Wonder

I’m not sure how to live in a world where kindness is a real possibility. Where gentle things can be protected, nurtured and grown. Where hardness can soften. I’m not sure how to live in a world where winds pick up flags and curly hair, where little girls walk into coffee shops in leotards, and old ladies wear overalls. Where bread rises with yeast and warmth, where people extend friendship and genuine smiles.

I’m not sure how to live in a world where Christ walked. The immovable point… in a stable. The Prince of Peace with a crown of thorns.

Where two trees with separate root systems can grow together, so close that the bark changes and becomes one tree. I saw this once. I felt the bark and it was not just interlaced; the trees had given into one another.

I put my head down on my book a few moments ago after reading about Russian princes ousting the Mongols. It is a history book but I’m too overwhelmed by the romance of it all. And I prayed, because I have to teach tomorrow and that means I cannot just sit here and imagine khans and princes fighting for Russia. And I cannot say every “Ferdinand” and “Isabella” out loud and be shocked by language and by my own tongue.

I love this world, this world of goose bumps (the hairs on my arms react to a touching story… what is THAT about?!) and pinstripes and white wicker porch furniture. Of delightful friends who teach me things. Of the Still Point (Triune, Steady, Good) that makes this dance possible. I know I love this world, but I’m not sure I know how to live.

Cemeteries and Somber Thanks

Tonight I watched the sun bow for the day. "I've finished a day," she said. "I rose this morning and bid the moon good day and goodbye. I stayed high at noon and came back for a brief magic hour after hiding underneath a cloud blanket."  I watched her bow from a cemetery where I felt small and insignificant and modestly grateful. She played her part. Have I played mine?

Learning

My boss, who will not like it one bit that I called him my boss, encouraged me to blog about things I am learning at school. I think this is a very good idea, but I am learning so much that the challenge overwhelms me. Should I tell you about Edward II or Alexander Hamilton? Shall we talk about commas, early American poetry, Transcendentalism? Or the pope! And really what he meant was pedagogy. Do I tell you how humbling it was to learn that I was scaring the students in writing? How exciting it was when my eighth graders identified trochaic octameter in a poem? And LIKED it?! No...

You get the idea. I sit still, the world leaps and flies around me. Again I woke struck with the urge to stop it all. To find the world's pause button (I'll bet it's somewhere so sneaky no one would guess it. I'll bet it's under the bleachers of a tiny high school in Kearney, Nebraska or maybe under  your chair. Everyone check right now just to be sure). I would press pause and then walk around for a year or so. Mostly I would put my hand to the cheeks of people frozen in their tracks. I would push their hair behind their ears, make the sign of the cross on their foreheads and bless them. They are sacred. I would flip through my student's writing journals (which I am allowed to read) and try to understand what they think about their writing. I would pick up trash from empty streets and put all the grocery carts back into their lines so that when I hit the play button again the boys who collect them (they do seem to always be boys) would wake surprised. Other than that I wouldn't move too many things. I would touch everything though, and I would turn all the radio stations to the same channel, and figure out how to play Allegri's Miserere when everyone woke back up. And we would have a holy moment, and I would die for joy.

I think I might leave someone else un-paused too, so that we could look and cry and pray together. This is what I learned this week. I need people so much. This is not co-dependence; it is human. God said, "It is not good for man to be alone." I work with people who give me room to breathe and grow and teach and love my students. This week I scheduled something wrong and my boss, without a moments hesitation or condemnation, picked up what I dropped. And a mentor teacher gave up his lunch to patiently walk me through something I should understand. Tonight I sit alone in a coffee shop, so happy to be here reflecting, but even more happy that next week I'll be able to see all of them.

I also moved this week. My roommate, who I mentioned in an earlier post, left a bit suddenly and I could not find a roommate. So I broke my lease, put my stuff in storage (again), and I moved in with people so precious I am scared to write about them. Last night we smoked Cuban cigars and talked about pilgrimage. Every morning one housemate and I hug before we speak. I can't believe I get to live there.

I learned many other things this week, but mostly I learned I need people. And I'm so blessed to have them.