Saturday Shout-out: You remind us to love

You are a severely under-appreciated holiday.  You are annually rejected and scoffed at as a ploy either to cause us to spend money or to feel lonely.  You just can't win.

But, Valentine's, you do deserve a day.

"We should celebrate our love for each other all year," some say, arguing that you should go away.  But no one is saying about Christmas, "We should celebrate God's love for us and our love for each other everyday, not just on Christmas, so let's cancel Christmas."

We should celebrate love all year, but, like Christmas, having a day makes the mushy feeling of celebrating love and each other just so much more fun.

So, Valentine's, here's to love, and here's to you.

Thanks for giving us a day to celebrate the ones we love.  Thanks for taking full advantage of cheesy cartoon hearts, light up hearts, hearts that hang from the ceiling, hearts that pop up out of cards, hearts of all colors and sizes from all places.  Thanks especially for chalky candy conversation hearts.

Thanks for being flexible and leaving room for the singles to celebrate as well.  Some find you exclusive and say you cater only to couples, but I know better.

Last year, you visited on a Thursday, my favorite day of the week.  You even brought a most wonderful surprise: snow in Tucson!  You encouraged me to begin to love myself, really deep down to the core to appreciate the person God created when he thought me up.  Since then, I have learned to accept who I have been, love who I am, and take positive steps everyday toward who I want to be.

Single or not, I will always love you, Valentine's Day.  I will always look forward to what surprises you bring when you visit.  And I will forever appreciate your reminder to love and to give.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go buy out the last of the clearance conversation hearts.

Saturday Shout-out: Thank you for jumping

After a week at camp, you used to write two songs for our youth group.  The first was a silly, musical scrapbook highlighting all the good times had and the jokes only we would understand.  We laughed at every lyric feeling surprised and so especially loved when we realized how well you had been paying attention to each experience all week.  You must have been taking notes!

The second song you wrote was built of sentences submitted by each small group: a summary of what we had learned that week, what God had done in our hearts, and what we hoped God would continue to do after our trip back home.  You took our sentences, made them rhyme, and set them to music.  You took our week at camp - all God had done to right us as people and strengthen us as a community - and gave it back to us in the form of a song that we might not soon forget all God had done and would do. 

Last week, I got to worship with friends and strangers, singing songs of praise and prayer about and for my city.  You said they were written by worship pastors in Tucson who came together from their different denominations and perspectives to collaborate on this process.  All I could think was, He's at it again.  You've taken our churches and our people, our history and our city and given it all back to us in the form of songs that we might not soon forget all God has done and is doing.

I think about the prayer meetings I got a glimpse into almost two years ago and how many of the same themes those leaders were praying for are present in these songs.  Just like I felt that last night of camp, I think your lyrics are making many Tucsonans and even, I would think, God, feel surprised and so especially loved to realize how well you have been paying attention.  You are so great at noticing the heart at the center of things, and you see what God is doing underneath it all.  You saw downtown as the heart of Tucson before many did, even when it was broken and barely beating.  And, as God does with things broken and forgotten, you paid attention. 

Thank you for City Psalms.  Thank you for your humility, for letting these songs be ours.  Thank you for releasing them to churches to play in their services.  Thank you for how you pay attention.  Thank you for loving Tucson and people how God does.  Gracias por incluir gente de cada raza y denominación. 

So many students were sad to see you leave our youth group, myself included.  But we understood you had to go.  We wanted you to follow the dream God had given you, too.   Though you had little idea what following that dream would look like, you knew absolutely that God had it all worked out.  You went, not without fear, I'm sure, but with much courage and faith. 

Thank you for going.  Thank you for following.  Thank you for jumping. 

And thank you for teaching us that when you jump in faith, you not only survive the fall.  God helps you fly.   

Saturday Shout-out: Thanks for breaking up with me

Though it may seem so, I assure you this post title isn't oozing with sarcasm.  I'm for real.  You did what you had to do, and I'm glad you did.   

I hadn't wanted to admit this before, but it took a lot of courage what you did.  People on TV break up weddings all the time, and they usually wait until the most painstaking moment: right before or even during the ceremony.  THANK THE GOOD LORD you did not wait until then.  You waited longer than I would have liked, but thank you times a million for not waiting until our wedding day.   

Life is harder than it looks on television, and I can now admit that it must have taken a lot to work yourself up to breaking off our engagement when you did.   

You bought a ring.  We put a deposit down on a date and a venue.  We had two different photographers (unpaid family and friend volunteers, thank goodness) take engagement photos.  I bought a dress, we booked a DJ, we designed the flowers.  I had just finished addressing all the invitations and had bought the postage.   

You sat me down in January and told me you had been having doubts about our getting married since September, which was one month before we got engaged.  I was furious that you had waited so long to tell me.  Now, on the other side of hurt and healing, I am thankful that the scariness of telling me then didn't cause you to shut up and tell me even later.   

It's a year after we broke up, but I still don't fully see the purpose of the blip we were in each other's life.  I believe I will one day, when you are a far distant memory.  But I can already begin to appreciate the things I've learned and the person I've become because of the experience of almost marrying you.  

I saw a picture of you the other day.  It felt like a picture of a stranger or maybe someone from a dream.  I knew you well, I thought.  But I will never know you again.  There was a bit of sadness, but strangely there was mostly a feeling of weightlessness, almost like relief.  Funnily enough, it was a lot like a Taylor Swift song. 

I still hate to admit that you were right.  I say instead that you did the right thing at the wrong time.  But you were right that it was wrong for us to be together.  We talked ourselves into the idea that we had found our match, and it was an easy idea to believe when things were easy.   

People think love is about feelings.  But love really happens when the feelings aren't there.  When life is hard and you've run out of reasons to love someone, that's when the choice to do so anyway really means something.   

But at the core of who you were, when you weren't putting effort into it, I didn't really like that person.  It was hard to enjoy you for exactly who you were and even harder to really love you.  I didn't enjoy your raw existence, and I know you didn't enjoy mine.   

I love you now like I love the Constitution.  You are a part of my history and the fact that you exist still plays a part in my life and will forever.  But I spend barely any time thinking of you.  I am thankful for what you taught me and the person I became from knowing you.  I am also thankful, though, that I don't have to spend everyday reading you.  

Thank you for the role you played in my life.  Thank you for loving me well for a short time and challenging me to be the best Katelyn I can be.  Thank you for all the things you taught me through the process of building a relationship together, planning a life together, and then dismantling it all.  Thank you for finally being able to say what you had been afraid to say for so long.  Thank you for breaking up with me.