“I don’t want to be pigeonholed into being seen as a certain kind of sinner, one that some people find more sympathetic, and others find worse. I’m just a sinner…” so I won’t give many specifics… but know that you and I share many details in our stories.
(I work in fits and starts, you may have noticed. I take forever to finish one simple thing and then knock out 3 in short order. I have zero consistency)
Took some time to think on this one, coming back a few times to reread. Redemption, the promise of the Lord, that no matter how far we stray, how dark our darkest moments are — our father in heaven will welcome us back into his arms. Forgiveness, rebirth. It’s the promise that always brings me back to Jesus.
I was grateful in your story your father here on earth welcomed you home too.
As usual, another essay with a hundred ideas and stories to sit with. Most writers on Substack would have an essay for each one. I like wrestling with the whole lot of them at a one time though, so keep it up!
I appreciate that you took the time to sit with it and even re read. Love this comment <3
(Agreed about my dad. I think it’s doubtful I’d be here to tell this story if he had chosen otherwise. Though I better write some stories that show my mom isn’t heartless now, lmao)
Testimonies aren't always neat, tidy, and wrapped in a bow! The truth is, we're all flawed, self-absorbed, petty, and violent. Left to our own devices we thrive in darkness, and normalize madness. None of us are pure driven, we've all lived debauched and rancid lives. I agree that our actions can be perceived as manifest evil, and that might make us repugnant in the eyes of people who are dishonest about their own proclivities. But for me, your essay just confirms that you are human, and most of the time, humans do some jacked up shit! But the light, you spoke of, at the end, that's where the gold is at! Acknowledging God, and his ability to clean up the mess, that's priceless! Like Joe Dirt sagely counseled, 'Life's a garden, dig it!' and 'Keep on keeping on!'
Jesalyn, I keep reading and re-reading this essay. It makes me angry and sad and cringe so bad that sometimes I have to shut it down half-way through. It makes me want to write things I’m not ready to write. Hell, it makes me think things I’m not ready to think. It stops up my mouth so I don’t think I could speak out loud about it even if I knew what to say. All of this is a compliment, by the way. At least I think it is. Someday I hope I have the guts to stop defiantly proclaiming that “I am NOT a victim, ” and “I am NOT a villain.” And to wake up the little creature in my heart that kinda knows that I am both.
What an excellent response. You nailed it, that was the point of what I wrote…I am the helpless victim who needs a hero, a savior, and I am the villain, too. I used to care mightily about not being identified as either. I was willing to play victim only insofar as it made me look good; NOT weak or foolish or anything like that, just, you know, wronged, sure. But tough and brave and a “survivor”, that kind of victim. Not the kind who needed rescuing, the kind who had already saved myself.
Ditto for being a villain. I loved being a “bad girl”, but didn’t want to think I was genuinely guilty of anything, either.
The deeper you go with Jesus though…the more you love Him, the easier it is to know and even, if the occasion calls for it, to say these things. I just want to glorify Him with my writing. And show my love to the saints. This piece was very much for both. I hope some people reading it felt some encouragement that they aren’t the only ones with ugly pasts that could be thrown in their faces by revilers on the internet. That happens to people who are really walking with Christ, you know. Sometimes it comes from people who claim to be doing it in His name. But there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus…we villainous, victimized misfits gotta stick together in love lol. Did you listen to that Sleeping Giant song I posted the other day? It’s called Sons of Thunder, you should check it out. I don’t know how far you’ve gotten in the Gospels, but you may catch that there’s a lot of Scripture in it and just, the most beautiful chorus it swells to eventually, “overcome this world, with love”. Our call to love one another (the brethren in Christ) is the last command Jesus laid on his disciples before He went to the cross, and I think about that a lot. What I’ve found in practice is that nourishing my relationships with my brothers and sisters in Christ…it gives me strength, it gives me courage; it refreshes and refills me and overflows to an easier love for the lost, too, even the ones that aren’t easy to “like”. I even felt love for the reviler going after my friend who partially inspired this piece, as I was writing it. And historically, I want to take a baseball bat to people who come after my friends, lol. But Christian love sure changes you. You’re in for a wild ride, girl! ;)
I'm listening right now. I recognize a couple of verses, and I'm assuming many of the other lyrics come from others. The music sends chills up my spine. I like it, but it's overwhelming, too.
I’ve always loved metal, from way back in my punk rock days. I don’t listen to it much because I live in the quiet woods and I mostly like the sound of the creek and the birds. But I think Sleeping Giant is going to be showing up on my YouTube pretty often in the near future.
I also live back in the woods and love listening to the creek, birds (and wind in the trees...and the bugs...and the frogs...lol)
I went through a phase when I had my daughter of pretty much not listening to metal at all anymore for a while, and spending more and more time with quiet in general. It was good for me, but I've found my way back to this balance of deliberate times for music and deliberate times for silence. One of the most beautiful things about it to me is that my little girl has that instinct already, instead of kind of craving music nonstop like I did; sometimes I'll ask her "music or quiet?" and she says "a little quiet".
Though she also has great taste in music lol, she digs Sleeping Giant and Clutch and Vivaldi and Merle Haggard and Mary Chapin Carpenter most of all, currently. Kids are so much fun, sheesh.
Wow. Of all your posts I've gotten to listen to, which thanks for doing that by the way I appreciate that effort to your posts, this is... I can't really beat Blue-Collar Theology's description. Heart-wrenchingly beautiful is apt. At the end I was reminded of this Wendell Berry quote: "As I have read the Gospels over the years, the belief has grown in me that Christ did not come to found an organized religion but came instead to found an unorganized one. He seems to have come to carry religion out of the temples into the fields and sheep pastures, onto the roadsides and the banks of the rivers, into the houses of sinners and publicans, into the town and the wilderness, toward the membership of all that is here."
That is a wonderfully satisfying comment to get, thank you :) as I told you before, that’s my favorite of Berry’s books! (which is saying something for me!)
Random question, is the sound quality ok on my recordings? When I play back a bit to check sometimes, it can sound sketchy to me but I think that may just be my computer speaker when I’m listening (ancient laptop, lol), but hopefully the microphone I’m using to record is doing ok as far as what the rest of you hear?
Usually they come in pretty clear. This one was the first I noticed almost like a skipping between some words. Like a cd scratching. Honestly not sure if it was quality or maybe my headphones.
I have a really hard time hearing this stuff. Always have. To avoid reality i’ll talk about movies. I felt sick and left the theater during a certain scene in Cape Fear. I actually threw up watching Last House on the Left. That was, what?, 30 something years ago. I still get the same way.
One of your other commenters said she had to sit with this and re-read some of it before commenting. I should do that too before typing further. But I won’t. I won’t re-read it and I won’t sit with it. Maybe someday i’ll remember what actually happened and be able to process it. But i’m not even gonna try right now
I appreciate you taking the time to read it, I’m honored actually. I didn’t think that you would, since you told me you don’t read long-form pieces. I’m sorry, this one maybe needed a trigger warning.
I think trigger warnings are overused, to the point they have about as much effect as a parental advisory warning.
I can tell when to stop reading, or walk out as the case may be. But I believe that's my responsibility, not the authors. I'm glad you write what you write. Some people need to hear it even if it's the most uncomfortable stuff to hear about. I might need to hear it as a little boy who may have witnessed some things in my family, or as a young man who may not have understood the line between persuasion and coercion. Your ultimate theme-question can be mirrored onto the men involved too
I agree with you re trigger warnings; that's why I didn't write one. I did second-guess myself on that when I first read your comment. I guess I've also always felt that the whole of the human experience deserves, at times, to be heard...not necessarily curated for the hearer, and that, like you said, the reader can usually sense it coming and opt out if it's getting too dark for where they are.
And I understand about the men. I was aiming to gently make that point, that we're all in this tangled mess of sin together, even in scenarios where one person seems more clearly guilty on a human-to-human level (and even those situations are often tangled, even on that level).
One of my favorite quotes by Chesterton: "We men and women are in the same boat, upon a stormy sea. We owe each other a terrible and tragic loyalty." Amen to that.
Perfectly, heart-wrenchingly beautiful. Thanks for sharing. If I were the crying type, I might have cried. To quote my favorite cucumber: "I laughed, I cried. It moved me, Bob."
Seriously. This is a very powerful piece. I am better for having read it.
Jesalyn, I keep reading and re-reading this essay. It makes me angry and sad and cringe so bad that sometimes I have to shut it down half-way through. It makes me want to write things I’m not ready to write. Hell, it makes me think things I’m not ready to think. It stops up my mouth so I don’t think I could speak out loud about it even if I knew what to say. All of this is a compliment, by the way. At least I think it is. Someday I hope I have the guts to stop defiantly proclaiming that “I am NOT a victim, ” and “I am NOT a villain.” And to wake up the little creature in my heart that kinda knows that I am both.
Oh man, I knew we were kindred spirits…
“I don’t want to be pigeonholed into being seen as a certain kind of sinner, one that some people find more sympathetic, and others find worse. I’m just a sinner…” so I won’t give many specifics… but know that you and I share many details in our stories.
Every bit of this was fire 🔥
Thank you!!!
I haven't even gotten through the Grilled Cheese one yet, and you drop another one!?
Well, hurry up. :P
(I work in fits and starts, you may have noticed. I take forever to finish one simple thing and then knock out 3 in short order. I have zero consistency)
Took some time to think on this one, coming back a few times to reread. Redemption, the promise of the Lord, that no matter how far we stray, how dark our darkest moments are — our father in heaven will welcome us back into his arms. Forgiveness, rebirth. It’s the promise that always brings me back to Jesus.
I was grateful in your story your father here on earth welcomed you home too.
As usual, another essay with a hundred ideas and stories to sit with. Most writers on Substack would have an essay for each one. I like wrestling with the whole lot of them at a one time though, so keep it up!
I appreciate that you took the time to sit with it and even re read. Love this comment <3
(Agreed about my dad. I think it’s doubtful I’d be here to tell this story if he had chosen otherwise. Though I better write some stories that show my mom isn’t heartless now, lmao)
Thank you for writing this! We all need to hear it for all the reasons. Isn't God so great! He has been so loving! Thank you for the writing. Kevin
Thanks for reading!
Testimonies aren't always neat, tidy, and wrapped in a bow! The truth is, we're all flawed, self-absorbed, petty, and violent. Left to our own devices we thrive in darkness, and normalize madness. None of us are pure driven, we've all lived debauched and rancid lives. I agree that our actions can be perceived as manifest evil, and that might make us repugnant in the eyes of people who are dishonest about their own proclivities. But for me, your essay just confirms that you are human, and most of the time, humans do some jacked up shit! But the light, you spoke of, at the end, that's where the gold is at! Acknowledging God, and his ability to clean up the mess, that's priceless! Like Joe Dirt sagely counseled, 'Life's a garden, dig it!' and 'Keep on keeping on!'
pshaw, our mutual friend tipped you off about my Joe Dirt obsession.
Daaaaang
Not so, Cavewoman! We haven't spoken about any of your obsessions! Its more a matter of us being platonic Twin flames… I'm starting to think!
Yah I told him after I read two essays by you "I think your brother is the guy version of me" lmao
Never know. God has a strange sense of humor!
He knows the man needs to be surrounded by Big Goof Energy
Did cavewomen get to wield big clubs, too? Because I insist upon one, obviously
Of course, we'll wrap her with barbed wire, like Negan's vampire bat Lucille!
Oh my gosh you just quoted my favorite movie, no way
Joe Dirt is one of the most profound philosophers! I value his insights as much as I have, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, et.al.
I don’t know what the hell I’m doin, but I’m doin it!
That's the very definition ‘just living, man!.. L-I-V-I-N'!’
This was heavy a piece, a good one but heavy. I think I’ll have to digest it for a bit but glad i read through.
Thank you for reading, digesting, and restacking <3 I know it wasn’t an easy read
A really good piece of writing. Lots of goodness wrapped in here.
Thank you :)
Dang... this is one I'm going to have to sit with, but I was right. I needed to read this. I'll message you. But dang.....
Jesalyn, I keep reading and re-reading this essay. It makes me angry and sad and cringe so bad that sometimes I have to shut it down half-way through. It makes me want to write things I’m not ready to write. Hell, it makes me think things I’m not ready to think. It stops up my mouth so I don’t think I could speak out loud about it even if I knew what to say. All of this is a compliment, by the way. At least I think it is. Someday I hope I have the guts to stop defiantly proclaiming that “I am NOT a victim, ” and “I am NOT a villain.” And to wake up the little creature in my heart that kinda knows that I am both.
What an excellent response. You nailed it, that was the point of what I wrote…I am the helpless victim who needs a hero, a savior, and I am the villain, too. I used to care mightily about not being identified as either. I was willing to play victim only insofar as it made me look good; NOT weak or foolish or anything like that, just, you know, wronged, sure. But tough and brave and a “survivor”, that kind of victim. Not the kind who needed rescuing, the kind who had already saved myself.
Ditto for being a villain. I loved being a “bad girl”, but didn’t want to think I was genuinely guilty of anything, either.
The deeper you go with Jesus though…the more you love Him, the easier it is to know and even, if the occasion calls for it, to say these things. I just want to glorify Him with my writing. And show my love to the saints. This piece was very much for both. I hope some people reading it felt some encouragement that they aren’t the only ones with ugly pasts that could be thrown in their faces by revilers on the internet. That happens to people who are really walking with Christ, you know. Sometimes it comes from people who claim to be doing it in His name. But there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus…we villainous, victimized misfits gotta stick together in love lol. Did you listen to that Sleeping Giant song I posted the other day? It’s called Sons of Thunder, you should check it out. I don’t know how far you’ve gotten in the Gospels, but you may catch that there’s a lot of Scripture in it and just, the most beautiful chorus it swells to eventually, “overcome this world, with love”. Our call to love one another (the brethren in Christ) is the last command Jesus laid on his disciples before He went to the cross, and I think about that a lot. What I’ve found in practice is that nourishing my relationships with my brothers and sisters in Christ…it gives me strength, it gives me courage; it refreshes and refills me and overflows to an easier love for the lost, too, even the ones that aren’t easy to “like”. I even felt love for the reviler going after my friend who partially inspired this piece, as I was writing it. And historically, I want to take a baseball bat to people who come after my friends, lol. But Christian love sure changes you. You’re in for a wild ride, girl! ;)
(Praying for you by name every day, by the way)
I'm listening right now. I recognize a couple of verses, and I'm assuming many of the other lyrics come from others. The music sends chills up my spine. I like it, but it's overwhelming, too.
My secondary mission on this blog is to make disciples of metal ;) lmao
I’ve always loved metal, from way back in my punk rock days. I don’t listen to it much because I live in the quiet woods and I mostly like the sound of the creek and the birds. But I think Sleeping Giant is going to be showing up on my YouTube pretty often in the near future.
I also live back in the woods and love listening to the creek, birds (and wind in the trees...and the bugs...and the frogs...lol)
I went through a phase when I had my daughter of pretty much not listening to metal at all anymore for a while, and spending more and more time with quiet in general. It was good for me, but I've found my way back to this balance of deliberate times for music and deliberate times for silence. One of the most beautiful things about it to me is that my little girl has that instinct already, instead of kind of craving music nonstop like I did; sometimes I'll ask her "music or quiet?" and she says "a little quiet".
Though she also has great taste in music lol, she digs Sleeping Giant and Clutch and Vivaldi and Merle Haggard and Mary Chapin Carpenter most of all, currently. Kids are so much fun, sheesh.
Wow. Of all your posts I've gotten to listen to, which thanks for doing that by the way I appreciate that effort to your posts, this is... I can't really beat Blue-Collar Theology's description. Heart-wrenchingly beautiful is apt. At the end I was reminded of this Wendell Berry quote: "As I have read the Gospels over the years, the belief has grown in me that Christ did not come to found an organized religion but came instead to found an unorganized one. He seems to have come to carry religion out of the temples into the fields and sheep pastures, onto the roadsides and the banks of the rivers, into the houses of sinners and publicans, into the town and the wilderness, toward the membership of all that is here."
That is a wonderfully satisfying comment to get, thank you :) as I told you before, that’s my favorite of Berry’s books! (which is saying something for me!)
Random question, is the sound quality ok on my recordings? When I play back a bit to check sometimes, it can sound sketchy to me but I think that may just be my computer speaker when I’m listening (ancient laptop, lol), but hopefully the microphone I’m using to record is doing ok as far as what the rest of you hear?
Usually they come in pretty clear. This one was the first I noticed almost like a skipping between some words. Like a cd scratching. Honestly not sure if it was quality or maybe my headphones.
I have a really hard time hearing this stuff. Always have. To avoid reality i’ll talk about movies. I felt sick and left the theater during a certain scene in Cape Fear. I actually threw up watching Last House on the Left. That was, what?, 30 something years ago. I still get the same way.
One of your other commenters said she had to sit with this and re-read some of it before commenting. I should do that too before typing further. But I won’t. I won’t re-read it and I won’t sit with it. Maybe someday i’ll remember what actually happened and be able to process it. But i’m not even gonna try right now
I appreciate you taking the time to read it, I’m honored actually. I didn’t think that you would, since you told me you don’t read long-form pieces. I’m sorry, this one maybe needed a trigger warning.
I think trigger warnings are overused, to the point they have about as much effect as a parental advisory warning.
I can tell when to stop reading, or walk out as the case may be. But I believe that's my responsibility, not the authors. I'm glad you write what you write. Some people need to hear it even if it's the most uncomfortable stuff to hear about. I might need to hear it as a little boy who may have witnessed some things in my family, or as a young man who may not have understood the line between persuasion and coercion. Your ultimate theme-question can be mirrored onto the men involved too
I agree with you re trigger warnings; that's why I didn't write one. I did second-guess myself on that when I first read your comment. I guess I've also always felt that the whole of the human experience deserves, at times, to be heard...not necessarily curated for the hearer, and that, like you said, the reader can usually sense it coming and opt out if it's getting too dark for where they are.
And I understand about the men. I was aiming to gently make that point, that we're all in this tangled mess of sin together, even in scenarios where one person seems more clearly guilty on a human-to-human level (and even those situations are often tangled, even on that level).
One of my favorite quotes by Chesterton: "We men and women are in the same boat, upon a stormy sea. We owe each other a terrible and tragic loyalty." Amen to that.
Perfectly, heart-wrenchingly beautiful. Thanks for sharing. If I were the crying type, I might have cried. To quote my favorite cucumber: "I laughed, I cried. It moved me, Bob."
Seriously. This is a very powerful piece. I am better for having read it.
I laughed, I cried, I lost ten pounds writing it!
(Not really, though there was prayerful fasting involved, for the first time in my life!)
Thank you for your kind words. I think all the poetry is helping my writing, lol, so you get a share of the credit for inspiring me too!
Jesalyn, I keep reading and re-reading this essay. It makes me angry and sad and cringe so bad that sometimes I have to shut it down half-way through. It makes me want to write things I’m not ready to write. Hell, it makes me think things I’m not ready to think. It stops up my mouth so I don’t think I could speak out loud about it even if I knew what to say. All of this is a compliment, by the way. At least I think it is. Someday I hope I have the guts to stop defiantly proclaiming that “I am NOT a victim, ” and “I am NOT a villain.” And to wake up the little creature in my heart that kinda knows that I am both.