Waiting Basket

The only downside of catching up with my mending is my basket is now empty. Oh, I'm not saying I enjoy mending. Relief flooded me when I grabbed that last garment. But this isn't really about me and how I felt, but rather how forlorn my basket now seems as it rests under my machine, waiting...

Oh, but what do you wait for, dear basket? For months and months didn't we dream of sorting through all that stuff I'd piled into you? 

First, the jumper I'd made from African fabrics long ago. I cannibalized a thrift store lace blouse and made it into a dress. Then a tawny-colored dress with a rip near the hem left your space and was soon returned to my wardrobe, ready for all my cleaning shenanigans. A lovely new floral satin skirt I found for twenty-five cents refused to heed decency: I sewed up the front button seam. All that remains now is a lap quilt my Grandma never finished; I'll back it another day. 

Sure, none of these garments were perfect. But they were your friends. They filled you up and satisfied your very own need to be useful. They brightened your faded self; you felt interesting, respected, loved. And now, in a single afternoon, they are all gone. 

They no longer need you. And so you're just... there. 

You know you shouldn't want to be full again. Because that will mean things will have to break. And yet... your purpose is to hold broken things. Who are you without those imperfect garments? You, a large, barren basket. Waiting. 

Ah, but maybe you don't want my sympathy. Do you enjoy collecting dust? Am I merely projecting my own current frazzled feelings? I know what it feels like to have sorted through the junk in my life and let it all go and feel.. empty, hollow, purposeless. 

To not even have anything to cry over anymore. Because it's all gone. 

Sometimes it feels I am waiting. To be broken again? To have something to cry over again? 

No. 

I'm waiting to hold love again. To feel alive and full, knowing that if I cry it is for something good. To know that I can cry. To know that I am God's vessel being used, never abandoned or discarded. 

I don't want to be filled with broken things anymore though. I think I'd rather have tears of joy when my tears return. No more pain. No more suffering. Let me hold something permanent and whole. Let me be permanent and whole. And more than tears or dust, let me laugh. 

Ah, but maybe God wants me to be more like this basket, not thinking of what I want, but what He has for me. It's not about fulfilling my desires, but having patience throughout whatever it is God calls me to walk through. Including the times I feel empty.