A Quiet Tuesday

I used to think that healing would feel dramatic.

I imagined fireworks.

Some overwhelming moment where I'd suddenly wake up and realize I was completely over everything that had happened.

Instead...

it has looked like ordinary Tuesdays.

I've started noticing that God doesn't usually heal me in the extraordinary moments. He heals me while I'm washing dishes, driving home, taking my son to the park, editing a podcast, making coffee, folding laundry, or laughing with my parents over something completely ridiculous.

Sometimes I catch myself smiling for no particular reason. A year ago, I would've immediately felt guilty. I would've wondered if I was somehow betraying my own grief by enjoying the day. Now I simply smile back at life.

There's something incredibly holy about ordinary happiness.

I don't think I appreciated that before.

I spent so much of my life believing that joy had to come from big moments. Falling in love. Getting married. Having everything finally make sense. But lately I've discovered that peace usually arrives much more quietly than that.

It arrives while watching my son discover something for the very first time.

It arrives during a long walk by the water.

It arrives when I open my Bible without looking for answers and simply spend time with God.

It arrives when I stop checking whether life is unfolding according to my plans and simply participate in the life that's already in front of me.

I've begun to realize that my life didn't stop because my marriage did.

For a long time, I unknowingly lived as though it had. It felt like everything was on pause while I waited for God to reveal the ending of a story I couldn't finish myself.

But life never paused.

The birds kept singing.

The ocean kept moving.

The seasons changed.

My son kept growing.

God kept being faithful.

And somehow... so did I.

Not perfectly.

Not every day.

But enough to notice that I am no longer merely surviving.

I'm living again.

That sentence feels almost foreign to write.

I still have questions.

I still have wounds.

I still have days when grief visits unexpectedly.

But grief no longer owns the entire house.

It simply knocks from time to time.

And when it does, I let it sit with me for a while.

Then I watch it leave again.

Maybe that's what healing is.

Not evicting sadness forever.

Learning that it no longer gets to decide how the day ends.

Tonight, after putting my son to bed, I made myself a cup of tea and sat in silence for a few minutes. There was nothing remarkable about the evening. No great revelation. No answered prayer. No extraordinary consolation.

Just quiet.

The kind of quiet I used to fear.

The kind of quiet I now recognize as peace.

And I couldn't help but smile.

Because I think...

this ordinary Tuesday would have once felt unbearably lonely.

Today...

it felt like home.

💜