Deep calls unto Deep

Salon Selectives & Soul Work

It was just another Thursday morning ~ me hunched over the keyboard, typing up a transcript of people fighting over things so small it’s a wonder they made it to litigation in the first place.

The irony didn’t hit me in the gooster until about an hour in.

Here I was, thinking they’re ridiculous for obsessing over every petty detail, yet I’d just spent the better part of my morning Googling a discontinued body splash and shampoo from the ’80s ~ desperate to find a scent I haven’t smelled in decades and probably never will again.

Why?

I don’t even know.

It started as a flash of memory. Then I thought: maybe if I see the bottle, I’ll remember more.

And once I remembered more… I didn’t want to stop remembering.

The memory began with a scent, as often most memories do.

July.

South Georgia.

Where most people you pass by smell like old garden taters and gnat spray.

But not me. Not today.

Mama always had the best bath products ~ those fancy bottles that made our bathroom feel like a spa, complete with the hand towels that were only for looks but never for hands... ever.

But my favorite? It wasn’t the expensive stuff. It was that big ol’ bottle of Vitabath body splash ~ the kind that looked plain, but made you feel fancy.

If I remember right, the bottle was clear or white, with flowers on a vertical label. I guess you could call it “cheap” stuff… and full of alcohol like Otis on a Saturday night after getting a snoot full. It evaporated the second it touched your skin ~ but I was splashing it all over me from my neck clear down to my ankles.

My freshly washed and curled hair ~ courtesy of my Clairol orange-and-green Lock 'N Roll hot curlers ~ held the scent of McIntosh apples from that red bottle of Salon Selectives. If you were a teenage girl in the ’80s, I bet you remember that fragrance. Not like the “apple” they’re selling today. No ma’am. This was like the Garden of Eden cracked open and dropped fruit straight onto your strands.

But it wasn’t just about a scent.

It set a whole mood.

I stepped outside into the heat, but it didn’t feel heavy or smothering like it does to me these days. It felt more like a spotlight than a scorch. In that moment, I felt confident ~ comfortable in my own skin. That rare July day was one of those that I just felt really good for no particular reason at all.

Teenagers are funny like that. One minute it’s all about me, me, me ~ full of fire and sass ~ and the next, insecurity knocks and self-esteem slips quietly out the back door. But every now and then, you hit a sweet spot right in the middle.

Maybe that’s just part of being a teenager. We tend to describe them as selfish and self-centered ~ but maybe God wired them that way. Think about it: It’s probably the last time we really get to think about ourselves.

For girls, it won’t be long before we become wives, mamas, caregivers ~ spending decades focused on everyone else around us and forgetting ourselves.

And for men? The weight just lands different, but it still lands… providers, protectors, problem-solvers.

We all start to forget who we were before the world gave us roles to play.

Now in my 50s, I’m learning how to think about myself again. It’s like becoming reacquainted with an old friend you haven’t seen in decades. Memories come floating back, weaving through your thoughts and conversations ~ reminding you of the sweet spots of long ago, like that summer...

It was a turning point.

I had just gotten my driver’s license and shed that little learner’s permit like a snakeskin. Sixteen and sure that I was pretty much grown. I could go anywhere I wanted…

so long as I asked Mama for permission...

and gas money...

and was home by 11 p.m. ~ 10:59 if I knew what was good for me.

And that’s when the irony caught up with me.

Here I was, rolling my eyes at two grown folks taking each other to court over a tree. Not a sprawling, hundred-year-old oak with roots older than their family Bible. No, ma’am. Just a regular ol’ tree that happened to grow smack dab on the property line.

And they fought like it was the last one on Earth.

The whole time I typed, I wanted to put my shoes on, drive over there, dig the joker up myself, and hand-deliver them each a brand new sapling for their own yard. Problem solved.

And yet ~ here I sit, wasting the better part of my own morning chasing a memory. Googling discontinued body splashes and shampoos from the ’80s. Hoping to catch a trace of something that time has long since carried away.

But maybe that’s the point.

Maybe it’s never really about the tree ~ or the shampoo.

Maybe it’s about the feeling behind it.

What it stirred.

What it settled.

What it saved.

That Vitabath bottle didn’t cost much, but it gave me something ~ something I didn’t even know I needed until I started looking back. And maybe that’s just how I’m wired… To dig, to keep chewing on it, to turn over every stone until the ache of that “thing” makes sense.

Some folks in my life have said I feel things too deeply and carry things too long. I’m the poster child for making a mountain out of a molehill. I’ll proudly stand on that sucker in a hard hat and work boots, striking the Captain Morgan pose like I didn’t just conquer it ~ I built it from the ground up.

But maybe it’s not a flaw.

What if it’s a gift ~ this ability to notice what others walk right past?

God doesn’t wire us wrong.

He shapes us for His purpose, even when it don’t make a lick of sense to anybody else.

So if that’s “extra,” go ahead and stitch me up in a cozy tee labeled

Extra Medium — Limited Edition.

I remember the first time I heard the phrase “deep calls unto deep.” I didn’t know exactly what it meant ~ I just knew it stirred something in me. Like God had slipped me a calling card on beautiful stationery, tucked inside a dark envelope. I didn’t understand it, not then. But I held on to it anyway.

A few weeks ago, the words “where the Spirit of God meets a Southern woman’s rib cage” dropped into my spirit while I was brainstorming about my book. I didn’t know what to do with it either. It felt awful big in the moment ~ super layered, and heavy in a good way ~ like Mama’s old quilts that have always brought me comfort.

But, in true Tina fashion, I started digging ~ Googling, researching all the different meanings, chewing on it like I do everything else that gets stuck in my soul. And wouldn’t you know it...

Right there in plain print when you Google it was this:

“‘Deep calls unto deep’ in Psalm 42:7 refers to the deep longing and yearning of the human soul for God, and how God's own infinite, deep nature responds to that call. It signifies a profound, spiritual connection where the depths of human experience and emotion resonate with the depths of God's being. The verse often appears in the context of overwhelming trials, suggesting that even in the midst of suffering, one can find solace and connection in the immensity of God's love and power.”

Tell me that’s not a woman’s rib cage aching ~ and longing ~ for something eternal.

Now, don’t get me wrong ~ I don’t get my theology from Google. The Word of God speaks for itself. But I am a digger. I like to study things from every angle ~ what Scripture says, how people interpret it, where it lands in real life. Because somewhere in the middle of all that dust and dialogue, there’s often a thread of truth that ties it all together.

God’s Word doesn’t change, but I think He knows some of us need to see it from the front, the back, and the side before we fully understand what He’s saying.

And when God’s Word and something I stumble across out in the wild seem to echo each other ~ like that Google description aligning so closely with the words He’d already tucked into my spirit about his Spirit and my rib cage ~ wheee doggy, my spirit does cartwheels. A spark goes off deep in my gut, and I know I’m on to something. Like a bloodhound picking up a scent ~ I might not know where it ends, but I know I’m headed in the right direction.

If you’ve read this far, maybe you’re wired like me.

Maybe you’ve got questions that keep circling in your soul long after other folks have moved on.

Maybe you’ve cried in the grocery store checkout line after discovering a cracked egg ~

not because of the egg,

but because of the last two weeks you survived that nobody saw.

Maybe you’re like one of my favorite lines from The Andy Griffith Show, when Lydia Crosswaith said,

“I hate to chit chat. I don’t mind ordinary conversation, but I hate to chit chat.”

Same, Lydia... Same.

No shallow pleasantries for me.

Just give me conversations that go somewhere.

Somewhere deep.

Where conversations get real and truth doesn’t have to squeeze itself into small talk.

Maybe the ocean pulls at you too ~

not just for the rise and fall of the waves,

but for what’s underneath... mysterious and deep.

Like your own soul,

and the work God’s been doing in the places we rarely let others see.

Maybe you’ve spent your life wishing somebody would get you.

That someone would look past your “extra” and see that it’s not drama ~

It’s depth.

It’s discernment.

It’s desire for something real.

Maybe ~ just maybe ~ “deep calls unto deep” is God’s way of whispering to us

that we’re not unraveling.

We’re being rewoven.

That the ache in our rib cage isn’t weakness ~ it’s invitation.

A not-so-secret signal between the Spirit and a soul-worn woman,

the ones who know what it is to feel too much and still not be full.

Heaven’s version of the arc in the dirt ~ quiet, sacred, unmistakable.

The original IYKYK.

This generation might’ve dusted it off and made it trendy ~

but let’s be honest, our Father’s been dropping soul codes since Genesis.

So if that’s you?

Welcome.

You’re not alone.

You’re not too much.

You’re just deep.

You’re the kind of soul I’d love to sit with over coffee and real conversation.

And most importantly, our Father sees you.

And to think… it all started with a bottle of apple-scented shampoo and a splash of Vitabath on a summer afternoon in Georgia. A girl soaked by the sun, not knowing she’d spend the next decades longing to feel that sure again.

Turns out, she wasn’t chasing a scent.

She was tracing breadcrumbs.

Breadcrumbs that always lead her back to Jesus.

Indeed, deep calls unto deep.

ABOUT THIS PAINTING ~

I bought this painting last year without fully knowing why ~ it just pulled on me. I hung it in my office, right over my head, where it's been quietly watching me work, wrestle, and write.

Now I know.

It was for this piece. For this moment.

Look at her ~ arms raised, rib cage open. Not just a posture of praise, but of surrender. A heart wide open to receive. It’s the physical embodiment of everything I’ve been writing… the ache, the invitation, the Spirit meeting me in the deep places.

God knew I’d need the reminder hanging right above me ~ that even when we don’t understand the why, He’s already placed the breadcrumbs to lead us to Him.

Thank you Steve Henderson for creating such a beautiful piece of artwork that says even more than my words can. “Ocean Breeze” has become one of my favorites.

© Tina McLeod, 2025 | The Truth and Tallow
This piece is part of a larger unpublished work in progress. All rights reserved. No portion may be copied, distributed, or reproduced without express written permission from the author.