Category Archives: Being Present

Dec22

Spotlights, Strobe Lights and World’s End

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Brew_video_still

Still image from The Brew’s “Into the Remembering Sun” music video filmed at Castle Hill, Ipswich, MA

Last night we celebrated the end of the world … or its un-ending, or non-ending … with a local (but internationally touring and recording) band The Brew. Just outside, white-capped waves rolled one over another and crashed onto the dark, wild, and windswept shore of Salisbury Beach. We were dry and safe inside the Blue Ocean Music Hall where the band played their annual holiday concert (with plenty of space for dancing). They are gifted lyricists and classically-trained-musicians-nee-rocker-sons of friends of ours.

They invoked Mayan spirits (who predicted this ending date) with drums. Invited those spirits to be present. Then sang a lot of songs about endings and beginnings. We moved, swayed, sang, and kept time to their offering of pounding music.

So, okay, the world didn’t end last night. Or today. Not literally, though some people in the past weeks, have reason to feel as if private worlds have ended. Oh, and my family knows that feeling all too well … when it seems as if all of human existence has ended, that everything that matters has been erased, or should stop and be silent and pay attention. And in many ways, that’s true. Fragile, tender, vulnerable, fleeting, too-young and beloved parts of our lives are taken away, and nothing can stand up against that loss. Yet we are challenged to continue caring, living, and being engaged in by life.

Some interpretations of the Mayan calendar’s ending date actually talked about transformation. That it was a time of change, rather than cataclysm and destruction. The rising of a new era. That’s another invitation, isn’t it? Renewal. Rebirth. Reclamation.

Perhaps the gift of the ‘end of the world’ prediction is to ask ourselves, what would happen if we lived as if it was about to end? What would we do with that precious time, if it suddenly mattered, because it was limited? What would we release? What would we hold onto? Events in the world remind us, over and over, that we cannot know what is coming next. That NOW is the only gift of time — the only moment — we can be certain of inhabiting.

Brew_video_Still2

Still image from music video by The Brew

Last night, we gathered among friends. Celebrated. Together. If the world had ended … it would have been a good place to be.

But it didn’t end. So my head is full of dreams about another night, another day, and a whole year yet to come. In a season of lights, there is a time and place for the artists’s lights. For the whirling strobe and flashing spotlight. For fingers on guitar strings and keyboards and drumsticks and microphone. For lips and lungs, minds and hearts, to remind us to live. To put our hope and pain into words and share it with each other. To let go. To get sweaty and emotional and expressive under those lights, and remember to BE … to BE the primal and present and passionate mortal creatures that we are.

I offer the copyrighted lyrics of Into the Remembering Sun by The Brew, one of many songs we danced to on the night the world almost ended.

Into The Remembering Sun
by the The Brew (c) 2012

(Verse 1)
On a night when the moon gave no shoulder
Even the wind was feeling old
Even the stars found a cloud to hide behind
Believing my last hope sold
Believing my last hope sold

(Pre-chorus 1)
You come through the gate
Despite what I told you
Still I have no shame
Cause never did I fold

(Chorus)
and I know the world was changing
At least what I had faith in
Burned into the pages time was not erasing now

(Verse 2)
When the days age and relay accounts of love
Knowing now what time was
You and I will be the jewel in the crown
Thrown into the remembering sun
Thrown into the remembering sun

(Prechorus 2)
You run through the gate
Despite what you told me
Still you have no shame
Cause you love me to the bone

(Chorus 2)
And I know your world is changing
At least what you have faith in
You burned into the pages time is not erasing
Let nobody be mistaken
And we’ll walk away so babe don’t be shaken now (?)

(Chorus)
And I know the world is changing
At least what we have faith in
We burned into the pages time was not erasing now
Don’t erase it now

You and I will be the jewel in the crown
Thrown into the remembering sun
Thrown into the remembering sun
Thrown into the remembering sun

Dec20

Remembered Light

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Here is a offering from the English Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882). Light is only a glancing aspect of this wishful, dreamy, time-traveling reverie. Yet within literature — and our imaginations — light is often the magical element, the unnamed presence that illuminates or acts upon a story to set events in motion.

Sudden Light

I have been here before,
But when or how I cannot tell:
I know the grass beyond the door,
The sweet keen smell,
The sighing sound, the lights around the shore.
You have been mine before,—
How long ago I may not know:
But just when at that swallow’s soar
Your neck turn’d so,
Some veil did fall, —I knew it all of yore.
Has this been thus before?
And shall not thus time’s eddying flight
Still with our lives our love restore
In death’s despite,
And day and night yield one delight once more?
Dec15

One Light Burning

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CSilence for too long, I know. And I promised (myself) to share words about light during this season of darkness, this time of short days and long nights … This evening, before the prayers are all whispered, the songs all sung, the matches struck, tapers lit, and flames blown out … tonight I make a beginning.

It is the last of the 8 nights of Hannukah, and just 10 days until Christmas. So many  festivals and rituals also occur around this time of year, and all of them celebrate, one way or another, light. I will share  excerpts from an interfaith service crafted by fellow Harvard Divinity Students over the next several days.

For tonight, let me just offer this excerpt of a poem first published in 1973.

‘A Winter Light’ by John Haines.

By candle or firelight
your face still holds
a mystery that once
filled caves with the color
of unforgettable beasts.

lascaux-cave-walls

Every added flame brightens the darkness: each one. Small lights, burning together, create great brilliance and potency. As do we … vivid spirits, radiant lives … made incandescent together, setting each other alight with humor, hope, compassion, resilience, forgiveness, and love.

Oct27

Boots, Birds and Good-Byes

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On a difficult pair of days, I wore a pair of high heeled boots, hid behind a costume, became vulnerable, wept, prayed, painted my nails, felt incredibly lonely, connected with special people, remembered those who are gone, and was visited by a winged messenger.

There has been a long silence from my end. Again. It’s been a few weeks of logistics such as deadlines, papers due, mid-term exams, and also … yes, pushing through difficult milestones such as the birthday of a departed friend and the anniversary of the fifth year since Jessie died.

Once upon a time, I wrote every day of Jessie’s treatment, and continued every day after she went on ahead of us, recounting the journey of the living. Now it takes me a week to reflect, in writing, about such moments.

Two days come close together last week. Both are difficult. One is the birthday of my friend Rebecca, who died of breast cancer a few years ago, after a long and gracious life, making a difference in the world of so many people, but especially her family, and most of all her two beloved children Ben and Anna.

Her headstone is only a few yards from Jessie’s, beneath a row of maples, at the top of the hill in the cemetery. Rebecca knew their spots would be close together. We visited those cemetery locations together. Stood while Rebecca was alive under the long shadows of old maples on young green grass, listened to songbirds, felt the stir of the wind, heard  its murmur through the leaves. Made memories up there. Had conversations we often couldn’t share with anyone else, about worries and wishes, realities and dreams, sorrows and hopes. Rebecca lived with a persistent form of breast cancer, and navigated a fine balance of hope in the possibility of a cure or new treatment, the wish for longevity and survival, edged with awareness of a threatening and mortal condition. Rebecca talked about a visit she had made to the cemetery with her family; wanting them to have a living experience with her there, as well as a place to visit in later days. We talked about where she and Jessie would both be (Jessie had already died, but we hadn’t interred her ashes yet), and how they’d be close to each other in the spaces between the maples, and imagined how maybe they’d find each other in the place beyond this one. We believed that Rebecca and Jessie would continue to visit those of us that they left behind, back here on earth.

The very next day marked the morning, five years ago, when my daughter Jessie died. Every year our family approaches this milestone differently. It is a markedly individual and separate experience for each of us as sister, father or mother. And of course, it is a day marked by our extended family, friends or her community, too.

This year, on the eve of the anniversary of Jessie’s death, I found myself locked in memory loops and traumatic flashbacks of the last 24 hours of her life. Vivid images or sensory memories came back. They blur together like this: her lung x-ray looking worse that last full day in ICU, followed by visits of specialists to her bedside, and a phone call conference from a small meeting room to consult with Chris and several medical team leaders to decide a recommended course of action, an evening visit from one transplant care team nurses who believed she’d make it, Jessie waking up that night and braking through sedation to kick and reach for me as I told her we loved her and named each member of her family, holding tight to her hand, 2am worries and conversations with a night-shift nurse as we changed her bed padding and checked IV lines and monitors and breathing tube, later kissing her as they took her off the floor — still medicated to a level of unconsciousness while on a portable ventilator — to undergo a lung biopsy, pounding on doors to get through to the room where a doctor waited to tell me she was dying, sitting in a numb disconnected state while a white-coated medical fellow knelt before me to deliver the unthinkable narration of events that transformed a scan room into an emergency operating suite, knowing our friend and minister Rebecca was beside me every step of that morning, and that Rebecca made the calls I couldn’t make, knowing that Jessie died while Chris and Sarah were en route to the hospital, walking with Chris and Sarah together as if through a gauntlet one final time down the hallway to her room in ICU, where it wasn’t Jessie waiting anymore, just her lovingly arranged body under a quilt, so we could say good-bye.

This year, those scenes – running on endless replay in my mind — recurred over and over. Sometimes scene-by-scene as they really took place. Sometimes as if I rewrote history and changed fate.

If only we had the power to change the script, stop the camera, halt the action, decide to make a different ending, give all the actors new lines, new roles … if only it was make-believe, fiction, theater … not real. But it isn’t. It happened. And there are no sequels or second versions of this particular story.

Of course, I have other beliefs about what comes next. About a spiritual life beyond this one … but admittedly, there is a difference between that spiritual and emotional comfort and the very physical and mortal reality of a child you can read to, speak with, hold close, argue with, sigh about, worry over or dance with.

During the anniversay of Jessie’s death, I always set aside productivity. I don’t do school work or client projects. I cancel any appointments, skip most commitments.

Instead, I give myself permission to be in the moment and experience whatever comes. To make space and go through this, because it will catch up to me one way or another.

It isn’t a day when someone needs to fix what’s wrong. It is simply … an unspeakably sad and moving day. A time when we are permitted to weep or pray or be pissed off or act off-the-charts giddy or stay silent. A time when we experience the feelings that are natural to such milestones; and almost every possibly emotion is likely to surface, visit and be expressed along the way.

On such an anniversary, I don’t have many expectations about what will or should happen. I may lose myself for part of the day. Or find Jessie all over again. Connect with Chris or Sarah, if possible, on this day. Retreat. Or be in the company of friends. Mourn. Remember. Acknowledge. And yes, celebrate.

We often try to experience some of Jessie’s best-loved activities on this day. For instance, my friend Martha got me started on the self-care and healing of pedicures and manicures. You may scoff at this self-indulgent choice, but it is a place of respite where no one expects anything of you, someone takes care of you for a little while, you float and let go, and you even feel a little better (or prettier, or something) on the other side of it. I did it again this year.

And this year Chris and I attended the Rotary Masquerade fundraising ball that evening. It happens every year; it just fell on the same night as Jessie’s anniversary. And what better way to celebrate her vibrant spirit? She loved dressing up, going out to dance, to be with friends.

I dared to wear a pair of black high-heeled boots and a short skirt and a wig. I was someone else: pretending, letting go, running away, wishing, and forgetting. And I was myself: grieved, sad, lonely, determined, giddy, connected, remembering, and living ‘in the moment’.

Underneath the black lipstick, fake eyelashes and sequined outfit, I was a mother thinking about both of my daughters: my beautiful intelligent grownup daughter putting away her textbooks and going out with friends to the night-life of cafes in Thessaloniki during her first semester abroad in college in Greece and my younger child whose ashes rest beneath a headstone graven with her name, marked that day by a blossom and a crimson leaf. Under the red-and-black wig, beneath the black spider rings, I was a friend who asked the opinion of girlfriends about makeup and party outfit, wanting someone to cheer and encourage me for risks to self-image when I wore an edgy costume. In the black boots and red silk top, I felt like a vamped-up sexy wife on a date with my husband, spending time together on a day that holds deep and surreal connotations for both of us, in a year that has been full of exhausting transitions, some wonderful, some challenging. Dancing among peers in masks and feather boas, capes and fedoras, applauding the band and jumping to the rockin’ music, I was one member of a club and a community that showed up to raised funds for local causes.

We aren’t binary: black-and-white, one-or-the-other, either-or. We, as humans, are so much more complex and layered and intricate and impossible to unknot or explain. We are just … who we are. And different, every moment, every day.

The next morning, I woke to the rush of wings as a bird fell or was knocked down my chimney. It emerged, eventually, from the hearth in our bedroom to circle and perch in our room. A common bird, familiar and full grown. Dark-tipped, pale-chested, bright-eyed. We caught it in a net and released it safely out the front door.

What do I believe about the sudden fall and flight or that common backyard bird that often visits the feeder outside our kitchen window? For me, its sudden arrival represented the visitation of a winged messenger, a spirit guide. A reminder that she’s here in many ways, and somewhere else, too. (You’re welcome to your own thoughts about it … whether you believe its coincidence or meaningful.)

The eve of Jessie’s anniversary, I relived nightmares. The day of her anniversary, I ‘got by’ in fancy nail polish and high-heeled boots she would have liked a lot. The morning after her anniversary, I participated in a startling and sacred moment.

And I am reminded, and I remind you, that we are connected. Body, mind and spirit. This world and the next world. All of us, always on a journey, perhaps in different places along the way, but not so far apart as we sometimes feel or imagine. Nearer than we suppose.

Oct17

Losing Your Voice, Saying Yes, Making Wishes

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This week, I virtually lost my ‘voice’, but I also made wishes, and reminded myself why I have said YES to so many opportunities.

First of all, it’s been a while since I posted, because I have spent so much time lately writing school assignments, that my hands hurt and my throat is sore. I think I’m losing my voice … my writing voice, that is … ha-ha!

But seriously, I haven’t dared consider blogging for a several days, because I needed every productive hour to meet other obligations. Right now, sleep isn’t always on the agenda! I pulled at least one all-nighter this week and stayed awake until 5am completing a paper for a deadline, since I had two papers due on the same day. In the days leading up to that deadline, I’d also delivered a sermon, facilitated a women’s spirituality group, assisted with an ‘Amazing Race’ youth group activity and launched Jessie’s floating wish lanterns onto the dark Ipswich River as part of Ipswich Illuminated … all in the same few days.

Why didn’t I work on the papers and deadlines sooner, you might ask? Getting fresh, aren’t you? Well, I did prepare in advance. Pages of notes. Re-reading books to analyze them. Creating outlines. If I hadn’t done that much preparation, there wouldn’t have been any ideas to plump up and submit as finished works yesterday.

So in fact, I did prepare. But time just … well … there was just enough time, if I didn’t sleep. Phew.

After all, there’s keeping up with regular class assignments: weekly essays, whole books to read each week, and various other assignments including oral presentations, debates and even (yes, it’s true) occasional art projects.

Plus working freelance. Plus, as some of the activities above will have indicated, field education as a seminarian working at a church in Beverly.

And yes, during the week, I actually sit down with Chris and spend a few hours being a person who is married with a husband. Or I take a walk or sip tea with a pal, and behave like a person with friends.

It was the perfect storm of deadlines and other activities this past weekend. More than usual. And you know what? I loved every part of it, even though I was very tired last night!

What did I do, when I wasn’t writing? I laughed, being with teenagers on a scavenger hunt to learn about community service and social justice organizations all over downtown Beverly, then racing to be first back to their church for a prize. I held my breath, and then delivered a sermon at First Church with just an index card as an outline, and powerful stories alive in my head and heart, waiting to be shared. Read an autumnal Mary Oliver poem and lit candles with a community of women I’m just getting to know. Applauded after watching my husband Chris and other good friends perform in the 16 Elm Street historical play.

Ipswich Illuminated? That was magical. So many people work all year, and then overtime on that weekend, to make it as beautiful as it is.

Each year, I stand boot-deep in cold river water, lighting hundreds of candles and nudging origami wax paper boats filled with wishes out onto the tide (thanks, Aileen Ang, for folding those boats). Again this year, they winked like nearby stars in a night sky: a constellation  spilled down to earth. (Thanks to friends Miri and Sadie and other cohorts who helped again this year, assisting people as they chose candles, wrote notes and gathered up their dreams to set afloat on the river.) Jessie’s Floating Wish Lanterns are the one activity we perform specifically in her memory each year, and I wouldn’t be anywhere else on that night.

Two weeks ago, we had friends Mark and Lesley visiting in our home from England. For a few glorious days, I set aside reading assignments, classwork and deadlines. Put graduate school on hold for one long weekend, to be with friends that I only see every few years. In other words, time for important activities and relationships remains a priority.

Yes, my writing voice is a little tuckered out, from finishing all school papers yesterday. Yet the subjects lit fires in my brain, and sparked questions in my heart. Despite the pace and the tension, I am where I want to be.

And I am making time, regardless all these deadlines, to do what’s important. To be with those I love. And just to be. Be.

My Harvard professors, even the intellectual ones who pile on work, will always say … take care of yourself. Find a balance. Don’t read every assigned page. Pause. Meditate. Get something to eat. Take a walk. Catch a nap in a quiet corner. And talk to someone, if it’s all too much. Always take care of yourself.

So I remind myself, and now I remind you … when you get wound up tight by schedules, deadlines, appointments, and activities … and we all do … the question is whether these are commitments that you have agreed to do … said YES to … because you care about them. Because you are moved by their purpose or use of your time. Because you believe by doing them, you make a difference, and it rekindles a light inside you, or connects you to something bigger than yourself. Or simply because it feels good to do this activity or be with this person, and restores your own internal sense of balance.

Check in with yourself. Can you say YES to those questions? Pay attention to the answer.

Me? I’m tired. I’m run down. But right now, I can still say YES when I ask myself those questions.

Oct4

The Space Between

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The hours of sunlight are short. Yet the days are long, and time seems to move fast. We can’t measure our days by the brief hours between dark and dark, as John Updike once called them. We  count the actual up-before-dawn, waking-and-productive, getting-things-done, go-to-sleep-long-after-the-sun-sets span of a daily schedule, to truly sum up how much we work and accomplish in a span of 24 hours in this season.

This quickened pace, this buzz of energy and activities, this hum in our veins … we knew it was coming. It rises like the frantic work of bees before winter. It’s part of the arrival of the school year or the busy professional season.

Autumn heralds a return to longer nights, cooler weather and more focus on work and academics. Summer slowed us down (if we were lucky) or at least changed our rhythms and tempted us to pause, linger, and have fun in the heat and light. Fall winds us up. We move faster to stay warm, or because we’re playing a sport, or because there’s something to get done once we arrive wherever we’re hastening to.

It’s the season of gathering-in. Harvest. We reap the benefits of slower times. Set aside whatever bounty we can for the lean times. Savor the brief time of abundance. Prepare for the long, frigid, brilliant months of winter that await us.

At the edge of October’s cooler presence, there’s pleasure in finding heat. It’s a dance of comfort and discomfort. We wear layers on the coldest days: sweaters and socks, hand-warmers and scarves. Then catch ourselves growing too hot, and peel off the layers again. Grow chilled and pull the protective gear back on. Then lean once more toward sources of warmth … a cozy fire, a steaming hot beverage, or an open door into a heated space.

We don’t stand still very long, because the persistent cold catches up. Amidst our rush and busy-ness, there is beauty in this changeable time of the year. It’s worth noticing: crisp and vivid.

If you stop a moment, and focus, every hair on your head, every follicle and nerve-ending, every brain cell and heartbeat, seems to stand at attention. Alive. Drinking it all in. Capturing flavors and views, burning them into memory.

Detail from a painting of County and East Streets in autumn.

Can harvest colors really be so bright? Do aromas hang so vividly in the air that you taste them on your tongue? Can sounds snap and retort so sharply? Does the tension between warmth and cold make you feel so aware of everything, so strung with tension and awareness?

Yes. Life often happens along the edges, margins and boundaries. In the metamorphosis. During the transformation. In the changes between one certainty and the next, between the point of departure and the place of arrival. Life vibrates here, now, in this transitional season, in the “space between.”

Don’t you want to stare off and step into, for just a moment, the changing hues – crimson, green and gilded — bright against a clear blue sky? Smudge your finger through the richness of long purple shadows cast by a distant sun in this season? Be robed in a swirl of golden leaves whirling and dancing in a high wind?  Breathe in, exhale out, then watch your own respirations hang there, if it’s cold enough? Extend your arms to the veiled world on a misty morning when droplets of water cling to the air itself? Watch the lights wink on in the darkness?

There is magic in this time of change: autumn. Yes, it’s busy. These schedules demand more of us.

This season also wakes us up. Reminds us that we’re here. Alive. Calls us to pay attention. To be grateful for what has passed away,  what remains here with us, and what awaits.

Oct3

Courage Reprised

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Scary ride at Topsfield County Fair (photo by Mark Murphy with Chris Doktor’s fancy camera)

Right now there are autumnal leaves on the ground. So why am I thinking about skiing? It has to do with getting on a scary ride at the fair, and trying to overcome my fears.

Every year (almost) I take one ski lesson, make several runs down the bunny slope, and then go to the “top” of one of the less-scary (aka, green) trails and ski down the side of the mountain with my family. For me, each year, this is an act of courage. As well as a sign of solidarity with my family. I want to do it once each year, just so I can be with them, and face up to something that scares me, too.

Each year, I get a little better. (Until I fall down, of course. Almost guaranteed to happen every year.)

As proof of this annual act, I have a series of photos of me posed part-way up a mountain, next to my daughter and husband. Just before we go down the slope together. Me making pizza wedges with my feet so I don’t go too fast or lose control. Sarah skiing in circles around me, laughing hysterically at my juvenile form, then swooping ahead and then swinging back again to cheer me on. Chris somewhere before or behind, usually shooting embarrassing videos.

Chris and Sarah, of course, are much more accomplished on skis than me. They go to the top of the trails. They enjoy black diamonds. They ski in Colorado with uncle Jeff sometimes, at much greater altitudes. Sarah will get on a snowboard, too, though I’m not sure she’d claim she’s as comfortable ‘boarding as skiing.

Now back to Topsfield County Fair. We made our annual jaunt there. Now that Sarah’s grown up, it’s usually just Chris and I, making the rounds of barns and rides for one sticky, deep-fried afternoon. (For years, it was me with other moms, our kids in strollers, stuck in the Kiddy Ride area.)

This year we went with our friends Mark and Lesley, who are visiting from Ipswich England as part of a Rotary Club cultural exchange. We wanted to share a quintessential American experience with them, and the County Fair embodies everything that is fun, campy and quirky about America.

Photo by Lesley Dolphin

C’mon, admit it! It’s the fair! Deep-fried food of every description. Cute child-made projects by Boy or Girl Scout troops and 4-H clubs, like collections of painted gourds decorated as Olympic teams or ghosts and witches for Halloween. The world’s largest pumpkin: 2,009 pounds! Clydesdales. Racing pigs. Farm machinery with big tires and bigger engines: pulling stuff. Goats, sheep, alpacas, cows, bunnies, guinea pigs, chickens, roosters, ducks, turkeys … and more. Bee-keeping house with honey, wax candles and live hives. Prize-winning flower arrangements, handmade quilts, jars of honey, and pies. The midway, with dart-throwing contests and every other sort of game in which you can lose a lot of money, plus lots of rides with bright lights and loud music.

Anyway, in past years, I’ve gone on rides at the fair with my family, for the same reason that I go skiing with them. To face a fear. To show solidarity.

Does it count as an act of courage, if you’re afraid to do something for sensible reasons, like the concern about gravity, steep slopes and fast downhill speeds, but you do it anyway? Does it count as an act of courage, if you’re afraid the whole time, but do it anyway?

This year I went on the Pharoah’s Fury with Chris and our friend Lesley. It is really a large boat on a swing, and it rocks higher and higher in both directions, while you face into the middle, so that eventually you are pivoted so high that you’re facing a 90 degree drop and staring down into the screaming faces of the people on the other end of the boat. And then it plummets down in the opposite direction, as it completes the swing to the other end of its pendulum motion, and you feel as if you’re falling.

Okay, this ride combines all my nightmares. You know … falling … heights … speedy drops … That sort of thing.

Meanwhile Chris and Lesley, to challenge themselves, let go of the bar and lift their hands to heighten the effect. They keep their eyes open. They’re laughing and whooping in excitement.

Me? Eyes closed. Hands clutch the bar. Moan. Complain. “I hate this. Why did I get on? I hate this. Aaagggghhh. Aaaaarrrrrrgggggggghhhhhhh!”

Screams. Squint, but open my eyes a few times, to experiment with peeking, because Chris and Lesley say it’s easier with your eyes open than squeezed shut. Stare down into the faces of the people on the other end of the ride. Stare DOWN at them, from my 90 degree vertical-drop position at the very other end of the ride. Aaaaaarrrrrgggghhhhhh. Looking isn’t helping. It’s worse!

Fried foods at Topsfield County Fair, photo by Mark Murphy

I scream every time we start the plummet downward. My stomach falls after the rest of me, of course. It can’t keep up.

And I never let go of the bar. Even though Chris and Lesley say it’s more fun — easier — if you let go. Let go! Let go!

Yes, it’s the mantra that I say to myself about so many other parts of life. “Just let it go.”

On this ride, I don’t work up enough courage to let go of the safety bar and throw my hands up in the air. That’s one more step than I can manage.

What did I accomplish? Well, I got on the ride, and didn’t panic enough to get back off again. I said NO to an earlier ride, but I got on this one.

And by the end of the Pharoah’s Fury — which felt like it lasted 35 minutes, if you ask me — by the end of the ride, in between screams, I’m laughing. Laughing!

Okay, so maybe the stomach-drop sensation ride is FUN in a sick-scary sort of way. Me? Laughing?

To laugh, I’ve actually gone through the mental exercise of admitting that I’ve talked myself into a place of greater anxiety than this ride warrants. It’s almost ridiculous. But that’s why I won’t open my eyes or let go, because I’m so afraid.

So let’s ask this question again. What did I accomplish? Well, I opened my eyes. I peeked. It didn’t kill me, though it wasn’t any better. I won’t let go of the bar. Nope. But I can laugh between screams.

Does that count as courage?

Sure, it would be a better story if I’d released the bar, unclenched my hands, flung them into the air and completely immersed myself in the experience of my fear of heights, vertical drops, falling sensations and all of those things. If I’d faced it entirely, without any anxieties or reservations, and then walked off the ride … cured. A new person.

That isn’t quite the whole story. I got off the Pharoah’s Fury, wobbly, but smiling. As if, indeed, the weight of all those fried foods that we’d gobbled down earlier in the afternoon had been left behind. (Which they hadn’t. For the record, I didn’t puke.) As if I’d overcome some part of myself that was hunkered down in a dark corner, hands over eyes, back turned to the light, unwilling to uncurl and take a chance.

Scary ride, but my eyes are open, and Lesley’s arms are flung wide. (Photo by MArk Murphy)

Yes, I held on tight. Yes, I complained, “I hate this.” Yes, I screamed. Yes, I kept my eyes closed most of the time. Yes, it’s true. I did those things.

But I also got on the ride. In the end seat, where the ride is the most extreme. I stayed in the seat. I opened my eyes a few times, to check it all out. Between screams and rounds of “I hate this,” I actually relaxed enough to laugh. To admit that it was fun to be scared. Glad I’d done it.

That’s a lot for this year. (Does that count as my going-to-the-mountain moment? Can I skip the ski slope?)

For me, going on Pharoah’s Fury is about like going to the top of a ski trail on skis. To go down a mountain with my family. Would I do it myself, for my own satisfaction? No. Would I do it to keep someone I love company, and try it, even if it’s not “my thing?” Yes.

Is that courage? I don’t know. But when I laughed, as the ride dropped into its swing toward earth, it felt like something new was happening inside. And I didn’t need a new pair of underwear when I got off the ride, by the way!

Sep25

Packing In, Packing Out

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You know what role you play in life by how you carry your “stuff.” In a purse. In a wallet. In an art folio. In a drawing tube. In a briefcase. In a book bag. In a diaper bag. In a gym bag. In a rolling suitcase small enough to fit overhead on an airplane.

I’ve switched from a small clutch purse and laptop case to a backpack. A heavy backpack. Lots of pockets and compartments for everything from textbooks and computer to student ID and train pass. Plus extra pens, Kleenex, snacks and change of clothes. Yes, I prepare for all possibilities, including being stranded overnight.

I’ve always been known as the bag lady in my family. Now isn’t any different. I usually have necessities for all sorts of emergencies that never arise. But heck, if they come up, I’m ready. Carry around almost everything except a first aid kit!

This also means that I tend to take on burdens and lug them around. Regardless of whether they’re mine to worry about and try to fix or not. It’s just how I’m wired. So I do a lot of work about letting go of issues that I cannot control or change, and trying to be responsible for those things that I can do something about … usually my own stuff. Sounds like a twelve-step recommendation, doesn’t it?

What I bring to campus, even with all the extras, is an editorial process every day. Some books go into the pack, others come out. Depends on the class. Sometimes I add layers like a sweater that I might need later, as the weather changes. Or extra meals, if I’ll be on campus very late.

I try to lighten the load, both physically and metaphorically. Acknowledge which texts I’ll have a chance to read, and give myself permission not to carry an extra stack, just in case I have unexpected blocks of time (usually I have less time than anticipated, rather than more). By minimizing what I need, I take a few pounds off my back, and incidentally off my mind.

To make sure I’m only bringing what I need, I often check my calendar and syllabi, reviewing deadlines for both reading assignments and papers due. Then I pick one project I can work on, using my computer or some time in the library, to keep up with course work. That’s what I’ll complete during my “down times’ for the day.

Staying focused, and one step ahead of my assignments, seems to keep my spirits revived. And that’s another way to lighten the ‘stuff’ that I’m lugging around.

Anyway, today’s journal is simply an acknowledgement that we’re all carrying a lot of burdens. Some of them pack away tidily into our chosen forms of storage and porting. Some spill out. Some just don’t fit at all, and we carry them loose, in our arms, slung over a shoulder, or in some other unexpected ways. Some burdens we try to leave behind. Or put into storage, until we have a chance to cope with them.

Every time you empty your pockets, your purse, your backpack … every time you move your gear from one container to another … it’s a chance to conduct an editorial exercise. Relinquish those things you don’t need. Collect and bring along those items that you find essential (right now). In the same way, it’s an exercise that can also lift the weight of a spiritual load, at least for a little while.

I’ve written, more than once, about the act of taking inventory, holding on to the essentials, and letting of of the rest. In sustainable ways, when possible: donating, recycling or repurposing.

My backpack is heavy. So is my schedule.

But my step? My step is light-hearted. I’m where I want to be, a lot of the time. I’m fortunate to be able to say so.

Sep24

Home

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Yesterday I started field education. That’s an internship, so to speak, working at another church. I’ll gain valuable parish experience and perform new and familiar roles in a congregation that isn’t my home church.

The difficult part of this transition is that Chris and I spend every Sunday morning together, and we have so few chances to spend time in each other’s company, that I miss those mornings … even though we’ve only spent one Sunday apart. In addition, First Church in Ipswich is the longest I’ve ever been rooted in one faith community. We’ve belonged there for 18 years. To spend a schoolyear away from my own congregation, working elsewhere, feels as if the ground is shifting under my feet.

Along with all of the other transitions, it feels as if parts of me are being torn away.

Yes, I know intellectually, that this stretching and moving away from what’s familiar and easy, is all necessary. To work and grow in this new vocation, I must step outside my comfort zone, which in this case is my own community.

It’s what I want. That’s what I tell myself, though I miss what I must give up to be there. Even after one morning away.

So yesterday I spent my first morning in a new congregation. Spent time with both pastors, who have already welcomed me onto their staff. Met some of the congregation’s compassionate and committed lay leaders and community members. Witnessed the youth of this church presenting their summer mission trip to Maryland.

It was all quite nice. Safe. Just not my own faith community.

Finally, at the end of yesterday’s worship service, a friend of mine appeared. I hadn’t expected to see her there. She belongs to this new church where I’m working (I didn’t realize it). One of the ministers is her daughter (I didn’t know that either).

This friend of mine used to be on staff at Winthrop Elementary years ago, where both Sarah and Jessie attended school. She was especially instrumental in Jessie’s successful interludes at school. We all shared an intense journey together each time Jessie made the re-entry to Winthrop classrooms and culture. Her office was often a retreat, when Jessie needed a safe sanctuary to collect herself. They developed a special friendship independent of my connection to this woman. She represents, even now, some of the most wonderful and tempestuous experiences in our long journey with childhood cancer.

So when she appeared unexpectedly in front of me, at the new church, we leaned across the pew and hugged each other. I think I yelped with happiness.

Then I burst into tears. Held onto her much longer than the embrace of friends exchanging greetings. Hung on as if she was holding me up.

I think a knot of emotions all rose to the surface. Every loss and transition I’ve experienced in the last few weeks and months. And maybe ever years.

So much has changed. So much has fallen away. Jessie is gone. Sarah is off at school. I’m starting college again. Chris and I are struggling to find times to maintain connection. And I’m spending a lot of time away from my entire community, including the church which sustained us through everything.

My friend received that grief with a hug. And then I was laughing, overjoyed that I know someone in this new place, this new congregation with whom I’ll sojourn for the next two semesters. Growing. Reaching outside myself for something more. Connecting with something greater. Trying to remain rooted in what continues to be important to me: family and community.

When my friend greeted me in that new house of worship, suddenly I felt as if this new church could also become home.

Can you be at home in two places? Or even more places? Of course you can.

I have many homes. My house on North Main street in Ipswich is intimately familiar, though rather empty now. Ipswich is where I feel connected. First Church’s congregation has been our extended family for years. Already the Harvard graduate school campus feels comfortable.

And now this new church? When I first sat through the worship service, it felt just a little off-kilter and strange. As if I was trying to transpose my former surroundings — the place and feelings of worship among old friends — onto a new and different congregation. Perhaps I was. I * want * to feel comfortable and connected there. But as we all know, as I must remind myself, that comes with time and experience.

Then my friend reached over the pew, and held onto me while I acknowledged everything I’d lost. And everything I’m trying to reclaim. Suddenly, it began to feel more like a new home. Another circle of belonging.

Sep21

Autobiography … What Faith Do I Claim?

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One of the homework assignments in a few of my classes has been to write and present a Spiritual Autobiography. Hmmm. It feels self-absorbed and narcissistic, in many ways, to focus inwardly and then to talk about oneself in this context. To an audience of peers and professors.

Yet it’s an important question to pose for ourselves. We need to be familiar with this story. To know why we arrived at a Divinity School to study. And what we want as the outcome of this time in graduate school. What is our connection to the Sacred?

I think it’s a question that all people pose for themselves at one time or another. What does my faith mean to me? What do I believe? What makes meaning out of the world to me? What do I hold as Holy or Sacred or bigger than myself?

As students and facilitators, we discuss milestones. Events or people or experiences or texts that shaped our faiths. Or raised questions that we’re still trying to answer.

Many of us consider our personal views of the sacred or the divine. Identify the language and images we use around those ideas. For some of us, the language might be a Trinitarian Christian concept (God-Jesus-Holy Spirit). For others it might be monotheistic Allah or Yahweh. For others it is a Boddhisatva, or a Goddess, or a different deity.

For some folks, there isn’t a specific deity or name that defines what is sacred. Maybe there’s a “Creative Force.” Or for some of my classmates, connection with the Sacred is inseparable from being human.

Some of these ideas may sound like heresy, if you are uncomfortable with the reality that people around the world follow many different religions. If you believe, or your faith tells you to believe, that there is only “one true way.”

I don’t put the idea of “one true way” into quotations to belittle that concept … just to acknowledge that not all belief systems require that people follow their way of thinking, being and doing. Not all belief systems consign everyone else in the world to Hell if they don’t convert. I’ve never been comfortable or okay with the concept that my faith is the only faith, and that everyone else is outside the circle and isn’t going to be okay, isn’t going to heaven, isn’t going to evolve to the next phase of being … I cannot reconcile that. Never could. Still can’t. Maybe it’s not my job to work out that dichotomy. I’m just admitting that I don’t embrace it.

Interestingly, many people in this era consider themselves to be spiritual, but not religious. And it’s a fair distinction.

Religion, as such, is the human-made institution that grows up around the seeds of a faith. For example, Christ and his first followers, for instance, were Jews. They were not Christians. And initially, Muhammed and his people weren’t Muslims with a capital “M.”

These Prophets didn’t necessarily believe they came to start new religions. Simply to bring a message to the world.

What evolved afterward, the codifying, the creation of a structure of authority and governance, administration and policies and laws and practices … those aren’t the original parts of any faith. Those are Religion with a capital “R.” They are systems developed and put into place by humans around the original messages brought to us by Prophets. At least, that’s my simplistic definition of it, but I think it’s a reasonable one.

I’ve learned, in the past few weeks, that saying that there’s one version of any Religion is also naïve. Is there one acknowledge and universal experience of Christianity? Christians would chuckle if you ask that. There are so many variations on what Christianity means and how it is experienced, starting with the major division between Catholic and Protestant. And you can go on from there.

The same is true of Judaism and Islam. Do you belong, for instance, to a temple that is Orthodox or reformed? Is the Judaism of a temple in Brookline, Massachusetts similar to the Judaism on a kibbutz in Israel? Unlikely.

Some contemporary scholars say that is it more accurate to acknowledge many Islam(s) rather than one Islam. Because again, these Religions, though springing from the seed of one origin, have developed within varied social, historical, ethnic, political, economic, and geographical contexts. Islam practiced in the neighborhoods of Chicago is different than Islam experienced in London or living in a nation such as Turkey. It has markedly different interpretation and practices in Afghanistan or Iran than in parts of India or Indonesia.

Some people following a specific Religion (with a capital “R”) will say there is only one true version, and all other schools that fall under that same umbrella or label are false. Not the real thing. But which version of any Religion is real? True? The only authentic one?

Those sorts of schisms and arguments are probably another reason why so many people in the world don’t want to be called Religious. For a lot of folks, technicalities lose sight of the whole point of faith. It sounds something like this. “Who cares about the semantics? Can’t we just pay attention to the original message? Can’t we get back to the bigger reason for why we worship and pray?”

Spirituality, on the other hand, seems to be a more universal impulse in humans to seek a connection with something greater than oneself. Something that some of us would call Sacred. Maybe some others would call it Nature or the Universe.

More people consider themselves to be Spiritual than to be Religious. Many people don’t want to be categorized, labeled or aligned with a particular tradition. It’s feels like a bad word or way of imposing limitations, for a lot of people.

And in a way, although I realize I am fundamentally Trinitarian (Christian), I am also connected to other practices. Yoga traditions, which can embody Christian references as well as others. Aspects of Buddhism that I have been taught. Native American beliefs that I find in poetry, art and stories. Teachings handed down from Asian origins by mentors who instruct us about spiritual practices as well as physical ones in martial arts classes such as kickboxing or karate classes. Jewish and Islamic offerings that I share during special holidays with my community. Other influences.

I don’t discount or turn away from the beauty and truths that I find in other places, other faiths. I incorporate them. I learn from them. I listen to them. Maybe I learn their practices, when those may help to offer balance or healing in my life.

Yet I am also learning not to make the mistake that all these Religions or practices are, underneath it all, the same. That’s a dangerous mistake. These are different faiths. The people who claim them also experience and view the world through a somewhat different lens.We live in a pluralistic world; that’s okay. In fact, that’s complex and amazing.

Yet we can inform and inspire each other. We can live peaceably. Build community. Share a world together.