

being alive is the most beautiful and the most painful experience. God puts us here on this earth and we are surrounded by beauty, and yet most of us have somehow forgotten how to see it. i know i have. there's something inside of me that remembers something else. something before all this. those childhood days when i went to the strawberry patch with my mom, came home, and walked up the street to my best friend's house. days full of sunshine and flowers and reading books while sitting on the branch of the apple tree in our back yard.

can i really be that kid again? is she gone forever? is Lizzy gone? i don't know...i don't think she is. where's the quiet simplicity? where's the joy?

am i really a "grown-up" now? it doesn't seem fair. and yet i'm ready for it. i'm ready to take on the world, to find the love of my life, to journey together with him through this maze. i'm ready to enjoy the fullness of joy. i'm ready for childlike faith. i just want to be a whole person again. and i know the path to wholeness is to die. not physical death (although true fullness does come after that), but as the new testament puts it...death to myself. every day God breaks my heart, some days more than others. i've just had a weekend of pretty major heartbreaking, and it was so needed. i need to be broken sometimes...well a lot of times. i need to be undone. my heart breaks, and i don't hold onto things so tightly anymore.


- liz r. - 8/19/2002

8/18/2002
i feel drained. but in a good way. i feel like i'm ready to just rest my little head, physically, emotionally, spiritually. i'm tired of trying to arrange my life. i'm tired of holding myself back.

i would write more, but i have no energy.


- liz r. - 8/18/2002