Free to Be

Yesterday I received in the mail a bottle of "Riots Not Diets" 3-free indie nail polish from Plump Polish, a brand recently launched by fat activist bloggers Kyla and Margitte. Each of their fun and quirky colors are named after a different blogger ("Riots Not Diets" is the name of Margitte's blog) and include colorful confetti! I was surprised how excited I was to receive and try out new nail polish. Like, I was really delighted. Why do I find so much pleasure and solace and satisfaction in painting my nails? I don't really know. It's therapeutic to me, and that's all that matters.

So what if nail polish is a conformist way of performing my gender? So what if its unnatural-looking and artificial? It's one hour a week where I'm doing something utterly and completely mindless, where I don't have to analyze things or be intelligent and articulate and self-aware.

Last Saturday I attended a six-hour long retreat meant for a time of silence and listening to God. I fell asleep three times. It's so hard to transition from "work" April into praying April. I still feel like I need to be super competent, "on top of things," focused and "in the zone" when I'm with God. I feel like I need to be thankful for all of the right things, and praise him instead of being self-involved, and have all these deep questions for him, and know exactly how to express my needs and desires to him, and pay attention without my mind veering.

And yet the phrase from the Bible readings that stuck out to me most at the retreat was "just be there" (from Eugene Peterson's paraphrase of Matthew 6:6-7 in The Message).

Hm.

I've been considering to myself lately, "Who do I feel safe with?" Who do I feel safe enough with that my "just being there" is enough--I don't have to "perform to the best of my abilities"? In those safe relationships, I can exhale mentally because there is no performance compenent to our relationship. I'm not expected to be my "best self." I'm just expected to be myself.

Whew, I cannot wait to spend time with Rachel tonight so that I can just be me. ilu, Rachel. Happy Friday, everyone!