when we're wounded together

i have been silent on Facebook, Twitter, this blog, my personal journal. i am in repair amidst a beautiful mess. i am in recovery mode. too many corners in my mind. so much to do to set my heart right. i'm not together, but i am getting there.
   thankfully, all the stuff that i think i need was avoided by the mouth of the tornado. i feel too lucky and too blessed to complain about how the last weeks of my senior year evaporated while i sat in the basement thinking about what a waste of my time this tornado warning was. i walked up the stairs still ignorant and ten minutes later, i was wondering if my friends on fifteenth street were alive. i didn't know tornados actually picked up houses and killed people like in the fucking Wizard of Oz. but, this indeed does happen and it has across the south. the destruction and damage goes beyond the ruined houses, buildings, families, injured, deaths and seeps into emotions that cannot be described.
     these past few days though, i have witnessed broken people helping in unimaginable ways. i have seen a community so tightly bound together determined to rebuild stronger. needs have not only been met, but have been exceeded. the donation locations are over-flooded with clothing. i've been amazed. its a beautiful mess. in the oddest way, there is much more than pain and hurt when you drive through the hardest hit areas. there is resilience as expressed by the mayor. there is beauty. strength. i walked around in awe, submerged in (the) contradictions.
to those who helped volunteer, who donated their "precious stuff," their time and their money, to those who were affected, who prayed, who offered kind words to ease hurt, you have done more than you know. the seeds that you have planted make a larger difference than you will ever know. i have been amazed by you. i have watched and been encouraged to join in your courage and faith. your efforts go against the selfish norm. like picking up trash in dresses.
     driving home from Tuscaloosa after taking every ounce of evidence that i ever once lived in that little apartment, i stumbled upon this older song and played it on repeat for almost an hour. i can't help but thinking that Tuscaloosa and those who love the town are a beautiful mess.
it kind of hurts when the kind of words you write, turn themselves into knives. the happy graduation wishes are received with salt, bitterness, while images of the storm fill my mind. it was never suppose to be like this.
   it's okay to be strong but needy. humble but greedy. because i know that (my) mind is rather reckless. well, i guess it just suggests that this is just what happiness is. hey, what a beautiful mess this is... and I have to believe that in this madness, there's no shame in being crazy. 
i love what he sings triumphantly at the end. shit happens. times change. hearts break. but it's no big deal. it's nothing we can't handle when we are wounded together. and isn't that exactly what we are? wounded but TOGETHER?
so as i feel the burden of describing how bad it is, i can find comfort in my friends and foundation who is all experiencing exactly what i am. because here we are. two days after what was suppose to be our graduation after a week completely different than what we had ever envisioned. and from here, we WILL heal. together.

through TIMELESS words and PRICELESS pictures, we'll FLY like birds out of this Earth.
and times, they turn. and hearts disfigure.
but that's no concern when we're wounded together.


here we are. we're still here. we are waiting closure. and we will get it. we will get praise for our efforts and our hard work and our impressive accomplishments because we deserve it. and we will continue to love, pray, support in all ways possible for as long as needed and even after. this spirit must carry through for months to come as we save ourselves and start again. and when we do get that closure and when we start healing, we will confidently say, the wait was so worth it.
thanks for reading this novel of a post and i hope it provided you with some comfort. i am still fighting urges to lament about how unfair all of this is from every single angle. i still have not cried. but i have to believe that we will understand why this happened in the end and that it's all going to work out more beautifully than we could have constructed on our own.
John Mayer says in the video link posted above, "the lyric idea for In Repair came from this kind of knowledge about the way people are. that we're always either on the way down or on the way up and you never really enjoy the moment when it's all put together 'cause it probably never really is. those moments where things come apart is only setting you up for that moment when you put it back together again. and you're so surprised that it's coming back together again. so there's this beauty of the idea of being in repair."