The frustrated creative type.

I am pretty sure that this phrase sums up my personality. My two basic modes are frustrated and creative. No wonder I get so tired!

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Pain & Creativity

I have been thinking lately about how pain and creativity are interlocked in a couple of different respects. First, that pain from the past can be brought to light, soothed, and healed through experiencing and making art in its many forms. Sometimes the only thing I land on that actually helps me progress in working through pain is art. There have been countless times that I have unexpectedly found myself a step further in the journey toward healing from something in my past after watching a movie, listening to someone's story, reading a sentence, or hearing a song. On many instances I have asked God to heal wounds in my soul and have been surprised by His direction to write words or to form songs, and have been even more surprised at how He answers my prayer for healing through this process of creating. Lately He has been pressing me to write a song about one of the hardest days of my life. I am scared to touch it, and haven't started yet. But I'm also anticipating that He has something in store for me.
Another facet of this relationship between pain and creativity that I've been pondering is that painful experiences can lead to breakthroughs in creativity. This came up in a humorous way for me recently. I woke up in the middle of the night with horrible curse-of-the-woman cramps, the severity of which I have only experienced a few times in my life. I was one sick puppy. Aaron woke up and lovingly, sacrificially took care of me until I felt okay again. (What a champ.) Here is where the fun happens: In the whole process of trying to slay the evil cramp monster, I took some extra-strength Excedrin, which contains a l-o-t of caffeine, at least for me. So, by the time I felt well enough to fall back asleep, around 5 am, I really couldn't fall asleep. My brain was like a kid on Pixi Stix. I was laying there ecstatically (but silently) thanking God for my wonderful husband, and suddenly the rest of a song that I had been writing about Aaron and had been stumped on for almost two weeks started coming to me really fast. I found my voice recorder laying around in the early morning light and very quietly made a horrible recording, my body scrunched up to the refrigerator, which was the farthest point in our apartment from slumbering Aaron. Then another song came to me, so I laid that one down too (also horribly). By that point I was just too happy and excited to sleep, so I made myself read until 7 am or so, and then returned to bed, laughing about how weird the night was, and thanking God for giving me some creativity out of the pain I'd dealt with. It's weird to think about how the song wouldn't have ended up the way it did if I hadn't woken up with those stupid cramps.
To sum up my blabbering: pain sucks, but pain doesn't have to be the end of the story. Our God makes beauty out of ashes and works all things together for good. It's fascinating to me that He calls us to become like Him in this way. I wish I had some C.S. Lewis quote about how God is the bombest artist ever or something, but I don't, so I'll have to end it here.

Schmuppety updateness

1) I was so tired and loopy the other night that I referred to a certain fast food establishment as "Tabaco Bell". This has since become said establishment's new name (in the confines of our marriage). Every time we pass one of thems, we yell it out.

2) I knew it before, but have recently seen farther into the fathoms of this truth: my husband is utterly charming. Of course he is charming to me, which includes the romantic sense of the word. Here's the thing though: minus the romantic thing, he is also charming to EVERYONE.
One story: the other night we were at a rehearsal dinner, and the waitress was not a happy camper. She actually told us in her crisp British accent that she would not bring us bread early because it would spoil our dinner (it was 8:30 at this point). Everyone at the table died a little bit inside when she said that, except for Aaron. He smiled and said, "No, I swear to you, if you bring us bread now we will eat ALL of our entrees."
And then he simply kept smiling. And smiling. She totally caved and promptly rained the manna down upon us. He also teased her at the end of the night that he needed a to-go box, which really upset her for a second before she realized he was joking, and then he managed to wrangle a free souvenir glass out of her. When she came and gave him the glass, she SMILED at him, which was her first grin of the entire evening. Aaron, FTW.
This is not an effect he has only on the opposite sex; it works on both genders. He has: talked himself out of a traffic ticket every time he has been pulled over; scored us a bag of 100 Andes mints from Olive Garden just by asking for a few extra; helped me make an exchange at a store that was adamantly final sale only; listened at length to innumerable random strangers who have picked him out of a room to talk his ear off; made countless people smile when moments before they were hopping mad . . . I could list a lot of other examples.
The best part of all this is that he doesn't know what he's doing. He's not manipulating people to get what he wants; he's just being himself, his winsome, respectful, empathetic, awesome self. I absolutely love that about him. Cheers to you, babe. I wouldn't give you a speeding ticket either.

3) I am REALLY worn out. I am hoping and praying for some real rest this weekend; you know, the kind that recharges the soul, not just the body. Anyone hear me on that?