Red Yarn & Loneliness (Originally Written November 2009)

When I was a kid my Mom & Dad used to get out of the house pretty regularly on weekends. There was forever a Sunday School class function to attend or dinner out with the pastor & his wife.

My Grandma Charles lived just down the street from us back then in the house my Dad & uncles grew up in. The only thing between her place & ours was my dad's machine shop, the community hall building, & a horse pen.

You could walk to Grandma's house in about five minutes but we rarely went over there. It was usually more often the case she would come to us... & it was just as usual that the times her red station wagon pulled into our driveway was on the nights when Mom & Dad were headed out for the night & needed Grandma to play babysitter.

Mom would send Dad down to McDonald's to pick up a gadjillion chicken nuggets for Neal, Grandma, & I to feast on.

Mom always had a way of timing things to the "T". I remember I'd be engaged in some mundane game of Hungry Hungry Hippos with Neal on the dining room floor & notice how fluidly Mom juggled multiple balls in the air as she readied for her night out.

She'd scoot Dad out the door & then in record time emerge from her bedroom looking like a million bucks & smelling like Cinnabar & winter air; the latter of which always drafted into Mom & Dad's room from the window on the south side of the house.

Mom would no sooner be putting on her earrings than two pairs of headlights would appear practically simultaneously in the driveway outside. Dad would come in, set down the fast food bags on the table, & then rush back to the door to take Gramma's arm as she stepped in from the cold blustery night outside.

"Perfect timing!" Mom would always say as she opened up the bags & divvied up the McNuggets.

They'd stay long enough to coax a dinner blessing out of my stubborn little brother, Grandma nodding approvingly, & then we'd each get a kiss on the cheek from Mom before she & Dad were out the door & onto their night of social interacting.

Grandma Charles was *not* much of a babysitter... & she was a flat out bore compared to the babysitter we had in our Grandma Page (who used to chase us around the basement wearing Halloween masks & let us stay up as late as we wanted munching Chex mix & watching cable).

No, Grandma Charles was a snooze... literally.

When she did take the time to plan activities for her nights in with us it was usually no more than instructing us to pop in some VHS tape she'd picked up at the local library... We'd have the thing playing for five lousy minutes before she'd transfer from the dining room table to the easy chair & fall asleep with Beaner, our mini dachshund, curled up in her lap.

I remember I'd try to sit still & watch whatever movie Grandma brought for us to view but as soon as Neal heard Grandma's first snores his attentions would shift from viewing the media on the screen to tormenting me.

I'd be in the middle of listening to Hugh Downs narrate some boring as hell educational program from the '70s when all of a sudden I'd be assaulted with every marble from the Hungry Hungry Hippos game box... Neal rolling on the floor laughing as he kicked his footed pajama feet in the air...

I'd usually chide him feeling it my duty to play the expected role of 'responsible one' but every now & then I'd decide if Grandma's library card didn't get her access to any better entertainment than documentaries about WWII warships that it wasn't *my* fault... & off Neal & I would go to entertain ourselves elsewhere.

One night this entertainment took the form of snatching a rather large ball of red yarn from Grandma's knitting bag. My teeth chattered & Beaner watched from Grandma's lap disapprovingly as Neal softly walked up to the bag & swiped it while Grandma slept.

"What're we doing with this?" I asked, once Neal & I had the yarn.

Neal just looked at me as if to say "Tsk... amateur!" & I watched as he tied the end of the red ball of string to the back leg of the dining room table & then began running all over the house with it.

The yarn crissed & crossed until it began to resemble something like the scene in "Entrapment" where Catherine Zeta Jones is pitted against a minefield of laser beams.

Neal rapidly painted the picture for me of how the game he had envisioned for us to play would work. The objective was simple. Get from one side of the room to the other without touching any of the string.

Had I a time machine, I would set it for 1990 & go back & ask my little brother how the hell it was he thought this crap up. I'm utterly convinced that something about freedom from parental supervision transformed him into a diabolical genius... the Koolaid moustache he usually wore only aiding to complete the image of a little kindergarten version of Hitler.

The game of "Don't Touch The Yarn" rapidly evolved... getting to the other side of the room proved to be entirely too easy.

Next added was the challenge to do it backwards.

Before all was said & done the lights were turned out & flashlights as well as two of my Dad's motorcycle helmets were incorporated as Neal & I *raced* to see who could complete the course first.

...at one point Beaner came in & was (unwillingly) added as the third competitor.

Neal & I laughed & wailed the night away as Beaner barked her concern - all up until the sliding glass door opened & the scent of Cinnabar & cold winter air again filled the room.

Mom flicked on the lights and Neal & I found we were too entangled in our red yarn obsstacle course to run & hide.

"What in the thunder is going on in here?" Mom would shout.

Then began the fruitless endeavor of attempting to explain to Mom why tying red yarn to every loose end in her dining room was actually a *good* idea.

"So you tie yarn to everything in sight & then what?" Mom asked, disgruntled.

"Then we turn out the lights & go through it backwards!" Neal exclaimed, proud of himself.

"Run through it backwards?!?" Mom would say, looking at my Dad with arched eyebrowss before asking, "...and where is your Mother while all this game play is going on???".

She'd no sooner ask then Gradma's snores would become audible from the next room.

"They're just kids, Paula." Dad would say in an attempt to calm my Mom down.

"Which is exactly why someone is supposed to be keeping an eye on them!" Mom would rebuttle.

I'd set to work untangling Neal & listen to the rest of the night play out as Mom would retreat to her bedroom & leave Dad to wake Grandma & 'thank' her for her babysitting services.

Here I am twenty years later...

I threw on a long sleeved thermal tee tonight & warmed up a bowl of chicken noodle soup for a bedtime snack.

The pilot light on my furnace is out so I guess it must be the cold autumn air that got me reminiscing about winter nights with my brother stirring up trouble in our footied pajamas.

That & also a conversation I had recently with a friend who is agnostic.

I used to think agnosticism & atheism were the same things but turns out that's not the case.

While atheism is a belief that God doesn't exist at all the picture I have recently had painted for me of agnosticism is that it's a belief system that God does, in fact, exist but does not interact.

Like a drowsy Grandma in an easy chair He slumbers away while all His creation runs amuck with red yarn.

...&, to cite my Mom, it's concerning because we're all 'just kids' & someone really *should* be keeping an eye on us.

We get tangled & instead of preventing it or helping us He just lets it happen... often leaving us to suffer the ramifications of exercising our beloved free will.

I don't know that the agnostic viewpoint suits me... certainly there are times when God does not intervene when we wish He would but there are other times when I believe intervention to merely be delayed.

The way it has been for me the last three years or so...

Since 2006 I've been working hard to make something of myself that would allow me to be able to financially prosper... help provide for my family in these tough economic times & also allow me to allocate more funds to my own personal goals of songwriting, blogging, & donating what I can to ministries I believe in.

Many have been the times I've felt tempted to accuse God of not being there... of not interacting... of being a bystander content to watch me get all sorts of tangled up in the webs I'd weave.

I'd ask Him, with a heavy heart, "God where *are* You?".

When I miss my family?
When I'd have a one night fling?
When I'd need Your strength?
When the guy I made my everything cheated on me?
When I had to resign from my job due to a bad situation?
When I lost so many friends as a result of trying to do what was right for me?
When I failed my registry exam?
When I couldn't afford more than a peanut butter sandwich & a bag of popcorn for dinner?
When I couldn't find a church & just wanted to be in fellowship with other Christians so badly I literally hurt?
When the first date with the new guy I'd built up in my mind ended up revealing him to be a complete jerk?

Where were you, God?

It feels like I've been asking Him that nearly every day since I moved to Texas in '06.

...& the last few weeks He's been reaffirming that He's not only *been* here - He's been INVOLVED the whole time.

First I passed that darned registry exam I never thought I would pass.

Second, He took me on a journey to help me embark on attaining forgiveness I've long been wanting to grant towards many people from my days living in Austin.

And most recently He did something I never expected...

He gave me a way to finally go back home... not only that but He showed me that home is where I actually want to *be*.

I used to swear up & down that I hated Kansas. Truth be told, I still do. lol.

But with my first nephew due to be born in a month or two & my being lonely for family worse than what I EVER remember it being I realize - I'd rather be somewhere I hate & have access to people who love me than somewhere I can merely *tolerate* being & without them.

Last week God debunked agnosticism in my life when He took the reigns & just started racing me towards an exciting new future - in Kansas! Who'da thunk???

I was flown up to Wichita by a hospital in Salina to interview for a job for a registered sleep tech & landed it!

Now out of nowhere I have three weeks to get my apartment emptied & to move so I can start working up there before month's end!

So... believe what you will but if you're asking me if God is uninvolved... well, I'd have to agree that a lot of the time it seems that way...

But just when you're so tangled up in red yarn & loneliness that you think you won't ever be free to eat chicken McNuggets again He'll show up - like Mom with scissors & smelling like Cinnabar.

...and He'll cut you free so you can have your ten millionth undeserved new beginning...

The Psalm says it best: "One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard - That You, O God, are strong. ...and You, O God, are loving".


Turn on the lights. It's time to stop playing games & let love & strength remove what binds you.