Accepting the gifts of the day
We were invited to a pancake breakfast this morning and so as soon as Tin rolled out of bed, we rolled over to our friends’ house toting a fruit salad of fresh apricots and blackberries. While Tin jumped on the trampoline with the kids, I sat in the kitchen and talked about re-evaluation counseling with my friends who have been into it for over two decades. I listened with rapt fascination because I had never heard of this effort or group.
My friend told me it is a community that nurtures being heard and how to listen, as well, it is a group interested in social change by processing hurt and fostering healing – the subject could pertain to woman’s issues, it could be racism, or any cause or individual in need of being heard. On the topic of racism, my friend was saying they found that white parents who wished to speak to their children about racism found it impossible to even broach the subject. Because we as a people have a history of not feeling – don’t cry, don’t be angry, don’t be sad – we’re taught from early on feelings are bad and so when white parents feel so badly about our racist history they don’t speak to their children, to keep them insulated from hurt, sadness, guilt and anger.
Our pancake playdate started earlier than planned because my friends had learned their minister was leaving the Unitarian Church and her last sermon was going to be at 10:30. So while we were enjoying each other’s company and our conversation, when it was time to leave we were all rushing and on a whim, they invited Tin and I to come with them to church – so off we all went rushing to get there, hoping not to miss the minister’s talk.
The kids were deposited in the kid’s group and we walked in and sat down near the front as the minister began reciting a poem by Elizabeth Bishop:
One Art
The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster,
Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.
I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.
– Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like a disaster.
Then she described her wishes for the church she was leaving and for the congregation. Finally, her husband (I later learned) sat at the piano and played John Lennon’s Let It Be while the minister sat with him, facing the opposite direction and wiping her tears.
My friend wrote a note and passed it to me, “More than you bargained for today, eh?” And I told them both afterwards it was a message that was actually quite on point as I have found closure in my life lately on many big topics – the LaLa, Steve, my mom, along with many decisions I have made that seemingly had led me astray but actually urged me towards a rich journey of growth. It all looked like a disaster. Yes, at first sight, it/I seemed like a disaster.
I came home to a friend’s email that was a reprint from a blog whose tag is the world will be free by women who are free:
As women, we have 2 choices: feel or go numb. When you’re numb, your relationships are shallow and your ambitions lack deep meaning. You can cross things off your To Do list, but when you’re not working, you’ll reach to every possible distraction you can (food, television, gossip and alcohol) to keep the feelings at bay. When you’re numb, you’re alive, but not living.
My journey since the 2005 Federal Flood has been a lonely one at times because I have chosen to not medicate, to not become an alcoholic, to try to not smoke, to give up pills that take the edge off, and to throw myself into the vast cauldron of emotions that have sent me to my knees more times than I care to admit. But I can tell you today, resoundingly, I’m not numb.
It’s two o’clock in the afternoon and the gifts I have received on this beautiful Sunday are already too numerous to list, but wait there’s one more, as it seems there always is when your cup runneth over – my dear friend in Boston (who I get to see very soon) emailed me that I should get this book, which I am adding to my reading list and will purchase sometime after the packing and moving is over.
My friend said the book is right up my alley – and I say it is the right book on the right day in the right life – watch the author speak here on numbness and vulnerability and connection: