The Aftermath of Healing
The dining room is a mess. Shards of pottery and glass, sticky puddles, a little blood. A chair smashed to bits. A metal floor lamp bent in half. The high cheek bruises on the face of a priest and the cuts on the hand of another. We have not slept but a few hours in days. Most of us are hoarse and slightly ill.
The person who needed the healing, needed to be confronted and told “no” has fled, telling no one, in the early hours of the morning. We made him a bed. If you are family, if you need healing, we will not turn you out unless we must.
We initiated him. He is family. Sometimes, people are sick of what they get away with. They dare the whole world to stop them and are enraged that no one does.
Your family will stop you. We will see your sickness, your fear that no one can see you or love you as you are, and the infantile rage that causes you to lash out. And we will tell you what we see.
This is the price of healing. The bone aching exhaustion, knees trembling with the effort of standing, but we do not collapse until everything is done. The will rules the body.
Today we mop the shards and the liquid off the floor. Today, we run the broken furniture to the dump. Today, some of us go to work despite it all.
Not all healing is cute. Not all healing is sweet and light and nicely worded prayers and well wishes.
Someone has to meet you where you are, no matter where you are.