About two weeks ago we experienced the first taste of fall in the air, and over the weekend I noticed a tree was donning its colorful finery. Labor Day is but a week away, not the fall solstice, but for most of us, it signals the start of autumn, and in Michigan, the return of children to school. Yes, summer is on the wane, but not yet passed.
Flowers, blueberries, apples, pears, peaches, peppers, bi-color corn, watermelon, and musk melon are in abundance at the farmers’ market. The array of colors, shapes, smells, tastes, and textures drenches the senses. We’re awakened with blue skies full of sun and the promise of warm days that draw us to the lake.
I am reminded to soak up these days, to be present for what each offers, to remember the joy and freedom summer days brought me as a child. I’m going to give myself permission to be idle, so I can find recognizable shapes in the clouds and listen to the lap of water. I will let refreshment wash over me and strengthen me for what is to come.
For everything there is a season…
(Ecclesiastes 3:1)
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Have a blessed rest
It happened the first night Amy (Bob's youngest) visited us here in Holland. She hugged and kissed us goodnight and headed down the hall to bed, but then she stopped. She turned around and said to me, "You didn't tell me to have 'a blessed rest.' You always tell me to have 'a blessed rest' before I go to bed."
My "identical best friend" (a description given to us by her husband) from high school is the one who first said it to me. I really loved it. I felt especially covered by God's love. I began telling it to others who visited, including Amy, hoping that they would feel the peace that it gave me.
I had no idea that it had become a bedtime ritual between Amy and me, but upon hearing her lament, my heart was warmed. It was the sign of another family connection between us, step-mother and step-daughter. I hope the blessing is something she will share with others, and I hope she thinks of me each time in the same loving way I think of Barbara. Amen.
My "identical best friend" (a description given to us by her husband) from high school is the one who first said it to me. I really loved it. I felt especially covered by God's love. I began telling it to others who visited, including Amy, hoping that they would feel the peace that it gave me.
I had no idea that it had become a bedtime ritual between Amy and me, but upon hearing her lament, my heart was warmed. It was the sign of another family connection between us, step-mother and step-daughter. I hope the blessing is something she will share with others, and I hope she thinks of me each time in the same loving way I think of Barbara. Amen.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Thin places
Thin places. Not on my body, you may be thinking, and you would be right, except for my very narrow feet, too narrow for most shoes. No, not on my body but haphazardly throughout my life, I experience thin places, times in my life when I have eyes to see God’s hand. I never knew what to call these moments, coincidences, or miracles (minor or otherwise) until I, along with other Disciples’ women, stepped into the realm of the ordinary being extraordinary at the annual spiritual writing retreat the past two summers. And it was this newfound awareness that led me to read the memoir Thin Places by Mary E. DeMuth. Let me share a few paragraphs from the opening chapter with you:
I, myself, am a thin place.
The Celts define a thin place as a place where heaven and the physical world collide, one of
those serendipitous territories where eternity and the mundane meet. Thin describes the membrane
between the tow worlds, like a piece of vellum, where we see a holy glimpse of the eternal--
not in digital clarity, but clear enough to discern what lies beyond.
Thin places are snatches of holy ground, tucked into the corners of our world, where, if we
pay very close attention, we might just catch a glimpse of eternity. Legend has it that thin places
are places for pilgrims, where ghostlike echoes of those gone before can be felt and heard,
where the Ancients whisper their wisdom near the ruins of a church or the craggy outcropping of
a rock. In this way, a thin place is an ancient doorway to the fairy-tale netherworld--a fanciful
notion that children embrace and adults find preposterous.
Maybe it’s my own imagination that hopes for real thin places on this earth. I’m a storyteller,
after all, prone to wander in make-believe worlds. I’d like to believe in portals to eternity--Narnia
doors beckoning me onward and upward. Even so, I’m broadening the metaphor a bit. Thin
places are snatches of time, moments really, when we sense God intersecting our world in tangible,
unmistakable ways. They are aha moments, beautiful realizations, when the Son of God bursts
through the hazy fog of our monotony and shines on us afresh.
He has come near to my life. I will tell you how.
Mary shares her life with her readers. She tells of traumatic things that happened to her as a child that continue to impact her life today, and she also tells of the lovely things that she has experienced. In each case, she identifies the part that God played.
When I opened the book, I was intrigued immediately upon reading that first sentence above (actually the second paragraph), “I, myself, am a thin place.” I’d never thought of myself, my person and being, as a thin place, but I've started thinking about it. We know from the Word that we are aliens in this land. We are not of this world, yet, we live here as God’s children. As Christians, do we wander always at the intersection of the spiritual and physical worlds? Am I a thin place, and are you?
I, myself, am a thin place.
The Celts define a thin place as a place where heaven and the physical world collide, one of
those serendipitous territories where eternity and the mundane meet. Thin describes the membrane
between the tow worlds, like a piece of vellum, where we see a holy glimpse of the eternal--
not in digital clarity, but clear enough to discern what lies beyond.
Thin places are snatches of holy ground, tucked into the corners of our world, where, if we
pay very close attention, we might just catch a glimpse of eternity. Legend has it that thin places
are places for pilgrims, where ghostlike echoes of those gone before can be felt and heard,
where the Ancients whisper their wisdom near the ruins of a church or the craggy outcropping of
a rock. In this way, a thin place is an ancient doorway to the fairy-tale netherworld--a fanciful
notion that children embrace and adults find preposterous.
Maybe it’s my own imagination that hopes for real thin places on this earth. I’m a storyteller,
after all, prone to wander in make-believe worlds. I’d like to believe in portals to eternity--Narnia
doors beckoning me onward and upward. Even so, I’m broadening the metaphor a bit. Thin
places are snatches of time, moments really, when we sense God intersecting our world in tangible,
unmistakable ways. They are aha moments, beautiful realizations, when the Son of God bursts
through the hazy fog of our monotony and shines on us afresh.
He has come near to my life. I will tell you how.
Mary shares her life with her readers. She tells of traumatic things that happened to her as a child that continue to impact her life today, and she also tells of the lovely things that she has experienced. In each case, she identifies the part that God played.
When I opened the book, I was intrigued immediately upon reading that first sentence above (actually the second paragraph), “I, myself, am a thin place.” I’d never thought of myself, my person and being, as a thin place, but I've started thinking about it. We know from the Word that we are aliens in this land. We are not of this world, yet, we live here as God’s children. As Christians, do we wander always at the intersection of the spiritual and physical worlds? Am I a thin place, and are you?
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Am I a writer?
Read and write. According to Ernest Hemingway and Stephen King, that’s what it takes to be a writer. I think it’s fair to add that a writer needs to have the gift or calling, the honed skill, and the passion too. Me, am I a writer? Do I have what it takes?
Of all of the above requirements, I can say that I am widely read. I have devoured books as quickly as potato chips from the time I was able to read on my own. Daily I eagerly awaited the mail hoping for a delivery from one of the book clubs my parents had let me join. When a new book arrived I quickly unleashed it from its packing and sat down in Daddy’s roomy black chair to begin a new adventure. Immediately I entered into the story whether it be a biography, classic, or the recounting of a famous event. As 5:00 p.m. neared my mother would tell me to set the table for dinner and I would call out that I’d get to it after I finished the chapter. Then the end of that chapter would leave me hanging, and I would start the next one and so on until my mother’s voice became harried or angry, her patience tried. Most of these books were recently rediscovered when I cleaned out the attic at my parents’ house upon their passing. They reside on my bookshelves, reminding me of the happiest of childhood times.
I also enjoyed other sources of reading material from “Highlights” to Scholastic books. And then there were visits to the city’s public library, The Burnham Anthenaeum, a big solid-looking building on Church Street, just across from the park. My eyes never strayed to the side of the street with the swings and climbing apparatus, no, my focus was entirely on my favorite destination. Once inside, I would stand in awe, admiring the pillars, marble, and huge staircase, and then I’d breathe in the familiar scent of the wooden bookcases and moldings. There, to the left and on the bottom shelf, was the Laura Ingalls Wilder series of “Little House” books. I read them all. I plowed through other series too, the Bobbsey Twins, okay but not a favorite, and Nancy Drew. Our sixth grade classroom library was composed solely of the Hardy Boys books, so I even read those.
During my high school years I was exposed to wonderful literature from around the world, and once I finished college and had time to read what I wished, I revisited many of those authors from Tolstoy and Dostoevsky to Vonnegut. During the summers of my teaching years, I often read two books a day, all “beach reading” from the local library.
My focus is different now having reached that point in my life where I realize that there is so little time and so many books. Consequently, my reading has become increasingly selective. Currently I am making my way through memoirs and literature suggested by writers as well as “how to” books on writing. I don’t know if I am preparing myself to write or merely testing myself. Do I have a gift for writing?
I don’t know. Much of my writing has been formal and work related--grants, long reports, instruction manuals, and articles for journals. More recently I wrote editorial columns for a small local newspaper and had some memoir pieces published as a result of the spiritual writing retreats I’ve attended. Now I have this blog that is supposed to provide me with an opportunity to write and the discipline to make timely entries. I have failed on the second. But it is the encouragement of others I have received for many years that spurs me on, and I find myself at 60 with this new purpose. Skills can be learned, but now is the time to discern my gift and my passion. Not for the faint-hearted.
Of all of the above requirements, I can say that I am widely read. I have devoured books as quickly as potato chips from the time I was able to read on my own. Daily I eagerly awaited the mail hoping for a delivery from one of the book clubs my parents had let me join. When a new book arrived I quickly unleashed it from its packing and sat down in Daddy’s roomy black chair to begin a new adventure. Immediately I entered into the story whether it be a biography, classic, or the recounting of a famous event. As 5:00 p.m. neared my mother would tell me to set the table for dinner and I would call out that I’d get to it after I finished the chapter. Then the end of that chapter would leave me hanging, and I would start the next one and so on until my mother’s voice became harried or angry, her patience tried. Most of these books were recently rediscovered when I cleaned out the attic at my parents’ house upon their passing. They reside on my bookshelves, reminding me of the happiest of childhood times.
I also enjoyed other sources of reading material from “Highlights” to Scholastic books. And then there were visits to the city’s public library, The Burnham Anthenaeum, a big solid-looking building on Church Street, just across from the park. My eyes never strayed to the side of the street with the swings and climbing apparatus, no, my focus was entirely on my favorite destination. Once inside, I would stand in awe, admiring the pillars, marble, and huge staircase, and then I’d breathe in the familiar scent of the wooden bookcases and moldings. There, to the left and on the bottom shelf, was the Laura Ingalls Wilder series of “Little House” books. I read them all. I plowed through other series too, the Bobbsey Twins, okay but not a favorite, and Nancy Drew. Our sixth grade classroom library was composed solely of the Hardy Boys books, so I even read those.
During my high school years I was exposed to wonderful literature from around the world, and once I finished college and had time to read what I wished, I revisited many of those authors from Tolstoy and Dostoevsky to Vonnegut. During the summers of my teaching years, I often read two books a day, all “beach reading” from the local library.
My focus is different now having reached that point in my life where I realize that there is so little time and so many books. Consequently, my reading has become increasingly selective. Currently I am making my way through memoirs and literature suggested by writers as well as “how to” books on writing. I don’t know if I am preparing myself to write or merely testing myself. Do I have a gift for writing?
I don’t know. Much of my writing has been formal and work related--grants, long reports, instruction manuals, and articles for journals. More recently I wrote editorial columns for a small local newspaper and had some memoir pieces published as a result of the spiritual writing retreats I’ve attended. Now I have this blog that is supposed to provide me with an opportunity to write and the discipline to make timely entries. I have failed on the second. But it is the encouragement of others I have received for many years that spurs me on, and I find myself at 60 with this new purpose. Skills can be learned, but now is the time to discern my gift and my passion. Not for the faint-hearted.
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