When the cavalry comes...

You've Got A Lot of Heart.

I realized this week that I had never really told you about the weekend Holly and I were able to spend in Denver a few months ago. We flew up there on a Friday, but just barely. Our friends Randy and Kaye were scheduled to pick our boys up after school and get them to ballgames and practices over the weekend. Our flight was scheduled to leave around 2:30 pm. We received a call at noon that Randy had fallen off the roof while hanging Christmas lights at Holly's office. He was in the emergency department with a broken hip and broken back. Kaye was with him and he seemed stable, but was being evaluated and would need surgery.

Holly and I finished packing, and then called and texted a "backup sitter" and teammates' parents to help with transportation. Jacqui graciously agreed to keep all of our boys for the weekend and we made it to the airport only to realize in the excitement Holly had left her driver's license in the house. We somehow made it through security and Holly called her business manager who made it from their office to our house and to the airport in record time to deliver the license to Holly before Southwest closed the door. 

We made it to Denver and drove to a suburb that evening to see the Killers play that night. As per tradition, I tried to make it in with the "big lens" and was sent back to the car. We had plenty of time so I wasn't too bothered. I then took the regular lens in and we saw a great show. My backup camera was great until the battery died. Holly had her new iPhone and I used it to take a video. It is pretty amazing considering it was on a phone...

I got a few good pictures and many not so good, just enough for a slideshow. Actually it is just an excuse to have you hear the song. The song is Be Still from their new album. They didn't play it at the concert, but I have listened to it quite a bit. It is a song Brandon wrote (I think) as a lullaby for his three boys. I can't listen to it without getting a lump in my throat, and thought you would feel the same way.

Be still
And go on to bed
Nobody knows what lies ahead
And life is short
To say the least
We're in the belly of the beast

Be still
Wild and young
Long may your innocence reign
Like shells on the shore
And may your limits be unknown
And may your efforts be your own
If you ever feel you can't take it anymore

Don't break character
You've got a lot of heart
Is this real or just a dream?
Rise up like the sun
Labor till the work is done

Be still
One day you'll leave
Fearlessness on your sleeve
When you've come back, tell me what did you see
What did you see
Was there something out there for me?

Be still
Close your eyes
Soon enough you'll be on your own
Steady and straight
And if they drag you through the mud
It doesn't change what's in your blood
(Over chains)
When they knock you down

Don't break character
You've got a lot of heart
Is this real or just a dream?
Be still
Be still
Be still
Be still

Over rock and chain
Over sunset plain
Over trap and snare
When you're in too deep
In your wildest dream
In your made up scheme
When they knock you down
When they knock you down

Don't break character
You've got sooooo much heart
Is this real or just a dream?
Oh Rise up like the sun
And labor till the work is done
Rise up like the sun
Labor till the work is

Rise up like the sun
And labor till the work is done

Where I Am Folded

Hey brother, I am sitting with this Rilke poem and it moves me in ways that music does.  I can't articulate the stirrings but still I am stirred. 

Your friendship continues to be a place in this world that echoes these stirrings and because of that I am not alone. I am connected, still tiny but near. I love you.

Matt

I am too alone in the world, and not alone enough
to make every minute holy.
I am too tiny in this world, and not tiny enough
just to lie before you like a thing,
shrewd and secretive.
I want my own will, and I want simply to be with my will,
as it goes toward action,
and in the silent, sometimes hardly moving times
when something is coming near,
I want to be with those who know secret things
or else alone.
I want to be a mirror for your whole body,
and I never want to be blind, or to be too old
to hold up your heavy and swaying picture.
I want to unfold.
I don't want to stay folded anywhere,
because where I am folded, there I am a lie.
And I want my grasp of things
true before you. I want to describe myself
like a painting that I looked at
closely for a long time,
like a saying that I finally understood,
like the pitcher I use every day,
like the face of my mother,
like a ship
that took me safely
through the wildest storm of all.

International Conference on Inflammation of the Eye

Above the hotel gate, I saw a sign: “International Conference on Inflammation of the Eye” for those who have cried too much or not cried enough. All of them with name tags on their lapels

like temporary nameplates in a cemetery or markers

in a botanical garden.

They approach one another as if sniffing, as if checking, Who are you where are you from and when

was the last time you cried.

The subject of the morning session is “Sobbing:

The end of Crying or the Way It Begins.” Sobbing

as soul-stuttering and griefstones. Sobbing

as a valve or a loop that links cry to cry,

a loop that unravels easily, like a hair ribbon,

and the crying—hair that fans out in profusion, glorious. Or a loop that pulls into an impossible knot— sobbing like an oath, a testimony, a cure.

Back in their cubicles, the women translators are busy translating fate to fate, cry to cry. At night they come home, scrub the words from their lips, and with sobs of happiness they start loving, their eyes aflame with joy.

Yehuda Amichai (2000, p. 147)

This speaks to a dynamic in our friendship I don't know how to articulate but is there and present.

I love you brother.

Seventeen Days

It's 10:02 pm, and the tears keep coming. I haven't seen so many tears in our house since The Russell's moved to England. I actually thought we had made it to the end. We took the Haggard boys to dinner, because we wanted to have some company. Holly fell asleep after telling the kids goodnight, and I sat with them in the Colonel's room talking about our favorite times with Paul and David, and about the chances that we may see the little rascals again. The hope that we may someday connect again seemed to dull the ache enough for all of them, and they fell asleep.

So I snuck out of the room and decided to grab some cereal, as I had passed on hot dogs at Wienerschnitzel. I opened the fridge to grab some milk and saw this...

Clayton had decided, evidently, on returning from the airport, to write their names on a Sunny D (Paul's drink of choice) and on the jug of chocolate milk (David's favorite). He must have thought this would be a way of keeping them with us in their absence, at least until the drinks were finished (or the milk spoiled). Seeing the bottles was enough to make me hear their Korean accents as they each would ask for their drink... and this in turn was enough to turn on my tears again.

Two or three times today I have thought of Jon Foreman's words in Switchfoot's song, Yet, "If it doesn't break your heart it isn't love". We have five broken hearts in this house tonight. Thankfully, these little guys we quickly grew to love are just off on the next leg of their journey, and then they go home to their families. But our hearts hurt none the less. The crazy thing is a few years ago I would never have even let myself think it possible to love someone in less than three weeks. As a matter of fact, a few years ago, I would have made a logical reason in my head why we shouldn't host two South Korean boys for seventeen days.

My tears tonight, as you already know, come from many places. They come from a place of love and pride watching my boys welcome these guys in and then love (and play, and share, and fight) with them like brothers. They come from a renewed love for my wife watching her mother two more boys with her whole, beautiful heart. They come from an ache that says these days are fleeting, and that these seventeen days with these guys (that passed like a blink) are a clear metaphor for the years I get (God willing) with my own guys before my heart is broken again and again, and again. They also come from a nagging voice that tells me I wasted some time, grew grumpy and tired, got selfish and controlling, and let some magic slip away not quite realizing it until it was too late. And lastly, they come from a place that is just a mystery. They are tears that somehow, in all of this fragile, messy, beautiful thing called life... just cannot be held back.

The Hardest Part

"This is the hardest part" he said, his chest repressing a heave as he looks at me.  He is a mix of fear, courage, inevitability and reluctance, and then he turns and we began the final ritual of the morning.  He walks towards through the courtyard, I move to the farthest point so that when he turns for the last time before he disappears into a world I have little to do with, he can turn, our eyes meet.  Mine reassuring him, his holding back the tears, mustering up the courage for the next 5 steps, the next 10 minuets, maybe the next 10 years. When I finally walk through the pack of the other parents my own tears flow.  I am unable and unwilling to stop them.

I think he is right, the hardest part is always letting go of the safety of connection and stepping into a place that is contingent, volatile, evaluative. Surrender.   You don't know if what you are letting go of and turning from is actually "in you" or only resident in the relationship you turn from.   I want to shout to him "It's in you!" I think in various ways I have been saying this to him since I held him in my arms in Guatemala City.  I understand in my 40's through you, my mom,  Ted, meditation, the Holy Spirit that it is in fact 'in me'.  But it does not make the turn away and towards any easier in the actual event of turning (I remember sitting on my porch saying goodbye to you).  Today I am learning how to trust the turn.  There is a joy and pain attached to it all - and in these events I can see the beauty.

Our time together over the holiday was wonderful and I feel so lucky to be my kid's dad, to be married to Michele.  My boys are growing with a wide eyed wonder, a creativity and strength and interest that is beautiful and deep.  Their relationships are becoming friendships and they have a lifeworld that is particular to each of them but collectively in communion.  It's all so fragile, it's all so beautiful.   

O Come O Come

It aint all there yet and it's a rough draft but it's what I have at 7:01 on Saturday night.  I love you and miss you and thank you for singing your song next to me, helping me listen to the song of God.

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

Third Week in Advent 2012

St. Edwards King and Martyr  

In more ways than one we are waiting in darkness.  Isaiah prophesied Jesus’ birth by saying, “the people in darkness have seen a great light”.  Darkness is a reality and the biblical witness seems to be clear that it is a reality that we live within, it won’t disappear.  It never is fully uprooted or routed this side of eternity.  But the gospel speaks of another reality and offers us something which is more subtle and helpful:  “the light shines in the darkness and the darkness will not overcome it, master it, put it out (Jn 1).   This is the circumstance of our existence, this tension of light and darkness is the paradox of our life, the mystery of faith that we all live into.   (RR 12/12/12)

There is an aching and a longing that is expressed today in these Antiphon’s that echo in us a longing that is ancient and aged.   An expression that uncovers our hidden longings - longings that we learn to mute, suppress and manage as children early on,  longings that get socially formed to become more acceptable and less ‘needy‘.   But in these songs that we sing this morning, in the Antiphons and particularly in Malcolm’s poems (as I have lived with them this season) - the human stuff of desire, frustration, resolve, longing, fear, desperation and prayer are held together, within a harmony of our humanity.  I sat in this very sanctuary alone this week and maybe it was my imagination that I let roam, but I swear to you I could hear 800 years of people gathered in this site under this roof - protestant and catholic,  monks and tanners, intellectuals and alcoholics (some of them occupying the same category no doubt), workers and homeless, emigrants and royalty whispering, chantings, singing this central refrain, not only of this season, but of all humanity that comes out of the darkness:  O Come, O Come Emmanuel.  Come. 

This is a song for a people with their backs against the wall, who have run out of options who are powerless and position-less.  Who have used up their resources, who have had resources taken.  O come o come emmanuel.  It is the cry of the victim who longs for a restored innocence and a different future, it is the cry of the perpetrator who cannot unweave the heartache and misery of the past.   It is a cry that emerges from the streets of Syria, in front of the wailing wall and behind the wall in Gaza.  It can be heard in alleys and corners where addicts buy their vials before slipping into oblivion and in the boardrooms of multinationals strategizing how to balance their future - all of our futures- on the head of an ethical mirage called the ‘letter of the law’.  It is the cry of the spouse who cannot turn back time, the prisoner serving a sentence where all he has is time.  It is the cry of the  destitute, anxious and afraid who feel the powers of the State pressed against the soft neck of the oppressed. It is seen within faces of children on every continent who need food, who are conscripted for war, whose groans are “too deep for words”.  It is the unspeakable mourning that that comes from NewTown Connecticut.  It is a for a people with their backs against the wall.  O come o come Emmanuel.

And the cry to this one called “emmanuel” is a breath prayer to the one who “makes a womb of all this wounded world” who creates a “tiny hope within our hopelessness”( and sometimes that is all you need is a tiny bit of hope to tie a knot around your rope).  It is the cry of the withered and rootless who long for life to be rooted within.   And Emmanuel is the name we give the movement of God, when God is present where we least expect him but most need him most.  This cosmic movement that includes into the life of God every dark alley, every tenebrous night, every god-forsaken experience.  This light that the darkness cannot master.  This God who is love all the way down, down into the depth of humanities darkness, down into our frailty, our broken systems and institutions.  When we are reduced to a pool of tears and our fears like black birds circle overhead.  It is this God, who put on flesh and moved into the darkness. Emmanuel, God with us, God for us, God not abandoning us.  

And in this movement, it is the very voice of God who takes up this song and begins to sing it back to his creation, like the call and response in an african-american church.  We sing O come, O come Emmanuel and the life of God answers back to us,   O come o come. The life of God answers back:   Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden, all you who are vulnerable, who mourn the loss of all that the earth has snatched away, all you who are broken down, disheartened, humiliated and overwhelmed Come unto me and I will give you rest.   

Come, if there is anyone here this morning who cannot see the "Wisdom" of it all, someone who is unable to make sense of his situation, some Willy Loman who cries, "The trouble with Willy is that he does not know who he is," someone who understands many things a little but nothing enough to live on, someone for whom "the most High" is so high as to be out of reach.  Come.

Come you who feel trapped, captive to some slavish Egypt who is afraid  of the desolation that is ahead, the sea of obligation that threatens to overwhelm, who sees no one to lead you through the barren debacle of your circumstances. Desert everywhere.  Someone who wonders if they are delusional or stupid to keep facing the way of faith.  Come. 

Come, the Spirit of God might say, to the one  for whom this hectic life is a killing pace, someone who is left sighing, “I am just dead”, or “I feel like the devil, or I feel like hell”-- and for whom these are not mere figures of speech, but the very symptoms of Satan's tyranny, the depths of hell and the grave.  One for whom anxiety, desperation and compulsion feels like a dark and constant companion.  Come.

Come to those who feel outcast and for whom all the doors to home have seemed to close, someone who has lost the key to life, who feels on the outside looking in. Come. 

O Come those whose shadows compel them to practice their pleasure only under the cover of darkness - who themselves feel dark and desolate  through and through.  Those whose foundations have been shaken, or cannot find a firm footing because of a broken home or a failed opportunity or frail mental health, if there is someone who longs for something more solid than her own feet of clay, Come the spirit of God would say.  

This God who is love all the way down, has come near and in this place we can bring our inconsolable longings, these memories we cannot make sense of, redeem or use to push ourselves into a preferred future.  To this one born of blood, this fellow-sufferer who has descended to our depths.  Come.

Advent holds a deep paradox for us.  It holds the paradox of the One coming - not yet fully here - and yet with us from the beginning of time. And this call and response into the life of God and the life of God back to us is to produce something other than a depressed or ‘weak-kneed’ Christianity.  We are to take Luke seriously when he says “lift up your heads” “raise your heads” because Advent creates new men and women.  We who are exposed and defenseless, we who grieve into the fathomless depths are to look up, positions ourselves and our songs of lament towards the one who sings over, in through and with humanity. Could this be how reconciliation begins?   Does it begin in fathomless grief and longing, with our backs against the wall ? Do our actions to bring justice to the nations, to not shout or break a bruised reed, to not snuff out a smoldering wick, to not grow discouraged until we establish justice, to hold Gods hand and be God’s promise, to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison, to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness (Is. 42), do these actions constitute the raising of our heads, do they embody the very song we sing today.  

O Come O Come Emmanuel

This is the paradox of advent - this call and response, this tension that is held within our humanity made possible by His.  And the reality that we are Christ’s coming now, this advent and again and again and again and again beyond time’s end.  Amen.

Create a Clearing

Clearing
by Martha Postlewaite

Do not try to save
the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create
a clearing
in the dense forest
of your life
and wait there
patiently,
until the song
that is your life
falls into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself
to this world
so worth of rescue.

I know that this poem is a bit romantic when it comes to the way life unfolds, the decisions we make, the ones we are afraid to make, the ones made for us.  But I also realize that the meditation that I have been doing these past few years has been a part of creating this clearing.  I awoke today at about 4:30am with all the usual tapes playing in my head:  "you let people down, you are like Jacob - a birthright stealing s.o.b who runs from consequences, you can't stay sober" (four-freaking-thrity - who needs a rooster outside when there is this?!).  So I got up, came down stairs, made coffee and sat amid these voices.  In the not so distant past it was the presence of these voices that formed the center and circumference of my life.  I understood that regardless of the direction that I took that these voices would exist.  They free-float looking for and creating opportunity to add comment to my life.  In the silence it was Rowan Williams song I heard:  "what would it be like to know you are held in an unconditional regard, to allow the reality of God's gratuitous and relentless love be the reality of your life?" and "what would it be like today to hold others in that same gaze?" (Rowan hasn't used these words to my knowledge but this is the gist of what I think he might say).  I found myself led to this clearing today - it's not perfect, the voices are a part of the treelike, but so is peace, so is acceptance, so is beauty and for today that is enough.

I love you brother.

Nothing...

Hey Buddy,
I don't think I ever told you about my Dwight Yoakam spell a few years back. Shortly after Holly and I met, he had a couple albums that were great, part country and part rock and roll. She and I listened to them a lot. It was also an interesting time with my brothers, as all three of us older Reeves boys were listening to the same music at the same time, Dwight Yoakam CD's. Mike has always had a bit more "country" affinity than Scott or I, though we have all had short spells of identifying with it.

Anyway, I have fond memories of listening to Dwight as we (Mike and Amy, Holly and I) travelled down to North Carolina to visit Scott and Debbie. Holly and I were just navigating that part of the relationship when we became bold enough to use the "L" word. I remember the day on the trip when it first showed up in conversation with reference to our feelings for each other. That is code for "I remember the day I first told her I loved her."

So now, a bunch of years later, and Ol' Dwight decides to put out a new album. My feelings for Holly are certainly still there and even stronger. But somehow when Dwight sings about the "L" word now, I
see it as the same thing, but also part of something so much bigger. Nevertheless, I thought I would share it with you as a little reminder... just in case you need one today.






And in a slightly more "country" format, it is still... Nothing but Love



PS I miss you.

What you thought you came for....

I read this Elliot poem (actually I am working my way through it) and thought of you, our friendship and the enduring and deep connection that I feel to you amid the silence and miles. The line: and what you thought you came for/Is only a shell, a husk of meaning - seems to sing with depth.  I hope you are well this morning, that you awaken into a presence that sustains, disorients and keeps you open.  I love you brother,

 If you came this way,
Taking the route you would be likely to take
From the place you would be likely to come from,
If you came this way in may time, you would find the hedges
White again, in May, with voluptuary sweetness.
It would be the same at the end of the journey,
If you came at night like a broken king,
If you came by day not knowing what you came for,
It would be the same, when you leave the rough road
And turn behind the pig-sty to the dull facade
And the tombstone. And what you thought you came for
Is only a shell, a husk of meaning
From which the purpose breaks only when it is fulfilled
If at all. Either you had no purpose
Or the purpose is beyond the end you figured
And is altered in fulfilment. There are other places
Which also are the world's end, some at the sea jaws,
Or over a dark lake, in a desert or a city—
But this is the nearest, in place and time,
Now and in England.
              If you came this way,
Taking any route, starting from anywhere,
At any time or at any season,
It would always be the same: you would have to put off
Sense and notion. You are not here to verify,
Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity
Or carry report. You are here to kneel
Where prayer has been valid. And prayer is more
Than an order of words, the conscious occupation
Of the praying mind, or the sound of the voice praying.
And what the dead had no speech for, when living,
They can tell you, being dead: the communication
Of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.
Here, the intersection of the timeless moment

Is England and nowhere. Never and always. 

More from John Mayer

Walt Grace's Submarine Test, January 1967 from Columbia Records on Vimeo.

UK Slideshow

Awesomeness from The Killers

You're allowed to do it

One of my assignments from my guitar teacher this past week was to listen to the new album, Born And Raised, by John Mayer. As you could guess, this is the kind of assignment I can take on with gusto. Wow, I have really enjoyed listening to it. The quote I texted you the other day is from a short, bluesy song titled Love Is a Verb (below).



I keep finding more and more to love about this album. I knew he had a reputation of being an incredible guitar player, but I am also amazed by his lyrics and how much of his insides seem to come through in these songs. Yesterday as I was driving back from lunch, the song that grabbed me was the second on the album, The Age of Worry. One of the comments under the You tube version below said, "This song gives me chills. It has the sing-along melody of an old church hymn, the musical quality of a dramatic soundtrack, lyrics that are uplifting and inspiring, and it's peppered with hint of Irish influence."



Alive in the age of worry
As I listened to it I thought of you, and me, and many of our discussions, and some of our challenges and struggles. I have wondered if we have reached a chronological age of "worry" or if we live in an age of worry when generations before did not. I don't think I buy this second option. I believe more likely, that our anxieties are discussed more openly today, with positive and negative consequences. Sometimes discussing them seems to make them better and other times it seems to have little effect or even make them worse. However, I can't imagine a human being who doesn't bump into their own fears on a regular basis. Hiding them from others doesn't hide them from ourselves.

Build your heart an army
To defend your innocence
while you do everything wrong


What I found as I listened to this song were different feelings than I expected, positive feelings, not negative.  It was interesting later, then, to see this clip of Mayer discussing his thoughts about the song. It was good to hear him describe wanting to have and give the emotions I experienced when I listened to this song. I certainly felt soothed by this song, and could identify with contracts we "sign" that end up creating anxiety in us. I like the part when he says, "this song is a series of permissions". Listening to this song somehow reminded me of the part of a church service after confession where there is a proclamation of forgiveness and a sending forth to freely live.

There's no time you must be home

So sleep where darkness falls

Dream your dreams but don't pretend
Make friends with who you are.

Regardless, my wish for you, in this month in the US and in this specific "age" of decision you find yourself in, is that you are free to live, even with the worry, if not in its absence. 

Close your eyes and clone yourself

Build your heart an army

To defend your innocence

While you do everything wrong

Don't be scared to walk alone

Don't be scared to like it

There's no time that you must be home

So sleep where darkness falls

Alive in the age of worry

Smile in the age of worry

Go wild in the age of worry

And say worry, why should I care?

No your fight is not within

Yours is with your timing

Dream your dreams but don't pretend

Make friends with what you are

Give your heart then change your mind

You're allowed to do it

Cause God knows it's been done to you

And somehow you got through it

Alive in the age of worry

Rage in the age of worry

Sing out in the age of worry

And say worry, why should I care?

Rage in the age of worry

Act your age in the age of worry

And say worry, get out of here!

We can hope can't we...

I found these on a blog by a a guy named Larry Lootsteen...

"I wanna believe"

"Of course, along with this freedom comes the knowledge that there will be days (every day, in some fashion) where I am confronted (for better or worse) by my humanity. And I am beginning to look at it long enough to see that even when it isn't pretty, it is beautiful."


Some days this is a tough ask.

That Wasn't Me

Hang on, just hang on for a minute
I've got something to say
I'm not asking you to move on or forget it
But these are better days
To be wrong all along and admit is not amazing grace
But to be loved like a song you remember
Even when you've changed

Tell me did I go on a tangent?
Did I lie through my teeth?
Did I cause you to stumble on your feet?
Did I bring shame on my family?
Did it show when I was weak?
Whatever you see, that wasn't me
That wasn't me, that wasn't me

When you're lost you will toss every lucky coin you'll ever trust
And you will hide from your god like he ever turns his back on us
And you'll fall all the way to the bottom and land on your own knife
But you'll learn who you are even if it doesn't take your life

Tell me did I go on a tangent?
Did I lie through my teeth?
Did I cause you to stumble on your feet?
Did I bring shame on my family?
Did it show when I was weak?
Whatever you see, that wasn't me
That wasn't me, that wasn't me

But I want you to know that you'll be never alone
I wanna believe do I make myself a blessing to everyone I meet
When you fall I will get you on your feet
Do I spend time with my family?
Did it show when I was weak?
When that's what you see, that will be me
That will be me, that will be me
That will be me

Heaven

Still trying to get a post together on the first chapter of The Predicament of Belief. In the meantime...


If I pictured myself living in England and walking the streets of Cambridge, there would be a really great soundtrack playing behind the events, through the days, and with the people sharing life with me. I don't know what soundtrack is carrying you through the days, but I am certain you have your own. If by chance you find a few hours or days that allow you to listen to something different, I have a suggestion.


There is a new CD by The Walkmen, entitled Heaven. It has been the soundtrack in my car and in my head this week as I drive around Lubbock, drop off kids, sit in the office, and go through these days. It will be part of the soundtrack of life this summer for me. This may not be England, and my walks (runs) may be in 30 mph winds and 98 degrees but this is the life I have and I'd just as soon have it be heaven as hell. This music may do nothing for you, but I thought I would share. Here is the video for the title track. It shows snapshots of the band through the years.




Something about the pictures in the booklet with the CD caught my attention. These guys are entering early middle age and appear to all have kids... somehow there music sounds like that to me. Here is a brief trailer, with the song Line by Line, they released for the album.



And finally, I found this quote from the band's web page regarding the album.

"All five members of the band have kids now and if the impact of parenthood is hard to pin down in a single lyric, there is definitely a new openness and emotional honesty to the songs. Most importantly, the old gang mentality has deepened, becoming something worthwhile and lasting. “I’m very proud of what we’ve done. We’ve stayed friends and those friendships have grown,” says Bauer. “We have survival experience and real love that children generate in your life.” Heaven is a definitive statement of purpose and commitment, from a band at the peak of its powers that is finally winning the recognition it deserves."




So with the life Holly and I have been living... kids, in-laws, parents, patients, each other... I was struck by a line in the quote above.


Heaven is a definitive statement of purpose and commitment... 


Are they describing an album or something a bit bigger?

Today (part two...Life is Beautiful)

The second song that resonates with what I have been feeling of late is a bit more direct. It is by a group called Vega4. Johnny McDaid was the lead vocalist and songwriter of the group, and he now happens to be part of a band called... Snow Patrol. No kiddin'.

I couldn't find a video that I really liked for it, so I made one. I put some pictures from life the past several months to it, starting with the day we said goodbye to you guys last August. These are a few snapshots of life since then. 

So anyway, the lyrics to Life is Beautiful are not as obtuse, not quite as difficult to grasp, as Holocene. They are somewhat more to the point, directly anyway, of what I was describing in the post earlier this morning. The melody is certainly more upbeat, more uplifting, less reflective. The interesting thing is both have a power to "lift" me. May you be lifted as you read, listen , and watch.

Here are the lyrics to Life is Beautiful:

Life is beautiful
We love until we die

When you run into my arms,
We steal a perfect moment.
Let the monsters see you smile,
Let them see you smiling.

Do I hold you too tightly?
When will the hurt kick in?

Life is beautiful, but it's complicated.
We barely make it.
We don't need to understand,
There are miracles, miracles.

Yeah, life is beautiful.
Our hearts, they beat and break.

When you run away from harm,
Will you run back into my arms,
Like you did when you were young?
Will you come back to me?

I will hold you tightly
When the hurting kicks in.

Life is beautiful, but it's complicated, 
we barely make it.
We don't need to understand,
There are miracles, miracles.

Stand where you are.
We let all these moments pass us by.

It's amazing where I'm standing,
There's a lot that we can give.
This is ours just for a moment.
There's a lot that we can give.

Today (part one...Holocene)

It is one of those days where my heart is full and there is a heaviness in my chest with the significance of this life. I am overwhelmed by how powerful the music is today, just as I am overwhelmed by my inability to control my own emotions on any given day- whether joy and appreciation (like today) or anger and frustration (yesterday), :-] . This life is nothing, if not beautiful and complicated. Somehow, when I convince myself I "understand" life, I make it less complicated, and at the same time, less beautiful.

I don't know how I made it so far in life convincing myself I had so much of it tucked away as if I understood it. I wonder if it was in large part because I felt like I was "supposed to". I am grateful for the process of unwinding all of this stuff I had so tightly wound. And though there are days were I get a little apprehensive at just how far this unwinding will go, the freedom that has accompanied it has been worth it. Of course, along with this freedom comes the knowledge that there will be days (every day, in some fashion) where I am confronted (for better or worse) by my humanity. And I am beginning to look at it long enough to see that even when it isn't pretty, it is beautiful.

Today, Justin is in Austin for the funeral of Laura's grandmother. She was 92.

I am doing his surgeries after mine today and seeing his patients after mine this afternoon. We still have house guests from the graduation weekend so the day is pretty full. Nevertheless, between cases this morning I came across this and it really got the wheels in my head and heart turning. It made me think and feel a lot of different things about my life and recent situations, even though much different than the author's.  I also thought much of your life and your situation, and share it hoping it will move your heart and soul in a positive direction.

One of the tough things for me about the time difference separating us is the difficulty in continuity of contact. Even if I finish this post and put it up today, I am not certain when you will read it. Likewise, even though I offer these words from my current situation to what I last heard from you, it may find you in a different place now. Certainly, as we discovered when we lived in the same town, the few hours from midnight to sunrise can sometimes bring an amazingly different perspective, and an entirely new emotional state. I hope today, you are in a celebration mode, appreciating your own life and that of your birthday girl.

Whatever emotional state you may be in, or for anybody else wandering by with their current emotional state... I offer a couple of songs that have found a home in me the past few days. The first video is Holocene, by Bon Iver.  I think his music carries an emotional weight to it, even before I spend time with the lyrics. Justin Vernon, of Bon Iver, said this of his song Holocene:

  "It's partly named after the (geological) era, but it's also the name of a bar in Portland where I had a dark night of the soul." He also stated that "the title is a metaphor for when you're not doing well. But it's also a song about redemption and realizing that you're worth something; that you're special and not special at the same time."

(Wikipedia)

Holocene

"Someway, baby, it's part of me, apart from me"
You're laying waste to Halloween
You fucked it friend, it's on it's head, it struck the street
You're in Milwaukee, off your feet

And at once I knew I was not magnificent
Strayed above the highway aisle
(Jagged vacance, thick with ice)
And I could see for miles, miles, miles

3rd and Lake it burnt away, the hallway
Was where we learned to celebrate
Automatic bought the years you'd talk for me
That night you played me 'Lip Parade'
Not the needle, nor the thread, the lost decree
Saying nothing, that's enough for me

And at once I knew I was not magnificent
Hulled far from the highway aisle (Jagged vacance, thick with ice)
And I could see for miles, miles, miles

Christmas night, it clutched the light, the hallow bright
Above my brother, I and tangled spines
We smoked the screen to make it what it was to be
Now to know it in my memory

And at once I knew I was not magnificent
High above the highway aisle (Jagged vacance, thick with ice)
But I could see for miles, miles, miles

 The second video will be posted later today I hope.
Love you.

What a Predicament.

Hey Buddy,

I have invited a few friends to read the Predicament of Belief, and told them I would notify them as I posted my thoughts on line to share with you. Some of them may be following or even contributing to this discussion in the comments section, so keep it clean and don't say to much about all of those skeletons in my closet (ha ha). I hope some of them (my friends, not the skeletons) are following and feel comfortable commenting anyway.

I think I heard some of Philip Clayton on the Homebrewed Christianity Podcast and thought this book sounded like something I would be interested in. The timing was very interesting as more recently I have come to find a new peace in the fact that I won't "figure things out" and don't need to in order to live a full and faith"ful" life. 

The disclaimer in this deal is that I have not finished the book. I read about half of it, and restarted it, something I seldom do, after you said you would be willing to read together. So I don't know what their conclusions are at this point. I have found their style, process, and apparent integrity to be refreshing to this point.

Basically here is what I kinda bring to this book. There are reasons, some I cannot articulate very well, that produce in me a belief, hope, trust in an ultimate reality in some ways most consistent with the God of Christianity. Yet there are also things I experience in the world that make me doubt the existence of the ultimate reality (as I have been taught it to be by my tradition and culture). In addition, my day to day experience of life both adds credence to the existence of this ultimate reality, at times almost undeniably, but also at times strongly contradicts many of the things I have internalized about the ultimate reality and the role of the ultimate reality in relation to it. 

I have a certain degree of ambivalence toward trying to find out about the ultimate reality by reading a book. This is kinda similar to reading about falling in love. Nevertheless, I share with the authors an almost irresistible drive to pursue knowing as much as I can (which may not be much) about this  (part of the) world that seems so real and yet so foreign to me.

I have at least come to believe that it is in no way bad or dangerous to open and honestly seek to find the truth as best we can understand it. Seek and you will find. The truth will set you free. (I just made those up).

Anyway... onward. A few handpicked highlights from the preface. By the way The Preface is one of the least engaging and most dense portions of the book. But, I can't quote chapter 2 straight out of the chute.

On page viii at the bottom of the page they state "the predicament of religious belief in today's world..."

"That Predicament, as we understand it, has two facets: on one side, the difficulty of formulating traditional claims about what is ultimately the case in ways that take full account of all the reasons for doubting those claims; on the other side, the need to do justice to the axiological and theoretical power of those accounts of ultimate reality that metaphysical reflection and religious traditions variously suggest."

In my words...

We are stuck between a world we know exists and can see and measure and examine, and a world we cannot deny exists because of the very things we see and know and measure. We follow a tradition as old as humanity attempting to engage, encounter, and describe ultimate reality. Mostly, we find it more difficult to say what ultimate reality is. Yet we cannot help but say what it is not, when confronted with descriptions not matching experience.  

They end the preface by offering this book as "guidance for those who wish to go where reason and experience may lead.We dedicate this effort to all, of every faith or no faith, who approach the ultimate reality in that spirit."

I will try to post on chapter one in the next few days.