Wild Geese

Many, many years ago ~ I am sure that it was October, 1979, so: 32+ years ago ~ I crawled through our small tent opening into the cold air of Isle Royale as skein after skein of geese rose into the sky above Lake Superior.  That I remember that moment with the clarity with which the tangerine colors of the sunrise pierced the darkness of the early morning sky is a testament to one of the few natural gifts with which I was born: a capacity to notice and appreciate that which I saw around me.  

It's no wonder that, when the time was right, it was the spirituality of Ignatius of Loyola, with his emphasis on words like repetition and savor,  that called out to me.

When my children were growing up, my approach to mothering was: Notice and Appreciate.  From what they tell me, I was not entirely successful in communicating that dimension of my interior life.  Their memories seem rather fixated on some of the daily expectations that were, in truth, the least significant things to me.  I suppose that the daily cycle of school, homework, soccer, and lessons did seem as if it were what life was made of, but what I was constantly aware of was the sunlight on blond hair, the giggles and meows in the hallway as cats fled to safety, the small bodies crouched over projects on kitchen tables and in creeks and lakes, the gleeful triumph when something was assembled or, much better, completely deconstructed.  I was never in any hurry for them to grow up, for school vacations to end, or for any of them to get on to the next phase, whatever that might have been.

The loss of that capacity, that ability to notice and appreciate, was the biggest consequence of the loss of Josh himself.  The entire universe, with its galaxies and colors and creative and loving people, went dim and flat three years ago. There have been moments, and even hours, of re-connection with hope and  joy ~ but the registry is at a level far below that at which I once lived.

This past week, in connection with the New Year, I've been thinking that I might like to recover some of my lost gift for awareness and gratitude. Or, perhaps more realistically, find a new version.  One of my friends just posted on FB that she loves New Year's and the way it makes her feel that anything is possible.  An entirely foreign thought to me. 

But maybe small things are possible.

St. Therese of Lisieux, the French Carmelite nun of the late 19th century, spoke of doing small things with great love rather than attempting great miracles.

Jean-Pierre de Caussade, an 18th century French Jesuit, focused upon The Sacrament of the Present Moment.

Franciscan  Richard Rohr's words have been making the rounds the past couple of days:  "Prayer is sitting in the silence until it silences us, choosing gratitude until we are grateful, praising God until we ourselves are a constant act of praise"  (Radical Grace: Daily Meditations).

And Mary Oliver, of course, in her poem "Wild Geese," reminds us that

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Last night I dreamed that I was at camp in North Carolina, visiting The Lovely Daughter during one of her stints as a counselor.  I was supposed to meet Josh later for a river tubing trip, but in the meantime I was helping LD with her laundry.  She had lost a t-shirt she really liked, and I was going through pile after file of folded towels and clothing, peeling each item away from the others, one by one, in search of the missing t-shirt. 

I didn't find it before I woke up. 

Awareness. Gratitude.  Small things. Wild things. This moment.  A willingness to sift through the laundry, piece by piece, for something (or someone) not recoverable.

My word for this year, you may recall, is patience. 

I think that perhaps I will say a lot less and  photograph a lot more.
 

Image: Isle Royale Sunset, found here. 

Patience

Over at Abbey of the Arts, the annual search for a word for the coming year is on.

Last year, I eagerly reached for the word frontier.  And then, sucked into the quicksand of the Presbyterian ordination process, I forgot all about it.

In retrospect, nevertheless, this past year was one of frontiers for me:

Preaching in all kinds of churches.

Interfaith work.

Invitations to make presentations on parental grief for nursing students and on discernment for pastors.

A graduation speech for brand-new spiritual directors and their guests.

A call to ministry.

Breast cancer.

Ordination.

All pretty much frontiers for me.

And all leading me to my word for 2012:

Patience.

It's not nearly as sexy a word as frontier.

At first I toyed with some words that promised more drama.  Words like generosity and magnanimity and creativity.  And maybe 2013 will be the year for one of them.  But even to wander in their vicinity requires a foundational year in patience.

Patience with my body, with its slow processes of healing ~ physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually ~ and the reality that in some ways it will never be close to what it was six weeks ago.

Patience with the reality of my work and the hours of driving it requires ~ hours that can be used for listening to books and presentations and for prayer, if I am gentle with myself rather than hurried and irritated and frustrated.

Patience with my new congregation, which as a whole has an experience of church and a view of the world much different from mine ~ working on what I have to learn rather than on what I have to teach.

Patience with technology ~ figuring out what will really work for me and making the effort to learn it.  This includes things like laptops and ipads and kindles and  cameras and all the associated software.

Patience with the people I love and like best ~ my affection for them does not make them me, or mind-readers of me.

Patience with how long things take ~ I am not required to do five things at once at breakneck speed.

Patience with grief, and with how it changes.

It seems that there is rather a lot to patience.

Now that I think of it, it might be way too big a project for me.

Or it might be a synonym for gratitude.

It might be a frontier all of its own.

Image: Presque Isle (PA), 2011