Vulnerability | The Christian Girl's Guide to Divorce

Jun 12 2021

A Good Day

I wrote this back in March. Yesterday, before I went out dancing (YES!) and sat in with the band (Honest: I was pretty terrible), I re-read it and came to the conclusion that I just needed to post it. So, here you go.
*****
I haven’t written much lately. Sometimes I sit poised at the computer and hope the words will flow. Inevitably, I get distracted or I vehemently procrastinate (“Haven’t used those makeup brushes in over a year, but I really should clean them!”), or I slither down the rabbit hole of mind noise.

It feels like the days are so very long, yet the weeks fly by. How is that?

It’s 2021, yes, but it sure as hell feels like December 116^th, 2020.

It does seem like there’s an end in sight: people are starting to get vaccinated and things are opening back up again. Being a rule follower, myself, I’m not too keen on jumping the line, but I’m champing at the bit (yes, it’s champing, not “chomping”) to have my turn.

I need to see people. I need to hug people. I need to be touched. I need to laugh, heartily, and not worry if my or anyone else’s spit particles are entering our bodies and ready to wreak havoc on our lungs. I can’t get the image of that crazy ugly virus out of my head. Probably ever.

I’m normally a very positive and hopeful person, but if I’m being completely honest here, it’s been a long, dark, anxiety-ridden road. And there have been multiple times I’ve just shut down, completely.

As we all know: a pandemic can do that to you.

Something recently changed, though. I don’t know whether it’s because I hit the six-week mark since enduring an appendectomy and subsequent Snowpocalpyse in Houston, Texas (oh, wait until you hear that story!), or I just got sick of the self-pity and destruction that follows feeling downright losery because I’m unemployed.

Yesterday I woke up and said to myself, “Self, you are going to be creative today. Sure, sure, meet that job application quota (at least two a day), but don’t let it suck your soul. A desk job isn’t where you’re ultimately meant to be. So, write. Play the piano. Laugh. Move your body (but don’t overdo it; you’re still recovering from fucking SURGERY). And revel in the sheer joy that you got out of bed, showered, ate breakfast and even put on lipstick.”

Sometimes, there’s something quite beautiful about being ordinary.

I truly have no idea where this post is taking me. The words are just writing themselves. But yesterday was a good day. I posted a story I had written a couple of years ago on request from O Magazine (they never published it). I had been sitting on it in hopes another magazine would. Alas, alack. Rather than keep it to myself, I put it out there.

I also contacted my publisher again. We parted ways in the summer of 2020, but I needed the rights to my book back.

I got them. A good day.

So, I’m back to square one. And I’ve already started shopping for a new home for “The Christian Girl’s Guide to Divorce”.

Oh! I forgot to tell you — I have officially been divorced for ten years. Ten. A decade.

A couple years into the chaotic aftermath of my marriage, I remember sipping coffee and journaling about the very real fact that someday, I would be divorced as long as I was married.

That day – March 3, 2021 – came and went, and I didn’t even notice. And when I remembered, I raised a glass, but it meant nothing. Because it doesn’t really matter. There’s no need to give it a second thought. Neither marriage or divorce defines me, or you, or anyone.

A good day.

Aug 29 2020

3 Comments

Humanity, Love, Vulnerability

Forty-Three

The other day I went to a restaurant for the first time since March. I felt ecstatic, then overwhelmed and horrified. I mean, there were people there. Droves of them. (Okay, there were only about fifteen, it was a strictly outdoor venue and we were all safely placed within many feet of one another.) But still – people! All dressed up, talking and laughing, eating food and drinking drinks. Acting normal.

And for a moment, all seemed right in the world. I breathed a (masked) sigh of relief.

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Tomorrow is my 43rd birthday.

Confession: I have been struggling lately. A lot. I am not proud to admit this, but anxiety has taken the wheel. I know I’m not alone in experiencing anxiety these days, and that is somewhat consoling. But tell that to me at 3:36 a.m. when I’m lying alone, wide awake in bed, staring at the ceiling fan and praying its incessant whir will lull me back to sleep. All the while, my heart feels like it’s going to leap out of my chest and bolt for the door, taunting me with maniacal threats of never returning.

The thoughts run like this: What will happen to my career? What do I do next? How do I pivot? Who will publish my book now? Why aren’t people buying my album? How will I make more money? What does my industry look like from now on? When will it return? What does dating look like? (Hint: non-existent!)

And, coupled with recent trips (yes, more than one!) to the dentist – fear in the waiting room, fear of the unknown cost; blubbering in the chair; the sound and smell of drilling; obsessively checking and re-checking the mirror – I finally crumpled.

Give me a pandemic and a truly unknown future, take away my preferred creative outlet and I’ll give you 170% real, raw Leslie. The remaining 30% is reserved for my husband on our wedding night. Snort.

Leslie cries. She makes mistakes. She is anxious. She is a perfectionist. She’s terrified of the dentist. At times, she is horrible at self-care and self-love. She’s constantly battling her bank account. She compares herself to others and subsequently feels like a failure. She isn’t sure how to pivot during this time.

Pivot. Pivot. Pivot. Oh, how I hate that fucking word.

Yet.

Leslie is grateful. Leslie is strong (albeit unwillingly, at times). Leslie is determined. She works her ass off. Leslie apparently talks in the third person. Leslie goes to therapy. Leslie is learning to meditate. Leslie is witty, kind, funny, generous, helpful, capable, talented, honest, vulnerable, hopeful, compassionate, warm, loving, a good kisser, lover, writer, singer, driver, songwriter, teacher, employee, daughter, sister, housemate, friend.

Leslie is loved.

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Earlier this month, I was on a Zoom call with more than eighty Biola University Chorale alumni honoring our dear friend, director and mentor, Loren Wiebe, who had just celebrated a milestone birthday.

He shared his wisdom: “Where you end up in life has very little to do with what you’ve accomplished and everything to do with whom you have loved.”

Amen.

I love, and I am loved.

And that is all that matters.

Happy birthday to me.

Mar 23 2017

1 Comment

Hope, New beginnings, Vulnerability

Five Days Left

Hopped in a Via and started chatting with my driver, Bakary.

We chatted about life, heartbreak, surviving in/the city; our dreams and fears.

I told him how I was attempting to raise funds so I can record an album. I told him how, when I first launched the project on Kickstarter, I don’t think I actually believed it would happen.

And now, with five days left, I’m so very close. I’m so close I can smell the vocal booth in the studio; I can hear horn parts on the bridge of one of my songs. I am close to tears thinking about all of the people who have pledged so far — a majority of you childhood classmates; friends.

It is an amazing thing to be so loved. Even if this project doesn’t fully fund (and I’m praying it will!) I have learned something absolutely invaluable:

You all believe in me.

You have supported me without question; without hearing one note of my music.

I am astounded.

And it pushes me even further: to get this project funded, recorded, mixed, mastered and delivered.

Bakary pulled over at my destination, got out of the vehicle and carefully placed my luggage on the curb. He smiled at me from at least a foot above.

“You have a good heart, Leslie,” he said. “You are a very special person. Don’t let anything or anyone change you. Even this city.”

I opened my arms to this stranger — my new friend.

“Let’s hug it out, Bakary!”

“I love you!”

“I love you, too!”

Click HERE to pledge to my project. There’s just five days left!

Mar 09 2017

Heartbreak is a Gift

I’ve 20 days left to raise funds to make my album happen.

I’ll be the first to admit I’m pretty terrible at self-promotion. I can’t be anything other than myself. I do my work and hope it speaks for itself.

But sometimes you have to see yourself as others see you.

My friend Chelsea — an exceptional writer whom I met several years ago when she interviewed me for an assignment about Christians who exercise curse words — offered to write yet another.

Leslie-Intelligentsia-2-copy

And it’s just perfect. Here’s an excerpt:

“That’s what I’m looking forward to, when Leslie’s record comes out. Knowing her and her work, I know it will be sour, bitter and sweet in perfect proportion, like an old-fashioned made right. It will be sharp enough to make the heartbreak culprit bleed, while being gentle enough to bind up your own wounds. It’ll stroke your hair with reflective insight and slap your ass with humor.

Best of all, Leslie’s record will give you more than words. Hers is the big, bad, ‘you can’t ignore me now’ voice of the woman who really tried to do it all the nice way, and is finally going to speak her mind.”

Read the article here.

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As of today, I am 40% funded. That is amazing! But I still have more to go. Click to make a pledge here. Don’t be afraid to pledge now; the funds will not be deducted unless the project is entirely funded on March 29, 2017.

And, as always, sincere thanks.

Dec 02 2016

6 Comments

Healing, Moving Forward, Ramblings, Sad, Vulnerability

Worth The Risk, Part Deux

For the last ten years, I have been on the road at Thanksgiving and Christmastime. It was hard, at first, because I was married. I didn’t want to be away from my husband or family. But then I found myself going through a divorce. The road was a soft place to land during a confusing, difficult and traumatizing time.

And then there were a few years where I was single. Transitioning. Moving across the country. Still, the road was good to me. Then I was pursued. Treated as I have always dreamed. I fell in love again and was finally in a good relationship. I had it all.

Two months ago, my relationship miscarried. I never saw it coming.

And what can I say? Nothing. If anything I have learned through my divorce, it is to let people go. I am done fighting for a relationship that only I want. People choose to leave, for whatever valid or huge-pile-of-horse-shit reason. It is the worst, most familiar feeling in the world. So much so you start to befriend the ache in your heart and pit in your stomach. You keep telling yourself that someday, someone will actually choose you and be all in, no matter what. You have to believe it, because otherwise, you sincerely will become jaded and succumb to anger and all of its accompanying pain and grief. You’ve been in this place before. You can certainly do it again. It is an old friend.

And the grief. Oh, the fucking grief. It is an unexpected, rude and sometimes cruel visitor. An unwelcome one, too. A memory, song or a familiar smell triggers the wave that pulsates through your entire body, sending your heart all the way to your wobbly knees. It’s like a bowling ball that’s constantly hitting the gutter, unable to knock over any pin with precision because it was tossed with the sloppiest, most unplanned aim.

“You’ll find someone better,” people say, seemingly flippantly. But it isn’t helpful.

A good male friend recently said, “Leslie, you’re a smart lady. You know pain and I’m not in any way going to talk you out of it. Welcome to disorientation and all of the accompanying shitty, self-loathing and self-questioning feelings that come with it. I don’t know the journey ahead but I know this, too, shall pass and you will come out the other side and know more about you; deepen yourself and find your true relationships and community in the midst.

It’s one of those things. When you hit rock bottom, what do you do? You kinda just sit there and play with the rocks for a bit. You know this is not about you or anything you’re lacking. It sucks and is hard that you’ve come this far to lose this much. I know you feel duped and like you shouldn’t have given so much, but you had no other choice. You had to give yourself.”

He’s right: I did have to give myself. And I was happy to. My relationship was good. The best of my life, so far. I haven’t anything terrible to say about it, except for the way it ended. Or just that it ended, at all.

I told myself I wasn’t going to write about any of this. Who wants to hear about yet another breakup? But here I am. Back in the land of writing as catharsis.

“I don’t know why you fight it,” my dear friend Meredith smiled, knowingly.

I am not looking for attention or sympathy. I am also not looking to censor myself or my feelings. This is who I am. I write to process. I’ve even begun writing songs. If my lot in life is to love and lose, then I might as well capitalize upon the real, raw and vulnerable place in which the pain repeatedly shoves me.

So as I type this from my stale hotel room in Newport News, Virginia, I am yet again thankful for the road. It does not allow me to fully get lost in an ocean of self-pity or grief. My friends out here listen and let me laugh and cry, without any judgment. They’re even helping me create music. It’s as if I have thirty overprotective big brothers. And I am very loved and cared for by them.

I long for the day when I cease crying over this loss. My heart doesn’t believe it, but my head knows it will come in time. And it is what I do with that time that will help shape my immediate future. I am already grateful for the opportunity to have succeeded in relationship where the odds were probably stacked against us, from the start. But when you choose to love; when you choose to make it work, it does. And well. It isn’t that hard.

Perhaps I’m the biggest fool on the planet, but I’ll keep getting back up, dusting myself off and jumping back in the ring. Because I was made for, and to, love. And, again, the risk of loving is always worth taking.

Sep 01 2015

Long Board Guy

I enjoyed some beach time this afternoon. Now that I am officially 38, I have religiously subscribed to bathing suits with underwire, sunscreen with an SPF no less than 70, oversized beach hats and sunglasses, supportive chairs (to feign flat abs from all angles), an obnoxious, Hamptons-style cover-up, and, most importantly, a juicy self-help book.

As I sipped on sparkling water and settled into my early afternoon reading, I couldn’t help but notice the powerful swell and number of surfers in the water. The guys were catching waves left and right, carving the shit out of them. If they happened to bail, they did it with grace and flair. No soft boards, no kiddie boogie boards. The water wasn’t gentle. Today’s ocean had zero time for beginners.

And then, I saw the guy on the long board.

He was right there with the rest of the young, wiry, quick short boarders. He would paddle strong and hard into a huge wave, get up and drop down its face with ease.

Having been around surfers, the surfing industry and actually surfed myself (not well), I understand the key to staying on your board is to get up quickly and stay low. Balance is most important. If you stand up too tall, you will immediately wipe out.

But Long Board Guy did something I had never seen before.

As soon as he was up, he stood stiffly erect. Then, he opened up his arms as wide as possible, arched his back and slowly turned his chin toward the heavens. It was the most beautiful posture I have seen on a surfboard. One of full, complete surrender.

I held my breath and thought, “If this guy doesn’t fall, he is the best surfer I have ever seen in my life.”

And, of course, the law of gravity immediately sent him plummeting forward, face first, into the crashing, aggressive white water. If the ocean hadn’t been so loud I might have been able to hear his entire torso slapping on the surface. I almost ran in after him to make sure he hadn’t broken his neck and drowned.

But he popped right up, fought and paddled his way back to the outside and did it again.

And again.

He held the same posture each time he got up: arms open wide, back arched, chin up.

And each time he fell.

After each fall, he got right back up. He kept surfing.

And I found myself cheering for him. Admiring him. Beaming. Applauding every time he fell and got back up. I totes felt his stoke.

After a while, Long Board Guy was finished. He got out of the water, smiling, and trotted over to his towel.

I glanced back down at page 19 of my book.

“If we are brave enough often enough, we will fall; this is the physics of vulnerability. When we commit to showing up and risking falling, we are actually committing to falling. Daring is not saying, ‘I’m willing to risk failure.’ Daring is saying, ‘I know I will eventually fail and I’m still all in. Fortune may favor the bold, but so does failure.” ~ Brené Brown, Rising Strong

When I looked up, Long Board Guy was gone. I had wanted to tell him he was physically living out the words on my page, but perhaps that moment was meant only for me.

It was obvious Long Board Guy didn’t care about he outcome of riding the wave; he just lived in the moment. And each moment added up to another moment.

And another.

And they were all joyful, brave, vulnerable and full of grace.

I now know Long Board Guy is the best surfer I have ever seen.

Category Archives: Vulnerability