"the place where the lost things go..."

"Time to close your eyes
so sleep can come around;
for when you dream you'll find,
all that's lost is found.

Maybe on the moon
or maybe somewhere new,
maybe all you're missing
lives inside of you..."

This morning, Lisa - my sister-in-law once removed, suggested that I might want to listen to the lullaby,  "The Place Where the Lost Things Go" from the new film, Mary Poppins Returns. We live in a mountain town without a movie theater anywhere within the radius of an hour and a half. In the winter -- movies mean navigating snowy passes. So we just don't see anything new until the snow melts.  Thank goodness for the internet!

I went right to Youtube, and within a few moments I was weeping. Oh my, what a song!  Lisa couldn't have shared it with me at a more perfect moment.

Earlier this morning, in the half-light of dawn -- that inbetween time of  timeless space between sleeping and waking -- I dreamed. And in my dreaming, the girls -- all three of my daughters -- were with me on the Cape. We swam in the ocean like dolphins and picked up shells and alabaster stones on the beach.

Afterwards, as we were changing into dry clothes I realized that Emma and Clara were about 4 years old. I felt like I had been given the greatest gift. Their little bodies were sun-kissed and soft. They were silly and eager.  I could hear them singing The Beatles, "Eight Days a Week," as clearly as if they were sitting behind me in their carseats as we drove along the sandy Cape Cod roads.

It was such a sweet return to the place where a happy moment lived. And it was fully alive for me. I was completely aware that I was "dreaming," and yet, there was nothing lost in the past, about this experience. I was fully conscious. I was happily cherishing the gift of being with their little girl selves again.

I woke remembering every second of it. I woke with the happiest feeling in my heart and tears on my cheeks. I wasn't remembering a lost moment from the past. I was experiencing the "now" of my love for them.

This may not seem like a particularly metaphysical post. But it is - for me. It is all about Life. It is not filled with quotes or insights. Just love. A love, that alone, is Life. And because, as Mary Baker Eddy writes, "Love alone is Life,"  Love is always present, always alive -- never in the past. And sometimes, this Love fills us so full -- that it bubbles over in our moments of deepest stillness and becomes visceral -- experiential. It is a gift that comes with such deep tenderness.

I will listen to this lullaby many times today. And maybe tomorrow too. Thank you Lisa for thinking of me when you heard it. That means more to me than you know.

Perhaps you will sing it for me one day.

offered with Love,

Kate

"if not now, tell me when..."

"it will take
a change of heart
for this to mend,
but miracles do happen
every shining now and then,
if not now,
tell me when..."

I spent a week grieving. Then I realized it was time to accept the gift of this moment in history.  To embrace the opportunities we have to be emboldened by love.

When I want a musical kick-in-the-bumm, I turn to Carrie Newcomer. She always reminds me that self-indulgence is not allowed in the heart of a spiritual warrior. I love her recording of "If Not Now." It reminds me that "everything that happens -- happens not to us, but for us."

I needed this reminder. I was on the verge of doing what we nesting creatures do. I wanted to pull into my shell, hide under the covers, slip beneath the wings of someone wiser.

But only for a while. And it was there in the silence, and in the remembering of who I am and what I am capable of accomplishing in service to my God and His children. I found the courage to do something more. I could build nests. I could be someone who quietly gathers the discarded bits and forgotten pieces of this  movement, and builds a safe place for the incubation of dreams.

This doesn't need to be a time of disappointment, but greater appointment. We have been called into this moment for a holy purpose. And it is upon this landscape of stark realization -- that there are millions of people hurting and angry --  that we can find our voice. There is a song to be sung, a message to deliver, a gift to give. And we are that gift. As Scripture assures us:

"prove me now herewith,
saith the Lord of hosts,
if I will not open you
the windows of heaven,
and pour you out a blessing,
that there shall not be
room enough to receive it..." 

Will there ever be a time like this one? A time when kindness stands out in such stark relief against the backdrop of hate. A time when clear integrity is seen in a sea of gray uncertainty. A time when acceptance - based on impartial, and universal Love - is felt where bigotry lurks in the darkness. This is our time. This is our calling.

Recently someone asked me if I didn't feel the hand of an earlier doctrine of racial-purging, religious registry, and white nationalism reaching into this time. Yes, I have -- the comparisons are pretty insidious. But we are not the people of that time. We are wiser, more aware, and we are empowered by what we now know - about where this kind of thinking leads. And we are ready to say "no."

In her collection of addresses, articles, and letters titled Miscellaneous Writings 1888 - 1896, Mary Baker Eddy writes:

"Be “of one mind,”
“in one place,”
and God will pour you
out a blessing such as you
never before received.
He who dwelleth in eternal light
is bigger than the shadow..." 

This is our time. This is our "now." We can be of one mind in this place. We can unite in the Principle of all unity -- Love.   Or as Kahlil Gibran writes:

""In friendship, or in love,
two, side-by-side, raise hands together
to find what one cannot reach alone." 

Whether we are marching in peaceful protest, creating sanctuary cities, refusing to let our Muslim neighbors register alone, or dancing, praying, petitioning and singing our love -- we are not alone. We are in this time together. We will not hide. We will love boldly and courageously.

I love thinking of this statement from Eddy as a benediction on our place in this historic hour:

"There is with us at this hour this great, a great blessing;
and may I say with the consciousness of Mind
that the fulfilment of divine Love in our lives
is the demand of this hour — the special demand..." 

We are not being imposed upon by hatred, hatred has been exposed by Love. The demands that are being made upon us are the demands of Love. Love is asking us to shine like stars against the backdrop of a midnight sky. Love is demanding that we step up and be counted.  Darkness cannot hide the light. This is our time to be the light of Love. To shine. To be our most brilliant selves. To be a candle in the storm.


offered with Love,

Kate

"Be here now..."

"Be here now.
No other place to be.
All the doubts that linger,
just set them free.

Let good things happen.
Just let them come --
into every moment,
like the rising sun..."

 There is something so peaceful about Mason Jenning's "Be Here Now." It reminds us that there is really no other place we can be, but here...now.

But how many hours have I wasted thinking "if only." If only I could be "there," then I would be happy. If only I could be back in a time "when," then I could make changes that would have brought healing. If only I could fast forward and know what was coming, then I could relax and be at peace with things as they are today.

But I clearly remember the day I realized that every one of those hours spent anywhere but here, and now, was time spent focused on something besides God.

God's name -- the only name He give Himself (excuse the gender assigment) is "I AM." So for me to let my thoughts dwell anywhere but in the "I AM" of being -- I am here, I am now -- is to feel separate from God. To feel separate from love, beauty, peace, goodness, grace.

I've spent way too many hours wondering "if only." Wanting to go back and make different choices, live in a different place where I'd have different choices, chase a future where the choices are boundless. But it's all fruitless. I am here. I exist now. This is the truth.

Mary Baker Eddy says, in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures:

"The spiritual sense of truth must be gained,
before Truth can be understood."

 For me, this says, that until I understand the presence and power of God -- operating as the only Cause and Creator of my life - as it is right here, and right now -- I will never find God, Truth, anywhere else...ever.

Sobering, and beautiful.   At least for me.

Shared with love,

Kate

"Here am I, send me..."

"...There's nothing you can know,
that isn't known.
Nothing you can see,
that isn't shown.
Nowhere you can be
that isn't where you're meant to be.
It's easy.
All you need is love,
all you need is love,
All you need is love, love,
love is all you need."
-     Lennon/McCartney

This morning I can't stop singing "all you need is Love, da, dadadada"...but I am thinking, "camp, camp, camp...da, dada, dada!"  Once a hippie dreaming of sitars and "flowers in her hair"...always a hippie!  And for me, the Summer of Love didn't happen in People's Park, in 1969, it's what happens every year at CAMP!! 

It's getting to be that time of year.  The dogwood tree, just beyond the front porch steps, is exploding with pale pink blossoms.  The violets are pushing through the moss in our shady dell of a yard.  And the temperatures are hovering somewhere between a soft chill in the morning and the need for air conditioning in the afternoon.   You can feel the excitement for camp building at the ranches...everywhere...it's in the air.  I can hear Alison whistling for Willow, the vroom of a four-wheeler, the phone ringing in the Hub, and horses sniffing the air for Lach's gentle strength...all the way out here in the Midwest.  

I've shed well-worn cowboy boots (at least until I get to camp), for my ubiquitous Reef flipflops (this year's webbing color is a bright turquoise, one that nicely fills out my Reef wardrobe of lime green and periwinkle from previous years' "collections").

I am chomping at the bit like one of Linda's horses.  Ready to tear into the rodeo arena.  I can feel a cool Arkansas Valley breeze lifting my mane and tickling my nose.  I can't wait.   Camp!!!!!!!  Crowsnest porch on a summer afternoon, the lake, the Hub, Valerie lawn, the rafting bus arriving back from the river...KIDS!!!!!

Alison sent along the metaphysical theme for this summer, and its message couldn't have more closely aligned with some of the spiritual themes I have been working with this year. Each one is an idea I've been cherishing since last summer...inspired "friends" that have done much to reform the way I look at myself and my relationship to others. 

The first is a citation from the book of Isaiah in the Bible:

"Here am I, send me."

I love it!  It is such a perfect springboard for this summer's spiritual journey.  This year I have, literally and figuratively, tried to "just show up" each day with an open heart and willing hands in service to God.  No planning, no agenda...just "Here am I, send me."

And I am discovering that I really have no choices...whatsoever...to make in my life.  If I just show up as "me," the perfect image and likeness of God, it is enough.  It becomes my purpose to honor that identity...in myself and others... and be true to it in every way.  When I do this faithfully, each moment will place its demands upon me to "step up" to that very holy, sacred, grace-infused opportunity, in service to Him.  To love, to think, to give, to pray, to speak, to behold... Him, to only see Him, in everyone and everything.

The next citation from this summer's metaphysical theme is from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy:

"Let us feel the divine energy of Spirit,
bringing us into newness of life…"

Yummmm!!  Let us feel it!!  Not just know it, but feel it...bringing us, carrying us, lifting, permeating, wafting, breathing, moving, dancing, singing, hiking, praying, motivating us...into newness of Life!  

And lastly, from the poem "Feed My Sheep," also by Mary Baker Eddy,

"Shepherd, show me how to go
O'er the hillside steep,
How to gather, how to sow, -
How to feed Thy sheep;
I will listen for Thy voice,
Lest my footsteps stray;
I will follow and rejoice
All the rugged way.

Thou wilt bind the stubborn will,
Wound the callous breast,
Make self-righteousness be still,
Break earth's stupid rest.
Strangers on a barren shore,
Lab'ring long and lone,
We would enter by the door,
And Thou know'st Thine own;

So, when day grows dark and cold,
Tear or triumph harms,
Lead Thy lambkins to the fold,
Take them in Thine arms;
Feed the hungry, heal the heart,
Till the morning's beam;
White as wool, ere they depart,
Shepherd, wash them clean."

Although I know that this entire poem will give form to the next few months of my thinking and praying about camp, today I love, love, love the first stanza's focus on "how."  For me, it's all about the "how."  It doesn't say we should focus on figuring out (or praying through) who to go with, or what to wear, or when to leave, or what to bring...or accumulate.  But how!  Jesus taught us how to go...how to treat one another, how to behave, how to see the world around us, how to heal.   Then we listen for His, God's voice, follow its leadings, and rejoice!  I can do this!!  But I have to start with the "how" of my living...how I "show up" each moment will make all the difference.

I promise, Alison, I will mine these ideas, dig into these truths, immerse myself in their "living waters," drink deeply from this cup. I will show up in the space of this inspiration...completely and wholly...over the next months.  And I promise to do so with supreme joy, to lean into these ideas with total surrender...and to "show up" on purpose.

So to those of you who visit this space occasionally, I am sure these themes will resurface...again and again...in the coming months, as I let them move me towards camp.  I will let them "send me," like a seed on the wind...carried by Spirit, moved by Love.  While I stay focused on the "how" of my showing up each moment. 

If I am living in the "how" of being, I am always perfectly poised in the I AM,  expectant and ready to be picked up by Pneuma, Spirit...and borne into the next moment...and the next...and the next..  Staying in the space of "how," right now...loving, giving, honest, willing, compassionate, non-judgmental, gentle, kind (and the list goes on, and on, and on)...God will take me to camp in the way of His appointing.

But, right now, am I excited to be in this moment of showing up for my life?  Today, am I thrilled to have received this "Summer 2010 Metaphysical Theme" to work with? 

Oh my gosh...even more so than ever before!!! 

I am going to camp!!!!!!!

And since there's:

"Nowhere you can be
that isn't where you're meant to be.

It's easy.
All you need is love..."

All I need is love...da, dada, dada...
All I need is love, love...
Love is an all you need..."

And to be here, right here, in this moment of our living...all we need is love, love, love...
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

[photo credit: Jessie Brown-Orlet 2009]

"September grass is the sweetest kind..."

"Well, the sun's not so hot
in the sky today
And you know,
I can see summertime slipping on
Slippin' away
A few more geese are gone,
a few more leaves turning red
But the grass is as soft
as a feather in a featherbed…"

- James Taylor "September Grass"

Today was one of those September Grass days.  The sun wasn't so hot, the air was cool, and the sky was as blue as a robin's egg. 

I was thinking about this all day in light of a comment Suzette shared in our worship circle last night.  Suzette is from Maine.  Ahh… Well not so quick, she and her children have recently relocated to St. Louis.  She explained that some folks have questioned why she would have left a wonderful home in a beautiful coastal village for a Midwestern city. 

Suzette went on to share that she and her family had felt divinely guided along each step of this relocation, and how they had experienced prayer-based consensus regarding their motives…and the logistics…of their move.

Then she told a story about a friend who, when living in a prairie state, learned to look at the wide blue western sky as his "ocean"….and how on a drive through suburban St. Louis that afternoon she had realized that her new city was just as "beautiful" as her previous location.

I loved this story.  I have often lost this chord of deep satisfaction with the current geographical details of where we live…usually after a trip home to Colorado…and bemoaned the fact that I am "here" and not "there".   So, this afternoon I decided to go in search of my own beautiful St. Louis.  Jeff's schedule included helping coach the girls' soccer team and I chose to tag along. 

Once there, I grabbed my CrazyCreek ground chair, my car quilt and my books and headed to a sun-drenched patch of grass under the wide canopy of a huge oak tree.  I scooched myself into a V-shaped space between the knees of two large roots and leaned my head against the warm bark of her trunk. 

The air was cool enough that I needed to tuck my quilt around my knees and wrap my large scarf around my shoulders but it was glorious.  Dappled sunlight fell through the leaves and onto the pages of my book.  Its warmth sank deeper and deeper through the layers of scarf and quilt until I felt it to the core of my bones.  I closed my eyes and let the golden late-afternoon light bathe my face in a flush of sunset pink.

The sounds of coaches, my husband, daughters, and their friends softly reminded me of all that I am blessed with.  The grass between my fingers was so soft to the touch, that I couldn't  help but recall Mary Baker Eddy's statement:

"Love, redolent with unselfishness, bathes all in beauty and light.
The grass beneath our feet silently exclaims, "The meek shall
inherit the earth." The modest arbutus sends her sweet breath
to heaven. The great rock givesshadow and shelter. The sunlight
glints from the church-dome, glances into the prison-cell, glides
into the sick-chamber, brightens the flower, beautifies the
landscape, blesses the earth."

I felt like I was in the holiest of sanctuaries.  Right here in the middle of St. Louis.  Trees, grass, sky, air, roots, shadow, shelter…the sounds of my family and friends…those things are right here.  Right where God has sent me to be…today. 

I am loving St. Louis, and I am loving autumn.  Something in me begins to quiet when I can feel the sun on my face through cooler, crisper air.  There is a gentling to my inner wrestling…the voice is more kind,  more full of mercy and encouragement.   It is almost as if this inner voice knows that we are heading towards Thanksgiving and a time of harvest…the time for gathering the substance of a tare-scattered growing season.  It is almost as if there is foreknowledge that we are, indeed, swelling towards a season of Christ-birthing in our lives.  Whatever it is, I am grateful to have discovered it right here in the Midwest this year.

"Delicious autumn!
My very soul is wedded to it,
And if I were a bird
I would fly about the earth
Seeking the successive autumns."
- George Eliot

Kate

Photo credit: Dwight Oyer 2003