Life

I was going through my photos on my phone last night and came across one that I forgot I took and it was recently. I think I’ll tell the whole story behind the picture, here goes:
Way back in the 1990’s I got a divorce, I worked three jobs, raised three kids and went to school, it wasn’t an easy time in my life. Somewhere in the mid 90’s my ex-husband decided to sue me for custody of our children. I think to say it was rough would be an understatement.
It was while this was going on my art history professor gave us an assignment, go to the museum and choose an ancient Egyptian piece that moves you and write about it. Easy enough, I love the museum and I LOVE Ancient Egyptian, well anything.
So off I went, in search of the perfect piece, so many to choose from, I finally settle on a statuette of Basttet. I have it, I’m done, so I can enjoy the rest of the day, wondering around aimlessly, taking in all of the beauty and wonder the DMA has to offer.
Then I see it, a painting that calls to my soul, my battered and bruised soul. It was a landscape of a cemetery, one that has clearly seen better days.
A cemetery that is on the coast, it has been forgotten, forsaken, the weeds have begun to overtake it the weather batters it and yet it still stands.
It stands, the headstones are weatherworn but readable, the people will not be forgotten.
It spoke to me, I was incredibly battered at that time, alone, forgotten, yet standing, I knew in that instant I wasn’t alone, that someone, somewhere had felt the way I was feeling.
My knees buckled and the tears just flowed, a security guard came over with a chair and said the painting does that to a lot of people. He handed me a tissue and said for me to take my time.
I didn’t write about Basttet, I couldn’t, my heart was too full of what I had just learned about myself from one painting.
My art history professor didn’t give me a pass but she did encourage me to go into some form of writing.
Last month the Irishman and I went to the DMA, I specifically wanted to see if my painting was still there. It was, it still invoked such emotion in my soul I had a hard time looking away from it.
I know whatever life throws at me, I am strong, I am resilient and I am not really alone, God walks with me, Jesus saved my soul.