When the sun sets – red – in the trees,
I lie in the new grass.
The cat comes, too.
Together, we sink into earth,
sniff the soft, green, blanket that holds us,
breathe in harmony.
We purr.
***
meb/02/2015
Category: Uncategorized
“When you are up against a wall…”
“When you are up against a wall,
put down roots like a tree,
until clarity comes from deeper sources
to see over that wall and grow.”
—Carl Jung
Return
Tundra graveyard, Unalaska, 1/2016
I returned home after almost 3 weeks away at the beginning of January. I had an adventure with that small group of pilgrims who worship together in community at the UMC Mission church on Unalaska in the Aleutian Islands. I learned many things, about the place and the people, and about myself.
That time during the holidays I stayed in the large, empty house that faced the Bering Sea, a luxury given to me as part of the adventure, and I was lonely, sometimes.
When my beloved arrived on January 31 to spend the last days of my adventure with me, I was grateful. I arrived early at the airport that boasts one runway in Unalaska, waiting with the others waiters: small children climbing onto the ledge that faced the window, dropping down just to see how far it was to the floor, then climbing up again, a couple of families waiting for the next plane to arrive and to leave, to take Mom or Grandpa away, a few strong, rough-looking men – fishermen, I supposed. I waited impatiently for the plane from Anchorage. It was a sunny day, and since it was not too windy, I expected flights to be able to make it from Anchorage to this “birthplace of the winds.” When the plane arrived and so many others disembarked, and then the line ended, and I didn’t see Jeff, my heart sunk. I was eight years old again, embarrassed and disappointed. I got up and walked around the small airport, wanting to ask someone: “will there be another flight?”
Within a few minutes, another plane descended onto that lonely runway, then another, and another. Jeff walked down the steps of the last plane, the last of the passengers (of course!). I was grateful and excited.
For about a day after his arrival, whenever I had the thought, I said: “oh, thank you for coming!”
On New Year’s Eve, we welcomed the New Year in that isolated place with the best firework display I have ever seen, and from the warmth of my front window. On New Year’s Day we walked in a flurry of snow, we drove on an 2-lane highway along the sea to a lake hidden in the mountains, and we watched – in slow motion – as a large rock tumbled from the cliffs above us into the Bering, just like the sign had warned: “Beware of Falling Rocks.” Ouch! Surreal, too!
Just as quickly as the days passed during my time away, the days since my arrival home have taken the month of January.
I have the sense that I am still in transition, a transition to some different part of my life, a transition from being in a community to looking for a new community, a transition to the time when I will, like other folks in The Wisdom Years, be saying: “I’m more busy than I ever was!” I’m not there. Still, since my arrival home just after the beginning of this new year, invitations to new groups have arrived, and I’ve even been able to help a few folks with their own transitions. I suppose this transition – which I trust has a life of its own, although I might not always like the life it has! – is going somewhere, or maybe not.
I like the sense of time this time of life gives me. I can reflect across a number of decades filled with the world’s life and with many experiences of my own. I can see how times changed, and how they seem to be changing now. Do things ever really change? I have more space in myself for other points of view, and for how my own life has unfolded. Sometimes, I grieve a bit for some part of myself that has played out again, over and over, and will not go away. I come to the place where I see that is simply who I was, and who I am. No need to change, now.
My mind still moves quickly from one thought to the next, from one idea to another, from one significant memory to a less significant event in the present, from one image to another. That’s what the mind does, I think. Another bit of acceptance.
Acceptance is such a lovely guest during a time of transition…
Home, again. Grateful, again. “I’m so glad you came!”
The color of things…
Overlooking the Bering Sea, Unalaska, AK
Life is the color of things:
of place, of thoughts, of people, of sky and trees.
(I have lived in gray, know that place well, for which I am grateful –
for its gift is to know, for the first time, the color of things).
Life is the color of things, and
it is good to breathe the riches of sky and earth,
of shadows across sky, of green grass that carries earth’s fragrance,
of long autumns and bright maples, of spring melting snow banks,
of a navy blue awakening, dawn.
The color of things lives in the eyes of friends, when sadness lurks,
when pain is not covered with dull happiness. The color of things, this gift, earth, and all
that is in it,the heart, and all that is in it.
meb/01/2016
Ending the Year
I end this year with a blessing in my heart for all of you, my friends.
I trust that you are ending this year with a sense of completion, of time well spent, a year of learning. Life is learning and growth. In my best estimation, that is what we are here to do!
I end this year in a continuing time of transition. Life is transition! I continue to learn what “retirement” will be for me. I continue to make sense of this new time of life, a time when I am no longer young, and yet, not yet really old. I hope I have gleaned some wisdom from my years of service and the way I grew as I served. When I think of service now, I am certain that we are called to service not because we have so much to give, but because we have so much to receive in our own growth as human beings. God is good, that is for certain, and when we choose to turn toward God in any circumstance, something changes. We change – maybe that’s it. And maybe that is enough.
It is my hope that as we change, the world will become more kind and just – that is my hope.
I end this year, also, at the end of another adventure, since I have the luxury of being able to travel and to explore other places. As I write, I am enjoying the way the light changes from moment to moment in the mountains that surround Unalaska, AK, on every side. I have tried to capture their beauty for you in a few pictures, but the beauty is in the moment, when I can be present to it. I have started every morning here with a time of prayer and a time of meditation, while it is still dark. Then, when the sky begins to lighten at nearly 10 AM, I move to sit in the chair that faces windows that look out over the Bering Sea, and to the moments as the light changes and daylight arrives. I wait for the new light to come, to see the sparkle of the lights on the barge and crane in the distance soften, as the light commands the day.
To be on retreat is to enter a time of silence, although that silence is broken by conversations, texts, and books. Over Christmas, the silence was often broken by the sound of Christmas carols which I carried with me to this place on an iPad. Now, I have more quiet, as the days grow longer. To be on retreat is to remember to be grateful, to have a time to be able to say: “thank you, God!” To be on retreat is to take notice of the changing moods that inhabit my body, to notice what song is playing in my head, and to have this moment to watch the light change over the sea. God is in all these things, God is in me, God is in this moment, God, the one I like to call All That Is.
While I’ve been here, internet access has been unreliable, and so I have taken this time to be away from the chatter of podcasts. Is 2016, the coming year, really an election year? I will be back to the thoughts and opinions that crowd my mind soon enough. I will re-enter the pace of another place, and hopefully, I will take some of this silence, this blessed, rich silence, with me. I hope there is more space within me for – nothing.
Happy New Year, all!
