Deeper Truth: Looking for the Light 2*

Heavy. Sluggish. Aching.  Winter SAD pumps through my veins.

In my morning Scripture reading, Jesus is weeping over Jerusalem. Mourning, today’s meditation says, not Jerusalem’s momentary and passing sins, but its choices that prevent fullness of life,

Jerusalem failed to recognize its Light. My Light, too.

That Light is a deeper reality than the SAD sludge in my veins, and I move momentarily to that place where all is well with my soul.

And I choose his light, again. How can I choose light today? I count some ways:

• Breathe deep. Breath prayers: Abbah, yes. Abbah, yes.
• Stand tall.
• Sit in the sun, or in the sun lamp.

Deeper than the SAD is the love of God. It is well. It will be well. All manner of things will be well.
___________
*Based on a journal entry, November 2009.

Looking for the Light

Yesterday Sr. Joyanne, my spiritual director, suggested that in daily examen, I look for what brings light into my life. This resonated for me.
Especially for Advent.
Especially for dark December.
Especially for my first winter in 20 years not buoyed by an antidepressant to combat SAD.*
Then, reading through journals in search of a new writing experiment, I discovered that I have frequently been wrestling with darkness in different forms, often looking for light. My blog posts have been forms of looking.
Sometimes successfully. Sometimes not.
So, for the moment, my writing experiment is looking for the light, whatever form that takes.
This experiment may last an hour, a day, a week . . .
I’m letting go of any attachment to outcome.
At least I’m trying to.
Sr. Joyanne’s other recommendation is that I enter this new book-completed-life-stage playfully. She knows that in an eye-blink I could turn this looking-for-light into another project, and blinders in place, race pell-mell for some new goal.
In this moment, I play with looking for the light.
I hope to look in other moments, as well.
But that belongs to the moments to come.
This moment is now.
I sit.
I look.
_____________
*Seasonal Affective Disorder

Thin Place

In the corner of my home office, purple pen in hand, I read the manuscript for On Mended Wings . . .aloud . . . word by painstaking word.

I find a wrongful capital letter here, a missing comma there . . .

I have set narrow boundaries for this final read-through: no edits of information, no clarifications or amplifications—only correction of errors.
It is, as I tell people who are starry-eyed about being a writer, slogging hard work.
Two chapters in, I’m feeling blue. Not because it has so many errors, but because, well, because it’s so . . . ordinary. It’s just a . . . book.
I don’t understand why the pages don’t ooze blood. Or at least a little sweat.
I remind myself that decades ago, I experienced the same letdown when I read the galleys for my book What to Do When You Can’t Do It All.

Then I take a break in the backyard hammock and browse the Banner that arrived today. In this issue of my denominations’ periodical I learn about sexual abuse programs, the church disconnect of young adults, the failings of public education . . .

Back in the office, I’m still not ready for more proofreading. So I dial a number in response to a phone message left for me this morning by a Minnesota stranger named Susan.
Susan obviously does not share my mid-afternoon lethargy.
“Hello!” she says excitedly. She’s so glad I returned her call. She’d like three copies of the long-out-of-print What to Do When You Can’t Do It All. Her copy is so dog-eared and marked up it’s hardly usable. And she wants two extra copies to give to friends. Can I help?
Surely. I have three copies I can send.
“That book changed my life,” she says.
Phone call done, I’m back in my chair.
I guess I’m ready for a little more slogging.

Barefoot in the Office

It’s Monday morning at the office.  I’m barely moving.

Two mugs of coffee have had no impact.

At Smokey Row across the street, I plunk down $3.91 for a mug of sugar-free chai and return.

I shift my location from desk  to black leather chair.

I remember the energy of last night’s worship:

• The C.S. Lewis story about the dwarves in a wonderland convinced they were in a filthy stable.  They wouldn’t or couldn’t open their eyes or ears—or even their taste buds.
• The Elizabeth Barrett Browning lines I love: Earth is crammed with heaven, and every bush aflame with God, But only those who see take off their shoes. The rest sit around eating blackberries.
• The Exodus reading about the burning bush and removing shoes for holy ground.
• Standing barefoot at the front of the sanctuary for bread-and-juice communion.
• Knocking on our pastor’s office door, sandals in hand, saying I wanted to remain barefoot the rest of my life.

This morning I’m a dwarf in a stable.

But this bleak morning, I want again to see the bush aflame.

I rip loose black Velcro straps and free my feet.

I savor a first sip of chai.

I sit. I wait.

Unveiling

Despite hours of preparation, it was a so-so children’s message, I thought.

I based it on Simeon’s Moment, a painting by Ron Dicianni that had called to me from the hallway in Pella’s Third Reformed Church several times in recent years. (http://www.tapestryproductions.com/products/artist/rondicianni/simeonsmoment.php).

I photographed and printed the painting, taping together letter-sized  on a  foam core board for a huge printout, and covered it with a blanket. During the service, I unveiled it, telling the children about the darkness of waiting. I pointed to the light coming from the baby blankets and Simeon’s face—so happy he looked as if he were crying. He has seen the Light of the World.

I didn’t dramatize it as much as I had planned, and I was too dependent on my notes—not a stellar final message before the year-long break I had requested.

After the service I trudge to the pulpit to retrieve the printout, cover it, and head for the drinking fountain.

A four-year-old appears from the balcony steps, eyes lit.

“I saw that picture.” he says.

“Do you want to see it again?” I ask.

He nods, and I uncover it.

He gazes. “I lke that picture!”

He runs off to find his parents. I try to follow, wanting to tell them about his joy.

He disappears.

But Simeon’s Moment has become mine, a thin place.

The Light—for one moment—unveiled.

Christmas Trio

After a quiet Christmas dinner for two and a feel-good movie, Marlo humors me and my wish to take a ten-stage nativity walk at a Pella church.

Its front doors are locked. So are the doors to the four-story prayer tower.

How can a church be locked on Christmas day? I wonder. We’re headed home when I spy cars at the lower-level back entrance. Those doors are open!

We walk the stages of the nativity—Advent, Prophecy, Zachariah & Elizabeth, Shepherds, Mary & Joseph. . . .  Stage 10, on the first floor level of the prayer tower,  puts us in the story, asking us to be Christ-followers in our time and place.

Marlo has never seen the prayer tower, so I offer him a tour. We climb to the second floor, designated for “meditation.” Then up another flight to the “missional” third floor.  It offers an even higher balcony with a 360-degree windowed walk, chairs facing each of the four directions, each direction label.

At the eastern chairs, we pause, our thoughts reaching beyond the Pella horizon to Afghanistan. We sit in silence, praying for our son stationed there.

We return to the main floor in silence; then I suggest another round of all flights—including the basement—a headstart on a 2011 exercise.

Meditation, prayer, exercise. . . . It was good for us to be here on a Christmas afternoon.

Morning Moment

 

As I shower, I fight mid-winter blues  by singing.

This is the day,
This is the day
That the Lord has made,
That the Lord has made.
I will rejoice,
I will rejoice
And be glad in it,
And be glad in it.

I wonder about the words.

This week, seeking more barriers to the black dog that lurks in the long nights of winter solstice, I read The Mindful Way through Depression. I learned about:

- being instead of doing
- living in the moment instead of the past or future
- living in my body as well as in my mind

And reading that book brought to mind a first lesson I learned from my spiritual director: surrender.

This is the day? I want just this moment.
The Lord has made? He’s giving it right now.
I will rejoice? Not a future to-do plan,, but a present gift of being.
As the spigot sprays, I revise the words:

This is the moment,
This is the moment
That the Lord  gives me,
That the Lord gives me.
I now let go,
I now let go
And surrender it,
And surrender it.

Shower and song complete, I amble to the porch for meditation and light therapy.

In this moment, the black dog remains at bay.