we venture out of the mind-boggling absorption of what’s really happening out there every now and then. and sit in the sun. or browse plants and flowers at the nursery. or take to the trail. or pet the dogga.
because we all need a break from it at some point, this devastation that wracks our hearts…just a few tiny moments away from thinking about it.
the rest of life is going on. people are working and sleeping, having babies and leaving this earth, healing and fighting disease with all their might, doing real life. right smack in the middle of horrific – – real life.
and sometimes that is enough.
really.
enough.
the rest of all of it is just too much.
“…well, everybody’s heart needs a holiday some time…”
it is hard for me to avoid. i simply cannot help it. or maybe i just can’t resist the impulse.
we play rummikub every monday and thursday with 20 after we share dinner together. and – every single time – something one of them – d or 20 – says, makes me break into song.
we were talking about the obvious – you know – the state of our country. it was in an unusual fit of optimism. it was right after we talked about bernie sanders and aoc and the pushback of intellectually woke people against authoritarianism etc etc etc (i know you hear that line now – from the king and i – uh-huh, uh-huh – etc etc etc).
it had been a week since we had seen 20 (which is also unusual) and much had happened – on both sides – so there was a lot to talk about.
in that week we had found a different trail. it wound its way through a rural landscape and we enjoyed its newness. and then there was this tree. one sturdy old gnarly oak in the forefront of a blank field. stunning. perhaps a hundred years old. perhaps more. its silhouette against the sky so intense, strikingly gnarly in a good way.
we have such an appreciation for these lands of space through which we hike. we have hiked out east, down south, out west, up north. we’ve hiked in county parks, state parks, national parks. we dream of thru-hiking one day on one of the national trails. we hold these places in high regard, grateful for the glorious beauty, the potential for peacefulness, the celebration of the wild.
and so our conversation of late and of that night – of course – is also about the threat to these places (in addition to all the other gnarly-extremely-twisted corrupt threats of the administration too long to list or even grok in any conscience-based way.) we talked about our new forest preserve hike and we talked about national parks. and it feels sickening inside to think of the decimation of any of this. and all for the wealth of the wealthiest.
in the middle of our rummikub game – me…stuck with gnarly chips – a double of black 13s and a double of 1s and the grasp of the plastic trophy seeming bleak – and in the middle of the accompanying punctuations of news-chaos-of-the-day conversation – it suddenly came to mind, rose to the top.
the song ooh child was written about times of strife.
i started singing.
and hoping.
that some day we – this broken country – will put it together and get it undone. and then we’ll walk in the rays of a beautiful sun – when the world is much brighter.
they rolled their eyes, poking fun at the records spinning in my brain. and, for a few minutes, we all laughed.
“the sun is coming out,” i told him. “i can hear it on the siding.”
it will be the littlest things, i believe. the smallest details, the tiniest noticings that will help us personally get through this. much of what seems to be planned for the populace will affect us. according to project 2025 – aka this ugliest administration’s agenda – we are those people. we are the masses.
with no idea how low this will go – though we suspect “hellish” may not suffice as an adjective – we will need to zero in on that which might bring a moment of light, a bit of joy, a sliver of hope.
and it’s only been 43 days, 1 hour, 43 minutes and 23 seconds since the inauguration (as i write this.). by the time this publishes it will be 45 days, 18 hours.
if we can assume that there will be another inauguration – and that seems a large assumption considering how far down the authoritarian hellhole we are being flung – it will be in 1417 days, 22 hours, 14 minutes and 8 seconds (as i write this), 1415 days, 18 hours by the time this publishes.
that’s a very long time. and a lot of hell between here and there.
i am holding a lot of stress in my body right now. merely blowing my hair dry this morning yielded a strained back intercostal muscle, making it hard to breathe. each day there is something that makes it intensely clear that i am not relaxed, the least of which is waking up achy every morning – even after a full night’s sleep. i trust i am not alone in this. we are all enduring serious worry and anxiety, raging anger, intense grief, raw fear. there is no real way for our minds or hearts or bodies to escape it.
but we try.
and in looking for the most meditative time, in looking for joy, in holding onto laughter and playfulness best as we can, in paying attention to the beauty right around us, we will seek out anything and everything that might help, any sign of comfort, any inkling of something positive.
so when i could hear the siding creaking – a sure sign that the sun was coming out from behind the clouds, it seemed apt to mention it.
many other adjectives came to mind to eloquently describe lake tahoe, but dreamy seems to fit the best right now.
in the way that sometimes happens with monumental beauty, i instantly felt a sense of peace descend over me…exactly what i needed.
for this has been a time. and i – like you – am filled to the brim, yearning for something different, something that builds up and does not tear down, something that is positive, filled with grace and not negative and filled with hatred. already, this is all exhausting. already, i am exhausted. we – all of us – have lost so much. and, though hopefully this will change – something will stop this destruction of our sea to shining sea – things will never be the same. betrayal has left its mark on us.
and so, the sight of this lake in the distance, as we approached, up close and personal, was balm for my spirit and i felt it wash over me.
some places are like that. you instantly feel a kinship with the vista, grounded by its simple, natural beauty. after all, this is merely mountains, forest and lake. nothing manufactured, nothing contrived, quietude with the potential for a tranquility that is so very powerful.
we do not live near this stunning landscape, but we do live in a landscape of our own. and i know that we must look to it for salve, for soothing us, for a balance of goodness against all the evil being perpetrated upon our country. clearly, we need to deal with the reality of what is happening here. clearly, we need to rejuvenate from the reality of what is happening here.
i think we need do that any which way we can.
there is a lot ahead of us. everything we have known is grotesquely distorted and people we have known have actively participated in that. it is the stuff of bad dreams. and we each are waking up to the horror of it all. as we brush the real-life nightmare from our eyes and wake to another day of fighting to keep our democracy, it is incumbent upon us to bring strength and resolve and a bit of peace from which we might draw these.
we will be looking everywhere we can for that peace, to join with it. it is an imperative.
“now he walks in quiet solitude the forests and the streams / seeking grace in every step he takes / his sight has turned inside himself to try and understand / the serenity of a clear blue mountain lake…” (john denver – rocky mountain high)
the galvanized metal coneflower tucked into the little garden with the ornamental grasses has rusted. we brought it home in july when it was silver and shiny. but the elements of weather have already gotten to it and have erased the shiny and smooth, turning it to a rougher texture, a warm brown color, like the center of a sunflower or the color of freshly ground coffee.
i still love it though, this coneflower.
its shape has been inspiring out back there in its little garden – the same garden that protects baby bunnies and tucks in our aspen tree. in the snow it has collected flakes until barely any of the metal is visible – like a tall snow-mushroom umbrella-ing anything below.
i stop in front of the mirror before i facetime or zoom. i wonder how i am seen from the other side of the camera. i am no longer shiny or silver. the elements have taken their toll and age has begun to catch up.
but as i gaze at other beloved faces across the technology of a phone or computer, across a table or on a trail, next to me on the pillow – i know that nothing – no amount of rust or erasure of smooth – can change the fact that they are still coneflowers, nonetheless. still beautiful. still loved.
i’m not sure that i can point to the moment when i realized – with every fibre – that the truly holiest moments were not the ones in buildings called churches.
it is a moment for which i am grateful, perspective-arranging and a welcome addition to my secular vocabulary – the word “holy”.
i spent many decades creating the atmosphere in churches where people might tune in to the emotional of faith – that which they could not palpably touch but which they could feel, they could intuit, they could impart to others. through music that i specifically chose – after research, after studying the narrative to be used, and after much listening and evaluating if a piece might touch hearts – open or closed – i shaped the music of services – the everyday and the special holidays, the celebrations of joining together and the inevitable release of people to the next dimension – to freely acknowledge spirit as it flowed and to try to gently grace others with it through music. to try and encourage an openness to the spirit that breathed into the place and maybe into them, into a place inside them where they needed the sweet assurance. whether i was aware if it did or not was not my only measure of success. providing the tenor of possibility and holding space for holy and their experience of holy was my job. there were moments when the last strains of a song or piece of music lingered in the air over the congregation, moments when a choir of singers, paused in a rest between notes sung with dedication and commitment to each other that you could almost see holy in the hush – the sun shining through, its rays touching each person. but over the course of these decades of time spent in these buildings, i was inordinately disappointed – even stunningly – time and again – by the hypocrisy to which i was privy. true faith is as true faith does, holy is as holy does, i was reminded, over and over. disillusionment was – and still is – a repeating theme.
out on the trail, as the clouded sun shined through the winter landscape and reflected onto the river, i could see – once again – how holy turns up in the purest of moments, the simplest, the least contrived. we have been gifted by the universe – and whatever deity we each individually feel or – perhaps – in which we might believe – with the extraordinary: a world full of beautiful.
beautiful is a descriptive word – easily understood as describing something of beauty. and that is all around us. the reaching of people to people in times of abundance and in times of need, kindness to and embracing of our neighbors despite differences, the love between any and all, regardless of anything, nature and its astonishments. our holy is all around us.
for those of you who are invoking your – supposed – religiosity to validate your vote – and your support – for the cruelest chaos that is this new administration, those of you who are spouting righteous religious drivel to prop up your bigotry, i would venture to say you may have missed the point. sheer hypocrisy has taken over your holy.
holy has not only left the building, but it has clearly left your soul.
“our forever work is to learn to hold the brutal and beautiful in the same palm.” (suleika jaouad)
i am trying to learn to list to the beautiful. lean into it. curve that way. take that path. abruptly turn, if need be.
in these fraught times, these times of brutal, we are finding how we wake – how we start our day – is crucial. we are fragile, maybe just like you.
and so we watch through the mini blinds, through the screen and storm window, as – out across the deck, reflecting on the sunroom windows, just past the awning over the back door – the sun – rising over the lake – climbs to a place where its rays sneak around houses and gardens and reach out and out, brushing our windows.
and we can see it.
we watch as it intensifies and moves up, up. a tiny gift for us to hold.
and then – as we sip coffee – one of us quietly comments on how truly beautiful it is. and our day is officially started.
even laden with new snow, the grasses spring up, ever resilient. they show fortitude in predicament and circumstance – a teachable moment for those of us humans who are not impervious to such things.
maybe it’s their golden glow in sun low on the horizon. maybe it’s that there are small critters taking refuge under the umbrella of stalky stems. maybe it’s the reverent bow of the fronds, the balance in the arch of growth and weight, a toppling over. maybe it is simply grace.
“i do not at all understand the mystery of grace – only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us.” (anne lamott)
in moments of this past year i have found myself in the presence of grace. i have watched grace heal physical injuries. i have watched grace blanket people, restoring relationship. i have experienced grace reaching out its arms to envelop. i have received grace – the support of others. i have been surprised – even shocked – by grace and i have been surprised – even shocked – by a lack of grace.
for if the presence of grace – such an intangible mystery – does not leave us unchanged, then so does the absence of grace.
were the grasses to succumb, to be lying down, flat upon the earth, their glow of beauty and their cozy shelter wouldn’t be. their place in the world and its workings would be different, perhaps. their resilience seems to be the key.
“I know nothing, except what everyone knows – if there when grace dances, i should dance.” (anne lamott)
in the mystery that is beauty, that is grace, that is the intertwining of both – for surely they are hand in hand – there is an invitation for us to dance, upright upon a floor of dirt on earth under the sun, able to both receive and extend grace – like feathery fronds on an ornamental grass, ever resilient though the elements are threatening.
we carry that dance – tucked in – with us as we make our way. it is present, beckoning us. we can see it in the falling snow and the driving rain, thick fog and dark nights. it is there, ready to leave us different.
my sweet poppo and i would go out to get a “real” tree every year – sometimes as late as just a couple days before christmas. together we would pick out the one that seemed the most right. they’d wrap it in netting and he’d strap it to the top of the car with rope. decorating it meant also watching him meticulously place each strand of tinsel – individually – on the tree. because we placed the shinybrites on together after he first wrapped the tree with lights, it seemed like we needed to be a part of the tinseling too.
now, tinsel – real tinsel (and, well, even the newfangled plasticized tinsel) requires a special skill set of patience. one piece at a time, stepping back, looking at the balance of tinsel, placing another, repeat. but, when my dad wasn’t looking – thinking many of you might admit to this as well – i would back up with several strands in my hand and launch them high into the air so that they would fall on the tree, scattered and perfectly placed. eh. not so much. they would land in clumps, impossible to disguise as meticulously-placed.
tinseling was not my forte. and, once christmas trees were my own, they ceased to have tinsel.
but tinsel has always had a warm place in my heart and always-always makes me think of my sweet dad. i didn’t realize it back then but later it became obvious that placing each of these strands – one by one – was both a generosity of his for others – to lift them into festive – and perhaps a way for him to immerse into the heart of the holiday as well, to arrive. when it was time to take down the tree back then, my dad would – again – ever so slowly and carefully – remove each piece of tinsel, protecting and preserving as much as possible to be used again the next year.
and so i have a bit of tinsel in the box of decorations – just to simply look at it brings my dad here.
many years ago i added this tinsel tree to my tiny-tree collection. each year, i place it where it is seen and this year, well, it got top billing placement, seen as soon as you walk in the front door.
the holiday itself has passed and the frenetic has somewhat slowed down. it’s time to look ahead – there is a new year arriving.
this new year will have many challenges…it’s already presenting itself that way. i am hoping to meet them with presence of mind and fortitude and meticulous patience – like my dad tinseling the christmas tree – slow and steady, one day at a time, one challenge at a time.
the shinybrites remained tucked away and silver and crystal ornaments took over this holiday. soon – in a week or two – these will also be packed away, ready for next year, save for a few to keep light in the living room even on the darkest winter days. the tiny trees will go into the bin, though i can see one or two staying on for a bit, also lingering to bring light into the darker months. i’ll place the tinseltree in the bin with the other decorations – happy to have had its company, happy that it places my dad in our living room.
and we’ll gear up and turn toward the new year. much as i’d like to avoid it, i know the only way to the other side is through.
and so it’s time to tinsel the new year – to find as much light as we can and to carefully place it around us so that it might be something others can see. to carry love and generosity past these holidays and into next, a reminder to participate in that which lifts others, to protect, to preserve, to be meticulous.
i’m thinking – in the way people hang signs or posters with messages or have daily calendars full of positivity – that i will place a piece or two of tinsel on the frame we have in our room. maybe that way – each morning when i wake and sip coffee under the quilt, david and dogga by my side – i will be reminded of light and reflection and every one of my dad’s silent tinsel lessons.
maybe tinsel – like sprinkles – will make me a better-equipped person in these fraught times than i would be without it.
the ornaments in the locked display cases were phenomenally expensive. it was a bit shocking. but we know many people collect things that are quite valuable and these definitely were perceived as that. the low end was just shy of $100 and the high end…well, rather high. we browsed them a bit, curious. i honestly cannot say that i wish we had purchased one or, for that matter, had even been able to purchase one. their ornateness did not appeal to me. too much. much too much. more is more is not us, especially when it comes to the baubles of the season.
i guess it echoes my sentiment – my heart – this simple-ing-down of it all. it is – for me – about the most basic things – this holiday season…regardless of religion. for me, this season of light – for which we have waited – reminds us that god (or whatever you call a greater deity) is with us. and i believe basic tenets are basic tenets, no matter what any book says – no matter if it’s written in red – no matter who said what – no matter the stories told. basic goodness – love, generosity, equality, kindness, grace – is basic and no scribed stuff should twist it into agenda.
in a time that celebrates peace on earth we are less than peaceful. in a time of gathering we are torn apart, divisive. in a time of generosity, there is greed beyond imagination. in a time of grace, there is marginalization. in a time of good will, there is monstrous evil. this is – most definitely – a world of hypocrisy. we need to seek light each and every day.
it’s not the fancy stuff that makes me stop, get lost, offer a prayer. it’s the dollar tree $1.25 tiny metal wire tree ornament hanging in our kitchen. it’s the little foot-tall fold-up $1 tree in the middle of our dining room table. it’s the crystal ornament catching the light in the living room. it’s the old pickle on the tree. it’s the galvanized star hanging on our branch.
there is more brokenness to come; there are more shattered dreams. this is a season where we need support each other, heal each other – best as we can.
love one another. the simplest of things. and the hardest of things. ours to do – to exist – as humankind.
reverse threading 