Thoughts on dirt
January 22, 2012 § Leave a comment
I have just started William Bryant Logan’s book Dirt: The Ecstatic Skin of the Earth and am already getting caught up in a sense of wonder and gratitude. This bodes well! This is the sort of thing we reader-types live for. Here’s an excerpt from the prologue:
How can I stand on the ground every day and not feel its power? How can I live my life stepping on this stuff and not wonder at it? […]
Recently, I have been reading Exodus, wondering about Moses and the burning bush. Moses, it is written, “turns aside to see a wonder,” a bush that burns but is not consumed. Throughout my life, I had thought this a ridiculous passage. Why should God get Moses’ attention by such outlandish means? I mean, why couldn’t He just have boomed, “Hey, Moses!” the way He would later call to the great king, “Hey, Samuel!”
Now I know why. The truth, when really perceived and not simply described, is always a wonder. Moses does not see a technicolor fantasy. He sees the bush as it really is. He sees the bush as all bushes actually are.
There is in biology a formula called, “the equation of burning.” It is one of the fundamental pair of equations by which all organic life subsists. The other one, “the equation of photosynthesis,” describes the way the plants make foods out of sunlight, carbon dioxide, and water. The equation of burning describes how plants (and animals) unlock the stored sunlight and turn it into the heat energy that fuels their motion, their feeling, their thought, or whatever their living consists of.
All that is living burns. This is the fundamental fact of nature. And Moses saw it with his two eyes, directly. That glimpse of the real world–of the world as it is known to God–is not a world of isolate things, but of processes in concert.
God tells Moses, “Take off your shoes, because the ground where you are standing is holy ground.” He is asking Moses to experience in his own body what the burning bush experiences: a living connection between heaven and earth, the life that stretches out like taffy between our father the sun and our mother the earth. If you do not believe this, take off your shoes and stand in the grass or in the sand or in the dirt.
The Wolf Moon
January 8, 2012 § 2 Comments
January’s full moon is tomorrow, the 9th – the Wolf Moon – though this night it was as near full as can be. It beckoned, as full moons can do. I listened, as I so often don’t.
I heated chili and poured it into a wide-mouth jar, then wrapped the jar in a tea towel. Took the cornbread muffins out of the oven and let them cool while stuffing books, yarn, and a spoon into my backpack. Found a scarf. Pulled on the wristwarmers my best friend gave me, slipped my feet into boots.
We went out, this white-blue night. Out to dinner meaning out to dinner. No cars in the parking lot. T bounded from the car. I walked slowly after.
It would have been best to get away from the sound of cars, the lights of houses, but that means going into the mountains and too far. So we take what we can have.
The first sound, over and beyond the cars, was that of the geese. The chorus of them raised their voices in a moonlit evensong, over the rise before the land slides down to the reservoir. We did not go to see them – we stayed on the trail – but they sang to us all night. I liked knowing they were there. I imagined the village of them, the gray and black gone silver, their wings tossing light as they moved.
Then came the sound of feet, T’s quick steps, my longer strides scuffing over gravel. Only patches of snow and ice to interrupt the rhythm. A few minutes of walking and I felt hungry. There is a picnic table that sits close to the water, which was white with ice. I spread burlap over the worn wood. The chili steamed into the air when I removed the lid from the can. It smelled so meaty and good that Tassie looked up from where she was nosing around the shoreline, then came over with her ears forward in expectation.
We had our dinner with lit candles, until they seemed too strong when I wanted only the calm of the moonlight. I blew them out, tucked them away. Honey-soaked cornbread. I rubbed my hands together and looked at the black silhouette of the tree against the half-frozen lake. No headlamp – forgotten in the closet at home – meant no reading, no knitting. Never mind; we would walk. It was what would make T the happiest, anyway.
In Colorado predators are always on my mind if I go too far or dark has fallen. Even here in the pinpoints of light from houses across the reservoir and up into the mountains, in the road noises not far away. A couple had walked past us earlier with a black labrador, so I reassured myself: If they thought it was safe, it likely was. Walk on.
T skittered and loped around, sometimes so far I could hardly make out her shape in the evening’s dim, though usually I could hear her well enough. Not stealthy, that one, but affectionate to make up for it. She is a breed meant for companionship, that’s for sure. I have owed her this walk and it was a nice thing to give it, at last.
And I found myself in prayer. I remember, now, how common a thing this used to be in this small life of mine, walking and praying. Often aloud, catching myself if another person happened to pass by. Nature became where I would best find Him. Walking was how I would begin to reach for Him. Clarity came in the space, and quiet, in my voice tumbling forth, and movement.
This has seemed a lost thing. Lost, almost without notice, in the pursuit of work and the appeal of technology’s entertainment.
When did I stop lingering through the woods? When did I stop allowing myself to be drawn into its holiness?
Only an hour or so, we had, this night. A duck rustled the water as we rounded the last bend. Only an hour or so, we had, but home I went with a hunger met, a spirit widened.
What is to come?
January 6, 2012 § 5 Comments
The dogs are wrestling in the middle of the floor. I have Peace Like A River propped open on my right, next to Miss T’s leash, next to an almost-done scarf, on top of my favorite quilt, on top of the puppy’s kennel. On my left are two sweaters that got stripped off at some point yesterday, the hot day, the non-January day. And I am in the middle of these things, in sweats, in need of a shower, lingering yet with my half-drank cup of coffee.
This is a Friday when I am fending off anxiety. What is to come? Where I will live in February is undetermined. How I will pay my bills is uncertain. Transition, again, stares me in the face. Such is life for this girl, and has been for a long time. Partly my own fault, partly just the way things have happened.
But what unfolds in the next few weeks may interrupt this pattern. There may be settledness at last. I must say that I have found it a strengthening thing to fly by the seat of my pants. The years from high school graduation until now have brought about a series of events to cure shyness and timidity. They have drawn out bravery, confidence, and risk-taking, or at least sometimes the appearance of these things. There is truth to the statement Fake it till you make it. I am that proof, for I have pretended to be outgoing, unafraid, and competent so often when inside I was quivering with fear, until somewhere the pretending became reality. And with that, a bit of surprise at one’s self – and a bit of satisfaction.
Still, I have my moments of anxiety, of trepidation, of simply being tired. My life doesn’t look like so many others along the American timeline, and there are those who would criticize me for it. And I can criticize myself for it, but then, what good does that do? Every step along the way offers a chance to learn. Every place and position presents a chance for living one’s beliefs. These are small but important victories.
Today. It is today. The tomorrows will come, one after another, and I will work through the decisions they present as I always have, and I will hope to make the right choices – or if I make the wrong ones, that somehow they work around towards being the right ones.
Breathe deep, self. To the rest of you – stay tuned! Interesting things are sure to happen.
Resolution
January 1, 2012 § 4 Comments
Isn’t it a funny word? I find it interesting how many definitions the word resolve has. What fascinates me particularly is how resolve can be synonymous with determination (“He stepped forward with resolve”) yet it also can mean to move from dissonance to consonance – most directly in music, but the idea extends to matters of opinion, problem-solving, working through an issue – ending the tension to reach a resolution. And yet – and yet – the word can also mean to separate. What?
Language is so strange. English, especially.
My conclusion, as I’m inclined towards peacemaking, is that resolutions might be built on this handful of definitions. As we make lists of what we want to do or not do this upcoming year, can we move with determination towards things that will bring us together into pleasing consonance? This doesn’t mean we all have to operate on the exact same opinions, beliefs, and perspectives – we can remain our separate, unique selves, like notes in a chord. And yet as we consider who we are and who others are and who we want to be, perhaps we can learn how to live together in harmony.
On that thought, here is my 2012 resolution list:
1. Be generous. Even when I have little. Generosity needn’t be expressed only by the giving of material things. Time, work, kind words, a small note in the mail – these count, too.
2. Be frugal. Don’t spend on unnecessary things, and get what I owe paid off. (All right, that’s a bit lofty for a year, but make significant advancements in this direction.) Debt creates discord, in one’s spirit as well as in relationships, even purely financial ones.
3. Be healthy. That means being healthy personally as well as promoting health in my environment – physically, ecologically, and economically. If my body is forced to operate on poor fuel and/or my actions contribute to degradation and toxicity around me, that puts me (and others) in a state of disrepair. True, we all age, but let’s age well. And let’s have land and water that go on being clean and fertile beyond our lifespans. Good health tends to foster happiness! And happiness tends to foster harmony.
4. Be optimistic. I must confess I have been a bit of a negative Nancy this year. Part of me wants to defend myself by saying that I feel everything strongly and express it openly so y’all get to go on the ups-and-downs with me. But the truth is that I have caught complaints coming out of my mouth far too often and have gotten into a habit of tampering my eager, rosy hopes with the dim glasses of criticism and self-doubt. (It doesn’t all get on this blog – but my friends and family have heard it more than once.) And the worst part? It drags the people around me down with me. Aiyaiyai. So optimism. Looking for good, holding onto truths, closing the door on regret and shoving aside fear and self-deprecation.
5. Be faithful. For me, this goal directs itself towards two closely related realms. First and foremost I seek to be faithful to my Father God, His saving Son, and the amazingly wildly loving Holy Spirit. Second, I will be faithful to my loved ones. This means to stand up for them. To step in for them. To be there when needed. Even to put them before myself. Because faithfulness is the fruit of the kind of love that is more than just a feeling.
Can I do it? Will I do it? The good thing is that these are not deadline goals. They are lifelong goals. (And I am a lifelong learner! Yay!) The next steps for me are to (a) remain conscious of these goals – maybe put a list on the mirror or refrigerator or nightstand, and (b) map out what changes I might make – big and small – to foster and further these things in my little old life.
I am not one of those who is afraid of resolutions! No, sir. I am resolved. Resolved to resolve.
What are your goals this year? Do you like or dislike New Year’s resolutions? Do you have any suggestions for me regarding mine?
The Christ Candle
December 27, 2011 § Leave a comment
The final advent candle, the Christ Candle, was lit at home, as much as Iowa is home still. It shone steady and white, surrounded by three purple and one pink candle in the middle of an evergreen wreath in Christ Chapel. The church that I went to as a teenager and young college student has been meeting in this college chapel, as an engineer recently told the congregation that the roof of their old brick building is on the verge of collapse. So we filed into the chapel of my college days and sang classic Christmas songs and watched families gather.
I don’t have a picture of this fifth candle, but it is the most important one. The birth of a King. A humble coming in what is, to me, a perfectly beautiful, earthy, close-to-the-world way to be born. In a stable, surrounded by living things, with nature nearby. It seems right for the King who would not be afraid of the world’s grittiness, but would instead engage with it. One who would find beauty where others could not; who would draw forth joy and shine; who would dedicate His life to restoring His Father’s creation, and to training and imparting others to do the same.
And it is a reminder, isn’t it, of who we might be, wherever we come from. Because of the One who was an example. And the One who made us with purpose. Where do we come from, after all? What might we be?
Heaven and earth. Heaven on earth.
The fourth candle of advent: Peace
December 19, 2011 § Leave a comment
The fourth Sunday of Advent (which was yesterday, I know, I forgot!) is the candle of peace, or The Angels’ Candle.
The Angels’ Candle reminds Christians of the angels who appeared to the shepherds on the hillside, announcing the Savior’s birth.
“Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.'” Luke 2:13-14.
Happy holidays from (kinda) Home Depot
December 15, 2011 § 2 Comments
Have you all seen that Home Depot commercial? The one where you take an old, empty window frame, paint it red, insert c-hooks, hang ornaments, and place the finished product on your fireplace mantel? I must have seen it about a hundred times, and kept thinking how fun it was.
So one random day, when I was feeling like I needed something satisfyingly tactile to accomplish, I looked around the apartment and considered how I might imitate that idea. I roped my roommate in and we set to imagining, planning, and crafting.
We didn’t have a paneless window frame, but we did have a trellis that I hardly used this growing season and didn’t plan to use again. I sawed off the legs and we painted it with a Martha Stewart silver-blue glitter. Three coats and we had the sparkle we wanted!
Then we selected fabrics and ornaments, and tried out a few arrangements until we discovered what we liked best. Instead of traditional red and green, we favored silver, blue, white, a little red, and a little brown.
We screwed in the c-hooks (which was harder than you’d think), hung the ornaments, glued the fabrics, and put it all on display above the fireplace.
Ta-daa!
Give a cow for Christmas
December 14, 2011 § Leave a comment
I’m a little late on my annual intention to spread the word about Heifer International . . . but here it is, nonetheless. Heifer International seeks to overcome hunger and poverty by working with communities to establish strong, local, agriculture-based economies. How can you help? By donating the funds to provide a family with a heifer (hence the name), goat, bees, ducks, even a water buffalo! You can give the gift on the part of a friend or family member, or simply for your own sake – and by doing so, you equip the recipient of your gift to pass on a gift to someone else. Passing on the gift is central to Heifer International’s mission; as one person or family gets on their feet, they can then offer a hand to someone else.
What kind of giving, this Christmas season, could be better? I encourage you to look at Heifer International’s website, and consider giving the gift that keeps on giving.
Here’s a link to the site: Heifer International
Have you ever given or received a Heifer International gift? I’d love to hear about it!
The third candle of advent: Joy
December 11, 2011 § Leave a comment
The third Sunday of advent celebrates the lighting of the Candle of Joy, or the Gaudete Candle. Gaudete is a Latin word meaning “Rejoice!” For Christians, this is a Sunday for experiencing the joy of the Lord’s promises, the joy that will come with the Christ-child’s birth, and the joy of His ultimate salvation of the world.
“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice. Let your forbearance be known to all, for the Lord is near at hand; have no anxiety about anything, but in all things, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be known to God. Lord, you have blessed your land; you have turned away the captivity of Jacob.” – Philippians 4:4–6; Psalm 85:1.
The second candle of advent: Preparation
December 4, 2011 § Leave a comment
The second candle is the Candle of Preparation, or the Bethlehem Candle. It symbolizes the preparations made in Bethlehem in expectation of Christ’s birth. Christians consider how they might prepare their hearts, lives, and communities to welcome a Savior.
“As is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet: ‘A voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him. Every valley shall be filled in, every mountain and hill made low. The crooked roads shall become straight, the rough ways smooth. And all mankind will see God’s salvation.'” Luke 3:4-6
Kinds of Honey 