An Italian Goodbye. Part Two.
The dessert has settled, and the atomic sausage’s rebellion has calmed down… for the moment.
It’s almost 9pm, and you can tell that people are starting to get antsy.
It’s the second part of the Italian Goodbye.
When you actually say goodbye.
A tell in my family is when they talk about the work they have coming up.
Wink wink… we’re sleepy.
We’ve all had a good time, but there is a time and season for everything.
Life and work call us away from the warm hearth of the table.
We accept these things, sometimes bittersweetly, as they call us away again from familiar loving faces.
We still have faith that we will see them again.
Even though we know it isn’t going to be tomorrow.
It’s better to go out and on in faith, rather than doubt lacing our hopes in life.
We choose to receive an end, as when it is received rightly… it brings us to a better beginning.
This is the second part of the Italian Goodbye — receiving.
Receiving the meal, receiving the love, and receiving the blessing of being around edifying loving people again.
Shooting the breeze, eating the cheese, and being… is that not a happy life in a nutshell?
It’s funny, I feel more can be said about acknowledging than receiving sometimes.
There is good in life, in hellos, and goodbyes.
Anyone knows that.
There are heavens of being to be explored and enjoyed… especially with someone special.
Love can be found, and by the grace of God… it often finds us.
We can’t control it, but we can receive it.
I wonder. How strange would it be if we rejected a goodbye? Especially in an Italian family? It would no doubt harsh the mellow brought on by the carbohydrates.
How much more does such an action harshen our souls?
It’s easy for us to make goodbyes harder than they need to be.
It’s hard for us to receive the hellos from God that make it better.
To receive, to receive, why is it so hard?
Is it because we feel it is our duty to be unworthy? Even when we are more than worthy (not just including the fact that we are worthy in Christ)?
Is because that we feel if we receive his grace, provision, dreams, and love that we are just saying “forget it” to a life that we know so well to a way of being that we know so well?
Is it our duty to somehow make the punishments and suffering we have been through have a purpose in us, by means of embodying their essence — that being a destructive one?
We gain nothing by holding on to the spirit of vengeance that we are taught. If we vow to never fulfill it on another… most often we fulfill it on ourselves.
To say no to the kindness and love of God out of a sense of spite towards him most often comes because we are truly acceptant of being spiteful to ourselves, as if we need spite instead of love. Many can understand almost needing a level of negativity to feel normal.
In saying no, we are saying no to our needs, our wants, our dreams, and callings from being met by him.
It’s mad because surrendering to him can be an even easier reality to adjust to and be comfortable in — rather than the pain filled, self-enforced famines we choose to live in.
This is what I think it boils down to for me. I’m sharing it in the hope that maybe someone else can benefit from it.
You are not alone.
I say this to myself often now.
I’m still yielding to this truth and working to accept it.
And as hard as it can be to yield, God and good people are there to receive you, and you them, when you make the choice to seek out the goodness of God. To Carpe Diem and receive the victory of his blood.
His goodness for your trauma.
His goodness for your fears.
His goodness for your tears.
His goodness for all your parts.
Even the screaming skeptic inside that tries so hard to keep you exactly where you are now.
Locked down.
But you are free.
Free to acknowledge the past, learn from it, and if there is nothing to learn from it… you are free to acknowledge that too.
Taking a position is necessary to receive.
You are free to receive.
The present moment.
The better reality of the now, or the better reality that you are veering towards and fighting for.
We are the bride of a King that is good beyond our conception and understanding.
When we say goodbye to family to return home, back to the hustle and bustle….
Let it be to say hello to the lover of our souls… to have supper with him.
To receive his company, comfort, healing, and love.
Just like returning to an Italian family.
Now, the hard question remains.
Dad… do we have espresso for tomorrow?
I hope you do.
Blessings.
