Saturday, May 29, 2010

Holy Sandpaper Batman!

   We all have 'Them' in our lives. 'Them' are sandpaper people. They're the ones that unknowingly poke our very last gracious, smiling nerve in the eye and THEN has the gall to tamper with our don't-EVEN-go-there tolerance meter.

    Sandpaper people are just like left-lane drivers...they don't know that they are one!!

(Disclaimer: The previous statement is not always true in all situations, because there are some individuals that have made very successful careers in the annoyance business on purpose.)

   I have had sandpaper people leave me feeling exhausted from just having a conversation with them. Others have given me the simulation of being jack-hammered. I have at times felt like I was being tossed like a huge salad or like I was in need of an emotion resuscitation. Like I needed to be defragmented.

   Sandpaper people come in different grits, anywhere from a 36-grit which is a heavy duty sandpaper used in an orbital sanding machine to sand down hardwood floors. All the way down to a 1,000-grit, a fine paper used to sand precious metal parts in an antique car restoration.

 The results is the same.....
 Sanding rubs off all of the unnecessary and useless build up of gack that has accumulated over a period of time. Could this possibly mean that sandpaper people are in our lives to remove the layers of unyielding, unattractive, and unabashed crud we have grown to call our personalities?

   I would like to say that I am not the one with the personality malfunction. I would like to say that 'They' are the ones with the  kooky thoughts or weirdo characteristics or whack-a-do tendencies. And 'They' make me want to run and hide among the ones that are 'normal', like me, because my comrades and I feel safe when we are all 'normal' together. But, inevitably here one comes making a buzzing sound and I struggle to get through my sanding session. Argh.

    I had a black German Shepherd about 3 years ago that absolutely traumatized me. He was a sandpaper dog. Nothing he did soothed me or brought me wondrous happiness. He was a hammering hammer, a drilling drill of a personality.

   What his actions put me through challenged every area of my human kindness. The day came when my furry orbital sander got to move on to another owner, but not until I learned this:
     That it was me that needed the grinding away of my imperfections, my irritations, my exasperation.
     That I had a need to have everything and everyone around me be like me.
     That I should look at my sanding appointments with a more purposeful angle.  

   These grating people (or animals) are not placed into my life to ruin me, but to rid me of the deposits of film that has covered my life and the way I perceive myself to be. In my eyes, I DO love my neighbor, except that one...or maybe that one...and definitely not that one!

   I am okay with Sister Cuckoo being a part of the group...as long as she doesn't act cuckoo. How about old Mrs.Grumpty Grump that insists on thriving on her vibe of negativity? There's always Mrs. Fault-Finder and Miss I'm Telling Somebody, aka Drama Queen. It's a big fat bummer.

   Or Chatty Cathy that makes you want to sing Father Guido's one-hit wonder "Shut Uppa You Face". And there's always a Mr. Know-It-All and a Miss I've-Got-It-All and a Sir I've-Done-It-All. There's an, I'm-Not-Going-To-Do-It-On-Your-Time-Schedule lady and a Would-You-Listen-To-Me-Drone man.

   The Clingy-Needy relationships and the It's-All-About-Me mentalities leave me with sore sanded spots all over my emotions and brain. I always want to use their face as the poster child of the cause of all my woes. After all, look at how 'They' make me act! That would be like turning on a light in a closet and saying, "Look at the mess this light has caused."

   "God, You know that my hardwoods can only be sanded so many times, what else could you possibly want from me?"

   "These people not only step over my boundaries, but they traipse around like they're clueless to their offense, which I find to be...offensively offensive."

    "Why am I always the one that gets singled-out? You never deal with Brother Doodad, it's always me."

    "Why, God why?".......Pearls, baby, pearls.

   Contrary to popular belief, natural pearls are formed, not by a grain of sand, but by a parasite that gets into the shell, and because of the damage that is done by the parasite, the clam secretes nacre which coats the inside of the shell which in due time produces a beautiful pearl from the mother-of-pearl sac.

   You could call the sandpaper person a parasite of sorts, that makes you unable to do anything else but to squirt, squirm, and grow from the whole pearl making experience.

    So, when you feel totally sandblasted and are completely sanded down to the bare metal, please don't think that you are being punished. Not so!

   A Holy God has taken interest in your development and desires to further enhance your beauty by taking extra measures to do it.

   With a Masterful hand and under a watchful eye He will bring forth, out of you, a pearl worth a great price, that lo and behold, sandpaper people helped produce.
 

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