Showing Up

So yesterday before bed I was laying there talking with the J-Man and I was doing what I usually do: breaking down all of my requests into concise form. Its a nice habit I think, it helps me more than it helps the J-Man obviously considering he knows what I'm going to ask before I ask it. However it allows me to understand myself alot better, rather than simply understanding that I want something I have a greater understanding of the reasons I want that something to begin with.

The first thing that struck me was that none of my requests mattered, that in fact I had asked for all of those things multiple times and the J-Man had not misplaced them or forgotten about them (another lesson in understanding that he works on his own timetable, not on mine). More to the point I wondered what I should be asking him and the words "What do you want me to do?" came out (before that I had thought about saying "What do you need me to do?" but realized that he doesn't "need" anything from me). I had asked that quite a few times before, this certainly wasn't the first or the last time. But for some reason they seemed to hold more value this time around, I guess its like telling someone you love them simply out of habit and telling someone you love them just before one of you dies. The telling comes from some deep seated part of you and it conveys so much more through the words. It felt like this time I had really meant it, had really wanted to know this time around. He of course obliged, not simply answering me with words but in an odd sort of way (which for him is pretty normal).

I began to wonder what it would be like if he was a physical being, if our relationship was built on physical pretenses. I imagined calling up my friends to play some poker and calling up the J-Man to join us, or playing Catan with Shadraq and the J-Man and whoever else we could get a hold of. Then I made the connection, even though I find that my relationship with him has so far diverged from what anyone would call "normal" I still put religious constraints on it. I'm still using a religious measure to try to figure out if our relationship is "good"or if we are "moving forward". I think its a realization that in the end he asked us to love him. He never asked us to "make it work" he didn't ask us to "grow up" or keep some sort of tab on our relationship so he would know were we where. Seek and you shall find, knock and the door shall be opened, the only thing required of us in those statements is that we show up. He wants us to call him up, to set aside time for him. Time and effort on our part is all hes looking for, which is weird to think about. I imagine that in heaven the only record keeping that he does as far as measuring his success with us is keeping a record of the time we commit to him, and I'm not talking about the religious type of commitment where you spend 4 hours in intercession. I mean just sitting there thinking about him, or shooting the breeze telling him how your day was.