I Refuse to Write Trite Words During a Tragedy

Why the Online "Pez Dispenser Model" Doesn't Work for Me

I was on vacation when the Texas flood tragedy happened.

It’s in times like these that writers are supposed to find the good words for everyone, especially on social media.

Can I be honest? I hate social media for forcing us into becoming like a dispenser of Pez— expecting us to spit out prayers and poems within hours of hearing the news of little girls, families and heroes being swept away by mad waters interrupting their sleep.

What if you’re still weeping over what happened?

What if you can’t dispense out words so quickly?

What if you don’t want to?

Because we writers — not the formalized ones social media has made us into — are also often the biggest feelers. We need a minute, or a week. Maybe we never want to write about something so deep and hard at all.

It’s true that words can be our healing balm. They’ve certainly healed me many times before. So I mean no disrespect to anyone who offered true, good ones in the face of this tragedy.

Personally, I just can’t do it much anymore.

I found myself in the weirdest of places 10 days ago — on vacation, laughing and enjoying my family, while hearing the news of folks grieving the loss of their own.

These are the kinds of things that I struggle with, if you were ever curious. Not doubt, typically. Not believing God. But injustice. Reconciling the fairness, or lack thereof, of life, itself.

Maybe you can relate.

I know God is good. I know God is love. I know, as certain as I have breath in my lungs, that God is real.

I also know that life is hard. Life is cruel. And yes, life is unjust.

I just do not like it.

I think what’s important is being allowed to say that, at times, without guilt. Christians often do not even want to acknowledge that tension.

Many a good church-goer has lived their life reciting pleasing statements like, “Let God and let God” and “God is good all the time, all the time, God is good” and I’m not here to judge how much they mean it.

But one time, my friend, Angela, who buried her 17 year old son, told me that singing the words to the song, “Good, Good Father,” just weren’t rolling off the tongue like they used to. I never forgot that.

The days after the Texas flood, I wanted to offer a soothing prayer for people on social media. I just didn’t have any good words to write.

And if there’s one thing I’ve learned through my years of being a writer, it’s not to force words. I love Jesus and my readers too much to be a Pez dispenser online.

These days, when my heart breaks, I just have to sit with it for a bit. Pray without words, most of the time. Let Jesus send a breeze or the lick of my dog’s rough tongue or hearing my family laughing to comfort me.

And then maybe, like today, He gives me some words to write about it.

PS: For my CCC — sharing a few intimate family pics from our vacation…and a few quick tips for if you ever sail off to Alaska. What a beautiful time we had! Keep reading for that.