Floating Encounters are experiences that Bob and I have been noting since we started attempting to live listening lives.
Oswald Chambers (My Utmost For His Highest) suggests that our lives are like a river. We're always moving forward; a current-pulled body that leaves it's mark on whatever terrain it's meandering (or rushing or white-capping) through. Because we're swept along, floating with the current, we don't, Mr. Chambers says, have the privilege of seeing our impact on the banks and rocks and debris we pass over. We're simply obeying the water's pull.
Today, after months of not-much-at-all (I think Danny was our last connection of this sort?), I coincidentally bumped into Kelly.
Kelly ~ A Floating Encounter
Kelly was our dog groomer before his business went belly-up. (I should clarify that when I say he was "our" groomer what I mean is that we'd taken the dogs to him a grand total of two times to be shaved naked so they'd stop coating our home in wiry black hair.) Several months ago, the last time we saw him, he was in a desperate situation: his finances were tanking, his addictions were consuming, anger and despair sat like two spectre's on either of his over-burdened shoulders.
That day was a typical summer day for me and the boys. Bob was at work and I was powering through the day, juggling schedules and meals and messes. Mid-morning, mid-tantrum, I was feeling particularly annoyed with the build-up of dog hair on my kitchen floor and thought that I really should get them shaved soon. I left the thought right where it was, filed under "Stuff to do Sometime," and went on with the day.
As the hours marched on, though, the thought persisted. Intently. Get the dogs groomed. Get the dogs groomed soon. Call the groomer and book an appointment. I shoved the thoughts aside. I had enough to do and couldn't be bothered to make the call. But by four in the afternoon, I was more annoyed by the insistent intrusion of groomer thoughts than I was by the dog hair. What started as a fleeting thought was now an all-consuming nuisance.
I picked up the phone a dialed, fully expecting to get a machine on the other end and wondering why one earth the OCD part of my brain was refusing to shut up about the groomer already.
I didn't get the machine. I got the groomer.
By his own admission, Kelly is a bit like Chef Ramsey (Hell's Kitchen) on downers. He's quick tempered and intolerant, focused and aggressive. His unkempt hair and weathered-by-rage-and-worry face frames icy gray eyes. He has the ease of conversation of a man who knows how to survive anything. He answered the phone with, appropriately, a bark. "What?"
"Uuuh. 'Just wondering if I can book my two newfie-labs in for a shave sometime in the next month."
"Yeah. Well. Whatever. If you want 'em done you'll have to bring 'em today. Like, right now 'cause I don't know if I'll even be here after tomorrow."
"Oh," confused silence to follow. "Uh. I wasn't really thinking about getting them done today. There are two of them. And they're big. It takes several hours to shave them both."
"Well, do what you want but I can take 'em now if you want me to."
"Right. Okay. I'll be over in fifteen minutes. With both dogs? You're sure you want them both? It'll take you until, like 9:00 to get them both done."
"Look. I'm really stressed out right now and I need the money, so this is kind of perfect. Just come right now."
I arrived at Kelly's hole-in-the-wall shop to find him very distressed, but, while he wrestles with common courtesies in the human world, he's very tender and funny in the dog world. He remembered the dogs and gently led them back into his shop, talking non-stop about his predicament. Rent was past due and the doors were going to close tonight if he didn't get his money. Bad investments, bad management, and bad business had landed him in an all around bad spot.
"Hmm," I mumbled. Listening. Inwardly waiting for the Holy Spirit's direction about how to engage in this situation. Suddenly my obsessive groomer thoughts became more about the possible leading of God than about my inability to control my mucky-floor thinking.
"So here's the thing, Kelly. I'm wondering if maybe the God who loves you has something for you today?" I told him about how hard it was for me to get the idea of getting the dogs looked after off my mind and how that had led to a four o'clock in the afternoon phone call.
"I think, maybe, that You were on the mind of God today. So He reminded me to think of you, too. What exactly do you need today -- right now?"
I had his attention then. I could see the addict/survivor in him wrestling with this-woman-is-a-stranger propriety. My defenses were up, too. I didn't want to be taken for a ride or to have what could be an investment on my family's part misused. I read him carefully, watching for signs that he was spinning a tale. I didn't care, really. By then I was convinced that God had me at the dog groomer's for a reason. It was just a matter of hearing what that reason was.
"Awww. You know. Really? You think God was thinking about me? Me?"
"Yeah, I'm kind of thinking so, Kelly. And I'm thinking this might have more to do with who you are as a man than it has to do with your business and your bills. The God who made you is interested in who you have become."
Kelly had a lot to say about that ~ the usual defensive-reasons-I-haven't-had-time-for-God-stuff-lately chatter. I was saying personal and uncomfortable things. He doesn't know me and I don't know him. This was a risky situation.
"What do you need today," I asked again.
"Hey. You know. Nothin' really. Well. If I could just do the dogs that'd give me a bit of cash. Maybe enough to fill the tank with gas and clear my stuff outta' here so I can leave before they come after me for the rent."
Dodgy. God, I silently wondered, what's my family's role in serving this guy? 'Not crazy about helping him avoid the inevitable. God was quiet. Have I mentioned before how really silent He is in these moments?
"Okay. Well, I'll leave the dogs with you, then. When should I come back for them?" We set a time. "Anything I can do for you before I go?" Then, in response to another of those flit-through-your-brain-so-quickly-you-hardly-notice-it thoughts, I asked, "Have you had anything to eat today?"
"Well, no, but I'm fine. But," he pauses, "I could really use a smoke." I beetle to the Mac's around the corner and buy him a pack (Steady hands on the razors that will be next to the dogs' skin seems like a good enough reason for that purchase!) and then head for home.
I call Bob and outline the day's drama and we started to talk about what God might have for Kelly. We had no clue. Not one. What he needed was money. We got it that any money we gave might be funneled into any number of wacky fixations or addictions. That's always the risk, right? No telling how your "gift" will be handled once it's out of your hands.
We settled on an amount (using the usual "What dollar amount popped into your head when I brought this up, Hon?" approach. It works remarkably well. We're always within a few bucks of each other.). We gave it when Bob went to pick up the dogs. And that was the end of that. We prayed for Kelly. We wondered what had happened to him. We forgot about him.
Until today.
God whispers. He's not in the storm or the earthquake or the fire, right? He's in the teeny whisper.
Today, at the video store, He whispered a really holy instruction: This would be a good time to look for that movie Cory's been wanting to see. I didn't know it was Him, of course. If I'd known it was Him I would've gotten all weird and sanctimonious about listening, or some such nonsense. But I didn't know it was Him. I thought it was me having a brilliant idea and so I asked for a hand from the desk staff and proceeded to extend my run-in-and-grab-a-movie trip to Blockbuster into an extra-long hunt for a misplaced flick.
And then God stepped out from behind the whisper. Kelly walked through the Blockbuster door. I couldn't place him immediately. I caught his eye, recognition struck, and I acknowledged him by name. He had no idea who I was until I said, "Hey Kelly. I'm two black newfie-labs."The light came on behind those sad, cool eyes.
"You. I never got to thank you. Sandra. You sent your husband, Bob -- really tall guy -- for the dogs so I didn't get to thank you. You'll never know what you did for me that day." He, remarkably I thought, pulled both of our names from whatever memory bank they'd been stuffed into.
"No? Well, umm, it kind of seemed like God wanted to connect with you, hey?"
We spent a few minutes updating his story. The business went under, but he was able to pay his bill. He'd left the city for another province and had spent four months in rehab. "It didn't take," he grimaced. And now he was trying to help his parents deal with a brutally messy divorce. Life was hard. Life is hard.
He extended his hand for a goodbye shake and said how glad he was that he'd had a chance to see me again. I agreed and said again that God's interest in Him went beyond business and into things like rehab and broken family.
"Yeah. Well keep praying for me. The people that are praying for me -- it must be workin' 'cause I'm still here."
I want to downplay that assessment. You're still alive? That's something worth acknowledging God for? But I catch myself and re-think it. For Kelly just staying a live is a big deal. If that's where God's meeting him than that's enough. And he's gone.
The by-now familiar confusion (What the heck was that all about?) that follows these floating moments settles in. I didn't say anything amazing or do anything miraculous ~ again. I hope that Jesus in me connected with need in another. Another bit of "Oh! I should listen to that little voice," settled into place. And that's all. No great moral. No flash of holy light or polished halo. Just Jesus injecting Himself into human experience.
I don't imagine we'll ever see Kelly again. If we do, I won't likely have anything more to contribute to his life. "Oh. Hey! How's that God thing going for ya'?" or some such fumbling. But He's on God's radar, right? Always. I'll just keep asking Him to continue to offer freedom and hope to the dog groomer. And He will. Because He's a God who invests in small moments in small amounts through small people. He will.
Tuesday, December 30
Sunday, December 28
Polaroid Jesus
In the picture of Jesus that I carry around in my head, He’s always laughing. He has a sort of “Why are you guys taking everything so seriously?” smirk on His face, and His arms, His hands are always reaching – away from Himself, toward His listener. Toward me. Toward you.
I love the way that Jesus served people when He was here. He was so raw and counter-culture and in-your-face about taking care of felt needs while pointedly (sternly?) addressing matters of sin and conscience and faith. He made wild suggestions: if you want to be worth something, serve somebody. If you want to master all of God’s laws wrapped into one, Love. Love God, love others. If you give even a cup of water to the broken, the ignored, the left-behind, it’s like you’ve given Me that cup of water.
A Jesus like that must be at ease with laughter and open-armed invitation. He didn’t discriminate, He just reached toward. In a time when women were marginalized and hated, He, without making any sort of show of it, walked alongside them as companionable equals. His best friends were nobody’s and somebody’s. He had the nerve to stand up to soul-killing tradition while carefully upholding Life-saving law.
And one day we’re going to be toe-to-toe with that One. We’ll see His face and know His ways and why’s and how’s. We’ll touch the hands that reached toward us and pulled us, urged us from our not-so-laughable dark. We’ll laugh, too. Without restraint or fear or shame. We’ll laugh too.
I love the way that Jesus served people when He was here. He was so raw and counter-culture and in-your-face about taking care of felt needs while pointedly (sternly?) addressing matters of sin and conscience and faith. He made wild suggestions: if you want to be worth something, serve somebody. If you want to master all of God’s laws wrapped into one, Love. Love God, love others. If you give even a cup of water to the broken, the ignored, the left-behind, it’s like you’ve given Me that cup of water.
A Jesus like that must be at ease with laughter and open-armed invitation. He didn’t discriminate, He just reached toward. In a time when women were marginalized and hated, He, without making any sort of show of it, walked alongside them as companionable equals. His best friends were nobody’s and somebody’s. He had the nerve to stand up to soul-killing tradition while carefully upholding Life-saving law.
And one day we’re going to be toe-to-toe with that One. We’ll see His face and know His ways and why’s and how’s. We’ll touch the hands that reached toward us and pulled us, urged us from our not-so-laughable dark. We’ll laugh, too. Without restraint or fear or shame. We’ll laugh too.
Thursday, December 18
Need a Nudge?
It happens to all of us. We get stuck. Stuck in the mud. Stuck in the snow. Stuck in old offenses and even older fears. Stuck in our laziness. Stuck in our loneliness.
We're in a deep freeze right now (I'm sitting at the computer wearing sweater layers, knit slippers, and a winter scarf), with just enough snow covering just enough super slippery ice to keep everybody just a little on edge on the roads. Our small car is, we've discovered, a summer vehicle. It gets high-centered on snow heaps and hopelessly stranded in it's parking space as the snow mounts around it.
Our neighbors have been getting stuck, too. We're all kind of slipping and sliding around, alternately careening around corners and navigating the skating rinks that our parking spots have become. Cars have been abandoned all over town as drivers give up trying to navigate their way out of their predicaments.
The key to getting unstuck is to trick the tires into thinking they're on friction-friendly ground. Sometimes just a crank of the wheel, changing the direction they're facing, is enough to get them on the move. Driving a teensy bit forward, and then a little bit back, might do the trick, too. Two steps forward, one step back. Repeat.
But sometimes all of the cajoling in the world won't work. In that case, a little more force is required. Force in the shape of a friend, or two, or (as in one case down the street this week) six. Said friends, by forcibly rocking the vehicle back and forth while it's in gear, can get a trapped car unstuck in no time. It takes a lot of effort (much more on the part of the friends pushing than the vehicle owner behind the wheel, come to think of it), but it works!
If you're really in deep all of the efforts of well-intentioned heavyweights might leave you stranded. In that case, the really big guns, the tow-truck drivers, might need to be called in.
Are you stuck? Maybe you've already tried the easy stuff: changing your approach to the problem, going back over hard won understanding and trying again. Maybe you've left off caring and have abandoned the struggle all together. Or maybe you just need a shove ~~ someone to get in your face and none-to-gently push you out of the slippery, rut-stuck, spot you're in.
It happens to all of us, right? We grow complacent and bored. We shrivel away in bitterness and small mindedness. We become self-indulgent and self-satisfied.
Do we have the courage to pop our head out of the window of wherever we are and call for a hand? Will we, when our friend shows up to throw their weight at the challenge, extend them gratitude instead of annoyance or rejection? They are the ones, after all, risking the heart attack!
Whatever your ice patch, whatever your drift, there's a way off and a way out. You might have to ask for your friends' weighty assistance, but you don't have to stay put. You can get moving again.
We're in a deep freeze right now (I'm sitting at the computer wearing sweater layers, knit slippers, and a winter scarf), with just enough snow covering just enough super slippery ice to keep everybody just a little on edge on the roads. Our small car is, we've discovered, a summer vehicle. It gets high-centered on snow heaps and hopelessly stranded in it's parking space as the snow mounts around it.
Our neighbors have been getting stuck, too. We're all kind of slipping and sliding around, alternately careening around corners and navigating the skating rinks that our parking spots have become. Cars have been abandoned all over town as drivers give up trying to navigate their way out of their predicaments.
The key to getting unstuck is to trick the tires into thinking they're on friction-friendly ground. Sometimes just a crank of the wheel, changing the direction they're facing, is enough to get them on the move. Driving a teensy bit forward, and then a little bit back, might do the trick, too. Two steps forward, one step back. Repeat.
But sometimes all of the cajoling in the world won't work. In that case, a little more force is required. Force in the shape of a friend, or two, or (as in one case down the street this week) six. Said friends, by forcibly rocking the vehicle back and forth while it's in gear, can get a trapped car unstuck in no time. It takes a lot of effort (much more on the part of the friends pushing than the vehicle owner behind the wheel, come to think of it), but it works!
If you're really in deep all of the efforts of well-intentioned heavyweights might leave you stranded. In that case, the really big guns, the tow-truck drivers, might need to be called in.
Are you stuck? Maybe you've already tried the easy stuff: changing your approach to the problem, going back over hard won understanding and trying again. Maybe you've left off caring and have abandoned the struggle all together. Or maybe you just need a shove ~~ someone to get in your face and none-to-gently push you out of the slippery, rut-stuck, spot you're in.
It happens to all of us, right? We grow complacent and bored. We shrivel away in bitterness and small mindedness. We become self-indulgent and self-satisfied.
Do we have the courage to pop our head out of the window of wherever we are and call for a hand? Will we, when our friend shows up to throw their weight at the challenge, extend them gratitude instead of annoyance or rejection? They are the ones, after all, risking the heart attack!
Whatever your ice patch, whatever your drift, there's a way off and a way out. You might have to ask for your friends' weighty assistance, but you don't have to stay put. You can get moving again.
Sunday, December 14
A Watery Christmas
Eleven sleeps until Christmas. We're so fortunate, as a family, that this is a generous and simple and exciting time for our tiny five person world.
We've been doing the 12 days of Christmas instead of stockings this year: One stocking stuffer-like gift each day leading up to the 25th. We preamble the exchange with a quick conversation. We started with the simple, "What's one thing we're thankful for from this past year?"
Today, Bob asked, "What's one goal you're setting for yourself in the year ahead?" The boys' initial answers were funny ("Stop walking the dogs." "Stop picking my nose.") but they came up with some good stuff, too (I'll keep those between them and us.). When Bob's turn came 'round we all tuned in more attentively.
Bob's a terrific goal-setter. He sets personal goals consistently and, once he's achieved a mark, he sets new ones to replace the one he accomplished. He talked about some personal things he'd like to reach for and then he suggested a not-so-new new one that we all quickly adopted as our own.
Bob's been out of the boat for awhile now. He's left off old comfort zone attitudes and behaviors in exchange for stretching himself in areas of faith and practical Christianity. "This year," he said, "I'd like to find a way to live even more out of the boat. A way to help or volunteer or something."
That doesn't sound like a big deal on paper, I guess. But it is big in our out-of-community experience. One thing that structured, meet-on-Sunday's Christianity offers is an (unending!) array of opportunities for service. Sound systems need to be run and chairs set up. Children need to be minded or taught. Youth group's need running and prayer ministries need facilitating.
When you're not involved in that structure, opportunities to serve and help need to be actively sought out. And that is trickier than it sounds! We've looked for God in a lot of areas in this, but have found ourselves floundering a little. It's not enough to simply be tuned in to our community and their projects; sure we'll clean ditches and help the neighbors and give at the door, but we're looking, honestly, for a cause that we can give our heart's to as a family.
As I write, I'm wondering if that might be misguided. Maybe the goal should be to become more fully committed to Jesus and to looking for His in-this-moment opportunity for service. Maybe we should be looking to hone that listening-doing lifestyle.
That's an uncomfortable thought. Because many, many days feel purposeless and silent and undirected. It'd be so much simpler (and I so love simplicity) to have one sure thing! Maybe we'll be able to work it out more specifically in the next few stuffed stocking days. Or in the New Year. Or a few Christmas's down the road. Or maybe it's not something to be figured out, but surrendered to and experienced. The thing will be, any which way, to hang out with Bob -- out of the boat.
We've been doing the 12 days of Christmas instead of stockings this year: One stocking stuffer-like gift each day leading up to the 25th. We preamble the exchange with a quick conversation. We started with the simple, "What's one thing we're thankful for from this past year?"
Today, Bob asked, "What's one goal you're setting for yourself in the year ahead?" The boys' initial answers were funny ("Stop walking the dogs." "Stop picking my nose.") but they came up with some good stuff, too (I'll keep those between them and us.). When Bob's turn came 'round we all tuned in more attentively.
Bob's a terrific goal-setter. He sets personal goals consistently and, once he's achieved a mark, he sets new ones to replace the one he accomplished. He talked about some personal things he'd like to reach for and then he suggested a not-so-new new one that we all quickly adopted as our own.
Bob's been out of the boat for awhile now. He's left off old comfort zone attitudes and behaviors in exchange for stretching himself in areas of faith and practical Christianity. "This year," he said, "I'd like to find a way to live even more out of the boat. A way to help or volunteer or something."
That doesn't sound like a big deal on paper, I guess. But it is big in our out-of-community experience. One thing that structured, meet-on-Sunday's Christianity offers is an (unending!) array of opportunities for service. Sound systems need to be run and chairs set up. Children need to be minded or taught. Youth group's need running and prayer ministries need facilitating.
When you're not involved in that structure, opportunities to serve and help need to be actively sought out. And that is trickier than it sounds! We've looked for God in a lot of areas in this, but have found ourselves floundering a little. It's not enough to simply be tuned in to our community and their projects; sure we'll clean ditches and help the neighbors and give at the door, but we're looking, honestly, for a cause that we can give our heart's to as a family.
As I write, I'm wondering if that might be misguided. Maybe the goal should be to become more fully committed to Jesus and to looking for His in-this-moment opportunity for service. Maybe we should be looking to hone that listening-doing lifestyle.
That's an uncomfortable thought. Because many, many days feel purposeless and silent and undirected. It'd be so much simpler (and I so love simplicity) to have one sure thing! Maybe we'll be able to work it out more specifically in the next few stuffed stocking days. Or in the New Year. Or a few Christmas's down the road. Or maybe it's not something to be figured out, but surrendered to and experienced. The thing will be, any which way, to hang out with Bob -- out of the boat.
Sunday, December 7
One Step, One Thousand Steps
I'm on kilometer number four and heartily wishing that I'd taken fifteen seconds to change out of my jeans and into some sweats before hitting the treadmill. Two kilometers to go and I am grumpily uncomfortable in the confines of unyielding denim.
A thought pops into mind -- a distant memory of a "diet tips and tricks" article that I'd read years ago. It was probably printed on one of many glossy pamphlet's promising sleek results in thirty days if I just went on a particular herbal regimen. This particular list of weight loss to-do's asserted that the first key to success in losing pounds is to wear comfortable clothing. This one step alone, they cheered, is a great motivator for movement.
As I trodge on, cranking the incline to it's maximum height, I think of how inane that suggestion felt to me at the time. At two hundred pounds with fussy knees and a head full of despair there was no way I was going to be motivated to keep my butt moving just by slipping into something a little more comfortable!
One of the stark realizations that came along with my initial baby steps toward health was that I was going to have to make friends with discomfort in a right rush. I had to accept that there was going to be absolutely nothing easy or natural about the thousands-of-kilometers journey I was starting.
In that first year I strapped on sneakers and whatever clothes I could squeeze into and I walked. Every day. Every day. I walked in hail, rain, and minus thirty temperatures. I walked with twisted ankles and screaming knees. I walked if I had the flu. I walked whenever time allowed ~ if that meant I didn't get out there until 10:30 at night, then I walked tired-out and ready for bed.
My body protested shrilly. My calves clenched into wooden shafts. I experienced heal spurs for the first time. My back grumbled and cranked, bitterly resisting each new pair of running shoes.
I was embarrassed. Mercilessly. I was big and jiggly and slow, so I took myself out into nearby fields determined to navigate rugged, bone-jarring tilled ground rather than expose myself on urban sidewalks. I didn't have any confidence that I was going to be successful. I only knew that I wasn't going to stop moving.
I was uncomfortable. For sixty minutes every day I thumbed my nose at discomfort in the hopes of leaving obesity and shame in those dusty fields. I didn't feel inspired or motivated. I made a choice and followed it through. I didn't feel self-satisfaction or increasingly fit and strong. I felt tired and unsure.
I decrease my incline and increase my speed. Now, many months and countless kilometers later, I can afford to think about whether or not I'm "comfortable" when I'm moving my body. If my knee's and back are screeching for the couch, I'll walk for 45 minutes instead of the usual sixty. I wear clothes that fit and move well. I take one day off in a week - if I feel like it. Usually I forget and just chug along. I use the treadmill on weathery days instead of insisting on heading outside in the wind and chill and wet.
I poke the "stop" button on the machine console. Dripping with sweat and vowing not to go the blue jean route again, I slip out of my worn out Zeller's brand sneakers and consider my culture and how it pushes against the discipline of discomfort. I'm aware that the allure of a soft couch, a bag of something salty, and a plate full of cookies will likely always have a strong draw on me and that, at any time, I may choose to leave off the work it takes to keep seventy pounds off my frame and out in those fields.
I punch the "off" button on the fan and head upstairs to slog an enormous amount of water. One more day of doing what needs to be done under my belt and off of my waistline.
A thought pops into mind -- a distant memory of a "diet tips and tricks" article that I'd read years ago. It was probably printed on one of many glossy pamphlet's promising sleek results in thirty days if I just went on a particular herbal regimen. This particular list of weight loss to-do's asserted that the first key to success in losing pounds is to wear comfortable clothing. This one step alone, they cheered, is a great motivator for movement.
As I trodge on, cranking the incline to it's maximum height, I think of how inane that suggestion felt to me at the time. At two hundred pounds with fussy knees and a head full of despair there was no way I was going to be motivated to keep my butt moving just by slipping into something a little more comfortable!
One of the stark realizations that came along with my initial baby steps toward health was that I was going to have to make friends with discomfort in a right rush. I had to accept that there was going to be absolutely nothing easy or natural about the thousands-of-kilometers journey I was starting.
In that first year I strapped on sneakers and whatever clothes I could squeeze into and I walked. Every day. Every day. I walked in hail, rain, and minus thirty temperatures. I walked with twisted ankles and screaming knees. I walked if I had the flu. I walked whenever time allowed ~ if that meant I didn't get out there until 10:30 at night, then I walked tired-out and ready for bed.
My body protested shrilly. My calves clenched into wooden shafts. I experienced heal spurs for the first time. My back grumbled and cranked, bitterly resisting each new pair of running shoes.
I was embarrassed. Mercilessly. I was big and jiggly and slow, so I took myself out into nearby fields determined to navigate rugged, bone-jarring tilled ground rather than expose myself on urban sidewalks. I didn't have any confidence that I was going to be successful. I only knew that I wasn't going to stop moving.
I was uncomfortable. For sixty minutes every day I thumbed my nose at discomfort in the hopes of leaving obesity and shame in those dusty fields. I didn't feel inspired or motivated. I made a choice and followed it through. I didn't feel self-satisfaction or increasingly fit and strong. I felt tired and unsure.
I decrease my incline and increase my speed. Now, many months and countless kilometers later, I can afford to think about whether or not I'm "comfortable" when I'm moving my body. If my knee's and back are screeching for the couch, I'll walk for 45 minutes instead of the usual sixty. I wear clothes that fit and move well. I take one day off in a week - if I feel like it. Usually I forget and just chug along. I use the treadmill on weathery days instead of insisting on heading outside in the wind and chill and wet.
I poke the "stop" button on the machine console. Dripping with sweat and vowing not to go the blue jean route again, I slip out of my worn out Zeller's brand sneakers and consider my culture and how it pushes against the discipline of discomfort. I'm aware that the allure of a soft couch, a bag of something salty, and a plate full of cookies will likely always have a strong draw on me and that, at any time, I may choose to leave off the work it takes to keep seventy pounds off my frame and out in those fields.
I punch the "off" button on the fan and head upstairs to slog an enormous amount of water. One more day of doing what needs to be done under my belt and off of my waistline.
Friday, December 5
What? This Ol' Thing?
I still think about her all of the time (I think it was this time last year that I wrote a bit about her). It's a geographical sort of remembering. I drive past her old condo and the apartment where she died. I fill up with gas at her favorite gas station and walk on sidewalks where we walked together. She lived where I live.
I think she shapes my thinking ~ invades my paradigm, maybe ~ more than I realize. She was everything that I am not: Brash. Cold. Drunk. Sharp witted. Keen eyed. Unapologetic. Always unapologetic.
Religion, apart from the odd trip to a psychic or her devotion to the daily horoscope, didn't touch her everyday. When I showed up on the front porch with cookies in one hand and Miss-Goody-Two-Shoes Jesus in the other, she didn't even flinch. We formed a friendship over time and I listened to hours of her story (A novel's worth of experience and suffering and hard living). She sometimes let me talk about mine.
At the time, I was being cajoled into thinking that I was something that I was not. The small church family that we were part of needed care and I was encouraged and praised and twist-my-rubber-arm led to believe that I was the gal for the job.
Deb saw right through the manipulation and fancy words that I, at the time, found enticing, alluring. "Why would you do that, Sandi? Nothing in it is real." She had no patience (and her impatience was something to behold!) for made-up compliments or feel good ego stroking.
But I was (and still am) looking for purpose outside of my work at home. The offer of an almost real job with almost real consequences and opportunity and responsibility was too tantalizing for me to ignore. I took the care giving role at the church. And Deb refused to talk to me about it.
She's been gone for, I think, three years (could it be four already?) and it's only been in the past month that I've begun to see what her fifty-something insight spotted right away: Flattery. I listened with hungry ears to false praise. My family is still working out the kinks that my choice then worked into the fabric of our home.
You might be seeing this in the lives of women around you, too. Women leaving their husbands ~ even their children ~ in pursuit of personal success. Women who are taking month long or repeated vacations just to "get away". Some are pursuing schooling ~ not because they feel purposeful or inspired or need to help with the family income, but because they are angry and are looking for ways to punish their men by forcing the guys to "step up". Some are openly having affairs. Some are just screaming silently, held prisoner by the duty and unending drudgery of their schedules.
For women who are pushing against the perceived confines of their circumstances, a little flattery might go a long way to convincing them that they are, indeed, capable of, deserving of, so much more than they have.
Deb would have told me that we really are capable and deserving, but her hard won experience also taught her that what we think is critically important in this life really amounts to nothing in our final days, months, years.
She had the career(s). She had the men. And the women. She was a published author and had her pilot's license. She'd done a bit of traveling and knew how to run a successful business. She'd abandoned her husband and son, too, to find herself and become all that she could be.
She was dead in her apartment for three days before anyone knew she was gone. Her son wept at her funeral, but his grief was detached, forlorn. I still don't know how to grieve for my friend who'd seen it all, done it all.
But I'm listening to her pointed interruptions as I watch the stories of new friends wind their way through months and years. I wonder if we'll see flattery for what it is and avoid being drawn into opportunities that look good and right and something-for-me-for-a-change motivating.
Is it possible to leave off that sort of temptation and just faithfully attend to what is True and future-building? I don't know. And how do we tell the difference between the thing that is going to hurt us and the thing that is going to build our lives and the lives of our loved ones?
Deb's life ~ and death ~ remind me that what we think we want or need will one day be exposed for the shadowy nothings that they are. And we will want our children. We'll want our Beloved. We'll want our sisters. We'll want our Daddy's. We'll be looking for hope beyond this side of life.
I'll keep driving by Deb's old place and remembering. She'd be so angry at me for getting all philosophical about these things! If she knew I was talking on like this she'd probably whip up the hem of her housecoat to show me how long her leg hairs had grown since I'd last seen her (Shaving was one of the many "useless" habits she'd abandoned in her final years!) or pull me over to the computer to show me her high score on the gambling site she loved so much. We'd settle into a game of Word Whomp...and she'd whomp me and gently chide me for being "actually sort of slow" at that kind of thing.
And she'd be right. And I'll keep figuring that out. But I'll get it, we'll get it, eventually. We'll figure out what's really important and give our all to pursuing that.
I think she shapes my thinking ~ invades my paradigm, maybe ~ more than I realize. She was everything that I am not: Brash. Cold. Drunk. Sharp witted. Keen eyed. Unapologetic. Always unapologetic.
Religion, apart from the odd trip to a psychic or her devotion to the daily horoscope, didn't touch her everyday. When I showed up on the front porch with cookies in one hand and Miss-Goody-Two-Shoes Jesus in the other, she didn't even flinch. We formed a friendship over time and I listened to hours of her story (A novel's worth of experience and suffering and hard living). She sometimes let me talk about mine.
At the time, I was being cajoled into thinking that I was something that I was not. The small church family that we were part of needed care and I was encouraged and praised and twist-my-rubber-arm led to believe that I was the gal for the job.
Deb saw right through the manipulation and fancy words that I, at the time, found enticing, alluring. "Why would you do that, Sandi? Nothing in it is real." She had no patience (and her impatience was something to behold!) for made-up compliments or feel good ego stroking.
But I was (and still am) looking for purpose outside of my work at home. The offer of an almost real job with almost real consequences and opportunity and responsibility was too tantalizing for me to ignore. I took the care giving role at the church. And Deb refused to talk to me about it.
She's been gone for, I think, three years (could it be four already?) and it's only been in the past month that I've begun to see what her fifty-something insight spotted right away: Flattery. I listened with hungry ears to false praise. My family is still working out the kinks that my choice then worked into the fabric of our home.
You might be seeing this in the lives of women around you, too. Women leaving their husbands ~ even their children ~ in pursuit of personal success. Women who are taking month long or repeated vacations just to "get away". Some are pursuing schooling ~ not because they feel purposeful or inspired or need to help with the family income, but because they are angry and are looking for ways to punish their men by forcing the guys to "step up". Some are openly having affairs. Some are just screaming silently, held prisoner by the duty and unending drudgery of their schedules.
For women who are pushing against the perceived confines of their circumstances, a little flattery might go a long way to convincing them that they are, indeed, capable of, deserving of, so much more than they have.
Deb would have told me that we really are capable and deserving, but her hard won experience also taught her that what we think is critically important in this life really amounts to nothing in our final days, months, years.
She had the career(s). She had the men. And the women. She was a published author and had her pilot's license. She'd done a bit of traveling and knew how to run a successful business. She'd abandoned her husband and son, too, to find herself and become all that she could be.
She was dead in her apartment for three days before anyone knew she was gone. Her son wept at her funeral, but his grief was detached, forlorn. I still don't know how to grieve for my friend who'd seen it all, done it all.
But I'm listening to her pointed interruptions as I watch the stories of new friends wind their way through months and years. I wonder if we'll see flattery for what it is and avoid being drawn into opportunities that look good and right and something-for-me-for-a-change motivating.
Is it possible to leave off that sort of temptation and just faithfully attend to what is True and future-building? I don't know. And how do we tell the difference between the thing that is going to hurt us and the thing that is going to build our lives and the lives of our loved ones?
Deb's life ~ and death ~ remind me that what we think we want or need will one day be exposed for the shadowy nothings that they are. And we will want our children. We'll want our Beloved. We'll want our sisters. We'll want our Daddy's. We'll be looking for hope beyond this side of life.
I'll keep driving by Deb's old place and remembering. She'd be so angry at me for getting all philosophical about these things! If she knew I was talking on like this she'd probably whip up the hem of her housecoat to show me how long her leg hairs had grown since I'd last seen her (Shaving was one of the many "useless" habits she'd abandoned in her final years!) or pull me over to the computer to show me her high score on the gambling site she loved so much. We'd settle into a game of Word Whomp...and she'd whomp me and gently chide me for being "actually sort of slow" at that kind of thing.
And she'd be right. And I'll keep figuring that out. But I'll get it, we'll get it, eventually. We'll figure out what's really important and give our all to pursuing that.
Check out Tia's post, "Drawing The Line" for more perspective on this. Just click on "Tia" on the sidebar.
Wednesday, December 3
Hairbrush Hand Grenades
This morning, CBC radio had an extensive report on gang activity in Canada. 'Turns out, our land is rife with gangs and they are wildly out of control. The younger generation of "gangster" is not governed by the decorum of their forefathers: they are carrying their weapons as badges of honor and wielding them publicly and with no thought of anonymity. The killings that once took place in back rooms and underneath bridges and in old cars are now occurring in front of children's hospitals and in residential areas.
Our own neighborhood is feeling a little dodgy of late. Houses, just a few blocks away, are invaded, their resident's bound, babies and all. Homes are riddled with bullets. Drug deals go down in my back alley. Yesterday, in the middle of the afternoon, I watched as the police drove off with one of my neighbors in their backseat.
Last night as I was scrubbing the dishes, I happened to glance up to see my sons in the living room. The lights were off, except for seasonal glow of the Christmas tree. The three of them were playing a game, content to be together and uninterrupted. At ease. Unthreatened. It was a vision of unmarred sanctuary.
For the past several days the guys have been waging war throughout the house. Sticks, water guns, air soft guns, belts, the ab roller (thank goodness it's getting some sort of workout), and a couple of hairbrushes make up their arsenal. Men rise and fall as strategies are worked and re-worked. I don't know who's at war or if the "good" guys are winning, I only know that it's a fight to the death.
While my sons lob their hairbrush hand grenades and fire imaginary bullets at contrived enemies, the sons of others are raising very real weapons, tilting them to the side, and firing ~ as many shots as they can squeeze off (another unique trait of the new generation of bad guy) ~ into the heads and chests of their rivals.
As this contrast sharpens in my city ~ on my street ~ I do not know what our family's response will be. We are affected by it. Daily. My boys need to learn independence, but they know what's out there and their not crazy about braving it alone. I know what's out there, and I don't want them to die. And I don't want them to be drawn into that world. That world. Two doors, ten doors down, two blocks over. That world that is so far removed from the peace of this home, but so unnervingly close.
The CBC didn't attempt to end their report on a positive note. There's not a lot of hope out there that this very old threat can be efficiently dealt with in new ways.
I'll hold on to hope, I think. Hope that fatherless boys will encounter purpose ~ Purpose that outranks fat bank accounts and violent power. Hope that dead morals and dull ethics will find fresh meaning in reborn souls. Hope that justice and Right will win the day.
Our own neighborhood is feeling a little dodgy of late. Houses, just a few blocks away, are invaded, their resident's bound, babies and all. Homes are riddled with bullets. Drug deals go down in my back alley. Yesterday, in the middle of the afternoon, I watched as the police drove off with one of my neighbors in their backseat.
Last night as I was scrubbing the dishes, I happened to glance up to see my sons in the living room. The lights were off, except for seasonal glow of the Christmas tree. The three of them were playing a game, content to be together and uninterrupted. At ease. Unthreatened. It was a vision of unmarred sanctuary.
For the past several days the guys have been waging war throughout the house. Sticks, water guns, air soft guns, belts, the ab roller (thank goodness it's getting some sort of workout), and a couple of hairbrushes make up their arsenal. Men rise and fall as strategies are worked and re-worked. I don't know who's at war or if the "good" guys are winning, I only know that it's a fight to the death.
While my sons lob their hairbrush hand grenades and fire imaginary bullets at contrived enemies, the sons of others are raising very real weapons, tilting them to the side, and firing ~ as many shots as they can squeeze off (another unique trait of the new generation of bad guy) ~ into the heads and chests of their rivals.
As this contrast sharpens in my city ~ on my street ~ I do not know what our family's response will be. We are affected by it. Daily. My boys need to learn independence, but they know what's out there and their not crazy about braving it alone. I know what's out there, and I don't want them to die. And I don't want them to be drawn into that world. That world. Two doors, ten doors down, two blocks over. That world that is so far removed from the peace of this home, but so unnervingly close.
The CBC didn't attempt to end their report on a positive note. There's not a lot of hope out there that this very old threat can be efficiently dealt with in new ways.
I'll hold on to hope, I think. Hope that fatherless boys will encounter purpose ~ Purpose that outranks fat bank accounts and violent power. Hope that dead morals and dull ethics will find fresh meaning in reborn souls. Hope that justice and Right will win the day.
Friday, November 21
God of Sundays
Where does your faith come alive? When does it behave like a living thing ~ a thoughtful, purposeful, active part of your life?
Is it in the quiet of nature or in a charismatic religious meeting? Summer camp, maybe, by the camp fire? Do you feel more faithful when you're dutifully meeting prayer time or reading list requirements?
Maybe Sunday morning church services are your connection point with God. Maybe you feel most in tune with God when you've held an infant in your arms or achieved a personal goal.
A friend once pressed me on my relationship with God: I just don't get you. You don't go to church. You don't attend any meetings or read any Christian books, but you obviously love God. Her tone communicates, loud and clear, that I shouldn't be feeling flattered by these observations. She's puzzled, even confused. I think to myself that she's looking for the smoke and mirrors that I must be raising to throw people off the track of my obvious rebellion.
She continued, I don't understand how you can be faithful to God when you don't go to church. I don't understand how you maintain any sort of relationship with Him without something to keep you on track.
Her soft British accent was charming even in it's rebuke. I pressed her with some careful questions, wondering if the conversation might have been more about her own struggle with faith than it was about my apparent waywardness. I asked about her own relationship with Sunday mornings and how they impacted her understanding of Jesus.
The dam of frustrated emotion quickly burst. She was wrestling with the loneliness and confusion she felt in services. She was angered by so much of what was happening there. She'd taken a part time job that required that she work on Sunday's and, relieved for the respite, had missed many meetings. But, she said, without church she was without God. She didn't think about Him at all. She never prayed. She didn't even think about picking up a Bible. Actively serving Him or worshipping Him didn't ever enter her thoughts.
I understood, thanks to her moving frankness, that loving Jesus isn't something to take lightly or for granted. Thanks to her gentle criticism I understood that one of the reasons we have experienced so much resentment for our choice to stay home Sunday's is because people apply their own experience to ours, assuming that because they wouldn't give Him a though without a structured reminder, that we probably won't either.
One of the breathtaking truths about our God, though, is that He is wildly diverse! Think of it: the God who created toads and croc's (the critters, not the "shoes") also thought-up waterfalls and cumulus clouds. He made blond hair and red, both. He said that some of us should be so white that the blue of our veins would show through (*sigh*) while some of us should be the color of warm chocolate.
God purposed that some of us would think in complicated, multi-layered, brain-straining ways while others would have the gracious gift of simplification. To some He said, "Sing!" and to others, "Exemplify Me in your silence."
Some of us will wrestle with faith, grasping and striving and demanding and falling. Some of us will look at Jesus and know, know, know that He is our Love. Our deepest, fondest, most breathtaking Love. Some will see Him in the face of a mountain, some in the stroke of a brush on canvass. Some will hear Him with clear, cool, like-I-heard-it-with-my-own-ears clarity, some will never know for sure that they've heard Him at all.
My friend felt that her own struggle ought to mirror mine (or the other way 'round). But her choice-experience path is simply different from mine. For a time, my family and I have not employed a pastor and a series of well-rehearsed songs to bring us face to face with the Maker. We're looking for Him everywhere, every day. We look for Him when things are bumpy and awkward and painful. We see Him easily when things are even and sure and healing.
No more. No less. We're not feeling right (or wrong). We've just made a choice. A choice that's different than some of our other God seeking friends. We do not begrudge them church service encounters with Christ, nor would we ask them to walk the uncharted trail that we're bush-whacking our way along. We love, too. Just differently.
And that's why I was wondering where you come alive ~ where your faith lives. Is there room in your understanding to allow for the striking differences in God's creation and in His created? Is there room to gently agree that while you may not be fully comfortable with the way of another, it may be, no less, the way of God?
Is it in the quiet of nature or in a charismatic religious meeting? Summer camp, maybe, by the camp fire? Do you feel more faithful when you're dutifully meeting prayer time or reading list requirements?
Maybe Sunday morning church services are your connection point with God. Maybe you feel most in tune with God when you've held an infant in your arms or achieved a personal goal.
A friend once pressed me on my relationship with God: I just don't get you. You don't go to church. You don't attend any meetings or read any Christian books, but you obviously love God. Her tone communicates, loud and clear, that I shouldn't be feeling flattered by these observations. She's puzzled, even confused. I think to myself that she's looking for the smoke and mirrors that I must be raising to throw people off the track of my obvious rebellion.
She continued, I don't understand how you can be faithful to God when you don't go to church. I don't understand how you maintain any sort of relationship with Him without something to keep you on track.
Her soft British accent was charming even in it's rebuke. I pressed her with some careful questions, wondering if the conversation might have been more about her own struggle with faith than it was about my apparent waywardness. I asked about her own relationship with Sunday mornings and how they impacted her understanding of Jesus.
The dam of frustrated emotion quickly burst. She was wrestling with the loneliness and confusion she felt in services. She was angered by so much of what was happening there. She'd taken a part time job that required that she work on Sunday's and, relieved for the respite, had missed many meetings. But, she said, without church she was without God. She didn't think about Him at all. She never prayed. She didn't even think about picking up a Bible. Actively serving Him or worshipping Him didn't ever enter her thoughts.
I understood, thanks to her moving frankness, that loving Jesus isn't something to take lightly or for granted. Thanks to her gentle criticism I understood that one of the reasons we have experienced so much resentment for our choice to stay home Sunday's is because people apply their own experience to ours, assuming that because they wouldn't give Him a though without a structured reminder, that we probably won't either.
One of the breathtaking truths about our God, though, is that He is wildly diverse! Think of it: the God who created toads and croc's (the critters, not the "shoes") also thought-up waterfalls and cumulus clouds. He made blond hair and red, both. He said that some of us should be so white that the blue of our veins would show through (*sigh*) while some of us should be the color of warm chocolate.
God purposed that some of us would think in complicated, multi-layered, brain-straining ways while others would have the gracious gift of simplification. To some He said, "Sing!" and to others, "Exemplify Me in your silence."
Some of us will wrestle with faith, grasping and striving and demanding and falling. Some of us will look at Jesus and know, know, know that He is our Love. Our deepest, fondest, most breathtaking Love. Some will see Him in the face of a mountain, some in the stroke of a brush on canvass. Some will hear Him with clear, cool, like-I-heard-it-with-my-own-ears clarity, some will never know for sure that they've heard Him at all.
My friend felt that her own struggle ought to mirror mine (or the other way 'round). But her choice-experience path is simply different from mine. For a time, my family and I have not employed a pastor and a series of well-rehearsed songs to bring us face to face with the Maker. We're looking for Him everywhere, every day. We look for Him when things are bumpy and awkward and painful. We see Him easily when things are even and sure and healing.
No more. No less. We're not feeling right (or wrong). We've just made a choice. A choice that's different than some of our other God seeking friends. We do not begrudge them church service encounters with Christ, nor would we ask them to walk the uncharted trail that we're bush-whacking our way along. We love, too. Just differently.
And that's why I was wondering where you come alive ~ where your faith lives. Is there room in your understanding to allow for the striking differences in God's creation and in His created? Is there room to gently agree that while you may not be fully comfortable with the way of another, it may be, no less, the way of God?
Thursday, October 30
The Subtle Lure -- by Tia
The following is from my friend's blog. It relates to some things that a couple of us have been talking about...
"Lead us not into temptation" often means, among other things,"Deny me those gratifying invitations, those highly interesting contacts,that participation in the brilliant movements of our age, which I so often, at risk desire."
from the reflections on the Psalms
I have been ruminating on this for a couple of months now and I'm not sure how to accurately put it all into words. We, as women have an instinctive need to help, to nurture and to put feet to our caring. It is a beautiful thing. I have seen it in action many times and I am always amazed at the caring and generous nature of those around us. It can however be misused or abused as most of God's gifts can be. We need to be aware of what we are doing, of not seeking out conflict or making more of a problem than there is or even seeing one where there is none. It can be so gratifying to be the one who is able to help walk someone through the storms of their life or even the one who is looked to for the answers. God is His infinite wisdom has chosen to work through man. This is His way. We need each other, and reaching out beyond ourselves to serve one another is truly remarkable. My word of caution in all this is that we need to look at our own hearts and see if we are doing this with the right intentions, to walk in humility, to see the person for who they are not the problem and how to fix it.
"Lead us not into temptation" often means, among other things,"Deny me those gratifying invitations, those highly interesting contacts,that participation in the brilliant movements of our age, which I so often, at risk desire."
from the reflections on the Psalms
I have been ruminating on this for a couple of months now and I'm not sure how to accurately put it all into words. We, as women have an instinctive need to help, to nurture and to put feet to our caring. It is a beautiful thing. I have seen it in action many times and I am always amazed at the caring and generous nature of those around us. It can however be misused or abused as most of God's gifts can be. We need to be aware of what we are doing, of not seeking out conflict or making more of a problem than there is or even seeing one where there is none. It can be so gratifying to be the one who is able to help walk someone through the storms of their life or even the one who is looked to for the answers. God is His infinite wisdom has chosen to work through man. This is His way. We need each other, and reaching out beyond ourselves to serve one another is truly remarkable. My word of caution in all this is that we need to look at our own hearts and see if we are doing this with the right intentions, to walk in humility, to see the person for who they are not the problem and how to fix it.
Tuesday, October 28
One of Those People
Warning: Uncharacteristically negative diatribe-like editorial dead ahead. Proceed with spit-guard and Valium.
"Oh. You're one of those people."
I sigh inwardly, not without emotion. Outwardly I attempt to make eye contact. "One of 'those' people? By which you mean...?"
He determinedly avoids my gaze. "Aww, you know. We have one working as a bag boy. He can work anytime. Even during the day. 'Does his school at night." He's actually sneering as he blurts his explanation in the general direction of my feet.
I'm surprised at the instant rise in frustration in me. I resent this stranger's insinuation -- undefined, uninformed -- that there is a "those" and that I'm one of them.
My oldest son has a smirk on his face (I fleetingly wonder if he can see into my mind. Does he actually see the building storm there?) as he shifts his grocery basket from one hand to another. He's been holding to a consistent (and new) Just sock him in the mouth approach to problem solving. I can almost hear him urging me on behind that grin. My youngest is contentedly oblivious to the drama that has the potential to explode all over the pharmacy shelves.
Because that's where we are. In Safeway. At the pharmacy. I asked a simple question about a product and a very helpful, if a little pasty-white and balding, man came 'round the counter to dispense his medicines and, unexpectedly, his opinions.
It began with a "Why aren't these kids in school?" We (I) brace for that question, never sure what blank stare, confusion, or open judgment we'll encounter when we glibly respond that we do school at home.
"Oh. You're one of those people." I don't even know what that means. What? Did he expect us to be rifle-toting, government hating, fear mongering system haters? Perhaps he feels we over protect our children or that we under educate them? Maybe we smell funny or look peculiar?
I'm instantly angry and when he mentions that he actually knows a home schooled boy I mask my growing ire with a smile and a joke, "So, does he have any peculiar ticks or facial twitches that worry you?" My attempt to lightly suggest that he is, quite probably, a typically developing boy despite the unorthodox nature of his upbringing goes unnoticed.
Not too long ago I was openly, publicly, and loudly criticized for my choice to stay home and school our sons (I always appreciate when both of these choices -- because that's all they are: choices. Not holy callings or fear-inspired withdrawals. Just choices. -- take a blow in one swift sentence.). A group of professional adults happened to ask an off-handed question about the kids' grades to which there was, apparently a correct answer. I did not give the correct answer. Those highly educated and successful folks spent the better part of fifteen minutes schooling me on the perils of my choice and the superior nature of their own educational preferences.
I did the same thing in that encounter that I did with Pharmacy Guy: I made light of our choice and deferred to their opinions in the moment, cloaking my own building fury with an attitude of submission. I had no frame of reference for dealing with such hostility then and I don't now.
In "Horton Hears a Who" (the recently released cinematic version) the antagonist of the story is made particularly obnoxious by her "pouch school" technique in raising her 'roo. She is intolerant, narrow minded, and snidely judgmental -- not to mention entirely irrational.
Right there, on the big screen, for all the world to see the message is clear: home schoolers are idiots.
I'm not sure how Mr. Pharmacy Guy came to that conclusion for himself. I didn't stick around to press for details (What with the full schedule of brainwashing and isolating I had lined up for that afternoon). But I'd just like to state, for the record, Mr. PG, that whatever bit you think you know about those people, chances are it's just a teeny bit of an enormous BIT and it'd be kind of you to get your informational pills all stuffed into the right bottle before you dispense your poisonous cure-all on them.
"Oh. You're one of those people."
I sigh inwardly, not without emotion. Outwardly I attempt to make eye contact. "One of 'those' people? By which you mean...?"
He determinedly avoids my gaze. "Aww, you know. We have one working as a bag boy. He can work anytime. Even during the day. 'Does his school at night." He's actually sneering as he blurts his explanation in the general direction of my feet.
I'm surprised at the instant rise in frustration in me. I resent this stranger's insinuation -- undefined, uninformed -- that there is a "those" and that I'm one of them.
My oldest son has a smirk on his face (I fleetingly wonder if he can see into my mind. Does he actually see the building storm there?) as he shifts his grocery basket from one hand to another. He's been holding to a consistent (and new) Just sock him in the mouth approach to problem solving. I can almost hear him urging me on behind that grin. My youngest is contentedly oblivious to the drama that has the potential to explode all over the pharmacy shelves.
Because that's where we are. In Safeway. At the pharmacy. I asked a simple question about a product and a very helpful, if a little pasty-white and balding, man came 'round the counter to dispense his medicines and, unexpectedly, his opinions.
It began with a "Why aren't these kids in school?" We (I) brace for that question, never sure what blank stare, confusion, or open judgment we'll encounter when we glibly respond that we do school at home.
"Oh. You're one of those people." I don't even know what that means. What? Did he expect us to be rifle-toting, government hating, fear mongering system haters? Perhaps he feels we over protect our children or that we under educate them? Maybe we smell funny or look peculiar?
I'm instantly angry and when he mentions that he actually knows a home schooled boy I mask my growing ire with a smile and a joke, "So, does he have any peculiar ticks or facial twitches that worry you?" My attempt to lightly suggest that he is, quite probably, a typically developing boy despite the unorthodox nature of his upbringing goes unnoticed.
Not too long ago I was openly, publicly, and loudly criticized for my choice to stay home and school our sons (I always appreciate when both of these choices -- because that's all they are: choices. Not holy callings or fear-inspired withdrawals. Just choices. -- take a blow in one swift sentence.). A group of professional adults happened to ask an off-handed question about the kids' grades to which there was, apparently a correct answer. I did not give the correct answer. Those highly educated and successful folks spent the better part of fifteen minutes schooling me on the perils of my choice and the superior nature of their own educational preferences.
I did the same thing in that encounter that I did with Pharmacy Guy: I made light of our choice and deferred to their opinions in the moment, cloaking my own building fury with an attitude of submission. I had no frame of reference for dealing with such hostility then and I don't now.
In "Horton Hears a Who" (the recently released cinematic version) the antagonist of the story is made particularly obnoxious by her "pouch school" technique in raising her 'roo. She is intolerant, narrow minded, and snidely judgmental -- not to mention entirely irrational.
Right there, on the big screen, for all the world to see the message is clear: home schoolers are idiots.
I'm not sure how Mr. Pharmacy Guy came to that conclusion for himself. I didn't stick around to press for details (What with the full schedule of brainwashing and isolating I had lined up for that afternoon). But I'd just like to state, for the record, Mr. PG, that whatever bit you think you know about those people, chances are it's just a teeny bit of an enormous BIT and it'd be kind of you to get your informational pills all stuffed into the right bottle before you dispense your poisonous cure-all on them.
Monday, October 20
Danny
Early Autumn sun filters past urban obstacles; stray rays brush past me as I pump dollar after dollar into our gas tank. Out of the corner of my eye I glimpse a loitering man: clean, just a little taller than I, black cowboy hat comfortably lodged on his aging head.
I pay him no mind (considering instead what I'll be paying at the till in just a minute), then I notice that he's moved closer and is, in fact, leaning up against the pump I'm using. He's gesturing at my oldest son who's seated in the front seat of the car. I turn to face him.
"Hey! Are you giving my kid a hard time?" I tease. I look more closely at him then. I see that he's leaning on the pump because his own legs will likely fail him if he doesn't lean on something. His brown-as-earth skin is beautifully wrinkled and weathered but, in his drunkenness, he's failed to clean the mucus and muck from his face. His right eye is seeping and crusty, both; it is milky white, blind.
I can't squeeze any more liquid gold into the tank so I hang up the pump and turn my full attention toward my new acquaintance. "What can I do for you today, sir?"
"Just need some bus fare. 'Trying to make it to Fort Macleod. Just need to get to the edge of the city so I can hitch my way."
His words are slurred and mumbled and difficult to catch. "You're looking for bus fare to Fort Macleod?" I ask with surprise. "That's a little more than I can help you with!"
He grins and then laughs at my misunderstanding. "No, no, no! I just need fare to the edge of the city!"
I laugh too and ask for his name. I ask him if he'll wait for me there while I go settle my bill and get some cash. "We'll talk about this more in a minute, Danny," I say as I move away from him.
Inside the station I'm surprised by the worry and anger etched into the faces of the staff and other patrons. A woman steps toward me and demands, "Are you okay? Do you need help?" The attendant, worried, mumbles "Is everything okay out there?"
I laugh my surprise and say that Danny and I are just having a quick conversation. I'm grateful for their concern, I say, but every thing's fine.
I make my way back outside and pull the bills I've just received in change back out of my purse. Careful to shield the transaction from the growing number of curious eyes both in and outside of the station, I press them into Danny's hand and suggest that there's enough there for a good supper and fare to the edge of the city, if that's where he wants to get to.
I tell him I'm glad to have met him and suggest that the few dollars I've given him won't get him very far. Would it be okay, I ask, if I talked with my God with him? He readily agrees, immediately taking my outstretched hands in one of his own and removing his hat with his other.
We approach God then, Danny and I, in the gas station parking lot. I ask Jesus if He'll heal Danny's blinded eye and keep him safe as he continues his travels (Why does inspiration always fail me in these moments? There are never any sparks or blinding lights or flashes of insight. Only mumbled, stumbled attempts at drawing God and man into the same moment.). We say our amens and our goodbye's. I jump into the car and he staggers on his way ~ not toward the bus stop, but toward the corner pub.
Just days later I received this in an email from my friend. She said:
Last night I had dream. I was sitting on the ground, just in the dust or dirt with an (East) Indian woman. We were, together, taking one of my cleaning rags and cutting it in half. In my mind, I was cutting it in half to give a piece to a man who had lost an eye. This rag would serve as a patch to cover over the place where his eye would have been. Then I realized that the other half of the rag was for ME to do the same thing to my own eye. I was no different from the man who was poor and blind.
Here I was thinking I was "saving" him (or rescuing him or helping him) and at the same time, reminded of my own need for rescue and of my own imperfection. The rag was for both of us! There is some sort of significance in it being shared.
When I read her dream I thought of Danny. I thought of how easy it is to feel sanctimonious. Good. I love the reminder that my "eye" is as much in need of clean rags as ever his was.
The exchange of stories and gifts and prayer between ourselves and hurting strangers -- they are as much (more?) for us as they are for the ones we are reaching out to. God reaches into both lives with different lessons, kindnesses, convictions.
We need that clean rag, split off from the one we've used to serve another, to bandage our own eye: an eye that sometimes skews our vision and indulges temptation and looks for glory.
I pay him no mind (considering instead what I'll be paying at the till in just a minute), then I notice that he's moved closer and is, in fact, leaning up against the pump I'm using. He's gesturing at my oldest son who's seated in the front seat of the car. I turn to face him.
"Hey! Are you giving my kid a hard time?" I tease. I look more closely at him then. I see that he's leaning on the pump because his own legs will likely fail him if he doesn't lean on something. His brown-as-earth skin is beautifully wrinkled and weathered but, in his drunkenness, he's failed to clean the mucus and muck from his face. His right eye is seeping and crusty, both; it is milky white, blind.
I can't squeeze any more liquid gold into the tank so I hang up the pump and turn my full attention toward my new acquaintance. "What can I do for you today, sir?"
"Just need some bus fare. 'Trying to make it to Fort Macleod. Just need to get to the edge of the city so I can hitch my way."
His words are slurred and mumbled and difficult to catch. "You're looking for bus fare to Fort Macleod?" I ask with surprise. "That's a little more than I can help you with!"
He grins and then laughs at my misunderstanding. "No, no, no! I just need fare to the edge of the city!"
I laugh too and ask for his name. I ask him if he'll wait for me there while I go settle my bill and get some cash. "We'll talk about this more in a minute, Danny," I say as I move away from him.
Inside the station I'm surprised by the worry and anger etched into the faces of the staff and other patrons. A woman steps toward me and demands, "Are you okay? Do you need help?" The attendant, worried, mumbles "Is everything okay out there?"
I laugh my surprise and say that Danny and I are just having a quick conversation. I'm grateful for their concern, I say, but every thing's fine.
I make my way back outside and pull the bills I've just received in change back out of my purse. Careful to shield the transaction from the growing number of curious eyes both in and outside of the station, I press them into Danny's hand and suggest that there's enough there for a good supper and fare to the edge of the city, if that's where he wants to get to.
I tell him I'm glad to have met him and suggest that the few dollars I've given him won't get him very far. Would it be okay, I ask, if I talked with my God with him? He readily agrees, immediately taking my outstretched hands in one of his own and removing his hat with his other.
We approach God then, Danny and I, in the gas station parking lot. I ask Jesus if He'll heal Danny's blinded eye and keep him safe as he continues his travels (Why does inspiration always fail me in these moments? There are never any sparks or blinding lights or flashes of insight. Only mumbled, stumbled attempts at drawing God and man into the same moment.). We say our amens and our goodbye's. I jump into the car and he staggers on his way ~ not toward the bus stop, but toward the corner pub.
Just days later I received this in an email from my friend. She said:
Last night I had dream. I was sitting on the ground, just in the dust or dirt with an (East) Indian woman. We were, together, taking one of my cleaning rags and cutting it in half. In my mind, I was cutting it in half to give a piece to a man who had lost an eye. This rag would serve as a patch to cover over the place where his eye would have been. Then I realized that the other half of the rag was for ME to do the same thing to my own eye. I was no different from the man who was poor and blind.
Here I was thinking I was "saving" him (or rescuing him or helping him) and at the same time, reminded of my own need for rescue and of my own imperfection. The rag was for both of us! There is some sort of significance in it being shared.
When I read her dream I thought of Danny. I thought of how easy it is to feel sanctimonious. Good. I love the reminder that my "eye" is as much in need of clean rags as ever his was.
The exchange of stories and gifts and prayer between ourselves and hurting strangers -- they are as much (more?) for us as they are for the ones we are reaching out to. God reaches into both lives with different lessons, kindnesses, convictions.
We need that clean rag, split off from the one we've used to serve another, to bandage our own eye: an eye that sometimes skews our vision and indulges temptation and looks for glory.
Sunday, October 5
Intersection
I hadn't thought about it for ages and ages, so I'm not sure why, at that particular intersection, on that particular day, in broad daylight, it came to mind, but there it was.
My memory kicked in abruptly and took me back in time. I was coming off of a late night shift. I'd spent my evening caring for a wonderfully bright and challenging Down's Syndrome baby. The proximity of that shift to my earlier client had left me without a dinner break so I steered our mini van into the nearest Wendy's drive-through for a near-midnight supper.
Keenly aware of the extra weight that saddled my stressed muscles and bones, I was embarrassed by my fast food forays. Pounds settled on and around my taxed frame, causing pain, mobility problems, and constant humiliation. But I was hungry and alone and looking for the comfort that only a carton of fries and a tub of coke could offer.
Eating and driving requires some skill. I had a system of balancing and lodging and placing my various treats so that I could access them easily and safely and in the exact order that I always consumed them: fries in the cup holder nearest my seat, Coke in the one beside. Burger in hand. Bite of burger first, then fry, then a sip of soda.
I was shoveling food into my mouth -- fast. Shoveling and driving. Scarfing the food down without taste or awareness. Madly seeking the comfort of carbs, I pulled to a stop at a well-lit intersection, stuffing a particularly large mitt full of fries into my mouth when I felt that I was being watched.
I was being watched. A small car loaded with young, beautiful, sneering girls had hit the red light at the same time. They were watching. They were pointing. They were laughing.
A fat woman stuffing her fat face. Or some such. I couldn't hear their words or read their minds. But I think I made an accurate assessment of their thoughts and intent.
I was...what? Destroyed? Crushed? Humiliated? I was sick. Sick of myself and my killing behaviors. Sick of the pounds and the pain. Sick of being stuck and ashamed. Sick of depending on seat belts that weren't designed to support my girth. Sick of hiding. Sick of ugliness.
All of this came over me in a wash of fear and relief and uncertainty and hope while I sat at another intersection just the other day. Excess pounds have disappeared (and stayed disappeared for almost two years). I don't snarf fast food as though my life depends on it -- often -- and never at night. I don't fear the jeers or cruel glances or averted gazes of an embarrassed public so much any more.
I imagine, on some level, I have those girls to thank for that. I don't know what part that snap-shot memory played (plays?) in this journey toward health, but I'm guessing it does play a part.
We can be so quick to fuss and bother about the painful, prickly, jarring moments of our lives. It's easy to believe that God is unkind and mean of spirit. It's not a stretch to think that He's orchestrated circumstances to somehow get us to shape up or get growing -- or, much worse, to simply harm us.
God is no such God. Rather, He'll change those awkward, tearing, cruel times into something seamless, healing, and productive. He didn't put those french fries in my hand, nor did he put the sneers on the faces of those young women. But He transformed a moment of ugliness into a part of the catalyst that would move me toward healthy change.
I adore Him for that. Wildly. Deeply. Gratefully. He is such a God. You have a sorrow right now. You have a physical wrong, a mental glitch, a brutal addiction, a festering offense. Your God did not heap those things on you, but He will redeem them for you. He is good. Always. And this dark moment will, in time, become a reminder of Light. Of salvation. Of rescue. Of healing.
Set the french fries aside. Dump the burger. Look those young and so-much-to-learn women square in the eye and grab 'hold of the truth that this time is not for always! There are other intersections with other you's not so far off.
My memory kicked in abruptly and took me back in time. I was coming off of a late night shift. I'd spent my evening caring for a wonderfully bright and challenging Down's Syndrome baby. The proximity of that shift to my earlier client had left me without a dinner break so I steered our mini van into the nearest Wendy's drive-through for a near-midnight supper.
Keenly aware of the extra weight that saddled my stressed muscles and bones, I was embarrassed by my fast food forays. Pounds settled on and around my taxed frame, causing pain, mobility problems, and constant humiliation. But I was hungry and alone and looking for the comfort that only a carton of fries and a tub of coke could offer.
Eating and driving requires some skill. I had a system of balancing and lodging and placing my various treats so that I could access them easily and safely and in the exact order that I always consumed them: fries in the cup holder nearest my seat, Coke in the one beside. Burger in hand. Bite of burger first, then fry, then a sip of soda.
I was shoveling food into my mouth -- fast. Shoveling and driving. Scarfing the food down without taste or awareness. Madly seeking the comfort of carbs, I pulled to a stop at a well-lit intersection, stuffing a particularly large mitt full of fries into my mouth when I felt that I was being watched.
I was being watched. A small car loaded with young, beautiful, sneering girls had hit the red light at the same time. They were watching. They were pointing. They were laughing.
A fat woman stuffing her fat face. Or some such. I couldn't hear their words or read their minds. But I think I made an accurate assessment of their thoughts and intent.
I was...what? Destroyed? Crushed? Humiliated? I was sick. Sick of myself and my killing behaviors. Sick of the pounds and the pain. Sick of being stuck and ashamed. Sick of depending on seat belts that weren't designed to support my girth. Sick of hiding. Sick of ugliness.
All of this came over me in a wash of fear and relief and uncertainty and hope while I sat at another intersection just the other day. Excess pounds have disappeared (and stayed disappeared for almost two years). I don't snarf fast food as though my life depends on it -- often -- and never at night. I don't fear the jeers or cruel glances or averted gazes of an embarrassed public so much any more.
I imagine, on some level, I have those girls to thank for that. I don't know what part that snap-shot memory played (plays?) in this journey toward health, but I'm guessing it does play a part.
We can be so quick to fuss and bother about the painful, prickly, jarring moments of our lives. It's easy to believe that God is unkind and mean of spirit. It's not a stretch to think that He's orchestrated circumstances to somehow get us to shape up or get growing -- or, much worse, to simply harm us.
God is no such God. Rather, He'll change those awkward, tearing, cruel times into something seamless, healing, and productive. He didn't put those french fries in my hand, nor did he put the sneers on the faces of those young women. But He transformed a moment of ugliness into a part of the catalyst that would move me toward healthy change.
I adore Him for that. Wildly. Deeply. Gratefully. He is such a God. You have a sorrow right now. You have a physical wrong, a mental glitch, a brutal addiction, a festering offense. Your God did not heap those things on you, but He will redeem them for you. He is good. Always. And this dark moment will, in time, become a reminder of Light. Of salvation. Of rescue. Of healing.
Set the french fries aside. Dump the burger. Look those young and so-much-to-learn women square in the eye and grab 'hold of the truth that this time is not for always! There are other intersections with other you's not so far off.
Wednesday, October 1
Dragons in the Pantry
I noticed the beginnings of the offending smell during school hours on Monday. On Tuesday Ben mentioned something that "smells like our old hamster" in the pantry. By Thursday, Jamy was taking dramatic breath-holding measures whenever circumstances required that he rally toward the offending closet.
But hours are quickly filled and schedules demanding and I did not have enough minutes in the day (and was too weary to make use of them by the night) to deal with the offensive, albeit organic, smell of rot coming from our kitchen storage.
Friday came and, busy or not, something had to be done. Heaps of recycling were disassembled and smelled and the breadmaker thoroughly examined. Canned goods and dog treat bins were sniff-tested and cracker boxes checked for peculiarities. Nothing.
And then, there it was: a slender, yellow cardboard box with beautiful Chinese figures tracing its surfaces. A gift from some of our world traveling friends, we had tasted its delicacies and left the rest for another day. "Dragon Cakes" they were called. Small, round balls of paste and flour and many mysterious something-or-others.
Dragon Cakes don't age particularly well, it turns out, and they were alerting us to that fact with an unholy scent. They found a new home in the trash, but despite my best coffee bean efforts (a trick I learned post-house fire last summer), the smell lingers still.
Almost two weeks later (This would be a good time to start formulating appropriately biting "Get your act together, Cinderella!" comments, as you'll find them useful in the next few minutes.):
It's late and I'm tired. I shuffle my way to the pantry to scavenge something that could resemble a tomorrow's-lunch for my hard working husband. A yank on the door and I am rudely, cruelly assaulted by a worse-than-dead-hamster smell. Bob catches a whiff, too, from his spot across the room.
"What on earth...? The smell is back! I thought I took care of that ages ago!" I start my search from where I left off upon the discovery of rotting Dragon Cakes. I yank, I haul, I complain, I shift things around.
There it is. Of course. A long forgotten bag of what were once potatos. They've deteriorated so thoroughly that their putrid juices are seeping through the bottom of the bag and into the wicker basket that holds them. Mush with eyes ~~ that's all that remains. I scoop them, basket and all, into the waiting garbage bag and leave the pantry to air out overnight.
Somewhere in my tale of questionable housekeeping there's a lesson on what happens when things are left to fester in us. Tiny offenses can become overwhelming problems. A thought sneaks in, too, on what happens when we are distracted by false solutions or Dragon Cake issues instead of pushing forward until we find the real source of the stench in our hearts, our minds.
I could spend some time ruminating there (I probably should if the care I take of my soul is anything like the attention I pay to my kitchen storage!) but I've just realized that in my haste to route offending vegetables I forgot to finish making Bob's lunch. Mindful meditation will have to wait for another metaphorical moment while I make up for the missing lunch with a spectacularly filling dinner. Unfortunately, we'll have to do without the potatos.
But hours are quickly filled and schedules demanding and I did not have enough minutes in the day (and was too weary to make use of them by the night) to deal with the offensive, albeit organic, smell of rot coming from our kitchen storage.
Friday came and, busy or not, something had to be done. Heaps of recycling were disassembled and smelled and the breadmaker thoroughly examined. Canned goods and dog treat bins were sniff-tested and cracker boxes checked for peculiarities. Nothing.
And then, there it was: a slender, yellow cardboard box with beautiful Chinese figures tracing its surfaces. A gift from some of our world traveling friends, we had tasted its delicacies and left the rest for another day. "Dragon Cakes" they were called. Small, round balls of paste and flour and many mysterious something-or-others.
Dragon Cakes don't age particularly well, it turns out, and they were alerting us to that fact with an unholy scent. They found a new home in the trash, but despite my best coffee bean efforts (a trick I learned post-house fire last summer), the smell lingers still.
Almost two weeks later (This would be a good time to start formulating appropriately biting "Get your act together, Cinderella!" comments, as you'll find them useful in the next few minutes.):
It's late and I'm tired. I shuffle my way to the pantry to scavenge something that could resemble a tomorrow's-lunch for my hard working husband. A yank on the door and I am rudely, cruelly assaulted by a worse-than-dead-hamster smell. Bob catches a whiff, too, from his spot across the room.
"What on earth...? The smell is back! I thought I took care of that ages ago!" I start my search from where I left off upon the discovery of rotting Dragon Cakes. I yank, I haul, I complain, I shift things around.
There it is. Of course. A long forgotten bag of what were once potatos. They've deteriorated so thoroughly that their putrid juices are seeping through the bottom of the bag and into the wicker basket that holds them. Mush with eyes ~~ that's all that remains. I scoop them, basket and all, into the waiting garbage bag and leave the pantry to air out overnight.
Somewhere in my tale of questionable housekeeping there's a lesson on what happens when things are left to fester in us. Tiny offenses can become overwhelming problems. A thought sneaks in, too, on what happens when we are distracted by false solutions or Dragon Cake issues instead of pushing forward until we find the real source of the stench in our hearts, our minds.
I could spend some time ruminating there (I probably should if the care I take of my soul is anything like the attention I pay to my kitchen storage!) but I've just realized that in my haste to route offending vegetables I forgot to finish making Bob's lunch. Mindful meditation will have to wait for another metaphorical moment while I make up for the missing lunch with a spectacularly filling dinner. Unfortunately, we'll have to do without the potatos.
Tuesday, September 16
Errands
We're at the mall. Welcomed with a warm variety of food court aroma's and perfectly controlled temperatures, the boys and I go our separate ways.
I take my place in line at the Telus store.
The couple in front of me are patient and engaging. She, in her too-tight navy sweat pants and almost-matching tank top, scratches insistently at her sunburned skin; he in his cycling muscle shirt, thick silver chain necklace, sweat socks-and-sandals. They are attentive to each other and clearly in love.
I carry on past groups of shoppers lounging in rest areas. A weary mum tends to her feeding infant. A bored husband waits, eyes glazed over in acquiescence, half-awake in an easy chair. Children shrill; parents soothe, bribe, threaten.
Wandering past a mother and daughter as they clear the escalator exit I hear, "Sometimes I hate you so much." I do not glance at mom's face to see the toll her daughter's cutting tone has taken. I do not doubt the truth of those words, but cannot bear to see the pain they are causing.
The clerk at the department store counter has a ring on every finger. I comment, wondering aloud if they each have a story or if she's wearing them just because she likes them. She lights up at the acknowledgement and quickly shares a story or two about her favorites: one a gift from a friend, another because it's silver and a frog! and she just loved it.
I wait, bored and ready to go home, outside the boys' favorite gaming store. A young boy, eleven? twelve? is throwing a royal temper because his mother is insisting it's time to leave the game demo. He defies her, his father standing by, smirking and silent. Mom insists. Junior complies -- loudly, angrily. As they move past me, he hits his father repeatedly, shouting his frustration. The layers of complexity in that stumbled upon drama!
My own sons weave their way through the crowd of merchandise and eager shoppers toward me. Requests for lunch in the food court are denied (feebly...I'm terrible at saying no) and knowlingly accepted (They'll pursuade me to stop for slurpees on the way home instead!). We're ready to leave and set our course for the exit.
A teeny, startlingly lovely child, clutching her so-big stuffed monkey tightly to her chest, catches my eye. I smile at her and give a little wave. She rewards me with a fully engaged, reaches-to-her-eyes grin. There is healing in such a smile.
A mother, face dark with isolation and uncertainty glances my way. I catch her eye. She reaches for her head covering, self aware, defiant. Again with a smile. Shadows vanish and the light of connection shimmers instantly. For a moment she is alive, part of something larger than the world of stroller, bottle, bills, and drudgery. We are the same, she and I: sisters, daughters, mothers, lovers. I pray her well as we carry on our separate-and-the-same paths.
Brief exchanges at every turn. Rude exchanges -- one woman dominates and belittles another. Kind interchanges with both parties moving on satisfied, looked after. Men ogling women. Courteous men. Kind fathers. Negligent fathers. Teenagers sighing contemptuously as parents fail them in ways real and imagined.
The guys and I are walking too fast, as is our habit. A man and his wife turn sharply into my path, drinks in hand. He jerks to a sudden stop and I dodge just-in-time. "Oops! My bad...So sorry!" I offer. They giggle...a light hearted, forgiving, it's-completely-okay sound that rights all wrongs.
We're down the stairs and moving through the parking lot. A simple errand accomplished; a part played on a peculiar stage, a busy stage. Life touching life, for good or for naught. We go our separate ways.
Saturday, July 26
Thirteen Going On Forever
Disregarded. He is ignored, dismissed. The wordless message: Disappear. The murmured message, grumbled by those he should most trust: Shut. Your. Mouth. She hides her face behind a mask of licorice-black hair. Strong, afraid, searching. An impediment of speech ensures that telling her side will be complicated, slow. There's no one to tell anyway.
His need for belonging and adoration eclipse rational thought. He tells tales to weave a reality that is livable. Safe.
Her need to understand, to fit, to breathe, overshadow restraint. She begins the tightrope dance of belonging in the world of men.
Who will hear? Who will enter into the web of fantasy and choking silence that winds 'round his lips, his mind -- soon his all. Who will be on his side first; who will shout his worth?
Who will reach? Who will call her down from that too-high strand, that too-risky place, and invite her into safety? Who will listen, beyond shaking lips and stilted words, and understand that she already is; that she is becoming?
The hearing, the reaching: they take time.
It is inconvenient to love.
The leaving, the ignoring: they are effortless.
Play blind, dumb, mute. For the sake of ease.
It costs all to withhold. It is inconvenient to love.
Monday, July 21
Place
Come
Walk with me awhile
Through stands of trees
And prairie grass
Along this gently wandered road
Hear the shrill of hawk
And hawk
Imagine yourself young
Free
Dance with the damselfly
Reach for the Wild
Stand in silence
Stand
In silence
Breathe deep the Promise
That permanent Beauty
Unsoiled land
Unspoiled land
Will soon be ours
Step firmly
This is the Way
Beyond ruin
Beyond waste
Where blossoms cover
Boundless plains
And Hope waits in spite of all
Walk with me awhile
Through stands of trees
And prairie grass
Along this gently wandered road
Hear the shrill of hawk
And hawk
Imagine yourself young
Free
Dance with the damselfly
Reach for the Wild
Stand in silence
Stand
In silence
Breathe deep the Promise
That permanent Beauty
Unsoiled land
Unspoiled land
Will soon be ours
Step firmly
This is the Way
Beyond ruin
Beyond waste
Where blossoms cover
Boundless plains
And Hope waits in spite of all
Sunday, June 22
About Her
If you met her for yourself, Anna's feet would be the last thing to draw your attention.The thing you'd notice about her, if you bumped into her at the market or the coffee shop, is her spirit -- her I'm-laughing-at-you-in-the-nicest-way, mischievous, determination. She's uncommonly comfortable in her own lovely skin. Perfectly blond and naturally curly hair plays around her freckled cheeks. Her petite, feminine frame carries her soon-coming babe with strength, energy.
But we're not talking about spark, we're talking about feet, she and I. Anna's first pedicure has resulted in perfect daisies painted on fluorescent green nails. "So, you know how whenever you go into something like this you always self-consciously apologize for what you imagine must be the worst feet they've ever seen? Well, it turns out mine really are some of the worst!" Her gently self-deprecating laugh assures her listener that she's really okay with whatever criticism may have been leveled at her to establish the nastiness of her callous-riddled toes.
I laugh in turn and press for detail. "It's true! They brought out a special cream! 'Just for you,' they said. Who knew?"
I'm generally uncomfortable with salons, spa's, perfume departments -- anyplace where aggressive women threaten to try to "make something" of my "challenging" appearance. I need to wax more regularly, but the fifteen dollars required is elusive (and most often being spent on slurpees, rather than beauty enhancements); the last time I visited an esthetician she, as I lay prostrate on my back in a dingy back room in a strangely decorated salon, perkily chirruped: "Oh my gosh! You're eyebrows are, like, completely uneven!" That eyebrows grow in all manner of raggedy slashes across the faces of women 'round the globe had, clearly, not occurred to her until that moment. I'm so glad I could be the one to demonstrate that imperfection.
My nail beds are too flat to handle the beautiful manicure's I love so much. My hair's natural s-curve co-operates with no one. I've started sprouting hairs in odd places ~ obvious places ~ places front and center where all the world can enjoy an excellent view (I am not exaggerating when I say that there is one that springs forth from the middle of my left cheek that can grow to the incredible length of one centimeter overnight!).
So, when Anna and I, busily setting up a picnic supper for the kids' youth group, talk about the grotesque deformity of feet, I can relate. The really glorious thing about being a few years into living is that our oddities and various uglies are becoming amusing. The youthful sting of fear and uncertainty that comes with the realization of imperfections is falling away and being replaced by growing (and sometimes grim) understanding that our callouses and sproingy hairs are not what the world is watching anyway.
If you met her for yourself, Anna's feet would be the last thing to draw your attention. Because she is clever and very funny. She catches your imagination, quickly, with engaging ideas and thoughts for the future. She is kind. She rejects no one. She is beautiful.
With a toddler straddling her right hip (Only occasionally directing a "Could you please help me?" at her distracted husband.) and a babybelly sticking out to forever, she wins her audience. She facilitates the picnic, now well underway. She organizes and executes appropriately sloppy and energetic games, the kind that only thirteen year old's can fully appreciate. She laughs. She draws in. She loves.
Bumpy feet. Flat nailbeds. Hair too-straight, too-curly. Moles. Unimportant, all. We are so much more than the sum of our imperfect features. We bring to the world. We give to the world. We share, love, offer, build in our worlds. Like Anna's feet, our flaws will go largely unnoticed, while the bits of grace and humor we offer will leave lasting, healing, motivating impressions. Now, would you please stop staring at my eyebrows?
Wednesday, June 18
A Splotch of Drool
A lunch bag, locks, and two kinds of milk. A lunch bag, locks, and two kinds of milk. A lunch bag...I'm chanting rhythmically to myself as I make my way to the grocery store. A lunch bag for Bob, locks for the backyard gates (because the neighbor kids are sneaking in to visit the dogs when we're not at home), and milk for breakfast.
Easy, right? A short list. I'm not sure how your thirty, forty, fifty-something memory is treating you these days, but mine is a bit like a dog dish on the back deck on a hot summer's morning: all the useful stuff has evaporated by midday, leaving behind only a few clumps of fir and a splotch of drool.
"Hey, Mom? I got 93% on my test."
"No kidding, son? Good job!"
"Mom?"
"Mmmhmm?" I'm stirring or cleaning or folding, my mind on other things, but I force my mind to scramble it's way into the present conversation.
"Mom, that's the third time I've told you about that mark."
I stop stirring, cleaning, folding, ruminating. "What? No way. I would have remembered if you'd told me something so important. Are you sure you told me before?"
"Yeah. 'Cause you responded before."
"So, why'd you tell me again?
"Because I usually tell you things three times, even if you respond, so that I'm sure you've heard me."
I toy with the idea that my teenager is messing with my head. He's not serious? He's serious.
I call a friend to go over the details for a birthday we're planning. She listens politely as I ramble off the meeting times and places. She waits for me to take a breath and injects, "So, this is all of the same stuff you told me in your phone message last night, right?"
A phone message? Last night? I didn't leave a message, I'm sure of it. I'd remember that, for sure! Wrong. Bits of fir and a puddle of drool.
I do remember some things.
Like, I remember what it feels like to sit beneath a tree on Grandpa's farm. I remember the fairy-tale feel of the cool breeze and the bony roots and the reaching branches.
I remember the smell in the car-pool lady's car after she'd had her radiation treatments. How old was I then? Ten, eleven?
The woman I babysat for who cheated on her husband with (no kidding!) the milk man, my first car, Dad teaching me to drive a standard (and not ever swearing out loud -- not even in German -- when I nearly spun us into the ditch on a country road), the first teacher to give me a near-failing grade on an English paper, the first teacher to challenge my beliefs about myself, my God, my life -- I remember all of these things.
I remember the pillar-of-the-church man who was offended, weekly, by my bushy eyebrows and "man sized" hands and too-firm grip. How I felt the first time I read "The Scarlet Pimpernel" and when I first encountered God on a just-me level; my first time skiing and that one mean swimming instructor. I remember!
But the grocery list is a little elusive. Four things, I tell myself. You're just picking up four things. I keep walking and chanting, Lunch bag, locks..., allowing myself a bit of a giggle and making a mental note to just write it all on my hand next time (because, Goodness knows, I won't be able to keep track of a piece of paper). If I remember...
Easy, right? A short list. I'm not sure how your thirty, forty, fifty-something memory is treating you these days, but mine is a bit like a dog dish on the back deck on a hot summer's morning: all the useful stuff has evaporated by midday, leaving behind only a few clumps of fir and a splotch of drool.
"Hey, Mom? I got 93% on my test."
"No kidding, son? Good job!"
"Mom?"
"Mmmhmm?" I'm stirring or cleaning or folding, my mind on other things, but I force my mind to scramble it's way into the present conversation.
"Mom, that's the third time I've told you about that mark."
I stop stirring, cleaning, folding, ruminating. "What? No way. I would have remembered if you'd told me something so important. Are you sure you told me before?"
"Yeah. 'Cause you responded before."
"So, why'd you tell me again?
"Because I usually tell you things three times, even if you respond, so that I'm sure you've heard me."
I toy with the idea that my teenager is messing with my head. He's not serious? He's serious.
I call a friend to go over the details for a birthday we're planning. She listens politely as I ramble off the meeting times and places. She waits for me to take a breath and injects, "So, this is all of the same stuff you told me in your phone message last night, right?"
A phone message? Last night? I didn't leave a message, I'm sure of it. I'd remember that, for sure! Wrong. Bits of fir and a puddle of drool.
I do remember some things.
Like, I remember what it feels like to sit beneath a tree on Grandpa's farm. I remember the fairy-tale feel of the cool breeze and the bony roots and the reaching branches.
I remember the smell in the car-pool lady's car after she'd had her radiation treatments. How old was I then? Ten, eleven?
The woman I babysat for who cheated on her husband with (no kidding!) the milk man, my first car, Dad teaching me to drive a standard (and not ever swearing out loud -- not even in German -- when I nearly spun us into the ditch on a country road), the first teacher to give me a near-failing grade on an English paper, the first teacher to challenge my beliefs about myself, my God, my life -- I remember all of these things.
I remember the pillar-of-the-church man who was offended, weekly, by my bushy eyebrows and "man sized" hands and too-firm grip. How I felt the first time I read "The Scarlet Pimpernel" and when I first encountered God on a just-me level; my first time skiing and that one mean swimming instructor. I remember!
But the grocery list is a little elusive. Four things, I tell myself. You're just picking up four things. I keep walking and chanting, Lunch bag, locks..., allowing myself a bit of a giggle and making a mental note to just write it all on my hand next time (because, Goodness knows, I won't be able to keep track of a piece of paper). If I remember...
Tuesday, June 10
Blackbird
This little guy is a Brewer's Blackbird. He's intensely parental and darkly vigilant where his offspring are concerned. I know this because every time I hike past his house he chitters and flaps threateningly at me, hovering just a couple of feet above my head.
Sometimes I take him by surprise and he doesn't begin his recriminations until I'm past, but once he's spotted me I'm in for it!
He and his family nest on the ground or in the bottom branches of the trees that cluster around our local man-made lakes. His Blackbird neighbors are equally vocal in the defense of their territory, sitting like tiny sentries just a few feet off from their home turfs. As I walk by, I chatter my reassurances in their direction, in my very best Bird, promising that I won't harm their mates or their babes.
They don't believe me and make gently determined swoops at my head, encouraging me to move along a little quicker if-you-please, their tones implying that they will reign their tiny fury down on me right quick if I don't shove off.
I happen to be talking with God about my own kids as I enter the Brewer's neighborhood. I'm asking (beseeching? petitioning?) my Lord for His ongoing presence in their lives. Will He, I ask, lead them to become all that He's created them to be? Will He be their teacher, counselor, conviction, Light? Will He give them the same gift of believing that I feel so grateful for in my own life? Will He teach them to love -- sooner, more deeply, more wildly than I?
You know what those prayers are like, I know! You know the breath-stealing intensity that settles around a Mom's crying out on behalf of her own. When I pray for you...and you...and you, my friend, my thoughts often begin as weighty and awe-filled petitions to God. After a moment's, "Lord, will You do such-and-such for my friend?" the weight of the moment lifts, vanishes.
When we pray for our kids, on the other hand, the import of what we're asking enlarges and expands inside us until it fills us to bursting: we carry unspoken, ongoing entreaties for the children, expelling them in short breaths as we mop the floor or fold their laundry. Spilling them in too-many-word rants in the privacy of the loo. Weeping them in silence in the safe aloneness of the shower. The urgency and momentous responsibility of their care is unchanging in us. The relief that follows a prayer for a friend does not always accompany the prayer for a child.
We're a little like Brewer's Blackbird. We're at our post, watchfully noting the threats and adventures and sustaining-things and breaking-things that are coming our charges' way. We may be tiny, but we will be heard. And if you appear to be a threat to our maturing broods, you'd better come equipped with a very sturdy hat and some good running shoes!
I hurry past, entertained and humbled by the Brewer's determined (militant?) vigilance. I do not have a hat and I'm unnerved enough by their angry chitchitchit's to be grateful for my running shoes. I mark the lesson on guarding the nest and, in my ridiculously high and squeaky sure-to-calm-the-critter language, leave them with a my final reassurance that they've done their work well; their young are safe, the threat vanquished for another day.
Wednesday, April 9
Thirsty
I thought our apple tree was dying. It's a new addition to our barren backyard (Note to self: Write landscaping into any future mortgage!) and a significant financial investment, not to mention a labor of love on behalf of our Mormon friends (an interesting story to be told another day). Our soil is thick with clay and stones so I've been having a minor internal panic attack that we didn't properly prepare the dirt and that the poor thing wasn't able to really get her roots down deep before the kill of winter set in.
When I went out to examine her branches yesterday, I felt certain that they were too stiff; too brittle. Checking the soil around her trunk, I realized (too late?) that it was desert-dry despite our recent spring snow flurries.
I've been feeling a little dry, a little spent myself of late. Winter takes it's toll on our psyche as well as our physiology. It exacts payment spiritually, too. The dusty brown and concrete gray settled between snowfalls and spring rain is a grim testimony to faith that needs earth-soaking moisture, turned soil, and a good weed whacking.
I mentioned to my Lord that I was feeling a bit like those brittle branches. Empty. Thirsty. I don't really have anything to add to my prayers for my friends, my neighbors, my loved ones. I need new language to properly exalt Him because my own feels crusty and over-used, like the rock-hard gray layer of tired earth that blankets my flower beds.
A friend recently expressed her concern over our lack of church community, suggesting that without it we would could not be properly "filled up" or refreshed. I've given her worries a great deal of thought as we continue on our away-from-church course. There is something to be said for Christian community: in it's healthiest form, it really does kindle hope and provide spiritual nourishment.
I consider, however, the "church" we have experienced outside of a Sunday morning service. I recognize that the refreshing, refilling, rejuvenating place in my own life, the real worship service in my everyday, has been in momentous conversation with friends.
A prayer, between gal-pals, thoughts turned to Jesus, turns tired soil, preparing it for nutrients. A good gab with a friend ~ about the mysteries of God, the wonders of God ~ is like slow-falling clear water on parched earth. A give-and-take over this bit of Scripture and that sound counsel seeds ready soil, promising fruit and beauty and more to give. The faithful, faithful wounds of a friend act as surely as any chemical to see wrong and shame on their way.
This afternoon I cranked the outside taps on to full-blast and soaked our tree with fresh water. I was wrong, you know. She wasn't dying after all. She was just thirsty. A good soak and her tiny, strengthening branches limbered up right away. A little one-on-one with a friend, and all was right again.
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