"the future feels so hard, and I want to go back..."

"...The past is so tangible
I know it by heart
Familiar things are never easy
To discard
I was dying for some freedom
But now I hesitate to go
I am caught between the Promise
And the things I know

I've been painting pictures of Egypt,
Leaving out what it lacks
The future feels so hard,
And I wanna go back!
But the places that used to fit me,
Cannot hold the things I've learned
Those roads were closed off to me
While my back was turned..."
- Sara Groves

A friend asked me to repost this piece. Whether we are "looking back," in regret or relief, it's still looking back. God's name is I AM -- this is where we find Him. And it is His Voice I listen for in the music of this moment. offered with love:

Okay, so I have become a bit obsessed with Sara Groves' lyrics and music.  But, as my husband says, "she is so good at knowing you."  When I discovered her "Painting Pictures of Egypt," it was like walking past a mirror, smiling at a stranger, and then suddenly realizing you are smiling at yourself.

I listened with rapt wonder.  She was able to put words to the feeling of knowing when you had to leave one place -- the place where you'd lived in hunched sadness -- for a horizon that seemed to hold no oasis or refuge.  It is a journey in which you cross the desert of pain -- traversing the lonely unchartered territories of your own heart, learning to eat locust and drink dew from the crevices in stones -- only to find that you are still just standing at the edge of something even more vastly new and incomprehensible. So uncertain that you begin to dream of returning to the soft comforts of the outgrown, but familiar.

I think this is what the children of Israel may have faced at the edge of the Red Sea.  Having left behind a tortured existence of brutality and slavery, they find themselves in a place where they are free -- but free to do what, when all that stands in front of them is a roiling ocean of resistance and self-doubt.  Pharoah is pursuing them from behind and they wonder why they ever left Egypt in the first place. At least in Egypt they had the fleshpots. 

I have known this kind of questioning.  I have known the terror of "not knowing" what comes next, and the pull of what once was. "At least there were those fleshpots," it hisses. "Hey, you know how to navigate the familiar, endless rhythm of pyramid building. You know how to anticipate and brace yourself for the touch -- however hurtful -- of the slavemaster's whip."

That's when I would begin "painting pictures of Egypt" in the soft golden glow of memory.  The straw and mud pits of backbreaking labor in the fields took on a soft light -- a "Little House on the Prairie" romanticism. Why I could almost hear the swell of a James Newton Howard soundtrack if I listened hard enough.

But in those moments when my Children of Israel-self complains to my Moses-self at the edge of the Red Sea, "why did you bring us here, at least in Egypt I had fleshpots!" I remember Moses' reply, "Stand ye still and see the salvation of our God," which God rebukes with, "Why are you telling them that, tell them to move forward!"

And what those in exile could never have even imagined - a sea splitting in two so that they could cross on dryland - happens right before their eyes.

They had outgrown the lessons of Egypt, and each step forward through the sand brought them to the place where a miracle was waiting.

Like the children of Israel at the edge of the Red Sea, I too have spent far too many days sitting in the hot shifting sands of self-doubt painting romantic pictures of Egypt in the soft glow of memory. When right there, right before me -- within just a few steps of its shores -- a Red Sea was waiting to part and lead me to the promised land. 

Today I have my heart focused on the sea.  I am painting seascapes full of milk and honey, bees and blueberries, lemons and lavender. I am leaving the outgrown in Egypt where it belongs -- in the past.  I am moving forward, one step at a time -- looking for miracles in the sand and the sea.

"...I don't want to leave here
I don't want to stay
It feels like pinching to me
Either way
And the places I long for the most
Are the places where I've been
They are calling out to me
Like a long lost friend

It's not about losing faith
It's not about trust
It's all about comfortable
When you move so much
And the place I was wasn't perfect
But I had found a way to live
And it wasn't milk or honey
But then neither is this

I've been painting pictures of Egypt,
Leaving out what it lacks
The future feels so hard,
And I wanna go back!
But the places that used to fit me,
Cannot hold the things I've learned
Those roads were closed off to me
While my back was turned..."

If it comes too quick
I may not appreciate it
Is that the reason behind all this time and sand?
And if it comes too quick
I may not recognize it
Is that the reason behind all this time and sand?"

with Love,


Kate

"My hands are holding you..."

"I'll be
by your side
wherever you've fallen,

in the dead of night,
whenever you're calling;

please don't fight,
these Hands
that are holding you..."

It's been a long time since I've listened to Tenth Avenue North. But this morning it was their,  "By Your Side,"  that inspired me. Another mass shooting, another tragic "natural disaster," -- and my heart was reaching out for something to hold on to. And Tenth Avenue North came through with the reminder, that I don't need to hold on to God -- His hands are holding me, and mine, and all.

Sometimes, we hear a horrifying story of mayhem or loss, and we almost feel like we can't process it. It's too big. It makes us feel vulnerable and shakes our sense of personal peace. We send our love and prayers. But the human mind itself is incapable of knowing how to "think" about it all. So it doesn't. It files it away for "later."

I remember once hearing an NPR [National Public Radio] interview with a social anthropologist, one afternoon while inching my way through rush hour traffic. She was explaining the phenomenon of an entire country rallying to support a single family facing a devastating loss, while almost ignoring the plight of millions of refugee families facing famine in Africa - where thousands of children were dying of starvation each day.

She explained that this grief was too massive for the human mind to process. So it looked for something it could actually feel empowered to do something about -- a single family felt "doable." Hundreds of thousands did not. So in order to not "go mad" by the breadth of the grief, the human mind sets aside what it cannot process. I got it.

But this explanation still didn't answer my own heart-wrenching question -- how can I turn away from photos and reports of starving families? What can I do? How can I pray? It did feel like "too much," -- because it was. At least it was for the human mind.

Tenth Avenue North's song this morning was just the reminder I needed to get back on track in responding to each and every tragic report of fear, pain, lack, disaster, and loss. To see that each individual -- from the starving Syrian refugee, to the corruption-enticed Wall Street trader [who so afraid of loss that he would even consider compromises his integrity] as held by God. Held in comfort, and held in check.

Again and again, I go back to this "Daily Prayer," by Mary Baker Eddy:

"Thy kingdom come
let the reign
of divine Truth, Life, and Love
be established in me,
and rule out of me all sin,
and may Thy Word
enrich the affections
of all mankind
and govern them."

This is my prayer throughout the day. This is my prayer when I am awaken in the night. This is the prayer that springs immediately into the space of every question.  It is my prayer for myself, and for "all mankind."

I know that it was this "Daily Prayer," has been my prayer in the darkest hours of my life -- whether during an attempted assault, or facing the loss of a child. To know this prayer intimately, was to know peace.  It strengthened my core confidence in knowing that the affections of the man who had threatened my innocence were being governed by the Word of God. And that this Voice had been speaking directly to his heart, causing him to self-arrest his behavior.  

To feel this prayer in an hour of loss, was to feel the Father's love for us - and for our child. To actually feel that this love was eternal; not validated by time, or space, or form of family. Untouched by sin [separation] and established in Soul.

Because I have felt held by the Word of God -- when I least expected it - I am able to know - with all my being - that this same presence is filling the consciousness of every man, woman, child, and creature in all of creation.

Because I have felt this Love shift my behavior, guide my actions, purify my motives, and heal my wounds -- I know it is at work in each human heart. This divine presence is stilling all conflict. It speaks in every language. Wherever we are, whatever we seem to be going through - alone, or in the midst of thousands - we are held.

This prayer has been the voice of God -- holding me, healing me, correcting me, encouraging me -- and mine, and all.


offered with Love,

Cate 

"You are not alone, I am here with you..."

"Someone whispers
in my ear and says,

you are not alone,
I am here with you...”

Jason Chen's cover of Michael Jackson's,  "You Are Not Alone"  is such a gentle version of this song. A song whose melody seems to be how I hear that phrase "you are not alone," whenever it comes to mind.

I have spent most of my lifetime comforting children who feel alone. As a big sister, teacher in a state institution for children who have been made "wards of the state," school administrator, hospital chaplain, and serving at summer camps - assuring children that they are not alone.

Each child navigates that feeling of alone-ness in a different way. Some become dismissive, some distract themselves with constant movement, and others cry as if their every breath is a labor of love.

But here is what I have learned. This is not home-sickness. This is home wellness. These children have such a full and healthy sense of home and family -- even those who have never known a parent's love -- that it fills their being. I have worked with sister children who have never felt deeply settled and still there is a love for the concept of home and family that fills their being. I have taught in a state-run facility with children who had been institutionalized by their families, and still there is a hope of family and a natural inclination towards warmth, affection, and connection.

It is not something that can be taken from them. It is a deep home-wellness that crosses all socio-economic boundaries. From the autistic 4-year old in a state institution, to the privileged child of loving parents at a sleep-over summer camp, this love for home, family, and being parented by love -- is universal. And it never goes away.

This morning, as I was reading the Bible lesson, I was so moved to realize that the Scriptural precedence for addressing this claim of children feeling alone is right there in I Samuel.

Hannah, after years of barrenness is blessed with a son, whom she names Samuel. And even though she loves him with all her heart, she knows that he is destined for service to God and as a boy sends him to live with Eli the priest from whom he would learn how to love and trust the Lord.

This is where the part of the story - that is in our Bible Lesson - begin:


"And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli.

And it came to pass at that time, when Eli was laid down in his place, [that] the lamp of God went out in the temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep;

That the Lord called Samuel: and he answered, Here am I. And he ran unto Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And he said, I called not; lie down again.

And he went and lay down. And the Lord called yet again, Samuel. And Samuel arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me. And he answered, I called not, my son; lie down again.

Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord, neither was the word of the Lord yet revealed unto him.

And the Lord called Samuel again the third time. And he arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me.

And Eli perceived that the Lord had called the child. Therefore Eli said unto Samuel, Go, lie down: and it shall be, if he call thee, that thou shalt say, Speak, Lord; for thy servant heareth.

So Samuel went and lay down in his place. And the Lord came, and stood, and called as at other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel answered, Speak; for thy servant heareth."

Today, this story has come alive for me in a new way. Samuel was just a boy. Just a child. He was alone in the dark. The person who was his care-giver -- not his parent -- had put him to bed and he kept getting up and asking if Eli wanted him.

Eli said, no, I didn't call you, go back to bed. Sweet persistent Samuel. He returns again and again to Eli's bedchamber. Until Eli finally realizes that God was speaking directly to Samuel in the dark. Comforting, assuring, inspiring him directly, tenderly -- by name.

My heart burst. Each and every child in the world -- whether at sleep-over camps with well-appointed cabins, or in refugee camps on hostile borders, can hear their name being called, can feel the calm comfort of that loving Voice speaking directly to them -- assuring them that they are not alone. This Voice is the voice of God, divine Love. This voice not only speaks to them of their Father-Mother God's presence, but of their own spiritual maturity and purpose.

Hannah, Samuel's mother -- who had yearned for this little boy with all her being -- must have known this presence herself. She must have known that God would reach out to her son and call him by his name -- just as he had heard her weeping, seen her own tears, and sent her a son. For she was His child too.

I will be holding this story close. It touches me deeply. For all children -- and their parents.

offered with Love,

Cate

"in restless dreams…."

"in restless dreams
I walk alone,
narrow streets
of cobblestone…"

Emiliana Torrini's hauntingly beautiful recording Simon and Garfunkel's "Sound of Silence," was waiting for me when I woke this morning. This may not be an obvious "spiritual" post. And I am not really even sure I will be able to make the written connection that I feel in my heart. But this blog is all about speaking from experience -- honest experience -- and this is mine. So here goes.

I am a prolific dreamer. This is not something I am alarmed by -- at least, not any longer. As a child I was what is referred to as a lucid dreamer. I only had to close my eyes and I would dream. Often two or more dreams at once. I was aware I was dreaming. I could turn my head and change from one dream to another -- depending on the level of terror, or joy, a particular dream was evoking at that moment. When I'd return to the dream, whatever had disturbed my peace would have passed, and I could re-engage with what brought me respite from reality.

No, I am not kidding. My childhood was pretty scary. These dreams were my escape from the "real" terror of being me, in the world I was living in.

I became very adept at initiating these dream-retreats from reality. I believed that they saved me from madness. I still do. As I grew up, and discovered prayer, I was less inclined to disappear and more willing to stay in the moment, where I would pray for clarity, courage, and a calm trust in the power of good to overthrow evil.

But there was one dream scenario that I hoped would never fully disappear from my life. In it, I walked the narrow stone streets of an ancient village. The pages I held were not in book form, but in scrolls. I read hungrily, as the sun warmed my shoulders, and the scent of lavender swarmed like honey bees around my head. 

I was often alone, but occasionally I sensed someone by my side. If I turned to look at my companion, the dream would end, and I would be back in my bunk bed, alone in the dark -- facing the terror of a long night, just waiting for dawn. If I continued -- without turning, I stayed in the warm sunshine, reading from fragile pages, until morning. At some point, I just stopped turning to see who was with me.

As childhood turned into young womanhood, the presence of this "other," was something I actively sought out when darkness threatened. If I thought that I would even catch a glimpse of "him," I would close my eyes to avoid waking. I wanted nothing to interrupt those hours of peace where I was wise, innocent, and free.

Then in 1971, I was hiding away -- tucked into the crooked arm of a tree, my little aqua transistor radio playing as I read -- when Simon and Garfunkel's 1965 hit, Sound of Silence, came on. I can't explain why I'd never caught the lyrics before -- perhaps because I'd really only heard it on the car radio with 5 other siblings talking and screaming in the backseat with me -- but for the first time they spoke directly to me. I'd been there too -- on those narrow streets, during restless dreams. I felt known.  And I felt not so alone in the universe.

I can't tell you what all this means. I only know that, suddenly,  I wasn't so lonely and afraid of my life anymore. You see, no matter how many times I'd been told that God loved me, I didn't believe the person saying it really knew what they were talking about. They were referring to a God that I could accept was loving and good. But they didn't know me, and all the darkness I had faced.  

They didn't know all the terrible things that had changed me from a little girl, to a creature who escaped her nightly terror by retreating into dreams of ancient villages and make believe stories.  I could believe all they said about God, but not that He could possibly love me.  But the "other" that I walked with in my dreams was warm, kind, quietly present.

It would be another 30 years before I would have the courage to open my eyes in a dream, and look into the face of the person who'd shadowed me during those long walks down the narrow streets of a warm village. I was not disappointed.

I guess what I am trying to say is, don't be afraid. You are not alone. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy makes this remarkable -- and deeply compassionate -- statement of encouragement:

"Whatever inspires
with wisdom, Truth, or Love 
— be it song, sermon, or Science — 
blesses the human family
with crumbs of comfort
from Christ’s table,
feeding the hungry
and giving living waters
to the thirsty." 

Those dreams, and later the song that made me feel "understood," were crumbs of comfort from Christ's table for me. Now, when these dreams come in the night -- they are sweet reminders of God's love for the little girl I was, and the woman she was allowed to become.

You see, you just never know where someone is, what they are facing in the darkness, how they are navigating the narrow streets, or who they are being chased by in the night.  And you never know whether it is the "waking dream or the sleeping dream," that seems more terrifying to them.  But if you can just "be there." Silently when needed, and sometimes without a face -- but always with a prayer, there will come a time when they will find their way into the light. And they will remember -- and give thanks. I promise.

offered with Love,

Kate

"Breath of heaven, hold me together..."

"Breath of Heaven
Hold me together
Be forever near me
Breath of Heaven*..."
- Amy Grant

Recently, the editors at Church Alive asked me to write about a time when "church" played a role in my Christmas memories. It seems like I have a heart-shifting, church-related experience every Christmas. But this is the one that came to mind:

"The greatest gift..."

I’d traced the path from our house, to the church we attended nearby, almost a thousand times that year. But this particular winter night, as a million stars hung brightly from an inverted bowl of midnight blue velvet, my steps were heavy and my heart sank low. We’d lost a baby that year…a baby who’d moved in my heart, long before she moved in my womb. Because of my size, there were those who wondered if I’d just imagined her and thought it was some sort of psychosomatic pregnancy. There were others who’d mourned our loss and feared my descent into a quiet sort of madness. But her still birth was very real. Leaving me, her mother, siding with the latter group—those who were praying for my fragile peace.

That particular night, so close to Christmas, I was months beyond her loss and yet closer than ever to my sorrow. Our church was holding a Christmas Hymn Sing and I was carrying a plate of cookies with one hand, and holding our kindergarten-aged daughter’s mittened hand in my other. Earlier that spring I’d imagined this Christmas with a baby in my lap and our sweet daughter opening presents under the tree. And although I’d tried so hard to be at peace with our loss, that night the tears froze on my cheeks as we walked through the cold December air.

Arriving at church we were greeted by a sea of love; it washed over our small family, and carried our daughter along from loving embrace to loving embrace. She was surrounded by an ocean of kindness, and I was deeply grateful. On the surface I’d been functioning normally for months, but just under the surface I was always on the verge of tears. As members and guests found their seats in the beautifully decorated auditorium, and my husband joined other musician on the platform to lead the singing, I took a seat at the back. I didn’t know if I could make it through the hymn sing without putting my face in my hands and weeping.

But as the first song was suggested, and the musicians played through the opening verse, I felt a voice…yes, felt a voice echoing through my being. It was the same feeling I’d felt, in that very church auditorium, the day our baby first moved in my womb and the words from Luke flooded my heart, “Be it unto me, according to thy will.” Feeling it again was like a divine reminder. I had felt our daughter move, I wasn’t mad. It was glorious. It was more than I’d hoped for, a sensation I’d only dreamed of experiencing during years of other early pregnancy miscarriages. I’d felt her move. I’d known the kind of love that defines the word “compassion” in Hebrew as “by extension, the womb as cherishing the foetus” (Strong’s Hebrew Dictionary). The foetal stage is the one where the babe’s life is not obvious, unseen to the observer, but completely known to the mother. And I’d experienced that awareness. I knew what it felt like to love the promise of what was unseen, without measure. This was the greatest gift in the world.

The auditorium became a manger that night. My church family had become shepherds, kings, wisemen, and cooing doves…midwives at the birth of something holy in me. My mourning had been turned into dancing. The Christ, the consciousness of man’s unconditional innocency, worth, purity, goodness, beauty, and promise, had found its breath, and was singing an “Allelujah” in my heart. It was as if each chorus rose to meet the next, in a crescendo of peace.

By the time we left the church later that evening my heart was no longer broken, it was whole. I’d felt the presence of a Love that delights in the unseen, celebrates the power of peace, and knows a love, that alone is life. The tears that froze on my cheeks that night, as we walked home together, were tears of wonder and joy.


*"Breath of Heaven," was written by Amy Grant, but the version sung by Sara Groves, takes me apart.  The clip in the first link is Amy's performance and the video sticks to the nativity story, but the second video, paired with Sara's extraordinary recording, although a bit rough and dramatic, underscores the human passion and pathos of the larger story.  Both are moving.  I love them each for different reasons.

"..it's yesterday once more..."

"When I was young
I'd listen to the radio,
waiting for my favorite songs
When they played I'd sing along
It made me smile..."
-     John Bettis

Sunday afternoon I was sitting in my new favorite coffeehouse writing, when Karen Carpenter singing "Yesterday Once More" came pouring out of the overhead speakers, and through the air like warm lavender-infused honey.

It was a moment of sweet serendipity that took me by surprise in the most delicious way.  Since I'd begun haunting its eclectic mixture of vintage fabric, organic baked goods with wonderfully strange flavor combinations, and gentle, but edgy tattooed baristas, the music in the coffeehouse had been more cutting edge, than soft rock.  It may not have been what I'd have put on my ipod, but I didn't mind it.  I was there for the tea, not the tunes.

So when I heard the first low strains of Karen Carpenter's sweet rich, "when I was young..." and Richard's harmonies that are so perfectly perfect they make you wonder if it isn't just great reverb, it really was "yesterday once more."

I was sitting on the end of the long grassy pier jutting into Lake Champlain on North Hero Island.   My friends and I had traveled to Vermont from western New Jersey to work at the Bed and Breakfast/Inn that our dentist owned and operated each summer.  It has been scary to be away from my family for the first time, to work that hard (16 hours a day...with only one day off every two weeks,  in the kitchen, the dining room, as a chambermaid, teaching water skiing, washing dishes...all for $14.77/week).  But I was doing it.  I was learning to try new things, meet new people, and hold my ground on personal space and values.  But it wasn't easy. 

I've been thinking about this a lot since I heard Karen Carpenter's voice on Sunday.  I'd never thought of myself as a particularly brave girl.  I'd spent most of my time drawing, writing, reading, painting, helping my mom raise seven younger children, baking, dancing, and haunting libraries.  I'd always thought of my sister Nancy as the "brave one."  I seemed to try new things only when she'd boldly crashed through the door and then held it open for me to slip in behind her.   But that summer was all mine.  I'd applied for the job, gone to the interview, gotten permission from my parents, organized travel, worked out coverage for my home responsibilities with my sisters (that had cost me almost all I would make that summer), and held my ground on going as each little demon voice screamed "you can't do this...you are the mousey one..."

But I did it. 

So what does this have to do with today's post...besides being a story about realizing that I wasn't the cowering bookworm I'd always thought of myself as being?  Well, it comes down to the conversation I had this summer with the nurse, Mark, at the mountain clinic.  I referred to it in a recent post titled, "Everything in its Time," about spiritual vectors.  Another part of that conversation had to do with aging.

When we first met Mark, I asked him, as "small talk," where he lived in the Valley.  He explained that he lived in a turn-of-the-century house near the Arkansas River.  He said that it had been built by miners and still had bullet holes in the windows where the winds blew through.  I asked if that wasn't cold in the winter (I knew how long, cold, and windy the Valley could be when the snow drifted to the rooftops) and he said, "yes, but that he tried to keep his scope of comfort broad."

This fascinated me.  I asked him to tell us more.  He explained that in the off-season he taught survival skills to elderhostel-ers.  And that what he had learned was that age-blind youthfulness seemed to be directly related to one's scope of comfort.  The broader the range of temperatures, living conditions, food choices one was comfortable with exploring or living in, the more youthful the person was.  The narrower the range the more age-related physical and mental issues the person seemed to be facing on a regular basis. 

This, he said, was what he himself was trying very diligently to arrest in himself.  To not decide that, just because he was getting older and had the means to determine his circumstances, he would only live in a place that he liked, to make sure that the temperature was optimal, that the bed was soft/firm according to his liking, or that he only went to his favorite restaurants and ate those items that he already knew were his favorites.  He said that he worked very hard to keep himself "uncomfortable." 

Wow...I loved it...but it made me cringe.  'Nuff said.  I have a lot of work to do in reclaiming my love for less comfort.  But Mark himself was such a great example of his philosophy.  When I discovered what his chronological marker was, I was shocked.    Mark told me our next conversation that "life conspires against our freedom from aging."  He explained that he saw so many of his patients come in with injuries, aches, and pains who "didn't deserve it."  They had worked so hard as young professionals, parents, and neighbors.  They had scrimped and saved to be able to retire.  But, he said, their retirement had come to mean living the good life.  Living in a temperate climate, eating out, sleeping in, relaxing, having things exactly the way they'd always wanted things to be.  But, he almost wept, it was this very decrease in discomfort...living a life full of surprises, and being caught off guard by a freak snow storm, or a teenager's crisis, that seemed to be aging them fastest. 

He said that the key to vitality, for him, was to have the broadest range of what he could be comfortable with, and survive in, as possible. 

Hmmm...

I love that spiritual thought-leader, Mary Baker Eddy, was busiest, and hardest at work, exploring new ideas, breaking down religious, social, and gender barriers in her nineties!!

I have been thinking about this a lot lately.  

We live in an age of personal choice.  A time in history when we think we should (and do) get to have things exactly the way we want them.  For example.  I should only have to listen to the music I like.  So I download my favorite songs...the songs I am comfortable with...on my ipod, pop in my earbuds, and listen to what I like.  

But I realize that there is no spiritual serendipity to this way of living. 

"When I was young I listened to the radio,
waiting for my favorite songs..." 

When I heard that line of music on Sunday, I got up from the table and walked over to the counter.  I hugged the girl with the shaved head, and fedora, wearing a vintage apron on top of her shorts.  I thanked the tattooed barista with piercings who was in charge of the music. I told them that I'd been at the Allentown Fairgrounds concert one summer when they'd played this song to a huge crowd that sang along with every word.  Then, well...I sang along.  We all did.  They knew the words too.  We were like a strangely-mixed up group of children in a sandbox singing,

"Every sha-la-la
every wo, oh, oh
still shines...

Every shing,a-ling-a-ling
that they're starting to sing's
So fine.

When they get to the part
where he's breaking her heart
It can really make you cry
just like before...
It's yesterday once more...."

Full voice...you should have been there...

A friend shared this video on Facebook yesterday....I want to be her when I grow up...

love,

Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

"And I still love you..."

"Well the sun is surely sinking down
But the moon is slowly rising
So this old world must still be spinning round
And I still love you

So close your eyes
You can close your eyes, its all right
I dont know no love songs
And I cant sing the blues anymore
But I can sing this song
And you can sing this song
When Im gone

It wont be long before another day
We gonna have a good time
And no one's gonna take this time away
You can stay as long as you like..."

If you are thinking that these lyrics seem familiar, you are right. I wrote Tuesday's post with this song as the keynote, but felt compelled to revisit it today. Deep beneath the surface of my experience with this song as a James Taylor/Carly Simon fan and folk song/lullaby-singing mother, lies a time when this song became my own anthem of comfort and surrender.

It wasn't an easy time, but it was probably one of the most profoundly spiritual periods of my life...and one I rarely talk, or write, about.

It was a long season of confusion, hope, fear, prayer, and anguish. I lived each day in a space of ceaseless prayer, seeking wisdom and guidance for just one more step forward...without falling.  The angel messages from God were clear, but terrifying.  I was being asked to take steps I couldn't even imagine without breaking into a cold sweat.  Hope kept me on my knees praying for "another answer" until my knees were sore and bruised.  My only relief from the relentless "oh, please not this" moments came in the middle of the night when my family was asleep. In the dark hours between midnight and dawn, I could steal away for long self-numbing, exhausting runs, and work with a hospice organization in our city.  This agency coordinated volunteer relief for families with children and teens who were facing terminal illnesses and under palliative...or "end-of-life"...care and services.  Volunteers were assigned to patients who were in hospitals, hospice centers, or were receiving palliative care in their own homes.

Attending to the basic needs -- hand holding, placing a cool cloth on a fevered brow, reading, singing, talking, listening, cherishing -- of patients so that parents and family members could rest...or even just feel like they could leave the room for a moment...was a release for me.  For a few brief hours between midnight and dawn, I was free from the terror of my own journey through the valley, the wilderness, the desert of human hopes.  It was not that the work was physically demanding, but that it required complete and utter focus, and I welcomed it.  Focusing on the needs of others, was like a deeply needed rest from myself.  It was a divine gift allowing me to be free of retracing my past and agonizing over my future.

There was something so liberating about being able to be present in the moment and just...well, be.  I was not there as a healthcare professional, I was not there as a Christian Science practitioner, pastoral counselor, or hospital chaplain .  I was serving as a non-denominational lay volunteer.  My only role was to support patients and their families.  It was as much about...as I would eventually learn... beginning the healing of my own grief.

This didn't mean that I wasn't praying, I was. I was always listening for God's life-affirming message concerning what was true about His child, listening for direction about how I could be of help, and listening for His constant reminders that He was present...right there in rooms where things often seemed terribly bleak and void of hope.   There were times when all I could do was silently bear witness to the evidence of His presence.  The face of God in the kindness of a nurse, the tenderness of a mother, the strength and courage of a child facing a journey that no one could provide a map for. But I was not there to give Christian Science treatment. I was not there to give advice or my opinion. I was there to simply give of my heart, my time, my silent certainty of God's presence. And I could give the gift of songs, songs I'd sing just because I loved them and I knew they brought comfort, joy, inspiration, and peace...to me, if nothing else.

"You Can Close Your Eyes" was just one of the songs that I sang to myself, and for those patients and their loved ones...devoted family members sleeping in hard plastic chairs, on floors, or in the bed next to a comatose child...night after night. 

I would start with the lullabies I had sung to my daughters earlier in the evening and then move on to hymns, folksongs, songs I had taught children in school,  love songs, gospels...and always to this song of comfort and love.

One night, it was a young man and his sleeping mother (click on this link to read a poem, "Hospice - You are Not Alone" I wrote at the time, and posted a few years ago on this blog) that I poured my songs out for. And this song was a gift...a promise of rest and peace.  I thought I was singing it for that mother and her son...as well as those who were asleep in hospital beds throughout the city...but after about the tenth time through I realized that I was singing it to myself as well. 

We could all close our eyes.  We could rest, not from the dripping of medication, the pain of loss, the sorrow of grief...but on the arm of our Father-Mother God.  We could rest in His presence, we could rest upon Her wise and generous preparation of our hearts and lives for the journey each one of us was facing.  And we could rest under Her wings of comfort and protection from the gathering storm of emotions that seemed to toss us to and fro, the glaring heat of self-doubt and regret that came in waves of "could I have done more?" and "what if I'd only..."

I have long loved this song as a child's lullaby, a prelude to sweet slumber.  But as I re-read Tuesday's post, I realized that I couldn't let Tuesday's message stand as the only testament to this song's spiritual impact on my life.  During those nights, this beautiful song was also a sweet, strong, tender companion to me, and a blessing offered to those I sang it for. I was singing for those who slept in darkened rooms where monitors beeped, nurses tiptoed in, mother's wept silent tears of heartache and surrender...and yes, I sang to myself, where in this sacred space and time I was learning the value of just being present, aware, gentle, and humane. I was learning that sometimes it is enough to simply sing a song and rest with another in, on, upon, and under a divine Parent's loving care. An ever-wakeful Parent who is always whispering, "and I still love you..."

"...So close your eyes
You can close your eyes, its all right
I dont know no love songs
And I cant sing the blues anymore
But I can sing this song
And you can sing this song
When I'm gone..."

I will never forget those families who taught me so much...i still love you...
Kate

"Trouble me..."

"Trouble me, disturb me
with all your cares and your worries.
Trouble me on the days when you feel spent.
Why let your shoulders bend underneath this burden
when my back is sturdy and strong?
Trouble me..."
- Natalie Merchant

I'll post the rest of the lyrics to 10,000 Maniac's "Trouble Me" below with the Youtube video, but when my dear friend Nancy sent it along this morning with a note: "...it's why we do what we do...eh?" all plans for writing today's post with another song as the springboard, were springboarded right out the window.  This was the song.

Yes, this is why we do what we do isn't it my sweet friend?  Nancy is a Christian Science nurse, in fact she is the nurse I wrote about a couple of years ago in  "Nursing...and the law of kindness". 

I am always surprised when someone apologizes after calling for help...especially on Christmas Day -- or in the middle of the night.  Helping others is what Christmas day...and every day...is all about for those of us who have devoted our full-time to serving as spiritual healers and caregivers. I can't think of anything I'd rather do than get a call from someone who needs to feel fellowship in God's love.  It is such a privilege and joy to be invited to pray with them...bearing witness to God's presence in their lives as living, breathing, palpating Love...any moment of any day.  Just ask my husband and children.  And I somehow feel that each of my fellow practitioner, nurse, and military chaplain colleagues must feel the same way.  This is why we do what we do.

As Mary Baker Eddy says in her article, "Love" from Miscellaneous Writings 1883 - 1896:

"Love is not something put upon a shelf, to be taken down on rare occasions with sugar-tongs and laid on a rose-leaf.  I make strong demands on love, call for active witnesses to prove it, and noble sacrifices and grand achievements as its results.  Unless these appear, I cast aside the word as a sham and counterfeit, having no ring of the true metal.  Love cannot be a mere abstraction, or goodness without activity and power. 

As a human quality, the glorious significance of affection is more than words:  it is the tender unselfish deed done in secret; the silent, ceaseless prayer; the self-forgetful heart that overflows the veiled form stealing on an errand of mercy, out of a side door; the little feet tripping along the sidewalk; the gentle hand opening the door that turns toward want and woe, sickness and sorrow, and thus lighting the dark places of the earth."

This healing work of love is not heavy labor, it is a gift, a never-ending, perpetually inspiring, always smile-producing gift. It "happifies existence." It keeps Christmas in our hearts each and every day. It is the "unto us a child is born" that moves within us. It is the real "rapture" and it never ceases to take my breath away.

Through the years I have had the privilege of working with many nurses, chaplains, and practitioners whose care and affection for humanity is just as tireless and true, joy-filled and selfless as this article suggests...and I have been deeply blessed by their example of charity and compassion.   Nancy is one of them. 

Here is a link to the song Nancy sent along with her note... please enjoy "Trouble Me" by Natalie Merchant.

Trouble Me
lyrics by Natalie Merchant

Trouble me, disturb me
with all your cares and you worries.
Trouble me on the days when you feel spent.
Why let your shoulders bend underneath this burden
when my back is sturdy and strong?
Trouble me.

Speak to me, dont mislead me,
the calm I feel means a storm is swelling;
Theres no telling where it starts or how it ends.
Speak to me, why are you building this thick brick wall
to defend me when your silence is my greatest fear?
Why let your shoulders bend underneath this burden
when my back is sturdy and strong?

Speak to me.
Let me have a look inside these eyes
while Im learning.
Please dont hide them just because of tears.
Let me send you off to sleep with a there, there,
now stop your turning and tossing.
Let me know where the hurt is and how to heal.

Spare me? dont spare me anything troubling.
Trouble me, disturb me with all your cares and you worries.
Speak to me and let our words build a shelter from the storm.
Lastly, let me know what I can mend.
Theres more, honestly, than my sweet friend, you can see.
Trust is what Im offering if you trouble me.

Thank you to everyone who has ever let me sit with you in the middle of the night, on Christmas day, or any moment of any day of any year...you have blessed my life with your call. And dear Nancy, thank you for this reminder of "why we do what we do...all my love,
Kate

"You're still you..."

"Time changes everything
One truth always stays the same
You're still you
After all
You're still you…"
- Josh Groban

My dad was a mystery to me.  A farm boy from a large immigrant Irish family of very humble means, his formal education was curtailed by the demands of agricultural seasons and crop schedules. By the time he was 30, he and mom had 6 children under the age of 10.  At 31 he was introduced to Christian Science and his desire to understand words he was reading about God, and the world around him, launched him on a personal quest for knowledge and wisdom. 

As the oldest child in my family, my dad and I were often (in those days as he took up his self-education where he had once left off) studying the same things.  Our reading levels advanced concurrently and I would often find him picking up my science or history textbooks when they were laying on the table during long homework sessions…and reading them.   His tools for self-instruction were as diverse as his interests.  I was neither surprised to see him with his nose in a volume of our World Book Encyclopedia (reading it through - page after page - like a novel) or a Nancy Drew mystery I had finished.

What always surprised me was his humility in letting us see him struggle with words that were new or foreign to him, and ask for help…or the dictionary…in order to self-solve the mysteries of language-usage or meaning.

When I was in high school I went through a very rough patch of self-doubt and loneliness.  I had always been a small child, girl, pre-teen, but with the onset of womanhood my body seemed to betray me.  All my new body parts seemed to appear over the course of one summer.  Unfortunately, it happened while I was away from all the kids I had only just met when we moved into the district just before the end of the previous school year.  In their eyes I went from being a skinny little kid to a young woman overnight…or at least over the summer. 

When I arrived back in school that September I was soft and round and I don't think there was an angular feature left on my once rather gangly body. Before I knew it rumors were swirling.  No one knew me well enough to deny the rumors as lies…in my defense, or to come to me and ask whether they were true…for themselves.

As a new kid I was a blank canvas for painting a titillating picture on…and my new rounder, softer body provided the paint for doing just that.  Of course, it all added up to a fantabulous story in which my parents must have moved our family away from wherever we had lived to this small farming community, because I was in the early stages of pregnancy.   Over the summer I must have had the baby, and I was still padded with post-baby fullness.  It didn't help that my mother had just given birth to twins (yes, numbers 7 and 8) and they didn't look anything alike.  One of them must have been mine…right?  Wrong!

When I finally became aware of what was being said, I was devastated.   I remember coming home after school that day and wanting to quit school and never go back.  I went to my bed and picked up the "autograph dog" I had sewn together from two panels of pale blue gingham printed with the front and back images of a floppy eared puppy and stuffed with poly-fill.  These were popular at my former school and everyone would bring them in to have their friends autograph.  I had made one for myself over the summer, but the only autographs I had on it were from my parents and my two sisters who were old enough o write in cursive.

I hugged it to my chest and tried to pray.  But nothing really helped.  At one point, I looked at my dog and there, written in my dad's pretty horrible handwriting, were the words "She walks in beauty and grace like the night - Dad."  Something about his writing of those words made me feel braver about everything.  I felt like I could walk with my head held high knowing that what was being said about me wasn't true.  I felt an inner elegance and dignity that looking in the mirror, and seeing the all too obvious reason for the rumors, didn't give me.

I went back to school the next day...and the next.  The rumor blew over with some help from my parents, and I ended up loving my school year and the friends I eventually made.  

The blue gingham dog moved through my young adulthood with me from room to apartment to house.  The ink from my parents' and sisters' autographs faded.  I never let another person sign that dog and if I close my eyes, still today, I can see that exact shade of turquoise-y blue gingham with those four autographs in faded black ball-point pen as if I were holding it in my hands. 

It was years before I discovered that my dad had quoted Lord Byron (adding the word grace) in his autograph.  When I did, it made me cry.  I never knew he had read, and loved, Byron well enough to quote him.  It was such a new and different view of my dad.  His addition of the word "grace" is still a gift.  He was not an emotionally expressive kind of guy...and we had our issues and differences, but to think that he chose such a word in thinking of me, and that he'd had the audacity to insert it into a quote by a famous poet makes me smile. He must have trusted a Voice that told him that his own inspiration and ideas were as valid and immutable as Byron's.  His use of the word "grace" still gives me courage when navigating through rough waters and facing down my own demons. 

I would like to think that no matter what mistakes we make, or misunderstandings we face…whatever rumors may swirl or fears may poke at soft places in our hearts where we feel vulnerable or fragile, we all have a Father who is constantly writing His message of Love on our hearts telling us that, in His eyes, no matter what, "You're still you…after all, you're still you."

with Love,
Kate

"Your life story...a gift of love..."

"Carry with you maps and string, flashlights
Friends who make you sing
And stars to help you find your place
Music, hope and amazing grace…

Everybody strains to hear the sound
Of their heart's calling
Now you can write yours down
It's your life story…"
-Mary Chapin Carpenter

I sometimes wonder what difference it will make whether I write this, my life's story…or not.   Does it matter if I let a Tuesday pass without an installment…will Thursday's square on the calendar suddenly frown up at me from my Daytimer if I fail to exorcise something from the depths of my own experience.  Because that's all this is…just small snippets from the fabric of my life's story…sewn together into a patchwork quilt of songs and memories…tears and prayers.

I lost a friend I never met this past week…at least not in person.  Children's author and inspirational allegorist Madeleine L'Engle passed on before I could sit in her lap and ask her all the questions of the universe…which I hope she might have answered from the wrinkled folds of time and space she traveled in.  Her heart laid out life's lessons bare before us through her writing.  Her "voice" was magical and warm, innocent and wise…and I loved her…deeply.  A day full of sorrows could be resuscitated by just one pop into the pages of "A Circle of Quiet", or "A Swiftly Tilting Planet".  Her words were deeply inspiring, her characters touchable, and her worlds of wonder and delight were a retreat into hope and goodness.

"Why does anybody tell a story?" Ms. L'Engle once asked, even though she knew the answer.

"It does indeed have something to do with faith," she said, 'faith that the universe has meaning, that our little human lives are not irrelevant, that what we choose or say or do matters, matters cosmically."

I believe this is true.  Her life's story, as told through fantasy and allegory, mattered to me.  I drew fresh breath from characters who, although broken, fought the darkness and discovered threads of light so strong that it led them home.  I found comfort and solace in the hollowed out places of warmth she feathered for her characters…and her readers.  Places where the light was golden and the quilts scattered about were already soft with wear.  I could almost feel her cool fingers stroking my temples as I lay curled into myself waiting for the book to warm me.

Jesus once said, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." I think this is what we do when we tell our stories.  When we are willing to share…whether it is through fairytale or testimony, blog or blathering…doubled up in laughter or spent with weeping…we love. 

Even if you are not writing a blog, a book, a lecture, or an article…and you have a story to tell, call me…I am always ready to be loved by someone's laying down of their life.  Or you could send it in an email to your mom, your sister, your bestest best friend…or me...I'm sure there's almost nothing we'd rather read…

You never know how it might carve out a place of comfort and healing…a space of sanctuary…in the midst of sadness, indifference, despair…or just on "a dark and stormy night"… for a weary heart.

Thank you Mama Madeleine for loving us all enough to share your stories, for sharing Mrs.Whatsit, and Meg and tesseract-ing, and teaching us that when we love intensely evil cannot stand…thank you, thank you, thank you…

"Maybe love is all anybody
Ever should believe in…
Maybe time can choose
Whether to be earthbound or to fly…
I won't worry, the truth's always been found
In your life story…"

Kate

"...all over this land..."

"...If I had a hammer
I'd hammer in the morning
I'd hammer in the evening
All over this land
I'd hammer out danger
I'd hammer out a warning
I'd hammer out love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land..."
- Hays/Seeger

Do you ever watch the news…CNN, MSNBC, or my favorite BBCNews on Public Television, and feel overwhelmed by the barrage of mind-reeling images and heart-wrenching information that comes out of that black box…flat screen or now, almost antique tube-style?   Have you ever wished that the NY Times you have delivered to your doorstep on Sunday mornings, pieced together from random pages scattered through the coffeehouse after church, or read online after midnight, would come wrapped in a "the contents of this package may be hazardous to your peace " disclaimer?

This past month, NPR, CNN, BBC, and NYT have had me on my knees in prayer.  My favorite news source, The Christian Science Monitor, has been like a good friend standing over me in the bathroom holding my hair, whispering messages of comfort, hope and encouragement when my stomach is unsettled…but still, I am a venerate news hound and I want to hear more perspectives...however disquieting.  Thankfully, I am also a passionate metaphysician and when I can stay clearly focused on seeing that every image, every piece of news coming at me is just an opportunity to "hammer" out each dull cold lump of information into an exercise in using my spiritual ocular muscles more effectively in seeing God in all things…I feel, not overwhelmed, but empowered.

Finding God expressing Himself as compassion in the tenderness of a soldier who is caring for an Iraqi child, finding Him as Mind when I hear about a senator who has been inspired to sponsor a wise bill, finding Her as Soul when I see beauty in the face of a mother who has expressed mercy at the sentencing of her child's murderer…these are small ways that I can ring my own bell of freedom.  In those moments, I am no longer the victim of my world, but sitting at the feet of its Master, letting his calm eyes hold my gaze and His strong hand on my shoulder tell me He is there…I need not be afraid. 
As most of my readers know there is always a song behind any mental image I hang onto and find useful as I navigate this spiritual journey.  My news feasting experiences are no different.  As a veteran of the anti-war 60s and the bra-burning 70s, my songs of protest are usually folk songs.  Joni Mitchell, The Weavers, Bob Dylan, Jackson Browne, and Pete Seeger fill my sign-carrying, chain-myself-to-the-front-columns-of-the-Pentagon heart.

"...If I had a bell
I'd ring it in the morning
I'd ring it in the evening
All over this land
I'd ring out danger
I'd ring out a warning
I'd ring out love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land..."

As part of our Sunday routine, Jeff and I start our morning with a two hour walk in the park, which includes a detour for church and then back onto the pathways through our neighborhood's large university campus, down to "The Loop."  This is our city's happening stretch of coffeehouses, performing arts venues, restaurants, galleries, cool shops and your "throw one in for good" tattoo parlor (it's where I got mine!), and arts cinema.  We make our way through the neighborhood on a pathway that literally pours us out onto "The Loop" like small children coming down a slide into a university playground…music, costumes, discourse…a paradise for old hippies…like us.

Our favorite Sunday morning coffeehouse (as opposed to our favorite afternoon and evening coffeehouse a block from our home) is Meshuggah.  It's eclectic, political, quirky, and they make a great cup of hot chocolate.  But most importantly, they offer a first glance through the Sunday New York Times…if you can gather its crumpled and coffee stained body parts and put it back into some sense of order.  Rather, to use a metaphor inspired by my friend Maria, like picking up pieces of straw from the picked apart scarecrow in "The Wizard of Oz" and poking it into the right places so that he can stand up and find his voice. 

As I retrieved a bit from one table with my "Hi, are you finished with the front page..." the man who handed it to me said, "I hope you haven't eaten this morning…it's a tough day for news and it might upset your stomach."  And I replied with a smile, "Oh, I'm going to pray my way through this one, I'm sure there's something there to remind me that God is present in the world today!"

As I returned to our table my folkie roots took hold and the first strains of Lee Hays and Peter Seeger's "If I Had a Hammer" started popping through the dark soil of my news day.  I felt empowered by what I could bring to the table…I could hammer out, from the steely images of apathy and hopelessness, some instance of compassion strengthened by a harsh experience on the Gaza Strip revealing the tempered steel of humanity's potential.  I was going to hear soft the "bell of justice" in the way a judge ruled fairly even when the world would have applauded a harsher response.  I would sing a song that warned of the danger of losing our "true north"…kindness, trust, respect for free moral agency…by singing about the love between my brothers and my sisters…rather than celebrating the kind of gossip-mongering, judgmental cannibalism I could have become disheartened by on the society and opinion pages.

"...If I had a song
I'd sing it in the morning
I'd sing it in the evening
All over this land
I'd sing out danger
I'd sing out a warning
I'd sing out love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land..."

So, for this folkie, I have a hammer, a bell and a song…but most importantly, I have what each of these instruments of change represent to me…I have a prayer….so does our world.

"...Well I've got a hammer
And I've got a bell
And I've got a song to sing
All over this land
It's the hammer of justice
It's the bell of freedom
It's the song about love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land."

This Sunday--when you read the paper or watch "Meet the Press"--sing, pray, ring, and hammer…"about the love between your brothers and your sisters…all over this land."

I'll be listening,
Kate

"So when days grows dark and cold..."

"So when day grows dark and cold,
Tear or triumph harms,
Lead Thy lambkins to the fold,
Take them in Thine arms…"
- Mary Baker Eddy

For me, yesterday's tragic incident at Virginia Tech brought back so many memories of those weeks following the Columbine High School shootings when I joined hundreds of other spiritual, health care and social service professionals in providing counseling to students, faculty, administrators and their families. 

However much I long to be there to help lift the heavy mantle of sorrow from the shoulders of those whose lives were touched by yesterday's brutal rampage, this time I don't live just 45 miles away.  I can't grab my Bible and Science and Health and hop in my Jeep and within an hour be sitting with parents and students, teachers and administrators holding hands, offering support or just listening to them tell stories about loved ones they feared were in danger.  I can't sit in the middle of this community whose peace was shattered by the sound of gunfire and speak directly…face to face…of God's tender care for their loved one.  The sons and daughters who may never again come home for Thanksgiving dinner, the ones who may be in surgery, or the ones who feel traumatized by sights and sounds they never imagined experiencing when they received their acceptance letter to Virginia Tech.   But… I can begin the same way I began that journey towards Columbine High School in mid-April of 1999…I can pray.  And from the summit of prayer I have a new perspective… I can reclaim the undeniable and certain spiritual peace I found during those weeks of providing care and counseling in the wake of the tragic shootings at Columbine High.

I have already recounted some of the lessons I learned during that time of rigorous spiritual caregiving in "A Peace that Can't be Shattered by Gunmen or Fear" and "Love, not Terror, is Contagious"…but today my thoughts and prayers are with the mothers, fathers, sisters, uncles, grandparents of Virginia Tech students.  Family member and friends who may have spent yesterday afternoon and last night wondering if their loved ones were safe, wondering if they would ever feel peace again, wondering if it could happen again.  The same suggestions of doubt and fear that many of us today may be wrestling with in the wake of such tragic news… accompanied by a never-ending stream of sound bytes and images we probably wish we could hit a delete button and erase forever.

But these feelings of horror, doubt, fear, helplessness, and hopelessness cannot steal from us our right to feel God's presence every moment…even when the sights and sounds of gunfire wrack our being, we can focus on the images of fellow students rising to help a friend, or a police officer carrying a wounded student from a classroom. These instances of kindness, grace and courage are our "faint morning beams" of God's presence in the midst of darkness.   We can still our wondering…our uncertainty, doubt and all the "what if"s of fear…with a spiritual knowing that is often not reinforced by the images being presented, but as powerful as the wind we cannot see yet still bends the tree to its will.

I recently had an experience one rainy Saturday afternoon that left me shaky with dread.  I had been quietly praying for myself and others, when suddenly I had the sensation of being violently slammed into something or having something slam into me.  This was arresting.  I had been so thoroughly immersed in that peaceful place of conscious communion with the divine that the abruptness of the sensation sent me reeling.  I immediately shook myself free of it, claiming that I was conscious, and that I could only be conscious of good.  Then I closed my eyes and returned to a meditative state. 

Within a very short time I was completely at peace again, fully engaged in listening for divine direction and watching for each glimpse of the spiritual nature of all "things" from a God-sourced perspective.  I was awake and aware of my surroundings--although my eyes were closed--when I felt someone come and sit on the edge of the sofa next to me. 

I have had enough experiences with things that seem unexplainable that I am rarely surprised.  I knew that I was alone in the house and that no one had unlocked, opened or closed our very noisy doors.  So I just stayed still and let "it" be there with me and share the space in consciousness that was so filled with peace and inspiration.  Within a few minutes I felt the weight against me shift away.  I felt the sofa cushion return to its natural shape and it was as if someone had walked out of the room.  At first I sat there celebrating life…affirming the all-presence of God as life…indistinguishable and eternal. 

And then it hit me square in the middle of my forehead.  Hannah!

My daughter, as many readers will know, is living in South Africa.  I then remembered that she was on holiday with friends during her spring break, camping in a remote area.  Suddenly my thoughts were in turmoil.  Had she been in an accident?   Had she been injured, mugged, or even mauled by lions (don't laugh…they were camping in the middle of South Africa)?  I wondered what it meant that I had felt a violent intrusion on my prayers and then felt the presence of someone.  I had had one too many experiences where a friend or a pet, when leaving this experience through "death," had spent a moment or more in transition with me, or with someone I knew,  before fully moving on.

But this was not a peaceful thought that Saturday.  In fact, it sent me into a tailspin.  I called my husband and I was grateful that he didn't scoff at my concern.  He reminded me to pray, offered to pray with me, and suggested that I call my daughter's birthmother (whom she is living with during her time abroad) to check in.  I was in the perfect state of reception for any wise and calm counsel.  Okay, I was desperate.  I hung up the phone, closed my eyes, and returned to that space of prayer that always gives birth to deep spiritual peace.  I was flooded with images of Hannah as a fearless child at play "popping up" after a horrible fall only to giggle and try some alarming highwire act again with perfect confidence.  Or Hannah, coming back from a day on the river at camp with her usual buoyant smile and reply to my question, "How was the river?" with an off-handed, "Oh, fine."  Only to find out later that she had been wedged between two boulders in a "hole" in the river and had to be rescued by a senior counselor when her efforts to free herself had failed and she had actually been quite frightened. (Kim, if you read this could you explain what a "hole" is?)

A parade of healings that I had witnessed with Hannah swept over me like a cool stream and I was washed clean of the frantic terror that seemed to have me in its grip.  But as I walked through the next hours of my day, concern continued to poke at the borders of my heart.  I would stop and pray…again and again…until I found peace.  Finally I felt that I could call her birthmom, my friend, without betraying any concern.  I reached her on the first try (not an easy feat from here to there) and she sounded relaxed and happy.  Whew.  So I asked if I could talk to Hannah.  My alarm meter went right back up into the red zone when she said, "No, they won't be back until tomorrow."  I chatted for a few moments more before hanging up the phone and I returned to that silent place of prayer.  I prayed all evening and through the night.  With the dawn I felt a complete peace…invulnerable and grounded.

At some point in the night my prayers had taken a turn.  I went from praying for Hannah to embracing all children "abroad", all children on spring break, the concerned parents of children on spring break and abroad...and finally to a solid place of seeing that it really wasn't about what I knew to be true about Hannah (as wonderful as she is to me, her over-adoring mom) or children on spring break…or their parents.

My prayer came down to…what did I know to be true about God?  Did I really know God to be all-powerful Love?  Did I trust Him to care for His children?  Or did I just pay lip service to a spiritual philosophy about Him…and always because of what had happened to us…me, my children, my community, my world, my humanity?

I realized that if Hannah had come to "visit" on her way forward in her life's journey, I could be grateful that God had given her the wisdom to understand that I might need to know, and feel that she was at peace.  If it was just her way (and His) of asking me to prayerfully support her in a moment of extreme need…well, thank you God for giving me the opportunity to celebrate with her the constancy of Your love…and the ONLY source of love…ever.

The next day I called South Africa and Hannah was back home and tired from a busy camping trip…and she would tell me all about it later. 

When she did I was not alarmed.  She began by saying, "Don't be concerned, Mom…I was alright, but…"    It was that "but"…that got me.  She went on to share that during her camping trip she had decided to take a flying leap off a very, very high cliff into a body of water.  Because of the height and the air currents, she missed her mark and had slammed into a rock.  A friend had come to help her and she had come away from the experience not only unharmed, but had returned to the cliff's edge to try it again…correcting her trajectory.  That kid!

Each parent, sister, brother, friend…today, tomorrow, next week…who spent time wondering (or is still wondering) about the safety of a loved one at Virginia Tech…or in Darfur…has really just been engaged (with God) in cherishing someone….their spiritual identity, the love they inspire and the space of good they represent in the universe.  In celebrating the certainty of God's wonder-ful loving care for His creation.  .

Thank you God for putting your love (not fear) in our hearts as we consider our children…the world's children.  Every parent and child is living, right now, in the warm embrace of that love.  Nothing can convince us that we are afraid…because we love our children so much.

As John says, "There is no fear in love…"

We either love them…or we are afraid…they don't mix any more than light and darkness can coincide.  As a parent, I choose love.  I have the right to reclaim this icky feeling in my gut.  I'll be darned if I will let anything tell me that I am afraid.  I am deciding that this feeling is and can only be, my overwhelming, unsettling in its magnitude,  love for humanity, my family…for Hannah.  I am NOT afraid… because I love.

Let's take the weapons of fear out of the hand of the "enemy" (whatever would say that God is not all-powerful and loving presence in our lives at all times and in all circumstances) and choose to be honor Him as His sons and daughters…and love, love, love…

Let's love the families and friends of students, teachers and administrators at Virginia Tech and around the world…let's shower them with our prayers of love…and with the way those prayers lead us to act…and by this loving honor the lives of those they love.  God will shepherd us all through these days, that seem so dark and cold, with His tender care…

We need not wonder…

"…Feed the hungry
Heal the heart
Till the morning's beam;
White as wool,
Ere they depart,
Shepherd, wash them clean."
- Mary Baker Eddy

with Love,
Kate