It’s about who I am now...not about who I was then.

June 5, 2011

I ran into a teenage party buddy today. We didn't exactly part as friends, but we weren't enemies either. Because of her...I learned how to forgive. Well maybe I just learned that I am capable of forgiving. At 17 that is a valuable lesson. I blamed her for some things that went wrong in our shared house (with our boyfriends). We parted with me angry and resentful. Then I bumped into her a year or so later on the street and in an instant all the anger and resentment departed...I realized that I was only harming myself. She was still living the same kind of life as we did when we lived together and it made me sad...and glad that I had made the decision to not live that way anymore.  At that moment in time, I still had a long way to go to pull my head out of my ass, but seeing her that way was an important step in my recovery.  

I have thought of her often in the many years since and am grateful for the life lesson I learned through her. I have always wondered how things affected her...and if she knew how mad I was...I did not ask her today. I wasn’t ready to go there, but we “clicked” and I will be seeing her again, and I will get a chance to ask her.  I told her about the journey I am embarking on and I have a feeling that she has a part to play in my journey.

She does Chakra balancing, and our discussion during the massage she was giving me (yes, she was giving me a massage because my regular guy was off and she was randomly assigned) leads me to believe some Chakra work might be a worth a shot.  I never believed in this stuff before, but I don’t believe in coincidences either, so I’m going to give it a try.  

A Miracle

I was on my way to Montgomery Alabama for an Air Force 4 day class on Emergency Management. We taxied to the end of the runway, ready for takeoff…then we taxied back to the gate for a maintenance issue. After a while, they announced that the flight was cancelled due to maintenance and we had to de-plane, collect our checked baggage and get in line to be booked on another flight. There were a half a dozen flights to various cities that had connecting flights to Montgomery, but all of them were already over sold. They checked other airlines. They could have gotten me out at 8:00 pm, but there was no connecting flight to Montgomery. After two hours of searching and pleading (both on the phone and in person at the counter), I learned that they could not get me out of Reno until the following day. So, I called the school and they said “don’t bother”. You just can’t miss a full day of a four day class.

I found myself at home by noon, wondering “now what”? My work calendar was empty, as I had blocked myself as out of the office months ago and I couldn’t stay on orders, so I knew that it was back to work I go.

As the full weight of this turn of events sunk in, I realized another point: I would be in town on Friday night, the very night that my dad would be honored at the UNR Boxing home opener. The Air Force Academy would be there, and they were going to make it the first annual Vern Rockswold Memorial boxing tournament.

I only learned that he would be honored on that day just a week before. The class had been booked for months, and there was no way to get out of it without my unit getting a black eye. I had to do my duty…Dad would have been mortified if I didn’t. So, with regret and much gnashing of teeth, I resigned myself to missing it. It took me a few more days to concede that I was supposed to miss it and that this was God’s plan to protect me from the pain, and I thanked Him.

As I pulled up to the airport the morning of departure, I wondered why I wasn’t booked in a more direct fashion. I was scheduled to LA, then Dallas, then Montgomery. There was a flight directly to Dallas that I could have been on and I wondered why SATO booked me this way…

Now, I know. I know that God can do whatever he wants to do. I do wonder if I hadn’t ‘conceded’ to his plan, and thanked Him, would the plane still have broke?