What am I doing new year's? Making coffee and making money. This is a blanket RSVP to all you party-planners. Better luck next year.
At the moment, though, I'm not working. I'm enjoying that feeling of I-slept-late-and-am-now-working-off-a-caffeine-and-carbohydrate-high. The day is mine to unlock. Possibilities are creeping in under the bedroom door. There's a lot to do, but I have both sleep and zucchini-walnut bread inside of me. Once I brush my teeth, there will be nothing I can't tackle.
It's a good feeling. Equivalent to an outdoors tarzan-jungle-yell.
Speaking of what to do today, I've been reading a tribute to Rev. Fred Rogers (of Mister Roger's Neighborhood), written by Amy Hollingsworth. It emphasizes the importance of basic activities such as reflection, prayer, and being kind. Seriously convicting. Equally inspiring. The fact that going off to be quiet and to talk with God about how I'm feeling is a "normal" thing to do comes as an earth-shattering revelation to me, the extrovert. The fact that it's a necessity makes me all defensive but totally resonates with my experiences.
Lately, it's been really difficult to be honest with other people about my feelings, but I'm trying to rise to that challenge. Not to be passively honest (which is easy: "if they ask, I'll try to tell the truth"), but actively so (which is difficult: "I want to stop and share with you how I'm feeling, even though we both have busy lives and it might be awkward"). Yeah. I'd much rather evade intimacy and skate along on the assumptions and impressions of others.
...hmm. That thought just led to a series of mini-epiphanies too personal to share. Time for me to go do some of that quiet stuff. Alone. Then maybe I'll brush my teeth.
Writing about social justice on grad school applications makes me want to listen to Citizen Cope. I'm currently jamming to "Bullet and a Target," off the Clarence Greenwood Recordings.
Hurrah for social workers everywhere.
a metal grass-rake rattles roughly
through the rotting, although
sometimes what it wants is a shovel.
barrow after barrow vomit mementos:
dolls, a rotting door, carnival masks,
bedsprings, not to mention the
spiders clutching, salamanders hoping
for a place to hide both dark and wet,
someplace they can count their sordid treasures
in peace. they will not find it here.
better that they go away among
the muck and shards of another life,
to that great compendium of refuse
in the sky. a shovel wouldn’t catch
on this level of detail so much,
would give us a little more breathing room,
unable as i am to disregard the pieces.
a shovel wouldn’t pull it piece-by-piece,
but lump-by-lump. these items
are not really items, after all, let’s say;
they are not to be treated as individuals
but as a class, just nameless waste;
they need a partitive and less discreet attention.
saying six or seven wastes is nonsense, you know,
there is only some or lots of,
non-specific amounts i can leave to the vermin.
the next time i am stuck without
line-item veto options, wading through this mess
to reclaim some neglected, dumped-on
corner of my life, i must remember
to bring my shovel.
We sang this one after communion at my PCA church this morning, set to the tune of the RUF version of "On Jordan's Stormy Banks." (I cried. Don't tell anybody.)
Arise, the kingdom is at hand,
The King is drawing nigh;
Arise, with joy, thou faithful band,
To meet the Lord Most High!
Look up, ye souls weighed down with care,
The Sovereign is not far;
Look up, faint hearts, from your despair,
Behold the Morning Star!
Refrain: Arise! Arise! The kingdom is at hand. (Repeat.)
Look up, ye drooping hearts today,
The King is very near;
O cast your grief and fears away,
For, lo, your help is here!
For this we raise a gladsome voice
On high to thee alone,
And evermore with thanks rejoice
Before thy glorious throne.
(Refrain)
...is my new favorite author. This spot in my life is always a time-bound position. To earn it, an author has to surprise me with real characters and an engaging plot while demonstrating mastery of writing. Pretty simple, eh? Is this too much to ask from our writers and our great publishing houses? Find some talent, you shmucks!
Sorry about that. I get a little bitter when I go too long without good fiction.
So, you might know Le Carré from The Constant Gardener: great film, better book. He's also written a slew of spy novels, including A Perfect Spy, which I just began. Maybe it's the emotional season or maybe it's low blood sugar, but by chapter three I'm seriously empathizing with both of the main characters. Tons of depth, tons of space for dramatic tensions.
If the words "spy novel" make you think of the stereotypical, pulp-fiction, give-me-some-hardnosed-dialogue-and-call-me-Tom-Clancy fare, please try this one out. I hope the author will forgive me for reproducing an excerpt or two below.
"Like many tyrants, Miss Dubber was small. She was also old and powdery and lopsided, with a crooked back that rumpled her dressing-gown and made everything round her seem lopsided, too." (pg. 2)
"In Vienna three hours earlier, Mary Pym, wife of Magnus, stood at her bedroom window and stared out upon a world which, in contrast to the one elected by her husband, was a marvel of serenity. She had neither closed the curtains nor switched on the light. She was dressed to receive, as her mother would have said, and she had been standing at the window in her blue twin-set for an hour, waiting for the car, waiting for the doorbell, waiting for the soft turn of her husband's key in the latch. And now in her mind it was an unfair race between Magnus and Jack Brotherhood which of them she would receive first...
"The telephone was ringing. By the bed. His side. Don't run, you idiot, you'll fall. Not too slowly or he'll ring off. Magnus, darling, oh dear God, let it be you, you've had an aberration and you're better, I'll never even ask what happened, I'll never doubt you again. She lifted the receiver and for some reason she couldn't work out sat in a heap on the duvet, plonk, grabbing the pad and pencil with her spare hand in case of phone numbers to take down, addresses, times, instructions. She didn't blurt 'Magnus?' because that would show she was worried about him. She didn't say 'Hullo' because she couldn't trust her voice not to sound excited. She said their whole number in German so that Magnus would know it was she, hear that she was normal and all right and not angry with him, and that everything was just fine to come back to. No fuss, no problems, I'm here and waiting for you like always.
"'It's me,' said a man's voice.
"But it wasn't me. It was Jack Brotherhood." (pp. 6-7)
there's always the danger
of life in this new place
happening other than you thought.
here, where your boxes arrived
intact and right on time,
here, far from marauders
and snowstorms and enemy tribes,
here, where you have a job
you love that pays good money,
here – even here – where
Jordan waters stood up in a heap
at the touch of one obedient foot,
there may yet be giants
in the land. (or even worse,
there may be none.)
folks you meet will want to hear
about your past, exciting life –
once.
whatever god you followed so far
will continue to direct you –
in theory.
the pain and sweat of your adventures
will only make stability taste sweeter –
sometimes.
other times, wondering and unsure,
you will go down to the stream
and sit among the trees
with your cell phone off.
listen to soft, arboreal promises.
watch the trout mime messages
in the shallows. whistle.
there may be only one spot like this:
one spot that looks just like
you thought it would look;
one spot that doesn't disappoint
whatever expectations you brought with you;
one spot that doesn't make you
look longingly at the open road
and want a wilderness.
the verdant fields of possibility
will always outstrip and outperform
the rough streets and urban sprawl of the actual,
because you are an optimist
when it comes to somewhere else
but a pessimist once you get there.
Tonight I attended an appreciation dinner catered – catered! – by a local Italian chain, in honor of the volunteers who decorated First Baptist for Christmas. It was neat to sit down with such a wide variety of people and think to myself about all the beeves I have with Baptists. For one thing, they're really firm on immersion and they won't baptize infants. (I remember when I was a child thinking that since they stubbornly refused to compromise on the first of those positions, the second followed on a more or less practical note.) They tend to love programs and get high marks on religiosity scales. Their churches are big. They dress up too much. They don't sing the historic hymns – traditional music, for them, means "The Old Rugged Cross."
But all that is more or less stereotype.
Some of those issues are important (whether or not baptism is a sacrament tends to fall in the important category), but some of them aren't. All of these points of contention (and others) have at some point kept me from fellowship with Baptist brothers and sisters, and have contributed to a sense of personal superiority. I, the Presbyterian, believe right things, eschew programs and poo-poo "modern developments" in the science of how to run a church, engage in culture and community like a good Kuyperian, attend small churches, and sing hymns with old German melodies... blah, blah, high horse, blah, blah, soapbox, blah, blah, blah. Yippee for me.
The thing that I'll take away from this evening was how welcoming these folks were – not just welcoming outsiders into their group, but welcoming people into their experience of (and passion for) God's kingdom. The main volunteer coordinator gave a short speech about how maybe people would see the lights and decorations and think that our church was warm and welcoming, how our efforts might make it easier for someone to come inside and meet Jesus. She talked about how grateful she was for all the people who pitched in, and how fun the whole experience had been.
Standard material, I guess, but the fact that we all felt so much like peers stood out to me. All of us, aged five to eighty-five, from all kinds of backgrounds, were eating together in an expression of thankfulness for one another and for being allowed to serve the Lord. Sounds corny to say, but there it is.
Equality among servants. Fellowship in thanksgiving. Love and respect.
How refreshing for someone who hasn't felt "at home" in awhile.
it happens to almost everyone. life takes an unexpected turn and you trade in your shiny high-mindednesses for a slot in corporate america. suddenly, you're working at starbucks.
which, as it turns out, is not that bad. to tell the truth, they seem to be doing more than most to exercise some corporate social responsibility. they nearly won me over completely when i found out that they give a ton of money to CARE International every year, but then i found out a chunk of that cash goes into a relief fund for natural disaster sites in coffee-producing countries.
ha! can't pull the wool over my eyes, Starbucks! still, you're doing something. lots of somethings, apparently. and your corporate responsibility report is encouraging. looks like some good practices in place across your Latin American supplier relationships, and (unsuccessful) efforts being made in the African and Asian sectors.
(if the report doesn't download properly, click here.)
day two at trendy-but-irrestistably-likable coffee-land begins tomorrow. wish me luck, everybody.