Boots and Blessings

And the day came when finally They put down their burdens And said, “That’s enough of that.”   The moment was full of sorrow but also relief Arms exhausted from carrying the burden Of trying to entice, persuade, people to be more   Compassionate, wise They continued their own work Of building a world more just But were freer, lighter The responsibility for others’ thoughts Was gone. They taught through their actions For anyone willing to read their lives You can see them now At work in the daytime Singing and laughing in the evenings Ask for their views And they’ll give a mysterious smile You can join them, you know But you cannot fight them For they just continue on their way Doing the work that is theirs to do They do not seek your agreement, your approbation When they encounter an obstacle They find a way over it I have never seen people who worked so hard Look so at peace.

  Last night, I came home after an intense couple of days. Spoiler: I’m fine, my mom’s fine, no need to read further unless you want to share in some processing about aging and life in general. I have been given an amazing gift that I never take for granted. My mom is 90, healthy “for her age,” sharp, and at the moment, living independently in her own home. A few years ago, she and my father moved from a state away to be 15 minutes from my house. My siblings supported the move, which I’m grateful for. I am 16 and 12 years younger than each of them and have always been a bit jealous that in the end, they would have had that many more years with our parents than I. So I figure I’m getting more “quality of time” now. The pandemic made things a bit harder, of course. All efforts were on keeping Madame safe, so no one went in her house, and she didn’t come into ours. I met her for our thrice-weekly walks on her sidewalk, and we’d visit in her backyard. My sister, who lives about an hou...

The next 5 months are probably going to be kinda weird. Uncertainty and anxiety flying all over the place. Duck! And then after that ... it's also going to be kinda weird, but a different kind of weird, as we move into the After Times, and figure out what exactly they're going to be like, and what exactly WE are going to be like.  It is in times like these, that I like to turn to art to help make sense of it all.  I refer, of course, to the art known as the television series Doctor Who. I mean, if we know things are going to be weird, we probably should look at some art that deals with the weird, right? Now's the time to examine Hieronymous Bosch and Marc Chagall. And Doctor Who, that time-traveling, face-shifting hero.  Part of the Doctor Who story (and why it's been able to keep going so long) is that rather than die, the Doctor regenerates, retaining who they are, but with a different face, body, and to a certain extent, a different personality.  Immediately afte...

For the next five months, we will be in a liminal space to beat all liminal spaces. We are between the large spaces of the Before Times and the Post-Pandemic Times, and we are also between the small spaces of the Pandemic Time and the Recovery Time.  We are not yet in the recovery time. The recovery time will (I hope) look similar to the Before Times, in that we will be able to go to church, children will go to school, etc. In Recovery Time, things will look "normal," but they won't yet feel normal. It will take time. It will require meaningful ritual and spiritual practices, to help us to make sense of all that we've experienced and to chart a new course.  The next five months are the in-between. They are transition time.  Transition is ... well, uncomfortable is the word often used, but really, we need a better word. Something that encompasses discomfort, irritability, our brains not really working well. I would like to go to a metaphor that everyone has experienc...

As humans, we have evolved to be wary of change. In a church, you see this all the time. I like to jokingly remind our leaders that if we change brands of toilet paper, someone is liable to leave the church over it.  Welp, this year our theme could be the line from one of our hymns: Don't be afraid of some change. Because whether you were afraid or not, change was here. Time to learn Zoom. And Youtube Premiere. And in non-church life, curbside pickup for everything from dinner to craft supplies.  We changed. We didn't have a choice in the matter. Trust me, if we'd had an actual choice, if the alternative was not literally potential death, we would have held lots of committee meetings, weighed the pros and cons, and decided nope, we were not going to change.  But we did. And now, slowly I hope, because it's the right and healthy and covenantal thing to do ... we will change again. We'll come back to church. Go back to eating dinner inside a restaurant where people ...

  We are hopeful that the end of the pandemic and a return to some of the things we've missed is on the horizon, even if it's a few months away. But we may feel confused at our own feelings of not being happy , or being anxious at the thought of things getting "back to normal."  And then there's the feeling of camaraderie, of sharing an experience with many people.  Going through something difficult together - even if we are in separate houses while doing so - is often a bonding experience. For those of us who have chosen to take the pandemic seriously, even if our individual circumstances have been different, we have still had similar challenges. It has been reassuring, as a parent, to hear that other families have had some of the same frustrations, like when blogger/author Jen Hatmaker shared on Instagram , "I just cannot look at the grades. I can't do it. I can't look at the missing assignments or those that scored under 70%..." Solidarity, S...