by Kathy Berklund-Pagé

     Three weeks into the process of preparing our home to go on the market, we live in chaos as larger repairs eclipse the small upgrades we had planned. Exhaust fans and banisters are no longer up to code. Accessing bathroom lights required removing a kitchen cabinet. When my husband checked a pipe behind the toilet, it burst, spewing water in all directions.

     Part of me—the purely rational, objective part—can laugh, but I’m also aware of a growing franticness. As I poke about in the feeling, I find that house frustrations are only the top layer. A tangled jumble of fears and worries lie beneath. The unknowness of where we will live and work next . . . the teenaged children I must set free to choose their own paths . . . the realization that I no longer hear the characters in my novel talking to each other, or to me. Have they moved away, feeling neglected and offended? Or are they still there, their words lost in the cacophony of other voices shrieking for my attention?

     In both my novel and my real life, I find myself increasingly tight and retreated, with a deep desire to control events and people. Where is the oasis the core of my being needs for passion, love, and imagination, to be released? I ache for something, someone bigger than me, to be bedrock for my heart to rest on.

     I could go to God. But if I do, will I find my creator to be enough?