To my beautiful babies:
You know how I feel about Taylor. I love every song she puts out there. And I will tell people til the day I die how Taylor Swift helped me grow up at age 53.
But Jelly Roll and Johnny Cash?
They helped me find my way home.
That home I’d been searching for since before you were born.
I guess I could start there. Your births. That shouldn’t have happened until I knew who I was. How can you be a good parent when you’re still trying to figure out who you are?
But there were good times too. I won’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Y’all know how much I love babies and how much I’ve always loved y’all. Even if I’ve been a little fucked up in the head all these years, you’ve always known my love.
I thought these songs might help explain ME a little better. For you, for other kids out there, for other parents… My intent was to send you each a link to an unpublished draft. But as I wrote this, I remembered telling the Lord I didn’t want to hide my skeletons in a closet. I don’t want to embarrass anyone either, but I’m tired of watching a hurting world suffer in silence because they think no one will understand.
I will!
And I’m far from the only one who will listen and understand. I’m probably just one of the dumber ones willing to risk her peace to shine a little light in other people’s darkened alleyways.
Spectator Sidenote: I’m speaking truth here. If you choose to weaponize my words to hurt the ones I love, you’ll only hurt yourself in the long run. Maybe them. You won’t hurt me because I’ve prayed all day over this post and am at peace with the words I’m putting out there. I’ll back up every word to any person. But if you use my words to hurt anyone in my family, you WILL have to deal with me. Tread lightly.
Toward the end of summer, I moved from Taylor’s entire catalog to Jelly Roll’s Whitsitt Chapel CD. I felt like I’d been in a game of hide and seek my whole life but by the time this album had settled in my soul, I’d made it home. I want to share 7 songs with you… I’ll snippet lyrics and link songs. You have lives now that revolve around YOU not me (what an adjustment THAT was!) so you may only want to get the gist. You might want to do a deep dive. It’s your call and I respect your boundaries. (I will tell you like you tell me when Taylor drops a new album, read the lyrics and listen to all of the songs to get the full effect. Bridges are the best part sometimes.)
You know the stories from my past- I’ve always been open with you. You know the life you lived as kids. You see the life I’m living now. Like with everyone, there have been ups and downs. If I’ve learned nothing else today, the most profound was this:
I AM WHO I AM TODAY NOT DESPITE EVERYTHING I WENT THROUGH BUT BECAUSE OF IT.
That makes it all a little more bearable.
Plus, I will never again have a victim mentality. Stuff has been done to me and I’ve done stuff myself. The devil has used me in other people’s lives as much as God has. Both have used people in mine. It’s life. I’ve gone from angry to aggravated to annoyed to merely aware now. It doesn’t hurt like before. I have a much more pragmatic outlook now. Toward the past as well as the future.
I’m not cold; I’m just trying to survive most days.
But some days I absolutely thrive.
It didn’t happen overnight. In fact, it started with a 4-day plea to God through this song. I couldn’t even find the words. I was trying to hide everything from everyone and keep it together and I thought I was going to shatter into a million pieces or spontaneously combust. Either way it wasn’t going to be good. I needed Him to SAVE ME FROM MYSELF.
Somethin’ inside of me’s broken, I hold on to anything that sets me free
I’m a lost cause
Baby, don’t waste your time on me
I’m so damaged beyond repair
Life has shattered my hopes and my dreams
Then something strange happened. I woke up from a spiritual slumber. One I’d been in for 90% of the last 47 years. And I was ALIVE.
But I wasn’t sure which way I was going to go. I’ve told all four of you this so I won’t go into detail. I’ve already posted about this in recent blogs anyway. I felt this song in my soul…a song I once considered blasphemous was now crying out from a place deep within me.
After a couple of weeks of flirting with the devil, it wasn’t fun anymore. I realized my battle was never with your dad or your stepdad, but with the devil and it started when that shit happened at the neighbor’s house when I was five.
The devil and I have done this dance my whole life. He always left me with bruised toes and shin splints. This time he was going in once again for the kill. I Emma Stone-d that Dirty Dancing “Nobody puts Baby in a corner” lift right into God’s Arms just like she did into Ryan Gosling’s.
I was headed to HEAVEN NOT HELL.
But that path was going to look a little different than it had ever looked before. Cause I definitely have JAGGED EDGES ON MY HALO.
This little light of mine
Damn near burned me alive
Lord knows that mama tried
Now I don’t know if I’mHalfway to Heaven or halfway to Hell
My angels and demons at war with myself
One foot in the fire and I still can’t tell
Am I halfway to Heaven
Halfway to Heaven or Hell?
I’d already been spending time in my car. It was my safe haven away from the pain of dementia. At first I just listened to music. Country, pop, Broadway, rap, Taylor…I shared songs with everyone. Y’all, my friends, my parents… I wanted to CONNECT.
And I did….a little. But then it was time to connect to God. At some point, He started talking over the music. I’d turn it up louder. He’d talk louder. I’d eventually turn the music off. Spoiler alert: He always wins in the end.
I guess there’s just some things you just can’t outrun
There ain’t no back pew in this truck, so I’m forced to sit in the front
And ain’t it funny how he’s working in mysterious ways?
Hell, I skipped my share of sermons, so he brought one to this Chevrolet
I ain’t going where the wild things are, I ain’t going to the cigarette store
I ain’t going to the cold beer bar to check in on the Tennessee score
I’m just having me a talk with the man, sendin’ my whole soul on a search
They might judge me on this two lane road, but little do they know
I’m going to church, I’m going to church
I’m finding that some people don’t like the REAL me. Especially some of those closest to me. There have been, and continue to be, stones thrown daily. I usually recognize them as attacks from Satan and move on. Sometimes I fight back. This won’t surprise you as you once saw me go from sweet PTA-leading, Disney-singing carpool mom to psycho Daisy Mae smashing glasses against the tree in the backyard in a single afternoon so it is what it is. I make no apologies anymore. You’ve heard them your whole lives anyway. Now it’s time for me to show you change.
This song gives me fire when I need it: Call me a jester from your lofty tower. I know I’m doing the right thing. And I WON’T HIDE BEHIND A THOUSAND LIES because I know WHO I AM! I don’t have to say these words to anyone. I can scream sing them in the car and get it all out.
Nail me to the cross outside
Of your ivory tower where you sit so high
On that horse you rode as I stand here alone
So heave me with the stones you cast
Your shadow looks back while you stare through glass
You don’t think I know I’m a jester bеfore your throne
How’s it feel up therе, holier-than-thou
To live without a care, perfect in and out?
I won’t hide behind a thousand lies
At least I know who I am
I started realizing I had an opportunity here. I’ve lived a thousand lives. Advance degrees and arrests. A church background and a street education. Life in fancy, uppercrust society to hanging out in dive bars. Yeah, I was protected more than I realized and I am grateful for that. I was like Johnny Cash when he recorded at Folsom State Prison. “I thought I’d seen a thing or two…” Yeah, Johnny. Me, too. I didn’t know anything!
But I do get it.
My solid ground CAN be found under a church steeple. But it can also be found kicking a soccer ball in my front yard with a 3-year old or playing prison-rules dominoes in a homeless camp. I’m at home everywhere and sometimes nowhere. My prayer to God is in the bridge…I’M BETTER WITH THE LOST THAN THE FOUND…LORD WON’T YOU HEAR MY PRAYER?
Johnny felt that way too. He wanted to connect with the down and out because he knew that feeling himself. He knew that he’d been brought out of a dark place for a reason and he used his music to reach people. (He didn’t do all spirituals either at Folsom, did he? He went right into Cocaine Blues when pushed…go, Man in Black!)
Y’all know my END GAME is to be untethered to anything material and completed connected to people. Hence my two year travel plan to live out of my car when the time comes. I want to feel like the butterfly I’ve always known I was…free and able to blow with the wind, alternatively cruising solo and having adventures with loved ones. I can serve God on the OPEN ROAD…the true object of my affection these days…
I see your fire and brimstone
That billboard sign on the road
But you can’t scare me to heaven
With gasoline on my soul
It’s that backroad baptism
Weed smokin’ syrup sippin’
Whiskey river carry me home
I’ve been known to find my kind of people
That ain’t at home underneath church steeples
You’d be surprised the places I find Jesus
That ain’t the regular crowd
I’ve been
Down and out
I’m better with the lost
Than the found
My solid ground
Is better with the lost
Than the found
I also had to go back. Way back. It included the 90’s as well. That was a painful trip. Cause as high as the highs were, the lows were even lower. I was only 19 when I got pregnant. It’s not an excuse; I made that choice. I wanted y’all from the first time I unwrapped a Baby Alive doll from Santa. But I wasn’t ready to be a mom. Y’all know as well as I do that Ms. Thelma was still raising me right along with you.
The bottom line is….you can’t UNLIVE WHERE YOU’RE FROM but you can decide if you’re going to let all that shit swirl around you like confetti for the rest of your life or if you’re going to let God weave it into His perfect masterpiece for your life.
Y’all know music like I do but it’s still worth pointing out here how metaphorical lyrics are for anyone dumb enough to try to make this next song my literal history. It hits close enough as is.
Final spectator sidenote: My kids know the fact from fiction in my life. Besides, they already know there’s more fact than fiction and that I don’t really wonder about many things because I pretty much tried it all at least once!
Mama was a pill-poppin’ pretty little number
Tendin’ bar at the Quality Inn
Every single day, she was uppin’ the stakes
To a game that nobody could win
Her kids would stay the night with the neighbors
Mama wouldn’t be home until later
We heard she was turnin’ tricks for paper
That was just another Tuesday night in those trailers
White trash roots run deeper
I done seen pain pills turn to needles
The things I’ve done to numb these feelings
Is somethin’ that you can’t outrun
(You can’t unlive where you’re from)
I know you are all concerned to varying degrees. Your concerns aren’t unfounded. I know my tendency to go off into la la land and want to escape reality. I know I can splash out on the smoke. I know the urge I get to throw dynamite at shit in my life and then run off and cry when it blows up.
It’s different this time.
I mean, I might light some sparklers because a) shit is hard at home right now, b) I get bored, and c) I’m human and a little bit of a bitch.
But I’m not off in another dimension trading my soul for a walk where the wild things are. I did that once. The price tag was y’all.
It wasn’t worth it then and it’s not worth it now.
But I do know this dance well. I’ve done it for years and I know I could be in the middle of a well-choreographed routine and not even realize it. So God makes me listen to this next song from time to time.
When I say MAKES me…I mean MAKES me. I tried to change it the other day. I usually skip over this one. It’s not me… I’m not there….I’m good.
But you could be, He reminds me. You’re going to listen to it today. Just once.
I know He’s right. Still don’t like to hear it. There was no guilt, just a gentle warning to keep shit reigned in.
I thought I’d heard enough. I tried to change it halfway through. My arms were cemented down. I tried harder. P.S. Don’t try to fight God. You won’t win.
I listened to it all.
I know. I’m aware….
She was the life of the party
She was the one everybody
Used to wanna hang around
I bet they wonder where she is now
I wish I woulda known
Beforе she was too far gone
I’m afraid to lose hеr now
She’s afraid of comin’ down
But right now…life is pretty good!
I am so thankful to be your mom, to have all four of you in my life, to know your sister is waiting for us all in Heaven. I love my relationships with you, your spouses/significant others, and your children.
Maybe I didn’t get it right when you were little but I can be a different grandma for your kids and a different mom for you now. I love y’all so much.
XOXO Mom
faith unfaded 
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