Imperishable Good Stuff

"When I say its you I like, I'm talking about that part of you that knows that life is far more than anything you can ever see or hear or touch.That deep part of you that allows you to stand for those things without which humankind cannot survive. Love that conquers hate, peace that rises triumphant over war, and justice that proves more powerful than greed."  Mr. Rogers  

Not long ago I had need of a clinic while I was out of town.  It was one of those doc in the box kind of places in my network.  As I sat in the cubicle waiting for the physician, I began to hear his voice talking quietly to his nurse as he made his rounds working his way towards me.  Each request he made, and their were many, many requests for lab work, medication orders, urine cups, was followed by a "thank you, Patty". That Doctor by the close of the day had probably said 'thank you, Patty" 500 times. 
                                                                                                              
What does it mean to live a life of integrity and compassion? If we believe we create good with our lives, then how do we do that day in and day out?

"This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine"

If relationships in all their forms, are the yarn we use to weave our lives on the loom of life what does that say about how important each strand must be to the   whole?

"Imagine Walking Through Your Own Cloud of Smoke to Clean Blank Sky"

 Have you ever realized how powerful you are? Can you thank your children for a kindness given?  Would you thank your husband or wife, or lover or friend for one of the millions of small tasks they do almost automatically every day? Perhaps you smile at the check out person, and ask how the day was going or when their shift ended?

"This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine,"

 

Will you round your dinner check UP before calculating the tip?
 When the haters are going full blast, would you quietly walk away?

 Have you ever realized you are an instrument for loving kindness? Did you take time to look into your children's eyes when you spoke to them this morning? Did you touch them before they left? When you come home from work did you go find your spouse or the kids and give them a kiss?
Do you wave at your neighbors when you see them?

Years ago I read about teenagers in a Mexican town overun by drug dealers who went to their priest in despair over the terrible toll of senseless killings. The teens decided to whitewash their faces, dress in white robes and cut out wings and every time there was a murder, go to the scene and do nothing but stand and witness in silence.

 "This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine,"

"Invitation"

Can you listen without interrupting? Have you ever responded with 'is there anything else?"instead of launching into your reply?

Have you ever turned down a family member's bed for the night, even for your teenager?

Do you pray? In whatever meaningful way that term registers with you? Have you forgiven yourself? Are you able to pray for people who wish to hurt you?

"Three Wise Men"

There are many brave courageous people in the world who do extraordinary things.  We are inspired and led to higher ground by their sacrifice. But the lives of all the people you come in contact with every day can be just as profoundly touched by the smallest exchanges of everyday life.  "No act of kindness", Aesop wrote, "is every wasted." 

 "Hide it under a bushel, NO! I'm gonna let it shine,

Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine."

  "In the external scheme of things, shining moments are as brief as the twinkling of an eye, yet such twinklings are what eternity is made of--moments when we human beings can say "I love you," "I'm proud of you,"", "I forgive you," "I'm grateful for you." That's what eternity is made of: invisible imperishable good stuff."

Starlight Falling on Water

I have found that when the dark parts of living threaten to suck all the room out of living I get the greatest comfort, the deepest sense of regaining my center by turning away from all the screens and shrill voices and wander off to someplace green.  When I lived in the city, I would usually just sit out on the back steps and look up at the trees. Sometimes I would walk around the backyard, do a bit of weeding, or puttering.  Sometimes there might be the smell of fresh cut grass--the most healing aromatherapy I think around.  When I moved to the lake I do the same thing-I go out and sit on the deck and look up or out across the water.  This part of North Georgia is still rural and once you get take a side road off Georgia 400 there are still pastures not taken over by subdivisions.  I can see cows and corn.

So for those who don't have the access or time, here is a lovely bit of prose from the wonderful poet Tom Hennen.  It's a small oasis you can drift off into over a cup of coffee or waiting to pick up the kids or instead of listening to the news cycle. It would make a lovely bedtime reading for yourself or someone you love--a sweet send off to rest. It won't settle all the discord in the world, but it will loosen some of the made made bindings of your life and that will give hope more room to grow.  What could be better?

 "There are deep hoofprints in the soft ground around the wooden water tank. A steel windmill with its fan blades spinning free in the summer wind. No water pumping because the connecting lever is not in gear and the tank is full. Thick green moss floats here and there on the water's surface. Blue sky and white clouds reflect in the pool, pulled out of heaven in a piece just the right size to fit the old round wooden tank. The cow yard is empty, the cows in the far pasture, strolling its hills for grass, slowly, with quiet pleasure as if on a boulevard in Paris, France. Nothing about a cow yard enters their thoughts until late afternoon when I come with the dog to fetch them home. Then they amble, dust stirred from its summer stupor by their hard hooves that kick up the smell of dirt and powdered dung. After the long walk from the pasture they remember they are thirsty. Now in a hurry, they crowd around the water tank. They drink and drink. When one raises her head, water and setting sunlight drip from nose and muzzle. With a tin cup I drink icy water from the pump and pour some into a pan for the dog. The cows are dry of milk until fall. Now all they need do is sleep. From the east dusk is sliding across the fields. Frogs and crickets are tuning up, fireflies cannot wait and are airborne before the sun is completely down. The summer night settles weightless as a feather on the grass. The windmill turning, cold water running out of the iron pipe into the tank, far-off bells, and the murmur of starlight falling on water."      Tom Hennen, "After Reading John Clare on Thoughts of a Cow" , from Darkness Sticks to Everything, Copper Canyon Press. 

The Long Stare

When I first lived at the lake, I soon realized that the main occupation of many who came to visit, was the opportunity to sit out on the deck and stare off into the trees. Some of them would carry the pretense of a book, or a plate with lunch or head for the cushions and a nap. The reasoning to get them there was only a facilitator.  The real reason was some peace and quiet and a chance to unshackle themselves from the daily striving and let their minds rest.  I called it the long stare. Time in the real world to let our minds shut down so we can be with our hearts-to wonder, to heal, to nourish our spirits.





 "Each afternoon he took his pipe
and led his goats beyond the pasture
to a neighbor's field behind his farm--
not exactly his but not exactly not.









As the goats dipped the tall grasses,
he sat in the chair he never failed
to bring. Sometimes he read, most often
not. The vetch climbed the goldenrod,

 the dandelions turned from gold
to globe, and every day he went,
thinking to himself how good it was
to be almost but not entirely alone."

"A Life" by Michelle Y. Burke 

"Following the Pattern of the Glory"

 

"If you think you know all the secrets, you think you know all the cures."  Colum McCann, Let the Great World Spin

 

"God speaks to everyone. The trouble starts when we think we now what God should be saying." gdo

Decades ago I heard a minister speak about what the story of Cain and Abel meant to him. He said he felt ultimately, it was a story about tolerating difference. The children of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel were the first generation to grapple with the reality of their parents eating fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. No longer one with God, humans now struggled with self awareness of the parts of them not like the divine in their encounters with each other.  So here is Cain-- the sturdy  practical farmer.  And here is Abel the gentle dreamy sheep herder. And both from the fruits of their labor present God with an offering. There are several different back stories depending on one's religious tradition about the offering, and the resulting preference by God for Abel's succulent lamb. Some faiths say there was an argument over God wanting Cain to marry a woman he did not love. Others tell that Cain was lazy and his offering poor; still others that Abel was more prosperous from hard work and would not let Cain have claim to a portion of his wealth. But laying all that aside, the essential confrontation is between two men and their relationship to their God and how those feelings spilled out in violence.

It happened again this past weekend, in Orlando. We are horrified at the loss of life right in our midst.Yet in countries across the globe, this happens all the time. They are all horrifying. Yes, we can say the circumstances are different. The politics of religion, sex, wealth, culture all color the story, But essentially it is the same story happening over and over again. When you are different from me, and especially when you threaten what I feel is my longed for connection with the divine, what we come into the world trying to regain, then you are frightening and a threat.

"It's about fear. You now? They're all throbbing with fear. We all are..Bits of it floating in the air, he said. It's like dust. You walk about and don't see it, don't notice it, but it's there and it's all coming down, covering everything. You're breathing it in. You touch it. You drink it. You eat it. But it's so fine you don't notice it. But you're covered in it. It's everywhere. What I mean is, we're afraid. Just stand still for an instant and there it is, this fear, covering our faces and tongues. If we stopped to take account of it, we'd just fall into despair. But we can't stop. We've got to keep going."  

What can we do?  We can choose. We can choose to pray for everyone--especially the ones that call up our anger.. We can choose to go out in the world and  live our life as kindly as we can.We can choose to practice compassion and acceptance and allowance.  Our life and the power created by how we choose to lead it, is the enduring good. I am always reminded when I start saying all this of this remark: "It is all fine and good to talk about acceptance and being kind, until the new people who moved in next door butcher and roast their supper in their back yard." There is the boundary, and it is a rocky road strewn with the details of different ways of living. Peace is built from looking at how we are all alike.

"What he liked about his brother, he said, is that he made people become what they didn't think they could become. His brother believed that the space for God was one of the last great frontiers: men and women could do all sorts of things but the real mystery would always lie in a different beyond."

(all quotes from Let the Great World Spin, by Colum McCann)

 

                                                              "Because Being Here is So Much"

New Landscapes

Even though I can still hear roosters crowing outside my studio, all around me the countryside is being developed.  In the last five years it has crossed over from rural to suburban. Much has changed.  I am reminded of that invisible boundary we all navigate when we move from the first half of our lives into the second. It is a poignant crossing. The intensity of the development feels similar to the endless energy we pour into growing up, settling down, raising kids, building careers. What we don't realize until its over is all that living has carried us forward and left us standing in the tall grass of another undeveloped landscape What happens now?

"In the second half of the spiritual life, you are not making choices as much as you are being guided, taught, and led--which leads to "choiceless choices": these are the things you cannot not do because of what you have become; things you do not need to do because they are just not yours to do; and things you absolutely must do because they are your destiny and your deepest desire.  Your driving motives are no long money, success, or the approval of others.. You have found your sacred dance."  Father Richard Rohr

Or to quote Isabelle Allende: "After 50, most of the bullshit is gone." It takes courage to shed old ways of being, to turn and walk a new path, to be comfortable in our own skins and open and available to support those who are following behind.  In the landscape of old age we get to be the self we have spent a lifetime discovering.  Have you found that true? Do you feel the rewards? Have you discovered a new freedom? Has it taken courage and perhaps the experience of loss?





                                                                               

The Beauty of Burnt Wood

The lake house where I now live was built by my parents over 35 years ago.  It was the realization of a long held dream that represented success and achievement far beyond their simple origins. From the early days of their marriage they collected house plans, dreaming of the day when it would be possible to build. After years of working hard, slowly acquiring property and success, retirement arrived and their dream finally began to take form. They sited the house on the highest ridge of the property overlooking Lake Lanier, a place where our family had spent years camping and fishing. They drove to Tennessee to choose the river stone and poured over every detail of its construction. The walk to the water was steep but the 245 degree panoramic view, breathtaking.  It seemed their dream had come true.
Dreams however, are slippery creations. While we hold them we can make them be anything we want. They inspire us, give us motivation, even comfort during the hard times when we are weary of trying to make a life. They are a refuge for our hopes. What we don't realize is that once they are born into the world, they are no longer ours.  The great arc of living sweeps them out of our hands and they take on a destiny of their own. And so it was for this house. Dad died a few years after it was built and in the wake of his death Mom developed dementia and eventually had to be moved to long term care.  Heavy with the responsibilities of raising our own families, and caring for Mom, my siblings and I made only infrequent trips to the lake. The years passed, the house grew ever more strange and uninviting .We had it refurbished and painted in an effort to make it feel more welcoming. We made the now and then visit with friends or for Thanksgiving. Upkeep became a burden as the house began to age. And no matter what we did there was the lingering emotional baggage of the house being their dream, something they had worked towards which my brothers and sister and I felt we had paid an emotional price. They built the house for all of us to come and enjoy but none of us felt the sense of family that required. Family histories remember, can be complicated. Eventually after a long decline, Mom died. With the market in deep recession, we decided to put off selling and went on with our lives.
There is another truth about dreams that people forget. They don't always fully manifest right away. They can go years and years in the bud before they blossom. Perhaps when they are built from love and hope that part stays alive no matter how difficult the circumstances that brought them to fruition. And so it was for this dream.Very gently and quietly,  the house became a safe refuge for each of us during turning points in our lives and marriages; culminating in my moving here almost a decade ago. With our parents gone the old hurts began to heal as we gathered on the deck looking out over the big water and shared our joint histories. We became a family in a way we had never known-- enjoying dinners and full moons and stories while all around us the house began to open up and their dream burst into full bloom while we made new dreams for ourselves.
Earlier this year we made the decision to finally sell the lake house.  It was always our intention to settle that last transaction of their estate and the timing now seemed right.  Among the family memorabilia we had to consider was a box of love letters written between our parents during the two years Dad was stationed overseas in the war. What was to become of them? We had read and kept a few, but what to do with all those years of dreams and anticipation long before we existed?  And then it came to me.  The letters belong to this house, to their dream. So one cold, windy afternoon while my sister was here, we took the letters out into the woods they loved so much and let the flames burn them into the place they always wished to be. Standing there,the wind picking up the ash and smoke and carrying it far out over the beautiful water, I felt a great peacefulness and release.  We had all come home. 

In loving memory of

Carl Joseph Pope

April 4, 1921-May 23, 1989

and

Julia Isobel Head

December 13, 1922-May 25, 2009

"Love, like fire, can only reveal its brightness

On the failure and beauty of burnt wood."

Philippe Jaccottet