I know that I’m not the easiest person to get to know, or to get along with.  I’m very guarded, and I have a lot of walls.  Walls that are thick, and high.  Walls made of bricks and mortar rather than dirt and sand.  I have carefully built those walls, and am loathe to let them fall.  Some people are better at tearing down those walls than others, and some people just vault the walls and root themselves into my life (for which I am grateful, eventually).  But, nine times out of ten, my walls are so high and so thick that people go running, and I let them go.

As much as I try to let my guard down, shrink my walls to ankle level, I can’t.  At least I can’t here and now.  I could back at Gordon.  There I felt like people really knew me, and they cared.  Even if it was superficial, they cared.  And then I came to MSU, where I immediately put up my walls again, and may have even built them higher than before.  I feel safe behind my walls, albeit lonely many times.  I can be myself behind my walls, dance when no one is watching, sing when no one is listening.  I can be afraid behind my walls because no one will see.  I can miss people who are many states away behind my walls, because they will never know how I really feel.  I can break down behind my walls, because I can put myself back together again (outwardly presentable, at least) before anyone sees me.  I can be honestly vulnerable behind my walls, because my walls are there to protect me.

My walls are my security, my facade to the outside world.  They hide my true feelings, my fears, my shortcomings, my CF.  I come off (unintentionally, many times) as know-it-all or holier-than-thou because I am afraid of what people will think of me if they see the me behind the walls – the vulnerable, scared, unsure, doesn’t-think-she’s-worth-it, constantly learning, haltingly praying, messed-up me.  There are seldom few people who have been able to fully penetrate my thick walls, and to those people I say thank you.  You have shown me grace and mercy, which hat I only hope I have reciprocated to you.  You have helped to show me that my walls are a hindrance, a hurdle that I must get over.  It’s not going to happen overnight.  When I wake up tomorrow, I’ll still have those walls.  With God’s help, they might just be one brick lower.