Wonderings in the World

Looking Long at the Sea

January 27, 2012 By Diana

I paid attention when he spoke.
“Sit and look at the sea,” he said.
“Look a long time.
Look long enough to become
the sea looking back at you.
Then tell me what you see.
I think you’ll like it.”

So I went to the sea.
I sat in the sun,
high on a bluff.
And I looked long.
I looked wide.
I breathed slow,
and I moved slow,
and I was slow.

And here is what I saw.

Islands, off in the distance,
a low layer of fog
pushed up against them,
like the covers
in a bed just left.

Kelp beds, red and brown,
swaying with the tide,
housing life
deep down,
where I cannot see.
I know it’s there,
moving, feeding,
following the rhythm
of the water.

LIGHT,
sprinkled across
the surface of the sea,
light.
Dancing, winking,
blinking, blinding.
I see light.
And I am undone.

Mesmerized by the motion,
caught by the pattern.
One spot, shining bright.
Then two or three more,
then hundreds of them as
the wave reaches its zenith.
See that thread of molten silver
as the water breaks against
the sand!

For just the briefest of moments,
enough for a breath or two,
I know the sea,
I am the sea,
And I see myself as lovely.

Loved.

See for yourself: (and listen, too.)

We’re experiencing a winter heat-wave here on the central coast. It was nearly 80 degrees today, and beautifully clear. Somehow, my parking spot was perfectly situated to see these cascades of moving light as I sat and contemplated the magnificence of the sea. I watched for a little over an hour. I was actually anxious about trying this. Generally, I have a book to read, a lunch to eat, a nap to take when I park at the beach. Trying to imagine sitting and looking for a long stretch was hard to do. The actual doing of it? Divinely wonderful, amazing, restful, moving, sacred. I’ve been told that this experience can be replicated by choosing any natural location that is beautiful to you – your own back yard might work just fine. The point is to sit in contemplation for a long stretch of time – 1 to 2 hours. Finding the time is probably the biggest challenge – but I am now hoping to do this regularly and will make the time somehow.

Filed Under: Photo Essay, Wonderings in the Word, Wonderings in the World

A Grandfather Pastor? I Think So.

January 26, 2012 By Diana

He walks quietly across the lawn,

laden with fallen palm fronds,

speaking softly to the small person who follows in his wake.

She is busy, looking at flowers,

discovering sour grass,

looking for birds.

They are content together,

the two of them drifting slowly towards the driveway.

She squints a little,

facing into the sunshine.

And then the smile breaks and I hear her laugh.

He has asked her a question –

who knows what it is.

And she laughs and says,

“I no know. I no know, Poppy. I NO KNOW.”

Ah, but I do.

I know that this man is a good man,

a faithful one,

and an earnest and committed follower of Jesus.

And he happens to be gifted with children.

He always has been,

especially small ones.

And anytime he’s with a toddler,

or a pre-schooler,

or even an elementary student,

he gives them undivided attention.

He delights in their presence,

their growing intelligence and understanding,

their open-heartedness.

And he lives the gospel when he’s with them.

As I have reflected on Sunday’s sermon,
I have thought a lot about this man.

This good man who happens to be my husband.

We’re in the midst of a series called,

“What Time Is It?”

And each week, the topic for the morning follows

that introductory phrase,

“It’s Time to…,”

finished this week by “…Repent and Go Fishin'”

We were in Mark 1 on Sunday,

that scene where Jesus sees some men fishing and

challenges them to come away

from their nets for a while.

He calls them to repent, to follow him,

and then…

to go fishing –

fishing for people,

not just sea creatures.

They’re in for an adventure, these fishermen,

an adventure that begins with who they are,

and where they are.

And Pastor Jon just nailed it.

There were several lovely points woven through his narrative, but this is the one that stuck with me the most,

the one I’ve been ruminating on as I watch my husband

in this second year of our shared retirement:

Not one of the people that Jesus called to follow him

was a religious ‘professional.’

Every one of them was called

in the context of what they were already doing.

And that’s where the adventure began.

Where it begins for each of us.

Nothing is secular,

everywhere has the potential to be sacred space.

We are all called,

every single one of us.

If we follow after the good news of Jesus,

we are called right where we are.

Every job is a mission field,

every person we meet is a gift of grace,

every word we offer has the potential

to be gospel good news for someone, somewhere.

Here is the takeaway quote for me this week:

“Jesus is not calling us to church work;

Jesus is calling us to follow him in our work,

whatever that may be.”

So, if you’re raising babies and toddlers,

and able to stay at home with them –

there is your good news platform.

If you’re in an office, behind a bank window,

standing in front of a classroom,

driving a cab, rising early to bake bread,

serving food in a restaurant,

or moving into the new rhythms of retirement –

wherever you are,

there is where you are called,

there is where YOU are a pastor.

So I watch my husband pastor our granddaughter,

as he has every one of our children and our grandchildren,

as well as many of the children in every church

we have ever attended.

And I thank God that he has heard the call of Jesus

so clearly;

that he has responded so obediently;

that he is living the good news…

right where he is.

How about you?

Joining with Michelle and with Emily and with Bonnie this Wednesday night:

Filed Under: family, Photo Essay, Sunday Reflections, Wonderings in the Word, Wonderings in the World

A SLO Day: Spiritual Direction + A Tribute to Abbot David

January 25, 2012 By Diana

I am re-posting this one from last January,

in honor of Abbot David Geraerts,

my spiritual director and friend,

who died on Friday morning.

These are some words I wrote to some friends earlier today about my response to receiving this sad news:

My mentor died on Friday. He was 77 years old – only 10 years older than I am –

and he’d battled a number of ailments this past year. But still…I didn’t think he would DIE.

We all die.

I know this in my head.

I even know it in my heart,

as we’ve lost a lot of dear ones in the last 10 years.

Yet each time I get a phone call like the one I got on Friday afternoon, I am bereft. Like part of me has been sliced with a very sharp blade and all that pours out are tears.

I took my usual evening walk on Friday, walking circles around our large driveway parking area. I’ve been learning to pray while I walk this past year – many fewer words, lots more images. But what I found myself doing on Friday was simply saying the name of Jesus, over and over and over again.

And here is why: a friend had posted a very old video on YouTube. A video of the mentor I had just lost. This clip, filmed in 1986, was an interview with Abbot David (who, at that time, led a much larger community in New Mexico) by a nun named Mother Elizabeth. Now may I just add, with a repentant heart and spirit, that if I had seen this video when it was filmed 26 years, I would have either switched it off immediately, or watched it with a sort of gleeful feeling of superiority to those ‘weirdos’ in the habits and collars. I’m ashamed and embarrassed to admit that, but it’s the hard truth.

I watched all 30 minutes of that grainy old video, marveling at the sweetness in David’s face, the kindness of his words and the truth of his life. I met with him monthly for the last three years, receiving spiritual direction in the form of dream interpretation. He was an expert at that and also at encouragement and gentle prayer. In this video, he suggested praying the Jesus prayer (which has been a favorite prayer practice of mine for about ten years) or just simply saying the name of Jesus over and over for 20 or 30 minutes. I have discovered that following Abbot David’s advice is a very helpful thing. (I wrote a post about the benefits of one piece of that advice at the end of January.)

So on that first afternoon after this dear man’s death, that’s what I did when I walked. I cannot put into words how intensely moving it was for me, in these initial hours of grief, to just say the Name over and over and over again. And I wept my way through a 45 minute time of walking, praying, remembering, celebrating. I will never again feel the dear Abbot’s fingers make the sign of the cross on my bent forehead at the end of our hour together. I will not be blessed by his hand when I receive my certificate in spiritual direction next August. I will not engage with him in friendly, loving conversation.

And that is a huge, huge loss to me.

And to so many.

Thank you Abbot David Geraets for your loving commitment to Jesus, for your years of kindness, wisdom and gentle correction, for your heart as big as the sky above the ranch you and the brothers live(d) in out in the back country of San Luis Obispo.

I will be grateful for your presence in my life during these pivotal years in mine until the day I die.

And then I will hug you fiercely.

SLO stands for San Luis Obispo, a town 115 miles north of my home.

This was our late-lunch view today, as we traveled home again.

One day each month,

I take a road trip.

This particular road trip is not like

the other ones I take.

I’m not going to take care of my mother.

I’m not going to enjoy my children and my grandchildren.

I’m not going on vacation.

Strike that.

I am going on a vacation, of sorts.

I am vacating the usual rhythm of my days

to embrace a different one.

And I find that I am hungry for re-creation as I travel.

I am eager to be addressed as…

me.

Not as wife/mother/grandmother/daughter/

pastor/teacher/friend.

Just me.

Child of God.

Stumbling follower of Jesus.

Seeker after wisdom.

And this is where I go.

A strange looking monastery,

one that used to be the ‘dream house’

of a retired dentist,

but was bought by some monks

from New Mexico to be their community home.

The monastery is the long white,

red-tiled house to the left in this shot.

To the right of the drive, is the chapel & bookshop

with a couple of additional bedrooms.

To the left of the drive, below the monastery itself,

is the home of Connie, the oblate who lives on the premises

and assists the brothers.

There are only five or six of them now,

praying the hours,

assisting the people of a dozen parishes

with healing prayer, special masses and spiritual direction.

This is where I meet my spiritual director every month.

The sign says it all:

And this is the view from that house,

in the springtime,

when all the hills are green and the sky is blue.

And this is the man I meet with in that house:

Abbott David.

Spiritual Father to this small band,

and an acclaimed leader in the

charismatic renewal movement

of the Roman Catholic Church.

He is a remarkable man, gifted and humble.

Did I ever tell you how we met?

Now, that’s a great story.

“Once upon a time, there was a tired pastor,

full to overflowing with the needs of her congregation,

the struggles in her family.

She had tried direction a couple of times,

with mixed results.

“Not a good fit,” was the diagnosis,

whatever that means.

For her, it felt like failure.

And she is not a fan of failure.

So she began to pray about it,

to search for someone.

She even went online, used Google

and found a monastery website.

Not a fancy, bells-and-whistles kind of place,

that website.

And the monastery featured there was over 100 miles away.

But something caught her eye,

her spirit.

And email responses were invited.

So she sent off a note.

“Is there anyone there interested and available

to offer direction to a tired

female pastor,

one who needs listening ears,

wise words,

some guidance along the way?”

That was in July of 2007.

Nothing came back.

Sigh.

So, she got on with life,

a life that was feeling a bit overwhelming

about then.

And she forgot all about that note.

One early morning, in September of the following year,

FOURTEEN MONTHS

after her initial inquiry,

her cell phone rang.

Puzzled at the early hour, she picked it up.

“Abbott David here,” a strong, friendly voice declared.

“You wrote about spiritual direction?”

And she burst into laughter.

“Yes,” she said. “I did. Over a year ago!“

“Really?” came the response.

“Because I just received this yesterday.

Would you like to meet with me and see if this

might be what you’re looking for?”

They set a date for one week later,

she drove up the 101, took the country road out to

his place and sat,

absolutely fascinated and astounded as he told

her his story.

Raised on a farm in Wisconsin,

paid his way through college by playing

trumpet in a dance band,

became a priest,

sent by his order to

study in Rome,

multi-lingual,

specialist in Jungian psychology

and dream analysis.

“If you work with me, you’ll keep a dream journal.

And that’s what we’ll talk through each month.”

She was hooked – line, sinker, bobble, lure –

the whole kit and caboodle.

“Thank you, Jesus,” she cried to the heavens as she headed south again

at the end of the hour.

Before their next visit,

there was a tragic death in her immediate family.

And before the following visit,

there was a ferocious wildfire in her community,

stripping lifetime memories from many in her congregation.

Within the first year, she herself landed in the hospital, was forced to make a major shift in her own training

program to become a director herself,

and by the second year, she was enrolled in the Abbott’s school for spiritual direction certification.

Not sure that she lived happily ever after,

but deeper ever after? That would be a big ‘yes.'”

Now I would call that whole tale

a God-thing.

My friend Jennifer might call it “God-Bumps” or a “God-Incidence.”

All I can tell you is that my entire spiritual journey

took a decisive turn upward from the moment

I heard that voice on the phone:

“Abbot David here. You wrote….?”

Abbott David leading mass in the monastery chapel.

Today, I had only one dream for the month.

Of my own, that is.

I also shared a tricky one from someone I am directing.

Somehow, this kind, brilliant man

(who has been seriously ill this year)

wove those two together, asked me some penetrating

questions, and helped me think about myself

in some new ways.

“You’ve spent your whole life relying on your left brain, Diana, your intellect.

It’s time to learn to trust your gut, your intuition.

You need to spend long stretches of time just sitting and looking at the ocean.

Do that long enough so that eventually, you find yourself on the other side of the picture – you’ll be the ocean, looking back at you.

And take a look at what you see when that happens.

I think you’ll like what you find.

Be still long enough to let the beauty in,

to let God in,

to shift inside from reason to intuition.

Learn to trust that,

to know that God meets you there, too.

This is the gift of aging, Diana.

There is gift in all of life.”

I sure hope he’s right.

I’m counting on it.

Stopping at Costco on our way home this evening,

I looked up from loading the bags into the back of the car and saw this.

My gut said, “Grab that camera, even if it is the little one,

even if the picture won’t be sharp.”

So I did.

The gift of the present moment.

Right brain all the way.

Joining with Jennifer and her “God-Bumps” meme. And with Ann and Jen, too.

Filed Under: Photo Essay, Spiritual Direction, Sunday Reflections, Wonderings in the Word, Wonderings in the World

Five Minute Friday: Vivid

January 21, 2012 By Diana

Late again for Lisa-Jo’s weekly invite to write it out without worrying about whether it’s ‘just right’ or not. This week’s prompt is skittering around this brain and I’m not sure where it’s going to land. Hmmmm….

The prompt this week is VIVID

Yup. That’s what I thought about all this stuff that happened! Are you kidding me??

GO:

When I was five years old, my mother took me shopping. This was a rare occurrence, as we lived on a school teacher’s salary and didn’t often shop for anything other than groceries. She took me to a department store, to the toy section and led me gently to the row where the dolls were located.

“Choose anyone you want, honey. It’s a special gift, just for you.”

So I did. I chose a sweet Betsy-Wetsy doll, the one who wet her diapers if you inserted a small bottle into the perfectly shaped hole in her mouth. I was delighted with my new friend and thanked my mother profusely.

However, just a few short hours later, I was far from grateful. I was terrified. The doll was meant to help me get through a coming tonsillectomy – something I did not understand in the slightest when my parents told me about it.

“We’re going to have the doctor cut out those things in your throat that are making you sick all the time, Diana. You’re going to feel so much better.”

Yeah, right.

The surgery was done in the doctor’s office, which included a small area for this ‘simple’ procedure. I remember the ether mask coming down over my frightened face.

And then I remember waking up to a splotch of bright red blood on my pillow, and anxious whisperings all around me.

“We can’t control this bleeding, Mrs. Gold. We must get her to Our Lady of Angels Hospital immediately. Yes, we’ll call an ambulance to do it.”

The ambulance ride was a big disappointment. They refused to turn the siren on! What kind of an ambulance ride is it if they don’t turn on the siren?

I was placed in a crib with high metal bars all round. The nuns glided by, bringing me constant bowls of…cream of rice cereal. Bleargh. And it was impossible to eat anything anyhow because…they staunched the flow of blood by inserting into the back of my throat….two very large…TEABAGS. Yes. Teabags. Apparently tannic acid is a coagulant. Who knew?

I spent one week in that scary place, alone in my crib, with my parents allowed near me only a few short hours each day. And then I had to go and stay with my great aunt for TWO WHOLE WEEKS because my own home was too far from the hospital for after care.

What good is a Betsy-Wetsy doll in that kind of world?

This is my most vivid early memory, an event which shaped my life in profound ways, some of which I am still unwrapping.

But that’s for an entirely different kind of post, isn’t it??

STOP. (2 minutes extra)

Filed Under: family, Wonderings in the World

What Makes a Student? The THC Book Club

January 21, 2012 By Diana

Two views of the one room schoolhouse on the LBJ Ranch near Fredricksburg, Texas

At the tender age of 15, I entered the classroom of Arthur Bottaro with fear and trembling. He was short, imposing, intense, demanding and highly intelligent. Mr. Bottaro taught 11th grade Honors English at Glendale High School, and he was perhaps the single most important teacher in my life.

In his class, we were expected to write weekly book reviews and essays and we were to type them on ditto paper. Please remember that I went to high school in the dark ages, before either Xerox or mimeograph machines. I went to school in the era of carbon paper – and dittos. A ditto master consisted of two parts – a front sheet of specially coated typing paper and a back sheet, laden with purple ink. The letters typed on the top sheet would pick up the ink from the back sheet and then the type-covered master would be attached to a drum that was hand-cranked to produce copies from its inked back side.

And why did we have to reproduce our work? Because copies of each and every written assignment were made and distributed to every member of the class. Then we proceeded to rip each others’ work to pieces, under the studious, challenging glare of our highly dramatic and talented teacher. I was scared to death about 90% of the time – but that year-long experience is the crucible in which I learned to write clearly, succinctly, honestly and reasonably well.

I thought a lot about Mr. B as I read chapters 3-6 of David Brooks’ fascinating book, “The Social Animal,” the most recent selection of the Book Club at The High Calling website. This week’s assignment takes us through the development of our lead character, Harold, by looking at how the human brain grows, changes and expands from infancy through high school.

From the amazingly high rate of synapses formed during the first three years of life (called synaptogenesis):

“If you want to get a sense of the number of potential connections between the cells in Harold’s brain, contemplate this: a mere 60 neurons are capable of making 10(to the 81st power) possible connections with each other. (That’s 1 with 81 zeroes after it.) The number of particles in the known universe is about one-tenth of this number.”

to the entirely unique pattern those synapses take in each one of our brains, and how repetition forms our “neural networks,” which:

“…embody our experiences and in turn guide future action. They contain the unique way each of us carries himself in the world, the way we walk, talk, and react. They are the grooves down which our behavior flows. A brain is a record of a life. The networks of neural connections are the physical manifestation of your habits, personality, and predilections. You are the spiritual entity that emerges out of the material networks in your head.”

Just as the ancient Hebrews believed, we are creatures who are all of a piece – head/heart/body/mind/spirit. And though Brooks, in his introduction, indicated that he would not be delving into the spiritual arena in this volume, he does not seem to be able to help himself. We are connected – to the various parts of ourselves – and to each other.

As I hoped he might, Brooks does look at how story-telling is an important part of intellectual and emotional development, noting that many of the stories we imagine in childhood carry over into adulthood, at least in terms of their tone, and in the way we think about life. An interesting contrast was made between ‘paradigmatic thinking,’ (which is “structured by logic and analysis”) and ‘mythic mode,’ (which contains “another dimension…the dimension of good and evil, sacred and profane. This mythic mode helps people not only tell a story, but make sense of the emotions and moral sensations aroused by the story.”) This distinction just may help me understand why my brother and I see the world so differently!

The sections in chapter 5 on parenting were deeply encouraging, underlining that good parenting does not require a graduate degree in psychology but rather depends on connections established early in life and continued at each stage of development. And it depends upon our modeling both resilience and problem-solving. The hackneyed phrase about giving our children both ‘roots and wings’ seems to have been proven in the social laboratories of our finest universities.

And the last few pages of that chapter reminded us with a powerful, storied example of how ‘fearfully and wonderfully’ we are made, with layer after layer of complexity that we cannot often see, much less navigate with success. “This is why,” Brooks writes, “all biographies are inadequate; they can never capture the inner currents.”

But it was in Chapter 6, where we are invited into Harold’s high school experience, that we delve most deeply into the powerful impact a courageous and dedicated teacher can have on adolescents. From his analysis of cliques and the intricacy of the socialization process, Brooks underscores the primacy of reading social cues correctly. Our hero possesses supreme skills in the social arena. But in the classroom? He is lost at sea.

Until he encounters Ms. Taylor, a teacher with powerful insights into how the adolescent brain is structured. She also possesses a grand idea for matching students with their particular passion for learning. And here is where Mr. Brooks’ writing and research began to resonate with me at a very deep level.

“Of course, Ms. Taylor wanted to impart knowledge, the sort of stuff that shows up on tests But within weeks, students forget 90 percent of the knowledge they learn in class anyway. The only point of being a teacher is to do more than impart facts; it’s to shape the way students perceive the world, to help a student absorb the rules of a discipline. The teachers who do that get remembered. She didn’t so much teach them as apprentice them…She forced them to make mistakes. The pain of getting things wrong and the effort required to overcome error creates an emotional experience that helps burn things into the mind. She tried to get students to interrogate their own unconscious opinions…She also forced them to work…She pushed. She was willing to be hated. Ms. Taylor’s goal was to turn her students into autodidacts. She hoped to give her students a taste of the emotional and sensual pleasure discovery brings – the jolt of pleasure you get when you work hard, suffer a bit, and then something clicks. She hoped her students would become addicted to this process. They would become, thanks to her, self-teachers for the rest of their days.”

And this, of course, is the place where I wrote Mr. B’s name in the margin of my book. For in addition to a long list of books, we also talked about ideas; we particularly talked about how ideas IN books can change the world. We acted out scenes from Shakespeare and Wilder; we enjoyed earnest discussions about controversial reading material; we learned to take a book apart, by theme/characters/plot and then to put it back together again. We were encouraged, even demanded “to think on paper,” as he used to say. Mr. B. was largely responsible for any academic success I enjoyed at UCLA and many years later, at Fuller Theological Seminary. Because Mr. B. gave me permission – and provided the expertise – to read anything and everything on multiple levels at once: analytically, emotionally, intellectually and experientially. And then he taught me how to write about it with clarity and occasionally, on a really good day, to write about it with grace.

He died of a heart attack, very suddenly, about a dozen years after I graduated, when he was about 17 years younger than I am now. And I never went back to say ‘thank-you.’ So tonight I will say it:

“Thank you, Mr. B., for your careful attention to each one of us and your unique teaching style with all of us together. Teachers like you are a gift to the world and I am forever grateful that you were a teacher of mine.”

Filed Under: Book Review, Wonderings in the World

God Has GOT to Have a Sense of Humor

January 20, 2012 By Diana

Remember that trip we took?

The one on the winding road? Highway One?

You remember. I’m sure you do –

the one with views like this one?

Sun on the water, rocks and sand and surf?

Well, take a closer look at those rocks.

Especially that big one right in the middle of this picture.

Hey, wait a second!

That ain’t no rock.

In fact, it’s a seal.

A very particular kind of seal,

that hauls out on a very particular beach

called Piedras Blancas.

And you can park-and-view near this very particular beach.

And let me tell you, if you’ve ever wondered if there is

weird wonderfulness in this world,

this is the viewpoint where every single suspicion is confirmed.

These are elephant seals.

The males can weigh up to 8,800 pounds

and live for 20 years.

Their name comes from that strangely-shaped proboscis –

and their immense size.

And they are amazing to watch.

They spend 80% of their time in the water, diving deeply, eating a whole lot.

They haul out to breed,

to birth,

to rest.

And we get to watch it all.

These mamas are very attentive – for about five months.

Then they waddle off to swim away and the pups are on their own. All of them that survive that first year find their back to their birthing beach again and again.

And if the wrong mama gets near the pup?

Fuggedabout it.

The jig is up.

And sand will fly.

(Actually, the sand flying is just a way to keep cool

and moist as the sun beats down.)

It’s an amazing sight.

Weird,

wild,

noisy,

a bit smelly,

and fascinating.

Stop by sometime, especially if you ever get the chance to visit San Simeon,

the Hearst castle on the hill.

This beach is just below there.

These are faces perhaps only a mother could love.

But to tell you the truth,

I think they’re kinda cute.

In a strangely alarming sort of way.

And they pretty much convince me that God likes to smile.

Posting early, but will join with Laura’s Playdates with God
and L.L’s On, In and Around Mondays early next week.

Filed Under: Photo Essay, Travel, Wonderings in the Word, Wonderings in the World

The Primary Verb: FOLLOW

January 20, 2012 By Diana

Maybe it started with … Abraham,

following the call of a God he barely knew,

a Voice in his ear,

in his heart.

Or maybe it was Jacob?

Finagling his way to a birthright,

following the north-eastern road to find safe harbor,

and discovering the God he never knew,

the One who was in ‘this place.’

And then there was Joseph.

And Joseph didn’t exactly ‘follow,’

or did he?

Forced into Egyptian slavery,

yet … always hearing,

always listening,

always hoping.

Always following.

Moses followed the Voice, too.

The Israelites followed the Cloud and the Pillar of Fire.

Sometimes.

It was hit and miss most of the time, actually;

the judges, the kings, the priests, the prophets.

Sometimes staying on the path;

sometimes not so much.

The magi followed the star,

Joseph followed the dreams,

Mary followed the promise.

And thirty years later, Jesus went on the road.

And over and over and over again,

he used one single verb:

follow.

Follow me, to be exact.

That verb came first; it came before

believe,

obey,

live,

love.

Follow.

At the heart of discipleship is this word,

this verb which comes from the root ‘to hear.’

This is the ‘essence of discipleship,’

our pastor said.

And I think he’s right.

But here’s something else I think:

it’s a really, really tough gig.

Because, see, I want to follow.

Yes, I do.

I want to follow Jesus, no matter what,

no matter where.

But then…I see a promising rabbit trail,

that one over there that says,

“Let’s Keep It Safe.”

Or the one that takes me to a box,

a nice big one,

with square corners,

and clear borders.

Borders that are not terribly permeable.

This box keeps Jesus neatly within my

particular worldview,

removing the uncomfortable bits,

the tough stuff.

Like denying myself,

or taking up that cross.

Or selling all and giving it away.

Or becoming like a child.

If I can just keep Jesus inside,

where we can have tea once a day,

and talk about life –

well, that’s the kind of following that seems doable.

There’s another route I could choose, too.

In fact, I too often do.

I truly do follow Jesus,

right down the path.

But I sorta stop part way.

I take a pit stop,

right there in that part of the path

where it’s just the two of us,

spending quality time together.

And that’s the true path,

the good path.

But it isn’t the whole path.

When I keep it close like that,

when I make it only about Jesus and me,

that’s when I am most apt to

miss the adventure,

to miss the abundant life Jesus promised.

So here’s to taking a bigger risk,

to letting go of that overwhelming need to be safe,

to breaking through the edges of the box,

to reaching out

as well as going deep.

Do I want to be a real disciple?

Or not?

Signing on with Michelle, Jennifer, Jennifer, Ann and Emily tonight.

Filed Under: Wonderings in the Word, Wonderings in the World

Just an Ordinary Saturday…

January 17, 2012 By Diana

My new friend Joe Bunting has this amazing website called “The Write Practice.” On it, he offers advice, writes lovely essays himself, and provides interesting prompts for 15 minutes of reflective writing. This weekend he had a doozy, generating more than 70 comments and lots of interesting response. It’s about inspiration vs. perspiration – check it out and play along. I don’t do what Joe suggested we do – jot things down in a notebook for future inspiration AND perspiration. But I did the next best thing. I just wrote for 15 minutes about the events of an ordinary Saturday. But….BUT the ending to that ordinary day was something else. And the photos that you see sprinkled throughout these words give only partial testimony to the extraordinariness of the evening. So…an ordinary day…lit by an extraordinary bit of central California coastal glory.

She sits and looks at me across the scones and tea. Tired and sad, the tears begin to gather, the jaw line begins to tense, the fingers curl.

A friend has asked for a meeting, for a listening ear, a word of encouragement.

She waits, trying to control the barrage of emotions that are washing through her as she speaks. Some are triggered by memories older than she is; some come from pieces of her own story, long before these events; some are as fresh as today’s coffee, the scent of which is filling this public space.

I try to listen and to speak carefully, gently asking questions when I need to, offering words of comfort, making one or two suggestions.

We spend about 70 minutes together, sipping tea, wiping tears, sharing stories. I bless her at the end of our time. I bless her with the words of Aaron and I hold her hands and cry out silently from deep inside myself; I cry out the ancient words of the blind man by the side of the road, the words of the leper on the way, the words of the woman who grabbed the hem of his garment. I cry out to the God who made us both: Have mercy, Lord. Have mercy.

Then I drive across town. Through the traffic, the road work, the line-up for the downtown farmer’s market, the red lights and the green ones. I pull into the underground parking, find a place to park and ride the elevator up to the first floor to look at shoes.

Shoes.

The bane of my existence.

Nothing fits. Nothing is comfortable. Nothing ever works.

But today, I find some fur-lined clogs that are PERFECT. And I stride upstairs, able to walk in something other than Asics running shoes for the first time in several weeks. Triumph!

There’s a baby shower this afternoon – a last-minute invitation that was a bit awkward. As the former (now retired) associate pastor, people are often a bit uncertain. Should we or shouldn’t we? This mother-in-law decided to go for it and I am happy to be included.

And I love shopping for baby things. Yes, I do. I’m not ashamed to admit it – I love it. So I pick up several adorable tiny things for this little-girl-to-be and leave them to be wrapped while I walk across the third floor to the restaurant.

Lunch. That’s exactly what I need! A salad, a tall, cool glass of water, a Cookie Royale. Sigh. I spread out the paperwork I’ve printed and look at all the possible writing assignments I can sign onto for this month. One deadline is past – that one is shoved aside. One is due within the week. Maybe. One the 31st of this month – definitely. And one the 20th of next month. Absolutely. Now I have a little direction for this writing part of my life. The salad tastes better because I did this small bit of sorting first. And the cookie – well. The best cookie ever baked, that’s all there is to it.

But as I look around me, I see something that makes my own eyes well up this winter Saturday. There is a table, just to my right, with three women at it – three generations of women, actually. A white-haired older woman – attractive, convivial, engaged; a brown-haired woman of middle age – listening to the older woman attentively; a 20-something, head moving between the two older women, shifting from one end of the conversation to another, taking a bite of lunch, pausing, pushing back the hair from the side of her face.

That was my life just about 18 months ago. My mother was stronger, saner, her beautiful, vivacious self. I and one or the other of my daughters would sit together with her, enjoying a meal or a story, listening and learning. That part of my life appears to be slipping away, along with large chunks of my mother’s mind. I miss that life.

I miss her.

A quick trip home, some furious computer work for my husband, then on to the baby shower. Always nervous entering a room full of women, I load my plate too heavily, find a place in the corner and sit and watch for a while. Again, I am struck by the connections across the generations. The women in this room range from early 20’s to late 60’s. They have gathered from near and far to offer gifts to a newly forming female child, to shower love on someone they have yet to meet.

So, I forcibly relegate the rising tide of inadequacy, timidity, and wondering-if-I-will-ever-really-belong-anywhere feelings to the room called ‘pointless noise’ in my brain. Instead, I choose to think about the blessing. The gift that is womanhood, the privilege of being a mother or an aunt or a grandmom, the joys of shared stories, shared experiences, mutual memories. And I offer up a breath of thanks for it all – the chatter, the scent of tea, the savory and the sweet on my plate, the love offerings wrapped in pink.

As I leave, the sun is beginning to color the sky. The mission is nearby, so I swing by there, struck by the clear view of the channel and the outlying islands. I grab my camera, swing into a parking spot and stand on the Old Mission steps just as mass is over. Snap. Snap. Gasp.

Then I race across town, down through the ravine to the state beach. Too late for the most dramatic of the evening’s color, the view is still breathtaking. University Point to my right, Santa Cruz Island to my left, the huge expanse of Hendry’s Beach in front of me.

And suddenly my ordinary Saturday is anything but. Rose and gold on the water, twinkling lights in the distance, stripes of sky and sea and sand, piled on top of one another like a horizontal crazy quilt, as the crisp winter wind reminds me to breathe out. Glory be.

And Hallelujah.

Added on a couple of photos of the winter flora at the Old Mission, viewed in the fading light – just because I felt like it. Joining these meanderings with Laura B and LL B for their weekly memes at “The Wellspring” and “Seedlings in Stone,” respectively. And also with Heather at “The Extraordinary Ordinary,” and her invitation to JustWrite:

Filed Under: Wonderings in the Word, Wonderings in the World

David Brooks on What Makes Us Human: The THC Book Club

January 14, 2012 By Diana

She’s sleepy, and fighting it – hard.

I take her back to the bedroom and open the computer,

dialing up iPhoto so that she can look at ‘pichures, pichures.’

As she looks, and identifies each person she knows,
her hands begin to snake their way up my sleeve.

This is a favorite sleep aid – the touch of human skin,
the skin of those who love and care for her.

It’s a repetitive behavior pattern that we’ve wondered about a little,
as parents and grandparents sometimes do.

Now, thanks to some fascinating input
from the latest book selection at the Book Club over at The High Calling,
I have a little more insight into why this works so well.

She has discovered a primary source of self-soothing, has our active, charming, I-won’t-sleep-unless-you-absolutely-force-me-to granddaughter.

And then there was touch…As Harry Harlow’s famous monkey experiments suggest, babies will forgo food in exchange for skin…They’ll do it because physical contact is just as important as nourishment for their neural growth and survival…Human skin has two types of receptors. One type transmits information…[about]…objects. But the other type activates the social parts of the brain. It’s a form of body-to-body communication that sets off hormonal and chemical cascades, lowering blood pressure and delivering a sense of transcendent well-being. pg. 33

Smart girl, our soon-to-be-two Lilly.

Rife with tidbits like this, David Brooks’ new book, “The Social Animal,” is a fascinating, often hilarious, always insightful collection of a lot of different scientific information gathered together in an engaging story-telling format.

Brooks takes the results of research – from biology, neuro-science, psychology, anthropology – and skillfully weaves it together in and around the history of a fictional family. What I am discovering is that the data is ‘sticking’ with me far better in this format than it would in a scholarly article.
My particular brain seems wired for story.
And I’m guessing we just might find some evidence for that in the data that is still to come in Brooks’ collection.

The introduction and first three chapters are filled with the basics of human partnering, relationship-building, baby-making, and knowledge gathering. (There are only a couple of pages dedicated to the actual physical act responsible for babies; there is much more emphasis on developmental issues, all of which are intriguing and often bring an ‘aha!’ moment of recognition).

What has been most interesting to me thus far is the number of parallels between what hard science is discovering in laboratories and guided studies and what early psychologists – most especially Carl Jung – discovered early in the 20th century by doing lots and lots of talk therapy. These words from page 32 sound an awful lot like what Jung called the ‘collective unconscious:’

The truth is, starting even before we are born, we inherit a great river of knowledge, a great flow of patterns coming from many ages and many sources. The information that comes from deep in the evolutionary past, we call genetics. The information revealed thousands of years ago, we call religion. The information passed along from hundreds of years ago, we call culture. The information passed along from decades ago, we call family, and the information offered years, months, days, or hours ago, we call education and advice. But it is all information, and it all flows from the dead through us and to the unborn. The brain is adapted to the river of knowledge and its many currents and tributaries, and it exists as a creature of that river the way a trout exists in a stream. Our thoughts are profoundly molded by this long historic flow, and none of us exists, self-made, in isolation from it.

At the end of this week’s assignment, a lovely, and by far, the most poignant small piece of story-telling in this volume, came from Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
So sweetly, these words served to underscore that ‘aha!’ moment I’d had earlier about our Lilly and her need to be skin-to-skin.

Coleridge’s three-year-old son once woke in the night,
begging his mama to come in and touch him.
Perplexed, his mother wondered why.
“I’m not here,” the boy cried.
“Touch me, Mother, so that I may be here.“

You are here, sweet Lilly.
You are most definitely here.
Thanks be to our good God for that wondrous truth.

Filed Under: Book Review, family, Wonderings in the World

Five Minute Friday: Awake…Oh, Really??

January 14, 2012 By Diana

There was this one morning, when I did manage to lunge my way out from under the covers to get my anxious husband to the airport for an early flight. And I was amazingly surprised on this ONE day to note that the sun rises over the ocean on our peculiar peninsula at certain times of the year.
And I got to see the fishing fleet set off for the day.

Yes, it was truly lovely.

No, I did not do it again.

The single most difficult thing I do every day

is get out of bed.

Yes, it’s true.

I am not a morning person.

No, I am not.

Not. At. All.

I struggle to see past the end of my nose.

I resist the sunlight, pouring through the transom window.

I resent the cheeriness of my partner for the last 46 years.

He is fully awake,

ready for the day,

bounding out of bed,

full speed ahead.

I am putt-putting in his wake.

If it’s a really good day, I get to stay in bed for another hour or so after he has made his wide-awake presence known.

And I am quite happy to let him make his own oatmeal

(which he does every single day),

to vaguely listen to him jostle the dishes in the sink,

to turn over and move right back into dreamland,

thank you very much.

It takes me a while to be fully awake,

even after I’m out of the bed.

I hem and haw and shuffle and mutter

and gradually make my way past the bathroom

into the closet and then out into the daylight.

But I’m not a happy camper.

No, I am not.

By about 10:00 a.m., I’m polite.

By noon, I’m downright gregarious.

And by 9:00 p.m. – I’ve had a second wind,

ready to read or write or watch TV or engage conversation.

And my partner?

Sawing logs.

Yes, he is.

Sigh.

Back with Lisa-Jo this week for her 5 minute prompt, which today was the word AWAKE.

Check out some of the other contributions – they’re always fun to read.
She encourages us to write for 5 minutes flat without worrying about whether it’s right or not – no editing of any kind.

But this week, I will admit to some formatting after the 5 minute bell. Other than that – this one was a breeze. It’s the story of my life. Even when my kids were little, I struggled with mornings. I got up, I did what I was supposed to do. But I was semi-conscious most of the time. I had a small floral business for a while and that meant I had to get up really early to get to the flower mart on a wedding/party weekend. And I always enjoyed that weird, upside-down world of activity in downtown Los Angeles – at 4:00 a.m.! But I was quite happy to give up my re-sale number after daughter number two got married, nearly 18 years ago.

Filed Under: personal journey, Wonderings in the World