Anca Stefania Iorgulescu

I don't know how others are. I only have my singular human experience.
And me, I wake up to a different personality every single day. Most of my energy goes into coercing my negative bias into behaving. Some sort of entitlement, constantly creeping in, as if life should bow and bend the knee in front of my desires.
I'm part of the 2%. The 2% fortunate enough to be healthy, to easily have all their necessities covered, to have access to more than just the bare necessities. I forget about God most of the time. Just live my life, full of myself. I crayon in togetherness the colours of our self-absorbed, centred-on-the-self reality.
There is no God in I. There is no grace.

There is a parable, by Confucius, they say.
Heaven and hell are the same: two long tables, full of everything you could want to eat. Sinners and good-doers alike, welcome at both. Only one rule: the chopsticks are two metres long.
In hell, no one eats. Everyone reaching, stabbing, contorting, trying to feed themselves with something never designed for that. Starving in front of plenty. The table full. The people hollow.
In heaven, same table. Same chopsticks. Same impossible geometry.
Everyone eats.
Why?
Because in heaven, they feed each other.

It's been a tough two months. I grieved. Maybe on the outside I looked the same, but the joy was gone.
God never deserted me, though.
And through His grace, I know that everything that happens in my life He either wills or allows. There is no bad. Everything is an invitation for the heart to open, to the truth, and to the incommensurable love that God has for His creation.

I am learning to use my chopsticks.

You ask how have we been for the last 2 weeks.

We've been fine. Nerve-wrecking, waking up most days in the middle of the night to bombs being intercepted or security notifications, fine.

We've been fine. Eyeballs on the screen, checking every 10 seconds for updates, fine. Full tank always, at the end of the day, fine. Carrying a passport and all the most important documents always with us, fine.

We've been fine. Moving the furniture away from windows, keeping each window 1 cm open, just in case, fine.

We've been fine, stretched between God, faith, nervous system regulation techniques, palpating the edge, what was that noise, a neighbor slamming the door or a new attack, fine.

We've been fine, ruptured between family and future, knowing home is here and leaving is not really something to consider, fine.

We've been fine, brushing it off when someone calls us courageous for venturing out of the house for work, fine. We're not courageous, we're reliable, we're dependable, we're not letting our freedom invaded by people with Messianic complexes decisions, fine.

We've been fine, washing the waves of grief off our faces, shaking out the palpable tension, hugging in the uncertainty, dancing off the long sighs and breathing in the long minutes before a "the threat has been eliminated and you can now go back to your normal life" message, fine.

We've been fine. How have you been?