Not Alone

Sometimes I feel like God is tapping me upside the head, very gently. “Hey. I’m here. I’m listening. You can talk to me, you know…”
And then sometimes suddenly, unexpectedly He taps me upside the heart, when I’m definitely not expecting it, and all of a sudden I fall apart during a particularly sappy/charismatic song. Yes, me of the Gregorian chant and the mysteries of the East and the Great Doxology and etc. “Do not be afraid I am with you” suddenly hits me. I cried to the point that I was reaching for tissues but realised I didn’t have any. So, I ducked out to fix myself, which took a few minutes and I ended up missing the Consecration in the process as I was still pulling myself together in the bathroom… oops. That was decidedly not cool, but I had seriously hit the point where I was a distraction to myself and others and I did HAVE to leave. But I sorted myself out to the point that I could go back up to the church directly after the Consecration and receive etc. At which point I almost had another meltdown. Sometimes I hate being me. I really don’t have any kind of nervous hysteria usually and I am firmly resolved to never cry in uniform but I honestly don’t know what brought all of that on.
Maybe I do. “Do not be afraid I AM with you”. Intellectually it’s possible to know that God is everywhere- present in all places and filling all things as the liturgy says. But how often do we think about that? When I’m having a bad moment it almost _never_ occurs to me that God is right there with me. Because I tend to think of God the Father as a stern judge etc. sometimes I think I’d rather not have Him right there with me. And when something awful is happening it’s hard to see how a loving Father could let that happen, so I tend to assume I’m alone without even examining the thought. And even when I do take time and think “You know, I’m not really alone. God’s with me even in this” all I can think about is how insubstantial He seems to be at the moment in question when I could really do with a hug. But every so often, He’ll surprise me with a reminder that reduces me to tears of relief, I think, that I am not alone. I’m used to tears of sadness, frustration, anger, disappointment and very rarely exhaustion. I am not at all used to tears of relief that I am not on my own.