Imagine taking the time and tranquility to run a bath of water to the perfect temperature, hot enough but not scalding.

You add your expensive oils and bubbles invested in for the finest skin care and aroma to soak in. They will wash away all the dirt from your body knowing that following a long relaxing soak you will feel clean fresh and smelling wonderful. While allowing all the stresses worries and cares to float away from off of your shoulders.

Then just before you get in you give the water a stir to test the heat and your hand gets caught in the chain and the plug is pulled.

You grapple around unable to see clearly because of the bubbles and the cloudy water they created, trying desperately to get the plug back in the plughole. All attempts fail and the water is disappearing rapidly down the drain.

Until all that is left are the bubbles.

Though the water is all gone in what seems the blink of an eye the bubbles will take a long time to pop. The bubbles may look lovely as they reflect the light and present many colours, but they only epitomize what is gone, and they, eventually will burst and be gone too.

Yes you can run another bath in time when the water heater restores the possibility to do so.

But that will be a new bath, and will take time to rerun.

The other is gone ~ down the drain, plummeting with haste through underground pipes then out into the open waters.

Those elements of water will never exist together again.

There are many varied unplanned and unprepared for catastrophes that will pull the plug on life.

A car crash, illness, theft, assaults, redundancy, medical or other mistakes or negligence may occur. Along with infidelity, relational breakdown and death, they all have the potential to be life changing to an overwhelming level.

Three years have passed since the plug was pulled out of my life. For a year I grappled to get the plug back in so that my entire life didn’t circle down the drain.

There were the confusing meddling cloudy contaminated bitter sweet waters that were unrelenting in their vague mystifying bewilderment, blurring and complicating all efforts to save and salvage the dregs of a precious relationship that had taken years to cultivate and get as good as possible.

Weeds and nettles, thorns and briars as well as the plumes and scents of buds, blossoms and blooms.

Down the drain it all went…

Why am I writing about this now after three years?

Because I am three years ahead of someone who may just have had the plug pulled.

Or two years forward from somebody who’s life in some form has just gone down the drain.

I’m inspired to reach out to help encourage empower and enable others toward hope and faith, strength and resilience.

My last bubble is ready to burst, and i am ready.

I have been living in a bubble since summer 2015.

Many have burst, but there has always been another to draw me in.

I may be in my last one or maybe my last but one, I have no fear, I am ready for the real world and a real life however it may materialise.

Recently I said to friends that I have been living in a bubble of unreality and I don’t have a tangible life yet.

Very kindly and without judgement they replied:

That’s how it looks from outside your bubble.

Though bubbles are real, and you can see the future through them, they are not the future, they’re not meant for permanence. They’re transitional, the space between what was and what is next.

But they are delicate, precious, protective and provisional while they exist.

What are bubbles?

Bubbles are compartments of soapy water that are full of air. When soap and water are combined and air is wafted into the combination, the soap produces a thin coating that traps air inside it, forming a bubble.

What a wonderful picture of our creator Gods shield and shelter in a time of trauma and life change.

With air in the bubble we can breathe, where there is breath we have life, where there is life we have hope and where there is hope…

…we have the joyful expectation of good.

Then joy gives way to strength and with strength comes healing and purpose, opportunity and promise.

I want to introduce you to my bubbles.

First, the bubble shock. As in an electric shock, there is a debilitation and feeling of being out of control as the body shakes. The tremors of despair and trauma are numbing. I was able to function without falling apart, because the body has its way of protecting itself with almost a formidable strength that is quite difficult to understand unless you are that person. I talked myself out of that bubble within several months.

Then there was the bubble denial. I refused to let my husband go, even when friends and family so loyally wanted to pop that one for me. I was not willing to face the unpleasant facts and acknowledge the truth that separation means separate directions. That bubble didn’t burst until a few short months ago.

Regret, that one would entice me in every now and then. I would begin to think of what I could have and should have done differently, even in our last few months together.

Anger, I visited that one several times, often vented when I was with my husband. I would express my anger with a text or email that would light my fire of frustration for his stupidity and recklessness. And her, she was the focus of so much anger, which got ugly at times. I don’t really care much on the matter of her anymore, apart from being sorry for her. I have made other judgements but they’re not for airing now.

Diversion, This was a big bubble and I loved being inside the membrane of distraction. Thankfully I am creative and never tire of projects to design. I work with driftwood, pebbles and wool. It has been a delight that many of my designs have actually sold. There is a page on my website where my work can be browsed and purchased. www.bornoffiremedia.org  Elaine Johnston Designs.

Friendships. Though my friends will always be there, and not burst, there has been intensity in the strength and support I have absorbed from them. I love and appreciate friends who have patiently been there when I needed them. I have spent weeks on the road travelling from town to town drawing from their love and care.

Then there’s acceptance, which is the one I am in now. It should be the most painful, but in reality, it is the most liberating. This covering allows me to contemplate my future. Honestly, I never imagined being ready for this. Amazingly I am excited about what’s ahead and am looking forward to finding my own home in the New Year and where that will be. Previously I have struggled to think about where home will be as in the past an opportunity or purpose has determined where I have lived. Now I am at peace in my head about where I plan to settle for the next chapter of my life.

Thank you God for bubbles, in them you have protected me from fear and worry, as I have never felt unsafe or unloved or forgotten.

Look forward to the promise troubled friends; in the meantime remain in the bubble. They will burst when it’s time. Where a person may want to pop it prematurely for you, smile and move out of the way.

I have it on reliable divine authority that everything will be ok, more than ok.

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 He (God) has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart…

Psalm 18:30 As for God His way is perfect.

 

 

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