The Other Person's Pain

It is one thing to deal with unresolved personal issues.  It is quite another to accompany some other individual stumbling in the darkness of loss and discouragement - one pressed by the proverbial wringer.

For several months I’ve witnessed a challenging scenario play out.  I’ve wanted so much to fix things, or at least assist in the fixing, and have been willing to sacrifice accordingly.  I’ve hoped for the best, prayed, waited for delayed answers, and waited some more.  I’ve supported the hurting person in both obvious and creative ways.

The situation only continues to compound.  My vicarious longings grow deeper until the ache of want becomes chronic. This doesn’t mean I’m without an anchor (hope), it just means discouragement reminds me of my smallness and inability to control the outcome. 

That’s a good thing, because when problems seem to have no solution, the options narrow.  Will I run, hide, quit? Will I pray, obey, wait?

It is still early morning of a day that will be full of visitors, activity, and service – as well as compassion and support.  As I consider the challenges before me, I grasp the words from an ancient morning prayer:  “Lord, teach me today to pray, believe, hope...”  The most I can do is petition God, trust Him, and hope in Him.  These must be the focus while I attempt to share the other person’s pain in ways that will eventually support resurrection from despair, redemption from darkness, and restoration from brokenness. 

Stunt Diving

While riding in the boat this afternoon, we watched a Kingfisher dive near a patch of lily pads in the lake.  First he furiously flapped his wings while dangling in a single spot in mid-air – as if treading air – until he spotted a desirable fish.  Then in an instant he tucked his wings and dove like a torpedo from the sky to pluck it out of the water. 

His performance was brilliant.  Stunning.  Deserving of whatever is awarded to skilled airplane stunt divers.  And yet we were the only ones there to watch…while the wind riffled the water, the sun prickled our shoulders, and the cattails waved in unison, pointing their fingertips toward the scene.

Salad du Jour

Tonight’s dinner menu featuring manly food was already quite well-developed* when I decided to add another side dish: a never-before and never-again unique salad that turned out to be the hit of the meal.

It all started because of the black olives.  A few old ones in the frig had been begging me to be used (picture their little pit-holes shouting, like wide-open mouths, “Eat me, eat me, EEEAT MEEEE!”), so I thought, “Now what would go well with those olives?”  A few minutes passed.  “Italian,” I told myself.  “Think Italian.”

I tried my old squinting trick when my eyes become slits (this helps me act impulsively rather than think too hard), then grabbed a zucchini from the produce drawer and made it into long, spaghetti-like strips with my hand-crank spirooli.  I tossed the raw zucchini “noodles” with the olives.  So far so good.

“What now?” I opened the produce drawer to look for the answer to my question. “OH.  It needs some color.  There – red pepper and burmuda onion.”  So I chopped half of a red bell pepper and some onion and threw the ruby pieces into the bowl as well.

“But if this is supposed to be Italian, what about tomatoes?  Shouldn’t there be tomatoes?”  However, I remembered one of the manly-men coming to dinner didn’t like fresh tomatoes.  “Surely he wouldn’t notice some small pieces of sun-dried tomatoes,” I rationalized.  So I chopped a handful of yummy, chewy sun-dried tomatoes and put them in a separate bowl to soak in olive oil.

“And what about cheese?” I asked myself.  “Feta would be perfect, but I don’t have any.  Hmmmm.  Some asiago would be nice – I have some in the freezer I could grate!”   But then I reminded myself: one of these guys is lactose intolerant.  NO CHEESE.

“Let’s see.  Seasoning.  Salt, garlic powder, oregano, and basil.”  I shook the spices over the vegetables, spilling the basil – oops – and thus adding probably twice as much as expected. “And here’s a little leftover homemade celery seed dressing.  I’ll use that.”

But the dressing was not near enough.  “Better add more olive oil – oh, and the oil along with the sun-dried tomatoes that have been soaking.”

It was looking pretty good, but I remembered another one of manly-men expected at our table typically preferred creamy salad dressings.  So I decided on a compromise: chunks of avocado.  Surely that would give the salad a creamy taste.

The result was visually enticing. “Nice.  I like it.  Those black olives really started something,” I told myself. But the verdict was still out.  What would the guys think?  Would they even try it, or turn the other way and gorge on meat and potatoes?  I anticipated the usual polite recognition when I try crazy salad mixtures (which happens frequently), but that’s about all.

Dinnertime arrived. I didn’t say much, but watched to see what would happen.  Of course the men piled their plates high with manly food, but…lo and behold….they also tried the salad!  In the midst of other conversation, one manly-man (the one who dislikes tomatoes) exclaimed that the salad was exceptionally good.  “This is great stuff!  What IS it?” Another one agreed that it was very tasty (the one who prefers creamy dressings), and a third person echoed the others.

“What all is in it?” they wanted to know.  I was floored. 

“Uh….let’s see…” I responded.  I honestly had to think hard before responding.  The salad had evolved without much premeditated thought, but I finally pieced the story together and told them – which is why I’m able to write this blog.

*venison roast, mashed potatoes, gravy, steamed broccoli, fresh kale salad with pine nuts, fresh strawberries, gluten-free blueberry bread made with coconut flour and rice flour.

Rest

Cattails sway like a troupe of willowy ballerinas to the rhythm of the wind as we anchor in a small private cove surrounded by wild shoreline.  I stretch out on the floor of the pontoon boat, grateful for the respite from busy activity, and study the cloud-studded sky.

A celestial pillow fight seems in progress.  Silky, feathery clouds appear at first glance to be frozen, and yet a slow motion choreography is in place.  They gradually change position, and I relax as their deliberate dance defines my own slowed breath, my own slowed thought.

Simple, uncomplicated, elemental things.  Dancing cattails.  Floating cloud-feathers.  They envelop me until my inner grinder stops grinding.  The clamp of busyness loosens.  Shallow breaths give way to deep, even ones. 

The sun spangles the water.  A blue heron flies overhead, swooping its wings with powerful, and yet seemingly effortless, strokes.  And I rest. 

Funky Ovens

We own ruddy-chocolate-brown, double-wall-mount ovens installed in 1961 when our house was built – miniatures in one unit that together measure 24x48”.  At 350 degrees the bottom oven belches steam like a muffled dragon when the door is shut.  The top oven, the more dependable of the two, has a more even-tempered reputation, but recently threw a fit and retired.  It just quit working, right when I was trying to brown some oven fries for the grandkids.  Of all the nerve.

Like a stealthy detective, I researched replacement ovens online. I found several of this odd size, but alas! The online reviews socked a punch - mawhumph - as if to deflate my victory.  One model was reported to have repeated problems with the control panel that would burn-out (nice pun) in about four years.  The shallow ovens described in reviews for several other models couldn’t accommodate normal-sized cookie sheets, let alone a turkey roaster.  And what good is an oven that can’t roast a Christmas turkey? Pshaw.

Still, we went on the prowl today to try and actually SEE some of these ovens for ourselves.  We found one, and one only – a GE.  It was attractive enough, with ovens of reasonable height, and the price was the lowest yet – but I gasped out loud when I peeked inside.   The back walls redefined what should have been the oven’s mid-section, essentially cutting it in half.  These ovens were not deep enough to hold a cookie sheet, let alone a…you guessed it…turkey roaster.  Gulp. Those reviewers were right. 

My old ovens, on the other hand, had thinner walls and larger cavities even though their rough exterior dimensions are the same as the new one we examined today.  They accommodate not only a normal cookie sheet, but some I own that are oversized – as well as large baking pans AND my giant turkey roaster.  However, a replacement part is no longer available for the old geezer, although an appliance dealer said he could supply a custom-made one (for a fee, naturally). 

So now we’re stuck in a quagmire of a dilemma.  Which funky ovens to we want?  Eh?  The bigger, on-the-way-out older ones with a handcrafted patch, or the smaller, more energy-efficient, newer ones that will deny us Christmas turkey?   The vote is still out.

  

Light

This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.  If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.  But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.  I John 1:5

I’ve heard it said that eyes are the soul’s window – small transparent lenses that not only allow light to enter, but also disclose whatever light or darkness lurks within an individual.  This seems a credible claim.  We’ve all been uplifted by lively eyes; we’ve all been deflated by deadened ones.

God is light: a compelling mystery, eye-opening truth, and comforting reality.  Can I see His light in you?  Can you see it in me?

Building Sand Castles with Words

I seem to be shifting gears in my writing life, but not without some grating and gear-stripping. Change is always challenging, even when defined as a silver lining peeking from behind a huge cloud of complacency.  I’ve got to be willing to reach out and take it.

While one good-and-respectable seven-year discipline grinds to a halt, a futuristic goal lurks in the wings.  It coaxes me to come, come on out from the stage of weekly contest entries into the cubbyhole of longer-term, committed writing – into the workplace where you get serious about publication.  I argue that I haven’t the time. The more I resist the more the gears grind. 

As a result I’ve been hoping to open the windows of my writing expectations by rereading some portions from Bird by Bird by author and creative writing instructor, Anne LaMotte.  I’ve read Anne’s recommendations numerous times in the past, and yet they always seem somehow new and inspiring, causing a fresh writing-wind to fill my sails. 

I’m copying excerpts below since I know at least several of my blog readers share my almost compulsive writing mania.  Perhaps they will also speak to those folks as well, and offer permission to listen to that other inner voice - to get on with what it insists must be written and shared.

Here is one:

You are lucky to be one of those people who wishes to build sand castles with words, who is willing to create a place where your imagination can wander.  We build this place with the sand of memories; these castles are our memories and inventiveness made tangible.  So part of us believes that when the tide starts coming in, we won’t really have lost anything, because actually only a symbol of it was there in the sand.  Another part of us thinks we’ll figure out a way to divert the ocean.  This is what separates artists from ordinary people: the belief, deep in our hearts, that if we build our castles well enough, somehow the ocean won’t wash them away.  I think this is a wonderful kind of person to be.

And another:

The society to which we belong seems to be dying or is already dead.  I don’t mean to sound dramatic, but clearly the dark side is rising.  Things could not have been more odd and frightening in the Middle Ages.  But the tradition of artists will continue no matter what form the society takes.  And this is another reason to write: people need us, to mirror for them and for each other without distortion – not to look around and say, “Look at yourselves, you idiots!,” but to say, “This is who we are.”

In this dark and wounded society, writing can give you the pleasure of the woodpecker, of hollowing out a hole in a tree where you can build your nest and say, “This is my niche, this is where I live now, this is where I belong.”  And the niche may be small and dark, but at last you will finally know what you are doing.  After thirty years or more of floundering around and screwing up, you will finally know, and when you get serious you will be dealing with the one thing you’ve been avoiding all along – your wounds.  This is very painful.  It stops a lot of people early on who didn’t get into this for the pain.  They got into it for the money and the fame.  So they either quit, or they resort to a type of writing that is sort of like candy making.

Don’t underestimate this gift of finding a place in the writing world: if you really work at describing creatively on paper the truth as you understand it, as you have experienced it, with the people or material who are in you, who are asking that you help them get written, you will come to a secret feeling of honor.  Being a writer is part of a noble tradition, as is being a musician – the last egalitarian and open associations.  No matter what happens in terms of fame and fortune, dedication to writing is a marching-step forward from where you were before, when you didn’t care about reaching out to the world, when you weren’t hoping to contribute, when you were just standing there doing some job into which you had fallen.