Katya’s story.  Yes, I’m calling myself Katya again. I don’t know why. For now, just let it be.

I’ve never been a goth. I’ve never called myself a goth, I’ve never even known what a goth is. But tonight, I’ve read stories of goths. Christian goths. Goths who are Christians. People who were gothic and Christlike, people who were Christlike and became Gothic. And I understood something. The gothic bit is an acceptance. It is an acceptance and embracing of pain. An acceptance and embracing that we’re walking a hard road. That the trials are there for a reason. That this world isn’t perfect. There are the bits that come from God, but that this isn’t how it’s meant to be. There are more things in store. There are better things to come. The human being is beautiful, and the human spirit is beautiful, but all the goodness and light isn’t here yet. When we think about God’s blessings in this life, yes, he loves us and wants the best for us, but that makes it seem horribly like the end of the story. But this isn’t it. We can’t settle for the joys of the desert, when the Promised Land awaits.

I saw the first Narnia film with Margaret on Saturday. It really really hit home. I saw them lining up to battle. They knew what they had to do, and they knew that Aslan was on their side. More specifically, that they were on his. They knew they had to hit it with everything they’d got. The peace came afterward. Like anything, the party comes after the studying. The cold beer comes after the backbreaking. The rest comes as a reward for a job well done. And our job is not done. Our party is not here yet. We still have work to do.

Too much, I have been thinking about the now. I’m finding it difficult to cope NOW. There are stresses NOW. I want what’s going to be right for my life NOW. But why "what was right", I was looking for peace. And not the Jesus kind of peace, that tells you that even if there are storms and fierce winds and it’s raining so much you can barely see where you’re going, but you know, and you KNOW that you are heading in the right direction. You can just about see that cottage up ahead with the light on and you know that there’s a welcome for you there. And it gives you hope. You think of the fire, and the blanket, and the mother figure making you tea. You think of the hot meal, and then the hot bath, and then the sound night’s sleep you’ll have in the very comfy bed, and how ideal the world will seem then. Yes, that’s a bit Famous Five-ish, but it’s true. And just that small light ahead in the cottage, when the wind is blowing, and the path has turned to mud, liquid mud. And the rain is beating your face. Between the hood of your raincoat, the wind blowing your hair over your eyes, the hail and the darkness of the storm you can barely see your hand in front of your face. You’re slipping and sliding as you try to find your place, and despite the storm, it’s worse if you hurry. You see the light up ahead, and it keeps you going. But you’re still outside, and you just keep pressing on. That, to me, is the route of the gothic Christian. In actual fact, that to me is the route of the Christian. I’m coming to a bizarre place where I am beginning to see that the gothic, the embracing of the difficult times, and the Christian, the embracing of life, and life in all it’s fullness, which means both the good things and the more difficult but ultimately good things – the gothic and the Christian, cannot in all honesty be separated, if one is to arrive at a believable definition of a Christian.

There are other parts too, of course. Being a Christian is also about the intense joy of the journey. The jokes you crack with your companions. The songs you whistle or hum to yourself. And the periods where the winds and rain subside. It isn’t over, you still have a long journey up a steep hill, but it is a lot more bearable, and a lot more pleasant, and you enjoy it for it’s own sake, as well as for where it is taking you. The sun comes out once in a while and you do know that you are blessed, and even the wind may blow gently for a while and begin to dry out your clothes. But that isn’t the end of your journey, and that isn’t the end of the road.

It is so much more helpful to see the path you are travelling on as a difficult one, and filled with storms, for which the drier, flatter parts, and the periods of sunshine peeking out from behind the clouds are interludes. Interludes which you will appreciate and be grateful for, but only because they help you to gather your strength for the rest of the journey.

I’m not saying there’s anything unbiblical about that, or that there’s anything biblical that suggests the opposite is true. I don’t know if it’s a bible thing, a church thing, or just something I have believed, but in my own selfish way, that peace I was looking for? I was just waiting for the storms to end. I was looking for calmness. I was looking for no more struggles. Sit down on a nice rock, the sun would come out, the birds would start singing again, you’re pretty high up so you’ve got a good view, and just have a picnic.

Only one problem with that theory though. You have your picnic, and what next? You’ve nothing to do. You’ve nowhere to sleep. I haven’t slept outside overnight before, but I can take a good guess that a rock would be pretty uncomfortable. It isn’t a bed. You also haven’t got any shelter, either from the elements or from wild animals. And your food would run out sooner or later, probably sooner in all reality. And much as you might not want to carry on climbing up that hill, settling where you are, selling out, giving up – the alternative is a pretty miserable one. A life on that rock, assuming you could even find a rock, would in the very short term be a better option. But really, it’s nothing compared to the joy and the comforts offered to you in that house.

Jesus-peace is the kind that keeps you going. Stops you giving up because the cottage is too far away or the rod is to steep or the winds are too fierce. Stops you rolling over and playing dead, or just giving yourself up for dead at the side of the road. The devil will play on you and tell you you can’t keep going. Jesus peace tells you you can.

The other kind of "peace", which isn’t any real kind of peace at all really, is the kind of peace that the world gives, I guess, and is the kind of peace that the world is looking for. It is the kind of peace that stops you on the way and gets you to have a picnic on a rock. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes, a picnic on a rock in a dry spell maybe exactly what you need, but it is not an end in itself. If it helps you to gather your strength to continue again, so much the better. If, however, you’d be better off using the dry spells to your advantage, because you could make more progress that way, get further along than you would do ordinarily, and you’d be better resting when the storms are at their worst, then remember that. Look for the wisdom, and look for the wisdom of the whole journey. Try to see the big picture. Know where you’re going, but remember where you are. Don’t get so focused on what the inside of the cottage will be like that you can’t bear where you are. Simultaneously, don’t get so caught up in trying to improve the journey, singing sings and cracking jokes, that you forget why you’re there. You forget, that this isn’t the point. You’re not there yet.

And as the story of Narnia shows us, don’t ignore the job or the battle that is at hand. In the battle in Narnia, much as they would all have loved to have been King or Queen or whatever, their focus was completely on the battle. They did what they needed to do with the time at hand.

Something I haven’t been doing. I have swung between the poles of wanting to rest now, or trying just to get there already. More of the rest now bits. But yeah. I’m not going to continue to beat myself up about what I could have done or should have done or had been doing or ought to stop doing. The lessons I think I needed from this piece have already been expressed, they just need to sink in now, they don’t need rehashing.

I haven’t also even stuck to the theme of what I was supposed to be writing about, which is the separation, or otherwise, the inability to separate, in all trueness, that that is Christian from that that is gothic. I understand a lot more now. And I was also thinking about Narnia. The books of Narnia. About reading them, about letting myself get involved with them. Because I don’t read much fiction, especially not fantasy fiction, even though I do enjoy the concept and some elements of the fantasy itself. I like fantasy. But I like good fantasies, I don’t like weird ones. Maybe I ought to give Lord of the Rings another try (I got bored during the film, I kind of refused to engage with it), but I definitely want to read the Narnia series. Could really help. It does strike me as being somewhat gothic in genre as well, although I’m not too sure why (maybe just an attraction to the fantasy that some of the gothic things can lead to), but …. I was going to say, that’s by the by, that isn’t why I’m doing it, but given what has happened tonight, and how I felt on the verge of something. It was almost even like becoming a Christian. Not nearly as significant, obviously, but I do think there has been a new revelation tonight, I can see something I couldn’t see before, and I don’t want to loose it. It’s a little scary, but I want to run to it and embrace it, and I want to learn more. SO yeah, unless I’m very much mistaken about what the gothic really means, then yeah, I guess tonight I may well just have become a goth! And that is why I’m reading it, well, looking forward to reading it anyway! He he he.

This doesn’t mean I’m going to start wearing makeup though. Not eyeliner. Not really thick eyeliner. Not eyeliner that is actually making a lightning bolt through my eyebrow. I’m not painting my face white. I’m not making a mask. I’ll be a goth, but, you know, there are limits. I’m not wearing any black lipstick. I’m not gonna wear ANY kind of lipstick. Not yet. Not today. Not now. Not for a long time.

But yeah. What I am gonna do now, however, is go to bed. And make shocked faces at the fact that this is now 9 pages long, in a word document. NINE pages long! Dear, dear. I can’t remember the last time I wrote something that was nine pages long! Oh well, I’ve done it now, I’m not going to delete it, we’ll just see what happens next. Other than, I go to bed, obviously. :-D