Perhaps this decision was not made today. No, it definitely was not made today. It's been a season of searching, of redefining, of silence. Over the last six months, I've endured one of the largest turning points of my life thus far: transitioning out of a season of constant transition (which, in itself, has given me passion, drive, excitement, and an addiction to the 'more' that's always around the next bend in the road).
I'm living in the same house. With the same roommates. And the same job. And the same church.
At the same time, I finished grad school. I went through a major break up. I gave up New Horizons. Much has been removed (perhaps it feels, in some cases, more like stripped). Little has been added, except my sweet dog Charlie.
And I decided that at all cost, I must learn to be still. I must learn to be ok with silence. I must learn to be ok with myself when I have nothing to say to other people, and certainly nothing to say to myself, and often nothing even to say to God. I'm just silent.
Dillard yesterday told me that "Trees stir memories; live waters heal them."
So today I took Charlie on a walk - in search of memories and their healing. I stopped at an old tree that I've passed ever so many times on my way down to the lake. I stood to question the pitted curves of bark beneath her scented branches - what memories would Jesus stir in me? None but those I forced and wrestled from their caves, doing my best to evoke a sort of half-hearted nostalgia.
Charlie and I continued. The wind blew blustery, like the Hundred Acre Wood where I felt when I read like it was always fall. Leaves hurled themselves across our path and lighted our way with an effervescent radiance all their own. Waves tore across the lake and licked the sun's ripe honey off their surface. I stopped and scooped Charlie between squatted legs to steal a stare at the glory of autumn falling across a lake. I felt, even in the turbulence of the wind-washed waves, a sort of breathless peace - like in itself, the turbulence of the water was my shield. What do I so desire to be shielded from?
Myself. The self in me that craves glory and fame and worship.
I am changing, like the leaves. I'm falling from some branch that's held me captive for so long. I want to abide in You alone, Jesus. Not this false identity.
I stared down at the oak tree's helicopter eggs littering the path. So many, and they always look the same. I wonder which I'd be if I were an oak tree's helicopter seed. I wonder if I'd be ok to just be another of the millions lying on the path.
Eventually, Charlie and I returned to the tree we had paused beneath on our way to the lake. I looked at it with scorn. Where were the memories it was supposed to evoke? The bark looked to me so rich and full of the possibility of years' worth of moments. But it offered none to me. And all I could see, as I arched my eyes backwards over the long years it had stood, was a poster haughtily nailed to its side.
A poster of my smiling head.
Thus it has been. In every major social circle of my life in the past ten years, I have striven to conform to Poster Child Status. Try as I might to hold my ground at first, I feel pulled by the moon's gravity to fit an image -- like a super model starving herself on celery and grapefruit. And eventually, I make it. I've made a career out of becoming the Approved. The Voice. The Face.
And now I sit without approval, without a voice, and without a face . . . wondering how to return to where I once was, when all along my heart rebelled against the false glory.
So today, I tore the poster child off the tree so I could see the bark. Maybe now, I can start to see deeper into my own heart. I'm giving up the Poster Child life.
Jesus, forgive me for finding my worth in man's approval. Jesus, forgive me for trading the value You have given me through Your blood for a cheap, shoddy idol. Jesus, forgive me for placing my identity in who other people say I am or believe I can be.
Who else have You called me to be, Lord Jesus, but Yours alone?
Monday, October 25, 2010
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Shadowless
Though I endured her at least 14 times, Winter only introduced herself to me once during those long years in the Midwest. I remember standing in my backyard near our ancient oak, where rough bark had been worn smooth in at least three places from bums and memories. My dad was there too – were we raking?
In Wisconsin, if we left the leaves on the ground through the winter, they’d mold and stink from wet hibernation beneath the incubated snow, and in the spring fungus would curl her yellowed feathers where the grass should be. So we would rake and rake until blotted pink blisters bubbled out of the soft skin adjacent to thumb knuckles, and yellowed calluses tried their very best to armor the upper-part of palm where fingers grow.
I had let my rake slide down beneath my armpit to take stock of the leaf pile and perhaps nurse a blister. I looked up at the cold grey November sky, and I spotted them: the first snowflakes. Excitement rose to bursting in me, that I should enjoy the first flake fall on virgin ground. I held out my hands and spun, laughing.
“Dad, it’s Winter!”
“Yep.” But he hadn’t stopped raking. He must have met Winter before, I considered. His taciturn jadedness spoke nothing to my pleasure, though, and I watched the sky with wonder akin to glory. Even after reveling in the moment for quite more than a moment, I was strongly averse to the idea of going inside. I remember now, with an aloof and understanding smile, how disinclined the girl-I was to forsake the sanctity of Winter’s very first snowfall that I had witnessed and shared in.
I’m remembering it nostalgically this morning because I woke to a cement sky, and considered the way Winter introduces herself here. It is far different. More sly, less romantic. Who was it that told me that ghosts go shadowless? When Winter steals my trees’ shadows by spreading thick cold-cream over the sky, I know she’s arrived – forcing verdant trees to relinquish life and murmur listlessly as anxious, shadowless ghosts for five months. And the sun, like Peter’s Wendy, appears in the spring to sew back their shadows and offer life.
But it’s not Winter here yet. The bricks have fallen away from the sky now, and thick yellow (less bright; yelling harvest) buttered the sky until it sprouted blue. Now trees cast their shadows on the ground beneath, and I know that there is life in them still. I consider the changing of shadows. None lasts, or even remains the same throughout a day . . .
Sometimes, my heart feels shadowless. I wonder where the Sun is that gives it passion, voice, hunger, SHADOW. Hearts change in season, like trees. I can feel the Sun melting my aortic valve and casting a shadow across my lung. My throat feels the dawn rising again . . . Please, Light, come. I'm ready.
"'For we are strangers before thee, and sojourners, as were all our fathers: our days on the earth are as a shadow, and there is none abiding.' We can't take the lightning, the scourge of high places and rare airs. But we can take the light, the reflected light that shines up the valleys on creeks" (Dillard, Pilgrim, 101).
"For God alone my soul waits in silence (SHADOWLESS-NESS);
from Him comes my salvation.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
My fortress; I shall not be greatly shaken" (Psalm 62:1-2).
Life is fragile, quickly passing. Lord, You remain. That alone gives me cause to worship.
In Wisconsin, if we left the leaves on the ground through the winter, they’d mold and stink from wet hibernation beneath the incubated snow, and in the spring fungus would curl her yellowed feathers where the grass should be. So we would rake and rake until blotted pink blisters bubbled out of the soft skin adjacent to thumb knuckles, and yellowed calluses tried their very best to armor the upper-part of palm where fingers grow.
I had let my rake slide down beneath my armpit to take stock of the leaf pile and perhaps nurse a blister. I looked up at the cold grey November sky, and I spotted them: the first snowflakes. Excitement rose to bursting in me, that I should enjoy the first flake fall on virgin ground. I held out my hands and spun, laughing.
“Dad, it’s Winter!”
“Yep.” But he hadn’t stopped raking. He must have met Winter before, I considered. His taciturn jadedness spoke nothing to my pleasure, though, and I watched the sky with wonder akin to glory. Even after reveling in the moment for quite more than a moment, I was strongly averse to the idea of going inside. I remember now, with an aloof and understanding smile, how disinclined the girl-I was to forsake the sanctity of Winter’s very first snowfall that I had witnessed and shared in.
I’m remembering it nostalgically this morning because I woke to a cement sky, and considered the way Winter introduces herself here. It is far different. More sly, less romantic. Who was it that told me that ghosts go shadowless? When Winter steals my trees’ shadows by spreading thick cold-cream over the sky, I know she’s arrived – forcing verdant trees to relinquish life and murmur listlessly as anxious, shadowless ghosts for five months. And the sun, like Peter’s Wendy, appears in the spring to sew back their shadows and offer life.
But it’s not Winter here yet. The bricks have fallen away from the sky now, and thick yellow (less bright; yelling harvest) buttered the sky until it sprouted blue. Now trees cast their shadows on the ground beneath, and I know that there is life in them still. I consider the changing of shadows. None lasts, or even remains the same throughout a day . . .
Sometimes, my heart feels shadowless. I wonder where the Sun is that gives it passion, voice, hunger, SHADOW. Hearts change in season, like trees. I can feel the Sun melting my aortic valve and casting a shadow across my lung. My throat feels the dawn rising again . . . Please, Light, come. I'm ready.
"'For we are strangers before thee, and sojourners, as were all our fathers: our days on the earth are as a shadow, and there is none abiding.' We can't take the lightning, the scourge of high places and rare airs. But we can take the light, the reflected light that shines up the valleys on creeks" (Dillard, Pilgrim, 101).
"For God alone my soul waits in silence (SHADOWLESS-NESS);
from Him comes my salvation.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
My fortress; I shall not be greatly shaken" (Psalm 62:1-2).
Life is fragile, quickly passing. Lord, You remain. That alone gives me cause to worship.
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