Quiet, still, towering oaks and poplars
stand guard above us, sheltering,
Or among us: small delicate Japanese maples,
friendly dogwoods, cheerful crepe myrtles.
Great trees of the South.
Fragrant pines and magnolias, evergreen and lively;
Blooming tulip trees, flowering redbuds –
Heralds of spring dressed in brightest array.
A tree fell once on my house.
Hurricane Ivan roared in from the Gulf
And ripped the 100 foot white oak
From its shallow bedrock footing.
Its massive stump still scars my yard,
Reminding me of its loss
While its limbs, fallen and broken,
Have warmed my hearth for two winters now.
As a child, I climbed trees,
Built forts beneath them.
They were friends, protectors,
Strong, sturdy, available players
In my make-believe adventures.
Trees wear their scars with grace,
Without shame.
They stand their ground until downed
By disease, or acts of God, or our ingratitude.
Trees stay though cars and people and animals
Move around them, coming and going.
Trees are connected to life, to the soil, to the air.
Their roots reach for water and for an anchor beneath.
Their branches reach for the sunlight
And spread their leaves heavenward.
Oak and maple, poplar and pine.
Dogwood, redbud, magnolia, and elm.
Great trees of the South.
I watch as you awaken to spring
And I welcome you,
Great friends.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Contemplating Simplicity: "dolce far niente"
Near the end of her book Bella Tuscany, Frances Mayes and her husband Ed wonder what they would most like to take back with them from Italy to a new house in San Francisco where they work (pages 268-270):
We ask each other what we could have done differently. And what can we take back to our lives in the new house? What accounts for the dramatic shift in our minds and bodies when we live here? And, in California, aren’t we frequently out of control?
… “Taking buckets of time back is the main thing.” [Ed observes]
“If only we could take back the siesta –free hours in the middle of the day.”
“Wouldn’t you like to call one friend and say, ‘How are you?’ and not hear the answer, ‘I’m so busy’?”
“Well, ‘I’m busy’ means several things—partly it means ‘I’m important.’ But maybe living life is so important that we shouldn’t be busy. At least not busy, busy, with that buzz-buzz sound.”
Ed tells his students to figure out how many weekends they have left, given the good fortune of normal life expectancy. Even to the young it’s a shock to see that there are only 2800 more. That’s it. Done for. Carpe diem, si’, si’, grab the days.
This reminds me of the counsel in Psalm 90:12: “So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts to wisdom.”
Hmmm…if I live another 40+ years (average life expectancy for a female in the U.S. is 87), that means I’ve got roughly 2100 left. Less than 500 of those will be with children at home.
Counting your days may also bring about an urgency that promotes busyness. A pressure to choose quantity of accomplishment over quality of living.
What is the measure of “quality living”? How can we know when we are merely enjoying life for our own self interests, at the expense of others’ needs? And when we are simplifying in order to improve the quality of our relationships?
That one line haunts me: “But maybe living life is so important that we shouldn’t be busy.” What are your thoughts on this?
One more thought/challenge: when was the last time that you experienced la dolce far niente – the sweetness of doing nothing?
We ask each other what we could have done differently. And what can we take back to our lives in the new house? What accounts for the dramatic shift in our minds and bodies when we live here? And, in California, aren’t we frequently out of control?
… “Taking buckets of time back is the main thing.” [Ed observes]
“If only we could take back the siesta –free hours in the middle of the day.”
“Wouldn’t you like to call one friend and say, ‘How are you?’ and not hear the answer, ‘I’m so busy’?”
“Well, ‘I’m busy’ means several things—partly it means ‘I’m important.’ But maybe living life is so important that we shouldn’t be busy. At least not busy, busy, with that buzz-buzz sound.”
Ed tells his students to figure out how many weekends they have left, given the good fortune of normal life expectancy. Even to the young it’s a shock to see that there are only 2800 more. That’s it. Done for. Carpe diem, si’, si’, grab the days.
This reminds me of the counsel in Psalm 90:12: “So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts to wisdom.”
Hmmm…if I live another 40+ years (average life expectancy for a female in the U.S. is 87), that means I’ve got roughly 2100 left. Less than 500 of those will be with children at home.
Counting your days may also bring about an urgency that promotes busyness. A pressure to choose quantity of accomplishment over quality of living.
What is the measure of “quality living”? How can we know when we are merely enjoying life for our own self interests, at the expense of others’ needs? And when we are simplifying in order to improve the quality of our relationships?
That one line haunts me: “But maybe living life is so important that we shouldn’t be busy.” What are your thoughts on this?
One more thought/challenge: when was the last time that you experienced la dolce far niente – the sweetness of doing nothing?
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Grace to Be and Room to Become
The thought for today is from Eldredge’s book Captivating: "Real beauty offers others the grace to be and the room to grow."
To me, that best expresses the beauty and grace that Jesus brought to the many he encountered on earth, especially to the sinful: Zacchaeus, the woman at the well, the woman caught in adultery.
And how rare to experience that kind of beauty in a person. The grace to be (acceptance and love for who I am right now, no matter what) and the room to grow (the freedom to be who God designed me to be and not what others want me to be or think I should be, to meet their needs or their expectations). The saying “Please be patient with me. God isn’t finished with me yet” is a longing for that kind of beauty.
Real inner beauty offers others life and rest and hope. That is what Jesus brought to each sinner at the end of his or her destructive path: beauty for ashes, hope for despair, life instead of death.
I have also been pondering what my part in my journey is this past year. With my dog Jazzy (read Sept. 24'06 and Oct. 1'06 blog),I observed how she likes to take the lead, instead of following mine, whenever I try to take her on a walk with me. Her persistence to lead robs us of a pleasant experience together. And yet, I am so like Jazzy when it comes to walking with God. I desire to walk with Him. Follow Him. But I become impatient and lurch ahead---thinking that I have to contribute somehow to the journey process.
This week as I asked God the question (again), what is MY part in all of this? Out of the silence, He answered, “None of it...except to love me—be in love with me. And love others in that way too.”
My head still wrestles with this answer, but not my heart. My heart knows this is the true answer to the question I have been asking.
To me, that best expresses the beauty and grace that Jesus brought to the many he encountered on earth, especially to the sinful: Zacchaeus, the woman at the well, the woman caught in adultery.
And how rare to experience that kind of beauty in a person. The grace to be (acceptance and love for who I am right now, no matter what) and the room to grow (the freedom to be who God designed me to be and not what others want me to be or think I should be, to meet their needs or their expectations). The saying “Please be patient with me. God isn’t finished with me yet” is a longing for that kind of beauty.
Real inner beauty offers others life and rest and hope. That is what Jesus brought to each sinner at the end of his or her destructive path: beauty for ashes, hope for despair, life instead of death.
I have also been pondering what my part in my journey is this past year. With my dog Jazzy (read Sept. 24'06 and Oct. 1'06 blog),I observed how she likes to take the lead, instead of following mine, whenever I try to take her on a walk with me. Her persistence to lead robs us of a pleasant experience together. And yet, I am so like Jazzy when it comes to walking with God. I desire to walk with Him. Follow Him. But I become impatient and lurch ahead---thinking that I have to contribute somehow to the journey process.
This week as I asked God the question (again), what is MY part in all of this? Out of the silence, He answered, “None of it...except to love me—be in love with me. And love others in that way too.”
My head still wrestles with this answer, but not my heart. My heart knows this is the true answer to the question I have been asking.
Monday, March 05, 2007
A Blog Year in Review
This month marks the one year anniversary of my blog so I went back and read my entries from March 2006: the inaugural issue, the questions that launched the journey, the topics that began a digital conversation – even if just within myself and then recorded for others to read.
These are my reflections...
The social networks Facebook and MySpace (March 16 ’06 entry) continue to trouble and fascinate me. Although I have figured out a way to view my child’s pages, it continues to bother me that there is not an automatic parental monitoring feature. Teens can write or post anything, and it is up to them to police it.
My Bible reading (March 20 ’06) is not as systematic as it was a year ago when every hour of my day had to be scheduled to meet the dueling demands of motherhood, marriage, and full-time graduate thesis work. What I have tried to pursue instead is practicing the presence of God throughout my day-breathing Him in and out, as it were-instead of compartmentalizing my devotional time into a fixed time frame.
While I have often enjoyed a sustained sense of spiritual intimacy with God, my intercession for others became sporadic and I fell behind in my reading schedule. This is indeed part of my journey as I desire to live spiritually with and without routined spiritual disciplines to measure or gauge the quality of my spiritual devotion.
What I am contemplating now is a revised reading schedule to maintain consistency within a fluctuating schedule. And an intercession agenda, internally motivated and structured, that will assist my mind to execute what my heart desires: passionate prayer for the people I love.
There are missionaries that I do not want to forget to pray for. There are friends that I want to routinely bring supplication for. And I want to remember to pray diligently on the good days, instead of just fervently on the challenging days.
God has often prompted me to pray for loved ones and specific situations (often in the middle of the night), but I feel He is leading me to be more available to His prompting by planning quiet times to hear His voice.
Scheduling silence will not be easy.
These are my reflections...
The social networks Facebook and MySpace (March 16 ’06 entry) continue to trouble and fascinate me. Although I have figured out a way to view my child’s pages, it continues to bother me that there is not an automatic parental monitoring feature. Teens can write or post anything, and it is up to them to police it.
My Bible reading (March 20 ’06) is not as systematic as it was a year ago when every hour of my day had to be scheduled to meet the dueling demands of motherhood, marriage, and full-time graduate thesis work. What I have tried to pursue instead is practicing the presence of God throughout my day-breathing Him in and out, as it were-instead of compartmentalizing my devotional time into a fixed time frame.
While I have often enjoyed a sustained sense of spiritual intimacy with God, my intercession for others became sporadic and I fell behind in my reading schedule. This is indeed part of my journey as I desire to live spiritually with and without routined spiritual disciplines to measure or gauge the quality of my spiritual devotion.
What I am contemplating now is a revised reading schedule to maintain consistency within a fluctuating schedule. And an intercession agenda, internally motivated and structured, that will assist my mind to execute what my heart desires: passionate prayer for the people I love.
There are missionaries that I do not want to forget to pray for. There are friends that I want to routinely bring supplication for. And I want to remember to pray diligently on the good days, instead of just fervently on the challenging days.
God has often prompted me to pray for loved ones and specific situations (often in the middle of the night), but I feel He is leading me to be more available to His prompting by planning quiet times to hear His voice.
Scheduling silence will not be easy.
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