I Haven’t Written Lately, Because …

So I haven’t written much lately.

I’ve gone through long periods of silence on this blog, but A. I’ve been disciplined at writing regularly this summer, and B. most of those silences were job-related, as I got bogged down with the daily work of the semester.

Well, this silence was job related.  As in: I lost my job, and it made it difficult to write.

If you don’t know, I lost my job at the end of June.  This was unexpected, and (as you might expect) really threw me for a loop.  Losing my job is one of the reasons I haven’t written.

It’s hard to focus and write when you’re trying to be especially careful about what you say.

It’s hard to focus and write when life has been turned upside down.

It’s also hard to focus and write when your most productive writing time–early morning–is now filled by necessity with driving Uber.

I got an Uber driving account last summer, kind of on a lark, and have kept it current by driving for a few hours every month since.  Since I lost my job, Uber has been a terrific device for helping us stretch our savings to cover an indefinite period of joblessness.

It’s hard to focus and write when you’re hurt, or angry.  In fact, I think I’ve been dealing with (or not dealing with) anger for several years now.

Richard Rohr says that you can’t really pray, you can’t practice God’s presence, when you’re angry.  I will attest to that.  Between my upset over the unexpected job loss and the upheaval in my schedule–my best time for prayer and scripture has also always been early morning–my prayers have been empty and dead for the past month.

Until this last weekend, that is.  This last weekend, I worked through anger and forgiveness over a few issues.  And then I was able to (again) sit down with my Bible and my pen and feel and hear God.

So: about anger and forgiveness and letting go of anger, … I’ll have more to say in my next post.