Ad Nauseum

Life of late has been...chaotic.  

To put it mildly.

Everything has been in flux; everything has been changing.  Plans have been up in the air, we've had to constantly "play things by ear" and improvise (a skill I lack), and there has been very little stability.

On the whole, I'm not very good with change.  Being flexible is not natural to me (neither schedule-wise, nor physically, to which my high school physical fitness records will attest.)  I like routine. I like predictability.  Novelty is very attractive, but my feet need a stable base; that base has been rocked pretty hard these last few weeks.

What has changed?  Well, my husband was/is fighting a life-threatening infection, twice, spending a total of about 12 days in the hospital all told, and now after 2 surgeries faces a slow recovery.  In the meantime, yellow jackets built a nest in our office ceiling and chewed a hole through the drywall, making their way into our house (that problem is contained but still unresolved.)  I dismantled my support system/friendships with my own hands (the right move I think, but insanely hard.)  My gardens (food supply) are dying from the heat and drought.  The (dumb)phone I pre-ordered last year to replace my constantly-dying one finally arrived, and it's a massive change.  Even which side of the bed I sleep on has been temporarily altered (medical reasons.)  

So, how have I survived?  How have I stayed sane?

(Who says that I have? Ha!)

Repetition has always been a thing with me.  When I was a kid, I remember when my babysitter would come by, she'd usually bring a few movies with her.  I'd get to pick one to watch, and EVERY SINGLE TIME it was the same one.  And when it finished, I'd immediately want to watch it again.  

I'd constantly twirl my hair.  I mean, Constantly.  To stop was like ceasing to breathe.  It was the soothing feeling, the repetitive motion, that was calming.  (I still do this, but generally with more restraint.  At some point it switched to pulling/shredding often, so now I usually braid it...but I digress.)

My favorite food for a while was a plain bologna and cheese sandwich.  It was the best thing ever, and all that I wanted to eat.  My mom would make it for me every day for lunch.  ...Until one day, I remember, I ate a bite, suddenly felt sick, and immediately vomited.  I don't think I ate another one until sometime in my teen years.

Why am I saying all of this?  Because part of the answer to the question, "How have I survived?" is just that: Repetition.

While sitting in the hospital and waiting - watching my husband in agony, shaking, hooked to all kinds of monitors, with doctors trying to figure out what's going on - trying not to look down into the deep dark "What if?" pit...in the moments when nothing was happening and he was out of it, I'd put on my headphones and listen to music. 

A few weeks earlier I'd decided I didn't care anymore if playing the same song over and over and over was weird; if no one else can hear it, then what difference does it make?  So, I'd listen to the same songs on repeat. When I'd go home from the hospital each day, I'd kill a few more wasps that had made it past the plastic barrier to the office, look at the pile of dishes, the dying plants, the heaped-up laundry, and the untouched to-do list...and I'd put the headphones back on, tackle the non-negotiable dishes late into the night, and find comfort in the repetition, in the routine, in the predictability in a completely unpredictable life.

I know this tune. I know these words. I know what happens next. I can sing along. This dish fits on the drying rack here.  That slick, punchy bass comes in here, and starts driving hard at the chorus.  These jars get washed last, because they need the bottle brush.  There's that sweet guitar solo again.  I'm not sick of it yet; keep it going round and round.

There are worse ways to cope, I suppose. 

Songs on repeat have helped to get me through some of the hardest, most emotionally-trying moments in my recent past.  They now carry memories with them, and at some point when I need to move on - or  I'm finally sick of it for the time being - it's time for new songs.  Maybe I look weird, with my big headphones on, indoors, in a noisy room or a busy hospital. But it's an escape when things get overwhelming. And I don't really care anymore, I guess, if people look at me askance. 

Putting on a song that has become so deeply ingrained, and that has walked with me through the hard moments...it is like burying myself in the warm embrace of a dear, familiar friend.  

(And, in the absence of such friends in real life, it is perhaps a poor substitute.  But I'll take what I can get at this point.)

Now, one thing I'd like to say here:  Don't go deciding, based on this, that I only became a Lutheran because I like repetition.  

I remember when my sister converted to Roman Catholicism way back when, hearing people say that it made sense, because her personality was of the type that was drawn to ritual.  I DO love the Liturgy, and if there was ever anything that offered TRUE comfort in life, that's it: Christ's gifts of Word and Sacrament, nourishing and sustaining faith, delivered in a predictable, repetitive fashion that works down into your psyche in a way that makes it really stick...this is truly wonderful, and if you ever want to take it from me, you'll have to pry it from my cold, dead hands!  That said, it's NOT why I became a Lutheran.  Indeed, it was one of the last things about Lutheranism that I embraced - certainly not what drew me into it!  I became a Lutheran because of the doctrine.  Full stop.  I didn't join the church because I liked the "worship style."  But now that I am one, and have come to love the Liturgy, it's no small part of what keeps me Lutheran.

So, I've found comfort, when life is chaos, in escaping into repetition, finding predictability in the midst of the unpredictable.  Upbeat songs listened to on repeat for hours has helped, in feeling like there are things in this life that can still offer some stability.  The repetition in the Divine Service offers true, lasting, eternal stability, so that when even the few semi-stable things in this life fall to pieces, there's still ultimate Truth that can never be shaken.  And I'm not only a far distant consumer of a song written by people I'll never know, but I'm actively - physically, even - anchored to The Author, The One who is Constant, Who is and Who was and Who is to come, Who knows me by name and holds on to me, from Whom neither death nor life etc. can separate me, Who is predictable because He has given me His Word from which He cannot deviate.

So, yeah.  Repetition is pretty cool.

And while I may get sick of a song (or a lunchmeat), there are some words that I can never hear enough of: 

"I forgive you all of your sins."

-M

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(Songs that have spent some serious time on repeat.)

[Side-note: You might say, "If you like repetition, why do you hate Contemporary Worship so much? That stuff's hyper-repetitive; you should love it!"  Answer: I did.  I used to swim in it, listen to it constantly, breathe it, create it.  But the focus is all wrong, and the doctrine is a mess, and it's not reinforcing Truth but is rather peddling lies.  It is in itself a confession, in using repetition in a way to manipulate and try to create an internal, substitute "sacrament", denying that God meets with us physically in The Supper, and proclaiming that the Holy Spirit needs no vehicle (except a carefully-crafted, emotional song.)  But that's a rant for another day.]