Welcome to Spring!

My husband and Son picked me up at work on the Equinox, and exclaimed as I opened the car door letting in a gust of cold air and a flurry of giant snow flakes "Welcome to Spring!" The following day the meteorologist called for sleet, freezing rain, hail, snow flurries and snow showers. We had them all. What is it called when snow is shaped like hail, but still fluffy and white, rather than hard and icy? I don't know either.

Yesterday the sun shone all day. I took a phone call on the back steps and discovered that my back yard has crocuses in full bloom on the sunny side, and the last of the melting snow on the shady side. Little green shoots of courageous bulbs are coming up all over the neighborhood. This morning the sun is shining again. The thermometer says 25 degrees.

Welcome to Spring!

Sunshine

The sun came out again this morning! I think that's twice this week!

I was driving up Rt. 13 and the stands of bare trees were coated with ice. The ground was white with snow, melted and re-frozen. Then I turned East and the low morning sun was shining through the top branches, shining through the ice like they were all diamond glazed. I gasped with awe. It was a perfect moment, and I tried to some how capture it as I zoomed east on the two lane highway. I was yearning for my camera, but knew this moment was too amazing to get on film. I imagined myself pulled off beside the side of the road walking up and down the shoulder trying to get the angle just right, trying to capture the vastness and at the same time each shining branch. I came to a red light, where the electrical wires, also glazed in ice melting in the bright sun. Rods of ice 5 feet long fell 20 feet and shattered on the pavement. The combination of brilliant sun and the night's accumulation of ice had met for one awesome moment and that brilliance would burn away before the morning was over.

My Dentist

I went to a dentist today, for the first time since we moved. It just wasn't right. Sure they were friendly, and the office was decorated in cheerful colors, but my California Dentist did everything differently. She did all the work herself, without the aide of hygienists. She used old-style films instead of digital x-rays. She used the manual scrapey thing instead of the new sandblasters they developed while I was under her care. She was gentle and kind. She cleaned my teeth while I was pregnant, and gave my son his first ride up and down in the dental chair when he only had 8 teeth. Because of her, he loves going to the dentist. She recently sold her practice to spend more time with her young children, so even if I was still in California, I would have a new dentist now. But in the immortal words of Joni Mitchell "You don't know what you've got till it's gone." I miss you Dr. W. You were a great dentist.

Winter Rain

Today I saw a kind of freezing rain I've never seen before. It wasn't hail, it wasn't snow, but there was a layer of it almost a centimeter thick on the ground. Weird.

Rain
Freezing rain
Snow
back to Rain

All in one day,

It's night now and the rain is dripping noisily outside.

Self Tending

In a recent article about personal practice a colleague of mine referenced “that small clearing deep inside myself, which is self tending...”

This phrase has really taken root over the days since it entered my consciousness. "Self-tending" describes something about the "self" we seek in meditation that I had never articulated before. It describes what I think of as the most amazing part of being "grown up" -- the knowledge that there is a part of myself which does not need healing and soothing to come from outside; it is self-tending. It calls to mind the word "autopoesis" which means we are also self-creating. This is one of the defining factors of a living system, that it be self-sustaining. Of course we are not a closed system; we inhale and exhale, but we are in some fundamental way self-tending.

The larger systems I am part of push and pull. What they ask from me sometimes takes me away from my self. But if I can just remember to return to my self when I am confused or depleted, I need only look for that little gardener inside who is already restoring and creating the living system that is my self.

Different Dream

The preacher said this morning that when he was a child in fundamentalist Sunday School he dreamed of a non-dogmatic religious education, one where you could ask questions and doubt.

I grew up in UU Sunday School, and wanted someone to tell me it was okay to believe in something. As a child beset from a very young age by anxiety about non-being, I needed something to have faith in. It is true that when I visited more conservative churches I was glad to know I didn't have to fit into a dogmatic box, but freedom from dogma is not enough for me. What I needed as a small child, and what I want today is simply something to get me through the nights when one feels adrift in an infinite universe, and your non-being sits like a chaperon in a dark corner of your bedroom making the "why" of life seem urgent and ever-present.

As Nancy Shaffer writes in her poem "A Theology Adequate for Night"

"But-- this may work in the night:
Something that breathes with us, as others
sleep, something that breathes also
those sleeping, so no one is alone.
Something that is the beginning of love,
and also each part of how love is completed,
Something so large, wherever we are,
we are not separate; which teachers again
the way to start over.

Night is the test: when grief lies uncovered,
and longing shows clear; when nothing we do
can hasten earth's turning or delay it.

This may be adequate for the night;
this holding; something that steadfastly
breaths us, which we are also learning to breathe."

That is my dream for religious education: to learn again and again that there is something steadfast in the universe, to learn how to remember it in the dark of the night, and to breathe.

Practice what you Preach

Every winter I say something like this from the pulpit:

"After the busy harvesting and preparations of the fall, winter can be a time to quiet down and look inside, to reconnect with family and self."

It's hard to practice what you preach.

I am the kind of person who is in constant motion. I get confused when I am sitting still. But this past week or two I have slowed so far down that I don't even HAVE a to do list. I have yarn ready for a new sweater for Dog, and It just sits there next to me while my partner and I watch the Firefly marathon on Tivo.

The downside is the angst, and the sense of being adrift.

The upside is that I am many-fold more patient than I have been since seminary. I sat with my niece this morning on our matching child-sized chairs and had an extended exploration of grapefruit and its many mysteries. My son has been giving me lessons in "how to speak Super Mario." I'm a slow student.

I haven't made any progress on balancing my checkbook, on the dog sweater, or on saving the world. In the mean time I'm going to listen to my own sermons and believe that season is coming in its turn.

Stirring things up

Each time we unpack a stack of boxes, things feel weird for a while. It stirs up dust, that's for sure. It stirs up memories. But it must be stirring up whole eco-systems of microbes as well. Here are communities of microscopic fungi and bacteria ripped apart and relocated. If it takes we who have orchestrated the move and chosen the location of each object a while to get used to seeing that picture there, to get used to stepping around the corner to look in the mirror, to remember which drawer has the wooden spoons and which cabinet the light bulbs, imagine the change going on at a level so small we can't even see. It's more than dust we disturb in the unpacking process, and a multi-layered chaos comes over the house. The act of running a vacuum over the floor, smoothing a cloth over surfaces feels something like soothing an agitated person. Settling happens to all that was stirred up, a new equilibrium is reached, and we rest into a new wholeness.

Now What?

My sister and her family came to visit this weekend. At some level I have been getting ready for this visit since we first rolled into town with our U-haul. I've been working since then on creating a home that was welcoming, safe for toddlers, and could sleep 7. And they, at the same time, have been trying to imagine a way to take 2 very young children on a very long car trip. Well, with a little creativity required for sleeping arrangements, we did it. The kids immediately felt at home on our giant puffy sofa, our dog magically did not bark once, resulting in this remarkable statement from our dog-phobic niece "I want a quiet dog like Dog" It was a proud moment for all of us. The adults stayed up too late to give us a glimpse of the old days before we had kids, and drank much coffee in the mornings. As the weekend came to a close, and we realized that we were only going to eat about a third of the food we had assembled, and I began to imagine all the fun things we could do "next time." I realized that if we really are able to stay in this house for 12 years as we hope, Ithaca could become a place that my niece and nephew remember and connect with and look forward to visiting: the place with the puffy couch, and the quiet dog, and the great library, and our family. I started to visualize fun things they could do when they are in Elementary school, and where they will sleep when they are teens.

But when their car pulled away from our curb, and we went back into the house, the quiet was unsettling. Now that we have had Sister's Family up to visit, and the moms and dads. Now that we have found a church, and a yoga studio and a library. Now that we have really warm gloves and have a plan for a winter storm, what comes next? With 11.5 years to go, (or the rest of our lives if we put down really strong roots) What now?

Casework

My brother-in-law asked me the other day whether I liked my current job, or if I was still looking for a new one. I actually stopped checking job postings at the prestigious private college in town when I started this new job, and haven't updated my resume since. I like the people, and the work suits me. I also like the 35 hour week, which is a huge change from the 60-80 hours people expect from each other in Silicon Valley. (I used to get nervous defending the 40 hour work week in sermons...)

But some days the work boroughs into my heart. Each week I inspect at least a dozen homes. We are just looking for basic health and safety things. Doors need to lock. No exposed wiring or jagged pieces of glass. For the first month or two I was able to keep my equilibrium no matter what I saw, but after a couple of really bad days, seeing and smelling the filth of a unit vacated by the tenant, watching a toddler walk through piles of garbage as I conversed with the belligerent mother, it started to slip past my defenses. I know I'm supposed to maintain a professional demeanor here, but yuck! I really feel for the landlord that's going to have to clean out the smelly brown water in the sink, and the dirty litter box that's been sitting for who knows how long among piles and piles of abandoned possessions. I wonder what it's like to grow up in a home where your parents can't even get motivated to pick the food up off the floor when a housing inspector is coming. I went home that night and scrubbed the stove until it shone.

Now I want to be clear; most of the homes I see are fine. More often than the images I described above, we see homes that pass inspection easily. I am often impressed by people's meticulous house keeping, by the knitters and quilters who are glad for a chance to show off their work. You sometimes can feel a home that is full of love even when everyone who lives there is away at work or school. But some homes are old enough, or were built of flimsy materials to begin with, that the drafts and the mildew and the overwhelming sense of decay is an inevitable byproduct of poverty. No mater how conscientious a housekeeper you are, the windowsills are going to rot if you have to pin a blanket over the windows to keep your home warm. Who knew when we left California that in my new life I would be witnessing these most private corners of people's lives.

Aging Spurt

I watch my son go through another growth spurt, and have decided I may be going through an aging spurt. I can't believe how much I seem to have aged since we made this move to NY.

It might be the cold, it might be the challenges to my immune system from a whole new set of threats. A wise woman at my CA congregation said that when she worked as a nurse in a hospital, she noticed that people who were functioning fine in their regular lives suddenly took a dive when they came to the hospital. It just takes less energy to do familiar things in familiar places. If you wake in the morning and aren't quite sure where your clothes are, it just takes more energy to make it through your day.

Or maybe that's not it either. Maybe I just haven't focused on the progress of my physical form since I was last paying close attention. That would be around the time my son was born, and my physical form was massively transformed as it grew and shrank and responded to new demands. I look at the pictures from 2002, when I finally looked not-pregnant again, and realize that's how I think of myself. But time keeps it's inertial pressure on the body. I assume it should be consistent and steady, but why shouldn't it happen in spurts like it does for my son? It's just harder to track when I can't mark the changes on the colorful growth chart hanging in the crooked hallway by our bathroom door.

Recycle

We had 2 big unpacking weekends, 20 boxes the first weekend, 12 this past weekend. We knew before we opened the first of this abiding pile of boxes that there was not room for it all. I was not sure what to expect. Could I really have 32 boxes of Knick Knacks? This was my fear. I went in with a very "take no prisoners" attitude. If I couldn't find a spot for it, it was going to goodwill. By the end of the weekend I had 3 boxes of books and 4 boxes of miscellaneous stuff waiting by the front door for a new home.

But these books were ones that had already been through 3 earlier purges. I wanted them to have a good home. I started by bringing the books to a local minister's gathering. I carried each of the 3 boxes up the church steps to the meeting. My colleagues carefully selected a book or 2, then I carried all 3 boxes back out to the car. Next stop, the used book sellers. Once again he thoughtfully looked at each book while I browsed the children's section, and at the end he pulled out about 8 books, and paid me $14 cash. Back to the car with the 3 boxes of books. Finally I headed to the Salvation Army, the last stop on my recycling journey. I pulled out the 4 boxes of stuff and the 3 boxes of books.

"We only take novels, cookbooks and children's books." Says the lady who staffs the donations dock.

I said "well pull out what you don't want."

"That's your job" she said.

So back in the car went all the assorted theology and cultural studies books. I brought them in to the office, and the crew in housing took all but 3. One I kept for myself- I figured it was destiny, and the others went back in the box. Turns out "Friends of the Library" will take them all. The last 2 books started our "friends of the library" box on the mud porch, next to the good-condition clothing that goes to younger cousins.

That night we finally got a bite for the very last of the furniture we've had listed on the Craig's List since the fall. I found homes for the printer and scanner that Salvation Army won't take, brought a 3rd load of re-usable moving boxes to co-workers, and the next day made a run to the Tompkins County Recycling center with a car load full to bursting of packing paper and boxes so big no one wanted them. Phew. Our porch looks like a porch again, and that double-wide hallway is now the playroom instead of a storage locker.

I won't bore you with the story of the second weekend of unpacking, because I think you can imagine. Let's just say there are 2 boxes of really great books in the cafeteria right now that I'm taking to Friends of the Library after work and leave it at that. William McDonough talks about trying to recycle as high on the food chain as possible- re-using boxes instead of making them into pulp to make newspaper or something. He is one of many who encourage us to be responsible for the ultimate impact of the waste our consumption creates. Moreover, I hate waste, and want to see the belongings I am responsible for (many of which are in great shape and which I have some affection for) continue to be useful and even loved. I didn't expect it to be such a big job though. Being responsible for things when they leave our home makes me much more wary about what I bring into my home. As my old friend King Me used to say "open space is something we give away without thinking, we don’t treat it as precious, but it is as valuable as the things we could put in that space.

I think I'll skip the used book sale this year...

Old Friends

Before we left California I had nominated myself "staff member most likely to be able to put her hands on a document." That was back when I had a 4 drawer lateral file cabinet at work and a smaller 2 drawer system at home. But the process of moving required a great winnowing of documents to stay, to put in storage, to recycle. And one little plastic file bin with a handle to accompany us on the trip. When we and our belongings arrived in New York, any given file might be in boxes marked only "Study 15" and come with pencils and sacred art, or might be in a banker's box marked "Worship 2002-2004". The process of gathering my papers and books into one cohesive system in my home office has taken quite some time. But tonight I swiveled the new office chair my husband assembled (the frustration of which took at least a year off his life) I pulled out the smooth wooden handle of the new file cabinet he assembled (we think it took about 5 years off his life...) to a hanging folder filled with songs for congregational worship, right where I knew it would be. It was a beautiful moment.

Now to my right, is a shelf at rolling-chair arm-level filled with the well thumbed books I turn to first when crafting worship. Above and below are bibles and other sacred texts, volumes on religion, theology, congregational life and scriptural interpretation. Downstairs is all my favorite fiction, and references on knitting, cooking, and living in Central New York. How can I explain the joy of being reunited with these books, like having old friends around me again.

Green Today

This morning I was watching the 3 soundless televisions that hang over the lifecycles at the gym. A big logo came on that said "Today goes Green" implying, I suppose, that the Today show has now made environmental sustainability a priority.

Cut to Al partying with other staffers in the back of a huge sedan holding a cardboard beverage tray with 4 Dunkin Donuts coffee cups with plastic lids. The juxtaposition was priceless.

More God

For weeks I have been pondering the why of church. What would compel folks to commit their Sunday mornings to gather in worship? It's sure not peer pressure in this day and age. What is it that I want when I go week after week?

Then, this week I remembered. I want to be in the presence of the Holy Spirit. I want to be reminded that our journey is at its core a spiritual one. I want to sing praise and gratitude to God. With the codicil that I know in my own heart that the God I am grateful to is the one-ness of all that is. It is the spirit of life moving through all things. It is mystery.

Unfortunately I belong to a religious tradition where it is not really considered polite to mention God in church. I'm tempted to go worship with other communities in my neighborhood, but it's hard to do that while trying to provide a stable consistent religious education to my son. I begin to understand the members of the congregation I used to serve who attended worship themselves on Sunday mornings, after dropping their own children off at Hebrew School.

A Case of the Whys.

I have come down with a bad case of the Whys. As bad as a 4 year old gets them. I am very susceptible to this bug. I get it a lot. And I get it pretty bad too. Generally people find this reasonable behavior for a minister. They feel like I'm "asking interesting questions" and "getting people to think about things." Little do they know that I am genuinely confused. It's like misplacing your keys, which I also do a lot. "I know I put that reason for being around here somewhere...I just had it!" "Honey, do you remember why I go to church?"

I do actually write myself little notes for when I forget. I have a whole page devoted to "what to do when things seem really frantic in the autumn" I sneak them into liturgy like an preset alarm in my calendar. "It's Winter Solstice, time to prepare for the Dark Night of the Soul. Don't forget the return of Sun and Warmth."

Unfortunately, sometimes the answers change. For example, I used to practice yoga because it helped me reconnect with myself , and made me feel like a Power Ranger. Now that my joints are achy with cold, and my wrist injury prevents me from doing all those cool arm balances I worked so hard on for 3 years, I sure don't feel like a Power Ranger. I may be reconnecting with myself, but my self is saying "Why do you keep going to yoga? It's winter and we should be in bed."

Often this syndrome is cured by wrapping my arms around someone I love. Pardon me while I go give that a try.

Johnny Pewsitter

How strange it has been to sit in the congregations on Sunday mornings. It's not just that I'm used to being up front -- it's also that for me being in church on Sunday morning has been primarilly about community.

I attended the same church from the time I was dedicated until after I left for college. I was recognizable to many adults as the child of my mother and father, who were church musicians. Being at church was about the familiar, about knowing and being known. Before too long I was a church musician myself, and a leader in the youth group. During my high school years I HAD to be at church each Sunday to sell donuts after the service.

For most of my adult life I have been on staff at one church or another. Sunday morning was a time when there were so many people you wanted and needed to talk to, that it was a bit of an adrenaline rush. Sunday morning was a time when you were part of a team working to create and facilitate. On Sunday mornings I was sometimes envious of the parents and families who could talk and play together, who went out for lunch after the service. Now I understand how hard they worked to create that community for themselves.

In my new congregation, my son and I slip in the back as service is beginning. I feel like it's been a big day if I can figure out where to put my snow boots and where my nametag is. Attending regularly on the Sundays that we are in town and I don't have to preach at another congregation feels like a major commitment. I don't serve on a committee. I'm not working on any church projects.

I understand now that for the majority of the people sitting in pews on Sunday morning, the experience of listening to sermons and singing hymns is the totality of their relationship to church. They may not have a sense of connection to the other individuals in the pews, and they certainly don't have any business to conduct. When I was in seminary, the theory of church life was very community centered. This probably developed in response to a cultural articulation in the nation at large that people longed to participate in community, and felt it was something lacking in contemporary life. Now I understand that the congregation may be a primary community for those who are in leadership, for those who have attended for many years and been lucky enough to forge that connection, but for Johnny Pewsitter that one hour worship on Sunday morning is equal to church. The relevance, power and warmth of that service is primary. (I remember with some chagrin the times when I failed to protect that time from the creep of church polity and business.)

My son seems likewise adrift in his new church home. Being a PK (Preacher's Kid), he was practically a celebrity in the congregation I served since before he was born. He spent hours every week playing in the nursery or on the playground while I took care of church business. He was so comfortable in worship that he often joined in leading stories, or helping facilitate some aspect of the service, like passing out shaker eggs for a song. Church was a place where you knew people and they knew you. Church was a fun, safe, familiar place that stayed the same even when you changed schools or advanced to a new class. His church friends were the ones he dreamed of when the dream called for a companion. When we left, the artists there made him a quilt that now hangs on his bedroom wall. His new congregation cannot yet offer him anything to compare.

I have to reach deep to answer his question: "Why do we have to go to church?" Each Sunday I set the alarm clock and brave the cold I ask the same question. If you are not going to church because it's your job and your calling, why is it that we do this thing together each week?

Cold Bones

Part of the reason for our move was to try something new, to experience a different pace of life. We knew intellectually that any change takes energy, and proposes challenges, and we knew that we wouldn't really understand what that felt like until we were in it.

Now we are in it. The cold, the dark, the snow really do change the daily-ness of life. Living in Ithaca really is different: the cold, the different quality of light, the different texture of the air. I believe the days are even shorter because we are further north. The hills are different. The trees are different. The local economy is slower. On first glimpse the differences seem negligable, but as we move through the cycle of the year, the feeling tone of my days, the colors of my dreams have changed.

The cold and dark of winter here, the layers of snow on our neighborhood have drawn us indoors. Even leaving the house to buy groceries seems counter-intuitive. It has made us more introverted and home-centered. I am becoming a little hobbit, or other hole-dwelling archetype.

Cold Wimp

I finally got a set of gear together to get me through those morning runs. Some nice fleecy warm pants, gloves, ear-warmer, thermal top and an old IU sweatshirt. I had even warmer pants in reserve. Then winter turned it up a notch. I looked out at the 4" of snow coating the un-shoveled sidewalks, and the snowflakes swirling in the wind. I decided to join a gym.

A plan for the cold

I finally got my special cold-weather running pants and was so excited that finally I my legs would be warm on my early-morning run this winter. No luck- still cold! And it's only November! How do people who live in cold places run all winter?

Perhaps I should take my example from the squirrels; double my body weight and get a fur coat...