For an early Easter gift, my brother bought me the double DVD of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I watched it with my mom tonight, and cried - again. There's something soft and subtle about this last installation in the Narnian constellation, and that story just always tears at something in me.
It's not an easy tale, and all the characters in it are used - and used hard by the One they follow. The paths are different for each, but I fear I am most like the biggest brat in the bunch. As C.S. Lewis says in his book, 'There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.' So, yeah, God and I have been wrestling quite a bit recently.
And He's winning. And that should be good, but it doesn't feel good right now.
It's not easy to have a constantly sun-burnt pride reminding me that I'm not in charge. Worse yet, it was my choice. That just makes the whole situation more... aggravating.
I'm scared. Like, really scared, and in my head, I know I shouldn't be. But here I am, all ego-bruised and vulnerable, hating every breath that quietly shows how frail I am.
What has me all disjointed and discombobulated?
My mom and I signed up for college. Right up there with a thousand foot sea serpent in the middle of a dark night of the soul, yeah? But... yeah. Really, really is.
We went to the community college downtown. We filled out some paperwork, and then talked to the counselors. I'm less than a year away from my Associates in Science. A year.
People go to college all the time. I've even heard there are those that go, like, right after high school; that it's expected for particular jobs. There're all sorts of rumors floating around the 'Net about it. Seems like it might even catch on and be, like, an institution soon.
I've tried to go to college before, but I got distracted. There was so much out there, so much to see and do, and I've noticed, it still happens now. As soon as I decide to do one serious thing, everything else seems infinitely more pressing and important.
I could write... but there are games on Facebook to play, dishes to clean. The dog needs to be walked, and I have e-mails I really should send before I forget again... The next time I blink, it's hours later, and I've done are things that will either not be remembered next month, or that legitimately could have waited another half an hour or so.
When I've tried college, the same thing happened - twice. It feels like a storm, gradually building until I drown in a sea of voices telling me I can't do it; that I'm not really doing what I'm supposed to; that I really should just go back home where it's safe. Then I wake up, somewhere I've never been before, not sure I am really who I think I am, not looking like what I remember myself looking like.
And I'm no farther along than I was, weaker than when I started... coughing on my own tears, and trying to convince myself it doesn't matter, that I didn't surrender something precious by the blinding rain.
I am Eustace, the dragon, scrapping at the scales that are my not-skin, embarrassed I make a better soul as a creature than I ever made as a mortal.
Drawing me back to college, and, lingering in the back of my mind like the considering weight of a lion's gaze, that means dealing with the darkness I've shoved into the back closet of my memories. I know by the fear that makes me want to look away what major I should choose. And I know by the quiet, steady assurance that it's the right choice that the path is prepared. I've said I would, now I just have to put foot to path.
Now, I strive to run a better race - not because if I do well, my dragonskin will be redeemed, but because I am compelled; because fear is never a good reason to not do anything.
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