tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-80827167310271355552024-03-13T08:29:01.651-07:00Irradiate MeanjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-3554114873557543492015-03-19T13:38:00.000-07:002015-03-19T13:38:13.817-07:00And now for a more refined version (of another poem)<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Since my last post showed a "first draft" very brand-new infant poem, this next one will be something a bit further along. The following is a 2nd/3rd draft of an exercise we did last fall in Pauletta Hansel's "Poetry Matters" class at <a href="http://www.womenwriting.org/" target="_blank">Women Writing for a Change</a>. The exercise itself is called "writing between the lines" (as described in JD McClatchey's <a href="http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Practice_of_Poetry.html?id=tPDAZIihym4C" target="_blank">The Practice of Poetry</a>). You use the format of an existing poem to follow very closely, mirroring or responding to each line to create a new poem of your own. My model was Maxine Kumin's <a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/242154" target="_blank"> "After Love."</a></span><br />
<br />
Here's mine:<br />
<br />
<br />
<u>After Birth</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
Afterwards, the cold.<br />
My body, shivering without you.<br />
<br />
The cord all that remains<br />
of what once tethered us.<br />
<br />
Warmth expelled, you are<br />
no longer mine.<br />
<br />
The blankets furrow, a cap<br />
thrust clumsily atop<br />
<br />
your head; and nearby the beep<br />
and click of monitors.<br />
<br />
Everything is changed, except<br />
this abrupt end<br />
<br />
is a beginning, too full<br />
of life and its mess<br />
<br />
refusing to count the cost.<br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-81182072070746688542015-03-19T11:38:00.001-07:002015-03-19T11:38:37.512-07:00<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">First draft:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><u>Avox</u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><u><br /></u></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The tongue is a ghost disturbing my wake</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a lie</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">to call it Mother. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Would you have me pull it out by the roots</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">beneath muscle and sinew</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">before memory of pain?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Or spool it up, silent, in contortions of </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">guilt, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">bitter, trembling, burnt. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is secret and secretive</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">tasting only itself</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">till that too disappears. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An invisible coating that curdles every flavor. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Everything it tastes is second-hand</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">forgotten</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">half thrown out in disgust, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">and retrieved always a moment </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">too late, the bitterness </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">of un-remembrance. </span>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-30818332425018140902011-05-22T07:48:00.000-07:002011-05-22T07:49:57.686-07:00I'm trying a new thing.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Maybe this is a bad idea. </span><br />
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My brain is too full of messy, slippery tangents. The problem is, they won't just stay small and concise and expressible; they must wander and linger and morph suddenly into much riskier territory. But these are the things that keep me (us?) up nights, that give vital but intangible flavor to the days. I HAVE to write about this stuff. I can't escape being a writer, even though much of what I think is confused and will never see the day. And the silly part (the idiosyncrasy for word-smiths?) is that these are not "meanderings." They are <i>always</i> reasonably well-formed mental essays, with thesis, sub-points and supporting detail/examples ready for prime time. They're always something I could spiel about for hours and eventually make a point even earthlings can appreciate.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But there is never time. I used to imagine "the Blog in my Head," or that somewhere floating around is the sum total of humanity's unexpressed musing, the things we hadn't time to commit to hard-copy, and that someday somewhere we'll all have access to that great anonymous cosmic record. And we'll have the lovely realization that our crazy midnights rants were understood, shared, and validated. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #ead1dc; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I don't really have patience for all that. So, while constrained by this annoying temporal cage, this busyness of surface life and servantly minutiae, I'm just going to post headings. Hopefully I'll get back to some of these threads some day . . .</span></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-12433154026524111912010-05-06T01:58:00.000-07:002010-05-06T03:08:49.685-07:00Paging Jonathan Edwards*Okay, Uncle. <div><br /></div><div>I can't sleep, so here I am with warm milk, hoping to blog myself into happy nighty night time by dawn. Tossing and turning upstairs, my mental jag was about how disconcertingly easy it is for humans, Christian or otherwise, to justify a status quo. Just read a column by Nicholas Kristof that sort of made me squirm after the fact. Take a glance here: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/02/opinion/02kristof.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/02/opinion/02kristof.html</a></div><div><br /></div><div><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/02/opinion/02kristof.html"></a>What got me was how few of us really can "grow in Christlikeness" in the sense of revolutionary transformation of how we impact our big world, in a way that makes God's grace (and our <i>differentness </i>from the unbeliever) readily apparent. Kristof's column mentioned several unsung Catholics who are making a tremendous impact by how they live and reach out to those in need around the world. Now, I know there is plenty of hurt to go around and plenty of good to be done right in our back yards, but that's not my point here. What I struggle with is now much, in the developed world especially, we are institutionally bound into a lifestyle that by default causes direct harm to people, the planet, and future generations.</div><div><br /></div><div>Please be assured that I'm no miltiant environmentalist, not even a wannabe. In fact, I'm painfully aware of how not-environmental my lifestyle is, and how difficult-to-impossible is to be a typical American (especially a suburban mom-of-4) and not walk around every single day spewing poison into the world and causing who knows how much damage to the weakest among us. </div><div><br /></div><div>Before I get accused of any Leftish leanings here, I also should mention the parallel "La, la, la, I can't hear you" self-justification by ignorance that many "progressives" live by - the refusal to admit the evil of taking a pre-born human life. I'm not even gonna get into arguing why/if it's wrong; we know it is, or why else would we be so reluctant/squeamish/irate about being shown pictures of a procedure if we really believe it's value neutral? (Now don't be judgin,' you're thinking. Okay, whatever. This is Anjoo. You all know me. I'm usually a pretty nice person, but telling me not to be opinionated is like telling the water not to be wet. This is my blog, I get to rant!) So let's just agree that this isn't about political leanings or "issues," but about human nature and selfishness and sin.</div><div><br /></div><div>So, Kristof was talking about some ordinary Catholics and their incredible witness. "Ordinary" only in the sense (from here out is my take, not Kristof's) that their beliefs and theology are basic Christianity 101: do unto others . . .what you do unto the least of these you do unto me . . . all Creation groans, waiting for its savior . . .no greater love has any man than this . . . etc. And still perfectly NOT ordinary by their rarity. How many of us privileged Westerners could dare to give up all our creature comforts and live like that? We may sponsor kids with World Vision or some other group, we may send checks and earnestly pray for foreign or inner-city missionaries, but how many of us would really live like that?</div><div><br /></div><div>And it's not because we don't know that grinding poverty exists, and that our actions and lifestyle choices have a direct impact on how the poorest in the world live, or even if they live. So why is it <i>so easy</i> to to make only token gestures? We give 10% or 20% of our income, and feel it's "okay" when the majority of the world lives on a 1/10th of that (Try this little link: <a href="http://www.globalrichlist.com/"> http://www.globalrichlist.com/</a>) Or we switch from plastic to paper, or SUV to hybrid, conventional to organic, omnivore to veggie, and think that's enough. I'm not slamming the environmental decisions either here, because some of them are more than I'm doing, and it's a great start.</div><div><br /></div><div>But it's just a start, and we'll never make up the difference. There's no way we're going to cleanse our eviromental impact in our lifetimes. Or, to look at the other half of the PC spectrum, even if we completely eradicate abortion in our lifetimes there's no way we can say we've adequately cared for the sick, the old, the forgotten, the abused, all those children AFTER they were born. We'll always find a way to deflect the problem, make it somebody else's, pretend we're doing all we can. Or more accurately, to compare ourselves to all "those people" who aren't doing<i> anything, </i>and be temporarily pacified.</div><div><br /></div><div>Uh-oh, Anjoo must be off her meds . Shhhhhhhhh . . !</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, let's come around to the theology. Be reassured I do NOT believe in salvation by works, that is EXACTLY the point. I don't believe that if we use cloth grocery bags, live in a hut, and save a million babies that we would thereby be pure and free and not need forgiveness. What I'm looking at, what's so glaringly absurdly apparent if you look at the typical 21st century US lifestyle, is that we can't stand to look at the harm we're causing for more than 3 seconds before we distract ourselves (TV anyone? Internet?) and find an excuse. </div><div><br /></div><div>We pretend that it's okay because <i>everyone else around us does it</i>. Or, everyone does that much plus 10% worse, so we must actually be doing better than most. We justify what is patently sociopathic or sinful behavior (how is it anything else when we use up so much stuff that God told us to share? when we destroy so much that God told us to take care of? When we kill and abuse so many that God told us to honor?) just because the culture around us doesn't think it's wrong. </div><div><br /></div><div><i>How is that following Christ?</i></div><div><br /></div><div>All that stuff about taking up our cross, counting the cost, being a new creation, set apart. . ? Now, I reassert that I do <i>not </i>believe we "have to" live by a certain mile-long list of Do's and Don'ts in order to be a "real" Christian. So what is my point? Am I just trying to be a downer, demoralize everyone? Or, even worse, just give voice to the accuser and make us all feel unforgivable? Nooooooooooooo way!</div><div><br /></div><div>It's GRACE that saves us! Yaaaaayyyyyy, because we all need it so desperately. And it <i>scares</i> me how quickly and almost universally we forget that. How we "do" some little token act of selflessness and think that now, since we're "saved by Grace," that we don't have to look at all the uncomfortable stuff. But I suspect it's just the opposite: <b>b</b><b>ecause</b> we know we're already saved and loved by Grace when we've accepted Jesus as savior, we should be unafraid to face the remaining yuck within ourselves, and freely acknowledge that there's still a whole lotta yuck left. </div><div><br /></div><div>A WHOLE lotta yuck. Enough for a lifetime of repentance. So my initial impetus was the hypocrisy of not acknowledging a few particular grievous sins in our culture, but there could be so many more. I do actually love the USA, I hasten to add. I firmly believe it's the least bad country in the world. In <i>this </i>world. But let's not pretend even for a minute people, especially my sisters and brothers in Christ, that this is anything near like the Kingdom we're praying for. Let's roll up our sleeves, fall on our knees, and get to work.</div><div><br /></div><div>*Jonathan Edwards: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Edwards_(theologian)">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Edwards_(theologian)</a></div><div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-56504118343243521292009-09-07T22:14:00.000-07:002009-09-07T22:47:46.972-07:00Fighting the good fightI am getting demoralized by trying to open the minds of right-wing friends on health care reform. Just got off a several days long, polite but passionate exchange with a a friendly acquaintance who's diametrically opposed to me on the issue. Been trying so hard to be rational, humane, reasonable, open-minded, and yet not pull punches or back down on why I think a national plan, is the better option.<div><br /></div><div>But dang it I'm getting tired of this deadlock! Today I just found out this person gets her talking points from Glen Beck.</div><div><br /></div><div>Sigh.</div><div><br /></div><div>There goes the chance for reasonable discourse. How do you get people to even see their filter, the presuppositions that color every "fact" they see? </div><div><br /></div><div>It's been giving me that awful, ugly gut feeling I used to get during implacable stalemates with loved ones, the kind you absolutely can't walk away from but you know they will never ever see what you see and will label you the "enemy." But just like those heart-rending spousal or parent-child battles, I know I'm supposed to stay and engage, not walk away.</div><div><br /></div><div>Because if we Christians can't stay, be civil, be honest and assertive about what we believe, how can there ever be reconciliation? The Bible has so much to say about unity among believers, and how that is the most powerful witness to a watching world. I don't mean that all Christians should have the same political opinions (heaven forbid!), but it makes me so sad when other Christ-followers use their religion to justify why their political opinion is right. Don't they realize I could just as easily play that game and "prove" Jesus is a left-leaning radical social reformer? But I won't sink to that level. It's pathetic, it tears apart the body of Christ and makes the enemy laugh. </div><div><br /></div><div>Not that that's exactly what this person was doing. I know she wasn't questioning my faith, but something about all this is making me kind of queasy. Of course, my faith has to support my political beliefs. Duh. If they ever conflicted, it would be the politics that has to change, in a heartbeat. Maybe part of what's making me queasy is recognizing that temptation so strongly in myself - to say Jesus is a pro-life Green and everyone else is just <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">wrong</span> - and know <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">how long and hard </span>I've tried to see the Right's point of view about this and I just don't get it.</div><div><br /></div><div>I <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">want</span> to find common ground but it's fading fast. All I see in the anti-reform sentiment is misinformation, ungrounded fears, and a failure of compassion. There, I said it as nicely as I could. My original adjectives were a heck of a lot more incendiary. But like I said, I really want to find common ground. </div><div><br /></div><div>Somebody on the Right please, <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">please, PLEASE </span>prove me wrong.</div><div><br /></div><div>Show me that you really <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">get </span>what it's like to have a pre-existing condition and be denied coverage time and again. To live with the daily fear that any time anything happens to you or your kids' health it could mean you lose everything, savings, job, home, all of it. To be literally unable to go to the doctor when your child is sick because you know it'll just be one more black mark that makes it even more impossible to get the insurance you so desperately need. Explain to me how in this amazingly blessed and bountiful country of ours it can possibly be "okay" that some people get state-of-the-art healthcare and others die for lack of a simple drug or diagnostic procedure. How is that okay? How is that "Christian?" And then, after you've told me what a horrible socialist takeover we're heading for, please show me your better option. Because that's what I haven't seen yet. Show me how these profit-driven, insane CEO-bonus giving, coverage-denying, shareholder-courting, free-enterprise-pleading private enterprises are suddenly going to do an about face, out of the goodness of their own hearts (without any legal lash) to make it all better.</div><div><br /></div><div>And they say Obama's naive. </div><div> </div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-85968137990291369092009-08-02T01:04:00.000-07:002009-08-02T01:14:24.029-07:00Square one, reduxThe Zoloft gave me massive brain fuzz. The SAM-e worked really well for the depression, but made me sick to my stomach (as in, doubled over in constant pain and unable to sleep) at the recommended dose. So, I took a couple days off and restarted at 1/4 dose, to see what I can tolerate.<div><br /></div><div>Other than that, vacation was good. Summer's ending. Good riddance kinda, I think. Except there's another couple of summery things left to do.</div><div><br /></div><div>We saw a wonderful free local Shakespeare production with 3 of the kids. R&J done as manic, hormone-drenched all-nighter. There were several "interesting" adaptations that nevertheless worked really well. It's so rare to find theater productions that use novel ideas without turning them into gimmicks, or snarky self-referential distractions that submerge the wonder of the Bard. But this really worked. The urgent pacing, cross-gender casting ("Nurse" played by a stocky middle-aged man whom you very quickly "believed" in the role), and loose-cannon physicality of even the more traditionally passive roles (Juliet!) added a freshness I haven't seen in R&J in a while. It's so FUN to find great arts freebies!</div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-46728297424875026612009-06-07T22:45:00.000-07:002009-06-08T00:22:43.445-07:00Some heavy duty theology<span class="Apple-style-span" style=" font-weight: bold;font-family:'Charis SIL';font-size:10px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" font-weight: normal; font-size:16px;"><p><sup id="en-KJV-28738" class="versenum" value="19" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">19</sup>If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28739" class="versenum" value="20" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">20</sup>But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28740" class="versenum" value="21" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">21</sup>For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28741" class="versenum" value="22" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">22</sup>For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28742" class="versenum" value="23" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">23</sup>But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28743" class="versenum" value="24" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">24</sup>Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28744" class="versenum" value="25" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">25</sup>For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.</p><p> <sup id="en-KJV-28745" class="versenum" value="26" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: text-top; line-height: normal; ">26</sup>The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.</p></span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- 1 Corinthians 15:19-26 (KJV)<br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">It begins (v.19) with what's very obvious, in looking around the world we live in. Of course we're fools if judging by the world's standards. Each person for themself, follow your bliss, the pursuit of happiness, whatever. . . maybe that system works really well for some people, in some places and fortuitous time. For others, it's a rabbit trail.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">Then a pretty straight-forward, on the surface, description of the order of resurrection (v. 20-23), but that's pretty weird too. I mean, who can <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">really</span> imagine what that is like? That world, redeemed, those eternal bodies, who can really inhabit that belief? We've had some talk at church lately about the inadequacy of English to express the fullest translation of what we often call "belief." The word we translate, in other languages, could more accurately be called "trust." So, it doesn't matter nearly enough that I say I "believe" in resurrection, if I don't<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"> trust</span> it as well. As an aging, broken, this side of 40-years-old person, it's easy enough to recognize that the bodies we live in now are painfully inadequate. But how on Earth does one imagine resurrection of <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">ourselves</span>? It seems almost sacreligious even to try. . . I can imagine Jesus resurrected easily enough, but He was/is already perfect. It feels comical, almost pathetic, to try to imagine that for little old me, with this ridiculous flesh housing an even more limited and obsolete consciousness. Where to even begin?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:'Charis SIL';">So let's just move along in our reading, but now it gets even stranger. In v. 24-25, I like that Paul mostly side-steps the trippy eschatological imagery, fire and brimstone, dragons and cosmic ladies, and deals instead with the earthly powers of men. Except, he isn't really. We know there are also the "powers and principalities" as the real enemies, not just theological abstractions but manifested in bones and stones. Here I get really <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"> irritated</span>, because my conscious imagery has been influenced by too many Hollywood epic battle scenes (I blame Peter Jackson for making LOTR so dang "evocative"). I really don't want to focus on the gore. the rallying cries, but to understand in whatever paltry level what it would feel like to welcome that king, to be part of that following, to step into eternity.</span><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">Then again, maybe I don't want to tax my little brain that much. It's late, and things are bizarre enough. We see through the glass <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">sooooooo</span> very darkly, or not at all. And when our eyes are too tired to see, when we can't even bear the over-stimulation of what clutters our retina for this second, we may be allowed to smell it. Maybe a wordless, subconscious hum we almost heard. We can't quite understand, we can't entirely say we "believe" because we're so smart and modern and have to explain, define, compartmentalize<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"> </span>it before we can trust.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">I don't understand. Except when I do. Sometimes when it's way too late and I can see the full moon, taste the insomnia, it's almost within reach. I miss those midnights with my feral nurslings. the raw physicality juxtaposed with acute clarity. Often times now it's so much more mundane; I act like I 'trust" in a resurrected life far too often for it to have been just some good idea I invented. This journey has far outlasted any good idea I ever had; it started with someone else. Lately I'm walking more in shadows and clouds (not doubts, clouds) than I have in decades. Frustrated and irritated all the time, and yet I know it's the only path open. I"m not aligning with the enemy. I'm not strong enough to challenge the creator of the Universe, or young enough to play the nihilist/existentialist pose any longer.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">So where were we? Oh yeah, we come to the last baffling line (v.26), which is either supposed to be reassuring or just make you scratch your head, I'm not sure. I'd like to just accept it and go on, except it changes the entire physical/temporal nature of the universe and existence as we know it. How can consciousness <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">go on </span>after death is defeated, if by "go on" we mean "to go forward in time," when time no longer exists? And anyway, thank goodness it isn't "us" that <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">goes on </span>anyway<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">, </span>us petty, silly (I'm being charitable) half-blind ghosts (okay maybe I'm being a <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">bit </span>misanthropic . . . ). I'd want it to be someone far more perfect than us, someone that bears only the faintest whiff of resemblance, and that only as a merciful nod to recognition. I'd want it to be someone awake enough, clear enough, alive enough to really belong there. See how even the usual adjectives don't work here? "Good" and "wise" are so earth-bound and arrogant. We just can't pretend, right now in this world, to understand or even describe, let alone <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">be</span> those creatures that would inhabit Eternity with Him (a far better writer than me might attempt it, but even C.S. Lewis only dared to be specific in his allegories, not as a literal projection of heaven).</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">Of course, the other option is to take it at face value, accept that we can't understand it yet at any deeper level, and return to the work of this temporary world we live in. Serve somebody, knowing it's not nearly enough to make this hurting, F'ed up place as good as it was meant to be. But it's what we do, it's the only thing we can do, while we wait for the one who will defeat the last enemy. And when we're really honest, we tremble at the bit of enemy still inside us, that must die.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'Charis SIL';">Have a great week, kids! : )</span></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-7324888171914899662009-05-25T09:24:00.000-07:002009-05-25T09:34:26.467-07:00I did it ~ sort of . . .Well, the 5K is over, and I'm trying to reframe this as a successful learning experience, if not an outright Success. I didn't make my goal of running the whole way without stopping to walk, but I learned a lot.<div><br /></div><div>Lesson 1: know your route. Had I known the topography in advance I would've paced myself much better and possibly not had to stop and walk. The route was pretty much straight up hill for the first 2.5K and mostly downhill on the way back.</div><div><br /></div><div>Lesson 2: Go sloooowwww . . . like, WAY slower than you think you should be. I thought I had learned this one during training, that the only way to go the distance is to pace really slowly, but in practice I guess my default pace is always starting out way too fast and burning out. I had to stop once to walk about 1 Km into it, and again briefly at 2K and 2.5K (top of hill for a water break). Still, I ran almost the entire way back down, and my final time was <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;">under 37</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"> minutes</span>. That's about 2 minutes better than my personal best, and 4 minutes ahead of my goal time. Which tells me I was going <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">way too fast</span>.</div><div><br /></div><div>Lesson 3: Meta-lesson. I don't "learn" nearly as fast as I think I do, because I'll think I've learned something when I understand it intellectually, but it doesn't do me any good till I've learned it experientially. Until I knew what it <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">felt</span> like to apply lessons 1 & 2, above, I couldn't really apply them in the crunch.</div><div><br /></div><div>But anyhow, I did it!!!! I finished the 5K in less than 37 minutes, and it was a glorious Family Event (both Nelson family and church family) for a good cause. Yaaayyy team! : )</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-18755787974247731262009-05-14T19:31:00.001-07:002009-05-14T19:42:05.656-07:00Here's something you don't see every dayI'm training for a 5K. Big whoop, you say, but this is <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">me</span>. <div><br /></div><div>Running. </div><div>Voluntarily.</div><div>Really.</div><div><br /></div><div>So, now that you've picked yourself off the floor, be reassured that I will approach even this most seemingly physical of endeavors with as ruminative and navel-gazing a perspective as ever. Already I'm convinced of at least 3 great "life lessons" learned from my 2 weeks (so far) of haphazard training. But the most wonderful part is that I haven't quit yet. And it hasn't been nearly as impossible as I would've thought. Or at least, the really hard parts are completely different/opposite from what I thought they would be. But more on that in later posts.</div><div><br /></div><div>Already I'm up to running 2.5 miles without stopping to walk. Yes. For me that's the best cardio-vascular performance I've ever had in my life, except perhaps in the fog of some netherworld dance-clubbing days. And those certainly weren't exactly <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">healthy</span> days . . . </div><div><br /></div><div>But off I go to bed now, since this <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">"training" things works a whole lot better if I get something resembling sleep at least 5 nights a week.</span></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-65883798359830621682009-04-17T10:42:00.000-07:002009-04-17T10:44:33.779-07:00Aaaahhhh . . . finally it's spring!70's and sunny, that's what I needed. Actually went running OUTSIDE today and didn't hate it. The birds are twittering non-stop, the pea plants haven't been devoured by foraging animals (yet), and I'm looking through my Breck's catalog for next year's tulips. Because the <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">one and only thing </span>I miss about our old house is the awesome tulips.anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-33755244966433101732009-04-15T11:26:00.000-07:002009-04-15T11:31:25.485-07:00April? What the . . ?Last week it snowed. This week, out with the kids, I saw what I thought was another snow and inwardly groaned. I was wrong. It was a cascade of pear tree blossoms caught in a gust of wind.<div><br /></div><div>Beautiful!</div><div><br /></div><div>Perhaps because it's been the LONGEST winter anyone can remember, I'm really noticing the spring signs proliferating this year. Every single day, there are changes from just a day before, buds that hadn't quite opened, leaves growing right before my eyes, (pre)teenagers sprouting another inch overnight . . . and suddenly our dead brown neglected lawn is <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">green</span> again. When did that happen?</div><div><br /></div><div>Now if it would just warm up a little.</div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-62162842131493537372009-04-09T12:05:00.000-07:002009-04-09T12:30:36.496-07:00<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- <span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-size:13px;">Mahatma Gandhi</span></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">Yow!</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">On this day before Good Friday, I want to reflect on how little we resemble Christ, NOT as a way to beat up Christians (after all, will the person in the room who isn't a hypocrite please stand up? There, you just found your hypocrite), but as a reminder how much we/I need a Savior. The Good Friday cross brings to mind so many things, but the latest visions are particularly brutal to me this year, having just watched a PBS special where an anthropologist did various high-tech scans of an antiquated specimen, a human heel-bone pierced by a Roman nail. The computer simulations illustrated graphically what would have happened inside a body after that nail was inserted, and the chain of indescribable suffering that would follow.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">Gasp.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">Can anything but horror and incredulity be an adequate response that treatment of one human being by another? </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 48px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">Call me slow, but I just got something really central to the faith. All these years I've been critical and dismissive of my own level of spiritual surrender (or more appropriately, lack thereof) because even though I am to metaphorically "die to self" everyday as a follower of Christ, it's usually pretty symbolic. Sure, I'll surrender my rights/wants/needs here and there, even if I don't really love the recipient of whatever limited "grace" I have to offer. And of course I would lay down my life for my children, and maybe even for someone else if that's what was required. But that's a tremendous MAYBE ~ God's grace would definitely have to be acting for me to be that surrendered at that moment. But even then I'm thinking a quick bullet to the brain, or something equally instantaneous and relatively suffering-free. And I'm not really <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">thinking</span> about it at all, in terms of the full trauma of expectation and knowing what's going to happen.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">But to </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;">choose</span> a death like He endured?</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">Never. Not in my wildest dreams. That is a level of Willingness and Acceptance that I truly cannot fathom. And somehow, in my warped (works rather than faith-based) walking out of salvation, I've held that as a minus against ME and my spiritual immaturity. But it's not about me. It's about Him. What he was willing to do, "while we were yet in our sin." While we continue (even years after being saved, see above mentioned hypocrite) in our rebellion and hard-heartedness. He still would do that for us; He still loves us <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">that much</span>.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">So this Good Friday the kids and I are taking some food to the Healing Center (pantry), delivering some chocolate bunnies to some kids who probably won't get much from the Easter Bunny, and thinking about how much we've been given.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;">Happy Easter! : )</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:verdana;font-size:13px;"><br /></span></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-40312313453178331152009-03-03T19:30:00.000-08:002009-03-03T19:54:41.219-08:00Lenten thoughtsAlthough I expect it to be predictable (isn't that kinda the point of rituals?) every Lenten season is different. This year, after deciding I don't have enough legitimate "vices" leftover to give up, and I'm DANG sure not giving up teevee during March Madness (grrrrr . . .Pitino!!), I gave up radio instead. This means no NPR, no classical tunes, no sports scores, nada. It's been a good thing, one less angry voice screaming through the day, if you know what I mean.<div><br /></div><div>I think I'm used to the surreal never-endingness of this cursed winter. It's gone on, what, like 9 years now since we had sweater weather? But today I put in the seeds for early starting with the little kids, so we have a pan of dirt on top of the fridge now, teasing us with dreams of future basil and beefsteak tomatoes. Oh me of little faith, I honestly can't fathom that we will <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">ever</span> see gardening weather again. . .</div><div><br /></div><div>So into the midst of this gloom and pessimism comes the promise of Messiah, the ancient wish for renewal and salvation. God we still need saving, 2000 years later, so Somebody please come quick. </div><div><br /></div><div>I'm glad we're doing this corporately, 50+ churches in greater Cincy are using the "Reset" curriculum to recharge, explore, explode our concept of who that Jewish carpenter was and what he really came for. It's a pretty heavy-lifting curriculum that requires real study and commitment, not just sitting in a pew once a week. Every week we have a small group meeting, suggested readings, and several assigned writing prompts to help us dig deeper. Plus we're going into large chunks of the gospel of Luke from various angles. The point of this, for me anyway, is to kick me out of the malaise and inertia of thinking I "know" what Christianity is supposed to be about and remind me once again of who Messiah is.</div><div><br /></div><div>That guy isn't just the hippie Jesus, the nice guy, the baby in the manger, the American Protestant. He's world-changing, enigmatic, unpredictable, dangerous, life-giving, life-saving, friend of the poor, enemy of tyrants, Lion, lamb, a brother, a mother, the beginning and the end and (most unsettling of all) the <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">right now</span>.</div><div><br /></div><div>Where do I even begin?</div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-22697881467312444252009-02-08T06:52:00.000-08:002009-02-08T06:55:21.489-08:00Go see "Slumdog Millionaire"Go see slumdog millionaire.<div>Go see slumdog millionaire.</div><div><br /></div><div>If you're Indian(ish), go see it.</div><div>If you're not Indian, GO SEE IT!!!</div><div><br /></div><div>Get past the first half hour of horror-show, and end up dancing in your seat. Go on, I dare you not get all Bhangra . . . </div><div><br /></div><div>Side note: perhaps the most amazing, disturbing, sadly appropriate usage of a Clash song I've ever seen in film.</div><div><br /></div><div>Beautiful. Now, go see it if you haven't!</div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-62714214465963262992009-01-31T20:46:00.000-08:002009-01-31T21:17:52.938-08:00Oh it's almost Groundhog's Day and we're in a blizzard ~ hey! : )Not really a blizzard. Just 10" of snow with a thin layer of ice in the middle, resulting in 4 days off school for the littles and a leeeeetle cabin fever for the rest. Luckily, I still remember last winter's lesson that going outside, no matter how crappy the weather (or sometimes, the crappier the better?) makes a huge diff in my attitude, at least for a few hours. Or maybe it's just the St. John's Wort finally kicking in. Or maybe it's the psychological perspective of the days' sunlight <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">finally</span> getting longer . . .<div><br /></div><div>Or maybe it's the 2 days I spent in bed past noon (ahhhhhh . . . blessed sleep!)</div><div><br /></div><div>I have been complaining to the husband for about 2 years now (because no one seems to take this freakin' thyroid disorder of mine <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">Seriously</span> enough sometimes) that I have literally FORGOTTEN what it feels like to "get enough sleep." As in, what does it feel like to get out of bed because you actually got enough rest, rather than because a kid is crying or you have an appointment somewhere or the phone is ringing? I had truly forgotten that feeling. And no, insomnia doesn't count as "not needing sleep." Just the opposite sometimes, maybe it's the sub-manic, semi-welcome, polar opposite of exhaustion, but it isn't the same as real energy.</div><div><br /></div><div>But for the record ~ shout it from the rooftops ~ I had one day this year (January 29, 2009) when I slept in from around midnight till 3:25pm the next day and I got enough sleep!</div><div><br /></div><div>Yes, you read that right. I actually got out of bed because I had had enough rest and felt competent to face the next 8 hours or so. Till 10pm~ish, and the littles were abed and I could surrender to the torpor again.</div><div><br /></div><div>So we still have a good 6" on the ground but most of the major roads are good, and tomorrow is actually <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">February.</span> As an act of supreme self-preservation (clawing towards optimism one bloody fingernail at a time), I am going to look through the gardening catalog and actually order something to start our seedlings early. </div><div><br /></div><div>Those of you who've followed NelsonLand gardening adventures over the years may argue that therein lies madness, but I reject such nay-saying. Gardening isn't about Product Yields or any such. Remember that little seedling at the center of "Wall-E," that they all risked their lives to protect? </div><div><br /></div><div>It's an act of faith, pushing away awareness of the too-close, deadly COLD, to warm our little souls till spring comes.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-74868061021229732792009-01-01T06:07:00.000-08:002009-01-01T06:54:18.421-08:00"All is quiet on New Year's Day . . ."So it begins.<div><br /></div><div>Today's topic, boys and girls, is the "cup of suffering" and what it means to drink of it. Perhaps before I begin I should issue a disclaimer more in keeping with the season, perhaps a gratitude list of sorts for the goodness of this past year, or at least an acknowledgement that I'm glad our household has been spared (so far) much of the hardships the rest of this country faces, but that's assumed already, and I have limited time to write. So assume the gratitude is there and we'll move on.</div><div><br /></div><div>Been thinking about how we're all called to take up the daily cross, count the cost of what it means to be a disciple, and keep our eyes on eternal things rather than get completely enmeshed in these passing troubles. Wear the world "like a loose cloak" and all that, rather than a straight-jacket. There was a time as a new believer, or perhaps all my life out of some misplaced guilt, that I would have <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">insisted </span>I have no real suffering in my life, since materially and in almost any externally apparent way things are so better-than-average (demographically . . .) for my clan. </div><div><br /></div><div>But now I'm a little more honest, or at least more beaten down, and I can admit that "suffering" of any sort - emotional, physical, intellectual, or other - feels real enough when it strikes, and distinctions about whether or not a critical mass of society would acknowledge it as valid makes no difference to the real and crippling effects one experiences. Or the surprising blessings. Because on the flip side of loneliness, pain, sadness, fear, failure, and disappointment, there are times for introspection, refining, rest, peace, and getting to the heart of what we claim we believe. </div><div><br /></div><div>I know, the cynic in me wants to say that things like perspective, humility, and moderation are just the consolations of a life winding down, or of watching most of your younger self's dreams flame out or fail miserably. But enough of the pessimist. Even if that voice is true, it's only half the story. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control . . those ring a bell, anybody? They're the "fruits of the Spirit" Paul exhorts us towards, or rather, they're the promised <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">gifts</span> of living a life of true discipleship. Like somebody said on the radio the other day, when this older woman meets somebody for the first time and they immediately tell her "I'm a Christian," she thinks <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">already?! How'd you get there? I've been trying all my life to be one . . .</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></div><div>Indeed.</div><div><br /></div><div>So, I haven't made much headway with this cup of suffering thing. I suspect, as always, it's probably not what we think. First, it was Jesus speaking explicitly of his own actions when he said he was willingly drinking of that particular cup (crucifixion and death, and all the Passion in between). Then, when he told us we would have to take up our crosses daily, anyone I know would give a very wide, loose, individualized interpretation of that "cross." Besides the obvious, awful suffering of many in the world for the Gospel (the acknowledged and unacknowledged martyrs ~ there's a rumor in Christian circles that there are more people dying in the world today because of proclaiming Jesus than there were in the first Century, but I don't know if that's fact. It's certainly believable in terms of sheer numbers of the persecuted church in some parts of the world) there are the limitless, inexpressible sacrifices we daily, semi-willingly make.</div><div><br /></div><div>I don't mean simply that the question of taking up suffering seems counter-intuitive, which of course the gospels so often are. The <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">w</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">hy </span>part is answered pretty clearly for any believer, and its motive quite different from the ascetic renunciation of other faith traditions - there's no aspiring to self-purification or perfection here, but instead a million little actions and individual decisions stemming from, at core, being <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">His. </span>Being so consumed with and hungry for that presence that all the other sacrifices and hardships seem as insubstantial and petty as mosquito bites. A love, a longing that is at once both utterly selfish and selfless. And there is no "how do I get there," or at least there is no <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">how</span>. For those who want it badly enough, I think it eventually sort of just happens.</div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-69178842424847162392008-12-11T21:59:00.000-08:002008-12-11T23:14:50.538-08:00Merry something or otherSomething about edging towards the shortest daylight of the year seems to bring out that old, pre-rational, animist self in me. That furtive, creaturely, slightly feral consciousness that tries to paste on tinsel and bright artificial lights and pretend it's real. But deeper down knows that our real selves are scared, small, and just one cold winter's night away from the edge of the cliff. Not to be morbid or anything, but the thought of spending a night in a freaking BARN having a BABY, for goodness sake, spilling blood and amniotic fluid into dirty half-frozen straw, while piling next to stinky sweaty animals for dear warmth, kinda puts me more in touch with how Bitter the cold is, than with Macy's tinseltown parade. Childbirth is not something I've forgotten yet. It was scary enough without throwing in the homelessness and the blasted bitter cold. <div><br /></div><div>I have to admit I'm one of those annoyingly p.c. people who somewhere along the way started saying "happy holidays" instead of "merry christmas." Actually I never thought of it as annoying or particularly p.c. until one of those new reverse p.c. virtual people ( you know, the ones that tell you how everyone else in your demographic thinks but you never actually meet a real person who thinks like that?), told me it was so. Funny, though, in an effort to be inclusive and thoughtful, I seem to be guilty of somehow watering down what I believe. Or so I'm told. Oh well, I guess I better quit this line of thought before sarcasm sucks me in even deeper.<div><br /></div><div>All that sparkles is not snark. I know, I should be arrested for flagrant punning in a non-malaprop zone. My punishment is to go read something uplifting and happy re-gifting. </div><div><br /></div><div>And if it still feels like none of what's going on in the world right now makes any sense at all - you're right! But it's impossible to feel grateful and guilty at the same time (that's my blurb for the day, except it's true), or rather, humbled and bitter don't co-exist well. So I'm trying to focus on the certainty that " . . . in Him there is no darkness at all" and that "He is faithful and just to forgive us . . ." and of course that "whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine you did for me . . ." while reconciling it all with this faltering, fainting flesh of mine that is so painfully afraid of the cold.</div><div><br /></div><div>If I despise anything at all it's the bone-shivering, utter black, miserable COLD of winter. But lately the "hate" part of me seems to be a waste of energy when I have so little to spare. Fitting it is, that becoming a less hating person is no act of virtue at all but a matter of just eventually running out of steam.</div><div><br /></div><div>". . . became flesh and walked among us." Would I follow Him into a homeless shelter tonight, or can I at least sit here and be genuinely grand-spankin' grateful for all that I have? Okay, cheerio. Good night.</div><div><br /></div></div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-8995559886584689702008-10-22T11:41:00.001-07:002008-10-22T12:20:58.478-07:00Eternity?Just made a strange connection about worldview and parenting. I had a lovely conversation with my friend Becky (aka my "Autism/RDI guru") this weekend. Becky goes to our church and homeschools 6 kids including 1 with autism. She's really dedicated to Relationship Development Intervention and has often been my pep-squad and motivator when I'm on the (frequent) verge of giving up. Becky reiterated the RDI mantra: remediating autism in our kids is "a marathon, not a sprint." I kind of thought I understood that, but lately I'm learning about it at a new level . . .<div><br /></div><div>When I see that Vasant still doesn't have the motor control at nearly 9 years old to brush his teeth, or that his 4 year old sister can easily ride her bike faster than him, I don't really wince anymore. He'll get there, eventually. What's sometimes harder is when I see him completely overwhelmed and unable to handle situations that even a toddler or 2 year old can easily negotiate, like how to join in a game of chase or peek-a-boo, that it tears my heart again. Times like that, I'm still tempted to doubt that we've really made any progress at all in these last 4 years. It doesn't always help that I (and to a certain degree, Chris) have been a non-conformist/very early adopter in our therapeutic choices. The fact that we've often gone against the grain of current therapeutic advice in favor of what we believe are/were more promising and ethical alternatives has meant that we often haven't had anyone much (locally, at least) in front of us, as guides.</div><div><br /></div><div>But that just makes it a greater opportunity to rely on God, to put trust in Him ahead of trust in man. Too often my native cynicism about trusting humans bleeds into not trusting anyone, but that keeps changing too. I think God's teaching me/us (slowwwllyyyy . . .) that He is trustworthy EVEN with Vasant's RDI program. The challenge of trust always seems to be in the specifics for me. It's easy to say yeah, I know God loves Vasant and will take care of him; it's harder in the crush of a typical day to know what I can do to make a positive difference without either burning out or overdoing it.</div><div><br /></div><div>So anyway, I was thinking about this long process, and I got to comparing it to just normal parenting stuff, Suniti's adjustment to high school, Sanjay going through some pre-teen stuff, and it struck me again that all parents have to face the limits of their power every day. And that the stuff you want for your kids often isn't going to materialize for 20, 30, even 50 years. </div><div><br /></div><div>And then it hit me - duh! - Christians get Eternity to work on/hope for this stuff . . . wow! What a concept: it doesn't mean I failed if my kids (now whose are they <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">really?</span>) don't learn something I hope they'll learn while I'm alive to see it, or even while they're alive on this Earth. Maybe God's eternal plan for them involves things that totally mitigate the hardships they'll face all their Earthly lives. . . Not that I shouldn't do whatever I can to help Vasant here and now, but maybe it will be <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">okay </span>even if I can't.</div><div><br /></div><div>And then the last thing struck me. Maybe it's the lack of a hoped for Eternity that makes so many (non-believing) parents make what seems like such bizarre choices to me. Of course, maybe I'm the weirdo and they're just doing what seems right, but maybe it's that fear of having to do everything <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">now, </span>in the next 5, 10 or whatever years, in this season of fleeting youth, that makes other parents so frantic about their kids. Not that I'm not just a big scaredy cat too sometimes, but I know there's a wider horizon if I'd just admit it sometimes. How scary, and what unbelievable pressure it must be, to try to raise kids in today's world without knowing there's a bigger back-up plan.</div>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-5274953188653029962008-06-22T00:08:00.000-07:002011-09-28T15:58:15.380-07:00some pomes (yes, that's how they're spelled) in progress"Sacrifice" <br />
<br />
<br />
Did it hurt Adam to wake <br />
from that sleep?<br />
<br />
From his body she was born;<br />
screaming into agony of birth -<br />
flesh from her flesh torn.<br />
<br />
Desire will heal the contagion<br />
<br />
and she will die from this who was<br />
too much loved.<br />
<br />
_____________________________________________________<br />
<br />
"Always" <br />
<br />
<br />
"Never will I forsake you; Never will I leave you."<br />
<br />
he promised.<br />
So why did the happy ending hurt so much?<br />
Goodnight sweet prince<br />
savior, Lord.<br />
<br />
alone at the foot of the cross<br />
blind hands and empty -<br />
he's gone.<br />
<br />
why then does she stay to live<br />
when the sword has pierced her too?<br />
<br />
she would have kissed those feet again<br />
and again with her tears,<br />
or wine to ease the pain<br />
but he refused.<br />
<br />
she would have followed him<br />
though the others<br />
turned away<br />
<br />
so she stays<br />
in the rough sand<br />
scraping out the shape<br />
<br />
of His name.<br />
<br />
<br />
~ apologies to J. K. Rowling <grin></grin>anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-88195466683417833632008-05-27T23:58:00.000-07:002008-05-28T01:07:15.975-07:00Apostasy, Autism, and why we bother to go on in the face of it all.I'm tired of beating my head against this wall. I want something to change for Vasant and for all of us. It doesn't seem we've learned near enough. In my perfect world we'd be Way Better Parents than we are now, and Vasant would get unlimited time and attention, enthusiasm, patience, encouragement. Unconditional love. <br /><br />He would thrive. <br /><br />Instead,he has to endure unfair accusations, cynicism, grumpiness, whining, distractibility and defeatism from the very people who want nothing more than to be able to love him right, just the way he is. But there aren't any other parents here than us, so we have to keep acting like we believe things will get better again, and eventually they will. <br /><br />Maybe. <br />Or not.<br /><br />I think I have faced ugly reality enough - the bloody, self-loathing insomniac face of it - to<br />know that perhaps there's no Cure here. Autism is the permanent, uninvited guest in this house. <br />For a while I struggled with the question of neurodiversity - how much I was/am selfishly trying to "convert" someone who didn't want to be. Really though, the question was never so high-minded and ethical; it was just a carefully sheathed quest for the Power to Heal someone else. In my theology there's supposed to be someone else who does that job, but never mind. I wanted to make Vasant all better. I'm the mom, dammit, what else would I want? But now I've faced the limits of my own power (zero). <br /><br />So what's left now? <br /><br />What does it look like to accept neurodiversity; just what are we trying to accept here?<br />There's horrible, wretched, made-for-TV autism, and then there's the day-to-day, not so bad, almost cute autism, and I've seen them both in Vasant. I've seen the "tampered with" (judiciously therapied and remediating) Vasant. He is still CLEARLY on the spectrum; no one's gonna say we were guilty of selfishly taking away his autism. But that Vasant is also happy, funny, strange, angelic, amazing, connected, and alive. The Vasant we're seeing right now is mostly angry, scared, wildly dysregulated, violent, chronically struggling and overwhelmed. <br /><br />He's suffering. <br /><br />It sucks and I don't want it to be this way. I don't want us to be like this. Here's the take home lesson:<br /><br /> Autism + hopeful LOVING remediation = weird, delightful, heart-wrenching, occasionally pass for "normal" but never taken for granted (I wouldn't have it any other way - talk about Unconventional . . .)<br /><br /> Autism + anger/fearful control = exhaustion, misery, despair, lost and abandoned kids, weary confused parents pasting on the "life-*#%&-sucks-but-we're-too-proud-to-say-it" face. <br /><br />Maybe I just needed to get back to appreciating what we have.anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-87529764790285408392008-05-12T08:04:00.000-07:002008-05-12T08:08:33.546-07:00Dave's comments on Pastor WrightIn general I don't like talking about other people's opinions on in the news kind of stuff because the swarm of commentary still leaves me with that kinda queasy love-hate recovering politico yuckiness. But I think Pastor Dave's comments on Pastor Wright were dead on, especially his insistence that at core this is NOT about politics but about the Body of Christ. <br /><br />Read them at Dave's blog "what I meant to say" here on Blogspot.anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-82174124654542630022008-03-09T13:57:00.000-07:002008-03-09T14:57:41.279-07:00slogans for the sickEverything hurts.<br />Sounds, lights, people talking, thinking, moving, standing, turning, listening, it's all just pain.<br />A hot, soaky tub-bath is all that makes life bearable. Now one should ever have to leave tub-world. <br />TV hurts. Bad TV is pure torture.<br />"Lost" is okay though - Hurley is all the therapy you really need in life.<br />The Wildcats really need a winning streak into the tourney so I can have one stinkin' reason to get out of bed for the next miserable month.<br />Boo-hoo. Leave me alone, I'm sick. <br />Go away.<br /><br />I've been sick the last several weeks and just now hopefully starting to let up. It began with a nasty sore throat and unrelenting hacking cough and mild fever back around Valentine's day. The fever and sore throat passed but the cough lingered for weeks, along with the fun, fun accompanying toss-and-turning sleepless nights on the futon in the office, trying not to keep the spouse awake. "The Cough" became one of our family's love languages, lots of rounds of serial coughing in stereo, everywhere you turn.<br /><br />Then there were just a few days in early March when it seemed like the coug had decided to leave us and move on elsewhere. Oh, cruel illusion of health, that was merely an excuse to ignore the underlying tiredness, inertia, lethargy, and creeping Blah-ness all around. Or, I can be resisting, fighting and denying my own symptoms for only so long before they become "real" by manifesting in someone else. So, soon enough, the low ebb (the "chicken of despair?") was overfilled with other family members' more obvious yuckiness. Vasant came home vomiting last Saturday and spent the next several days completely wordless and motionless on the couch, under blankets with Sprite and NogginTV for company. Kavita joined him with fever and general misery (thankfully minus the tummy-sick) for the rest of the week. Then Sanjay got it for a couple of days and retreated to his bedroom lair, but was able to fight it off to go to a friend's party yesterday.<br /><br />So I've had to succumb to it this week. Fever, aches and pains, nausea, incessant cough and sinus headache. Garden variety yuck. I went to the doctor, which I hate, and got an Rx for antibiotics. Then the snowstorm hit before we could get it filled (11" of snow - a record for us in March - really beautiful to look at but it was a level 3 emergency and even the malls and churches closed down Saturday) so I'm still making do on the otc stuff. The doctor said she's seen people down with this bug for as long as 2 months. Yay. <br /><br />It was kind of peaceful on Saturday just to sit and watch the snow accumulate, and know we didn't have to rush out to "be somewhere" because everywhere was closed down too. Snow is really yummy, only closely followed by icicles. Have you ever eaten them directly off a beautiful, brittle-glazed tree? I had never done that - it's surprisingly more cool and refreshing than just drinking water or even crunching ice cubes from a regular freezer. That undefinable, stars-twinkling, winter night magic, I guess. Something you just can't capture with home electronics. <br /><br />It's been a most unexpected coda to the winter we thought was edging out. So maybe I'll be not-sick next time I post. But one thing's changed for sure - I have had it with being super-efficient and functional. Efficiency is an annoying illusion - just what am I trying to be so darn effective at? The kids are as adequate as they need to be, my life may be lame and boring but no more so than anyone else's. So what's the point of working so hard fighting to change stuff that never changes, just to end up hiding on the couch whining? Insert saying of Solomon here: <br /><br /> "Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done<br /> and what I had toiled to achieve,<br /> everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind;<br /> nothing was gained under the sun."<br /> (Ecclesiastes 2:11)<br /><br />I love Ecclesiastes. Best thing in the world for one's moments, days, seasons of cynicism and despair. Or as one of friends says: I may not be very happy today but by gosh I'm going to enjoy the hell out of this depression. Despair is not = depression. Crucial point. I have suffered both in my years of crawling along planet earth, and depression is a positive walk in the park compared to despair. Despair as a momentary passing emotion, sure we can all live with, but as an end-state it's somewhere I don't ever want to go again. Depression, on the other hand, in its mild-to-middling range anyway, can be that comfortable old grey sweater you keep sliding into that everyone else thinks is dog-ugly and why do you keep it around, but you just feel so Yourself and comfortable almost in it. It's that slight wintry moroseness, the welcome sigh. . . of being able to accept finally your own anti-socialness. Just go away and let me suffer, people, I'd much rather be alone with my kleenex and herb tea than pretending to like listening to you all.<br /><br />I can handle depression. It's old hat. Occaisonal life-hating bleariness, who doesn't enjoy that? Curmudgeonliness is one of the consolations of middle-age, is it not? Just a nice middle-class luxury we should all be lucky enough to indulge in from time to time, to sit around, sneer at the TV and kvetch, before we pull on our boots and go shovel the drive. It's only when the depression veers into true despair, when all hope is gone, when you know that your only chance for joy is over and done and the suicidal thoughts become a waking, constant obsession - your own little secret - that you've entered the isolation zone from which is no escape minus a miracle.<br /><br />I'm not there.<br /><br />So everyone just go away, I'm sick. Nyah, nyah.anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082716731027135555.post-34954705193049577942008-02-12T22:09:00.000-08:002008-02-13T01:11:19.536-08:00not ready for thisI think, finally at age 40, I'm getting some peace with the idea that life will never be easy, that I'll never feel like a grown up (straight from pediatric to geriatric with no pause for proper adulthood in between), and that uniqueness is neither blessing nor curse but just the condition of life.<br /><br />It'll never be easy. Just how will it be not easy then? Not easy as in, full of challenges and opportunities and too much stress, too many responsibilities, not enough downtime and fun, not enough friendship love and dreams we dare? Well, not really that. Nothing as nameable, quantifiable, identifiable as that.<br /><br />More, why why why? Not even why me (other than the usual stark staring amazement bordering on ridiculousness that I'm so blessed and lucky when so many others have such horrendous burdens to bear). If the unfairness of life (i.e. why do I get so many toys when others don't even get to eat today?) has always been a backwards glance into the abyss, then at least as a supposed follower of Jesus I might trust someone else to have the answer. Not that I have the answer, of course, or would ever even be capable of understanding it, but simply that I have no other choice than either insanity or trusting that the master has his reasons and that "there is no darkness in him."<br /><br />But I won't let this devolve into a theological reminder because it's too easy to let that become an anesthetic. I'm not supposed to be completely comfortable with the level of suffering in the world, but I'm useless if I think of nothing else but that suffering. When I was younger I believed there was no other option but either continual torment or anesthesia. Anesthesia won, for a minute, then it too dissipated. When the 7 demons rushed in to take its place, they were of my own creation and no one else's fault, with not even the consolation of being able to kid myself I was someone who "cared too much." Right.<br /><br />Sometimes it almost offends me how easy it is to step out of that vicious circle: awareness of suffering/injustice> pain > anesthesia/cynicism > anesthesia fails > awareness . . . It seems insultingly simple that the solution/escape is just to take action, do something to help alleviate suffering in some way, relieve another's pain and in that small moment be fully turned towards the light rather than the ever present darkness. "Small things done with great love will change the world" is true but I only half understood it. I always had to keep the illusion going that my little part was going to make "a big difference" because I couldn't bear to face how insubstantial it seemed in light of the world's huge problems. I couldn't face how tiny my part was because as long as I was trying to come up with the "great love" in and of myself I was doomed to disillusionment. I'm supposed to do the small things, which I sometimes get a little joy from, but the "great love" comes from the fisherman and it's pure volcanic grace for anyone in its path.<br /><br />Finally, at this ridiculously late age, I'm beginning to see another side to the story. Before, I always mistrusted the ease of the action solution (not "easy" as long as I'm a foolish selfish mortal, but "simple") because at the back of my mind was always the "knowledge" that the darkness still remained essentially unchanged. My drop in the bucket, in the end, only momentarily relieved my own conscience but did little tangibly towards the lump sum of suffering in the world. Bucket-head that I am, it took this long to really get that my perception is faulty, that I've never understood the whole picture, and who the heck am I to think I have an "objective" assessment of the good/bad breakdown of the world? Who gave me the scales of justice, where light and darkness hang in the balance, that I could accurately assess whether or not there is any hope?<br /><br />Someone had to remind me that truth/reality did not reside inside anjoo's head, at a moment (just a micro-nano-giga-second, really) that I was beaten down enough to lay down my existential arrogance. Many someone's had to remind me it was part of a larger plan, and that no, I really didn't need to see it and wouldn't even possibly understand it even if I could. But then they patted me reassuringly on the head and for once I was sheepish enough to be relieved at having the burden of figuring it all out lifted from me. And you know me folks - that's not a burden I give up lightly! And for that split-instant there was safety and certainty and light, and it was good. And whether or not I wanted to there was no going back because the adventure was on, but it's still never been easy. It's still a daily choice, and sometimes a terrifying one.<br /><br />But maybe I just like it that way. Some of us maybe, you know, kinda feel more at home in the grey than in full light. And please don't go quoting John at me - yes I *know* that "if we walk in the light as He is in the light" etc. etc. But now I'm telling you that this is a place head-knowledge theology doesn't quite reach. Grace, and action, are all that work to wrench out the comfortable half-darkness and replace it with a purer light. The action of helping another and stepping out of myself; the miracle of grace that somehow things only ever makes sense when I stop looking at them head on. And maybe it's not so terrifying at all, but I don't think I could trust a god that is entirely mundane, "nice," and ultimately forgettable.<br /><br />I need/want/hunger to be reminded that the master is Universe-shaking-Big, and yet full of grace; more splendid and unimaginable than anything I've ever met, yet a presence that is familiar with everything I've ever experienced; fully knowing, as yet unknown; that complete satisfaction of all my mystical "seeking," yet a profundity and depth of love as makes the very seeking seem childish and superficial. And the grace that loves me even though I am childish and superficial, because it's not even about ME and MY shortcomings at all really, is it?<br /><br />Now, where was I going with all that . . ? Oh yeah, just coming back to some of the reasons I've finally, reluctantly, decided to give up my (false) modesty and take up the blog after all, after years of self-doubt. Always at the back of mind I've been chastised by the awareness of how annoying are the jabbering me me me voices of our self-obsessed culture (there, don't you love me when I'm pure misanthropy?), and embarrassed most of all to reveal that I'm one of them too. Yeah, I'm terrified of Myspace and all that because I might like it too much! There, I said it - I'm just as exhibitionist (or not) as every other blogger out there. I am one of you. I come in peace. <grin>. Like every other lonely small-w writer soul out there, afraid of revealing my own inner triviality carefully disguised as "depth."<br /><br />And, perhaps to better purpose, always challenged by C.S. Lewis' reminder that the great work of the Christian artist is not to use individual identity as a way to draw attention to our limited little ego-selves, but to use our uniqueness to reveal yet one more facet of our creator's limitless beauty. Not to draw ostentatious attention to OUR SPECIAL CHAIR in the theater, but quietly to invite others to come sit in that chair so that they too could see the wonders we see from this angle/slant of the light, that they might enjoy his beauty even more.<br /><br />I had it backwards. I thought I had to become unselfish or "good" enough to want to do something that I didn't really want to do, like a bitter medicine I was supposed to pretend to enjoy. I thought I had to give up my right to draw attention to me me me (which I really like to do, in case you hadn't noticed!), in order to write something theologically safe, sanitized, "glorifying," and ultimately completely false. I was afraid I would be unsatisfied, unconvinced and unconvincing. Now what kind of "testimony" would that be? I thought I would have to give up the good stuff, without anything really better in return. Sure, I understood intellectually that heaven/the kingdom of God/the new abundant life/Spirit-filledness/Jesus would be "even better by far" than the little goodies that really weren't that great any more anyway, but only intellectually. And too ashamed to admit I was struggling, I hid the struggle, walked away from my passions, denied myself the dream.<br /><br />I never believed myself up to the task of creating art that was real and raw and personal and relevant and really could touch someone else, and still be whole-heartedly following Jesus. I always thought, I'm too selfish, too trivial, too jaded, too proud, I have nothing new to say. Poetry doesn't count, it doesn't feed any mouths, if I were a real writer I'd write fiction not poetry, not this hyper-personal rambling inner monologue (but really it was always a dialogue wasn't it? Because I was looking for YOU, wherever you are . . .), all the standard accusations and maybe even a few original ones too. Because of that doubt and fear, self-condemnation and generic misanthropy (fun when you're 20, soul-sucking decades later), I gave up writing, painting, listening to the ache of musical transcendence. I threw away my one-of-a-kind LP's or masochistically let the kids destroy them, gave away my punk rock uniform (the sleeves with Joe Strummer's autograph, man!).<br /><br />I swore I would never write another poem, never get published again, never create another beauty-craving, insomniac, multi-media piece, if that was what was separating me from God. I was willing in that moment to let it go forever, cause I needed him so bad. If I thought at all, it was that it would be a forever trade-off. And now maybe the ground has shifted. Maybe God wants to give some of this dream back to me now, but it so scary when possibilities long dormant open up again. At this absurdly late age - I'm way too old to be a cool person anymore. Now it's only gonna be about the art and not a thing else, not just looking like a poet or living like one (self-destructing like one . . . tried that, highly over-rated).<br /><br />Anyway, it's not really up to me, is it? If the character defects remain, even at this late date, 20 years after my alleged expiration, then it's not really my place to mess around obsessing about them. Just get on and do life, as messy as it is. The wonderful secret (really, it's such a delicious relief I could laugh) is that by age 40 you don't have to try to become less selfish and self-centered and become the kind of "good" person who really loves god more than themselves. If you live this long with even one brain cell left you've doubtless realized the limits of your own tired old story - we're just not ALL THAT entertaining, in the end. It's no major stretch now, having assessed the parameters of my own "fascinating" ego, to say that the master is way more beautiful, brilliant, limitless, fiery, passionate, pure, intoxicating, breath-taking and infinite than anything I could ever come up with. Why wouldn't I want to throw my lot in with him? It's not about being good, or giving up rock and roll and all that.<br /><br />It's simply that he is so much better than all that. I don't have to "become a better person." I just have to keep looking at the most beautiful creature in the universe, and maybe sometimes some art will even happen, so someone else can sit in my little chair for a minute if they want to.<br /><br />So here I go again.<br /><br />I'll never be ready for this, but that's no reason not to try.anjooBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10270719802841096791noreply@blogger.com0