i’m cheating on robert…

lately, i’ve found myself cheating on mr. frost. i know, how terrible of me, but hey, he’s dead, right? still, no excuse. but, i think he would support the affairs i’ve found myself involved in. i have been reading the words of both wendell berry and mary oliver. look into their backgrounds, especially mary oliver’s…it makes her poetry an even more interesting read. she was recommended to me at a women in ministry conference after i talked about my love for robert frost. interestingly enough, i had fallen in love with one of oliver’s poems, “wild geese,” previously in a collection of poems by garrison keillor.
now, enjoy “wild geese” and look forward to more where that came from.

Wild Geese
by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
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.

i love this poem, as i love hearing of my place in the family of things. often enough, though, i find myself looking out upon the world and hating my place in the family of things. it doesn’t feel like a family. it looks like exploitation. we exploit the earth, not care for it. we use it. we destroy it. i destroy it. what a place to have. and, to top it all off, i’m white. i’m part of an even greater family of exploiters. but, i hear god calling to me, saying, you’re mine, and you don’t have to have this place in the family of things. listen to the wild geese, listen to me, and then act upon that. care for the earth. seek justice. fight injustice. love the world, love others, love yourself. so, i hear many voices in my head, i just have to choose which ones to listen to, and which ones to act upon. i can listen to the best voices all i want and still exploit the world and others. i must choose not to do so, and also choose to fight for the world and others by acting on their behalf. it’s not only about what you choose not to do, or what you choose not to listen to, but it is about what you choose to listen to, what you choose to believe (maybe even despite your best judgment) and what you choose to do. what place in the family of things will you choose and act upon?

and again, evidence of my love affair with robert frost

The Pasture – By Robert Frost

I’m going out to clean the pasture spring;
I’ll only stop to rake the leaves away
(And wait to watch the water clear, I may):
I sha’n't be gone long.-You come too.

I’m going out to fetch the little calf
That’s standing by the mother. It’s so young,
It totters when she licks it with her tongue.
I sha’n't be gone long.-You come too.

this poem was one of the first i ever memorized, this one and “fire and ice,” also by frost. at a young age, i fell in love with frost’s verse. in 12th grade, i borrowed by mother’s edition of “you come, too” and i took it to school to help with the yearbook. i then lost this copy, and was never able to find it. just last year, i found one on ebay and surprised her with it. it was a neat thing to be able to do for her.

anyway, back to the poem. whenever i read this poem, i think of the farm my dad grew up on in tennessee. we were there often as children, i and my two brothers, as well as our parents. i was the only girl cousin my age and therefore had no other girls to play with, and i liked roaming the hills with the boys. when i read this poem, i think of how often i wanted to come, and how often i was allowed to, but also those times when the guys wanted to just be with the guys, not with their younger sister. it’s completely understandable. but, i think it’s also understandable that when i read this poem, when i think of it, i just smile. i hear my brothers telling me where they’re going, and inviting me along. i remember being the youngest child, and wanting to get invited to come along with people, with my parents, even though i couldn’t help. i couldn’t help my dad inspect the jails as an architect when i was young, but i could go play in padded cells. i can still hear him inviting me, saying, “you come, too.” and i hear my brothers saying that, the many times when they let me come, too, even though i would likely have been more of a burden than a help, than a playmate.

this poem makes me wonder at how i can still smile at the remembrance of being helpless and useless, and yet being invited along to be a burden anyway. i hear in the voice of robert frost someone saying that while parts of me coming along may be burdensome, that the owner of the voice wants me to come along. they desire it. how important is it for us to invite people along into our journeys, to be companions, and burdens, to love and be loved, to tag along, even when they can’t help? just think, maybe someone will look back fondly on that moment, and realize that you involved them, even though they weren’t needed, they were wanted. and not only were they wanted, but though they may not have been able to help in the labor of the chores on the farm, they could be involved in the enjoyment of beauty, as they both loved nature and life together.

thanks, robert.

sorry for the lack of blogging.

hey guys, sorry i haven’t blogged lately. i see that many people have been checking in for anything new. i’ve been busy with the end of school, then helping with and attending a women in ministry conference in dallas, texas, and then working a lot this week. also, i no longer sit at coffeeshops staring aimlessly at papers and books trying to study, so i’m also not sitting in front of my laptop most of the time. another blog with more substance will come soon. i have things to say, but i need to know how to say them and what to say. it will come. later.

just a few quotes

all truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them.
- galileo galilei

in mathematics you don’t understand things. you just get used to them.
- johann von neumann

what we play is life.
- louis armstrong

what i need to hear from chittister and benedict

let us now listen. i, at least, am and will.
from joan chittister’s commentary on the rule of benedict:

the fifth rung of the ladder of humilty is an unadorned and disarming one: self-revelation, benedict says, is necessary to growth. going through the motions of religion is simply not sufficient. no, the benedictine heart, the spiritual heart, is a heart that has exposed itself and all its weaknesses and all its pain and all its struggles to the one who has the insight, the discernment, the care to call us out of our worst selves to the heights to which we aspire.

the struggles we hide, psychologists tell us, are the struggles that consume us. benedict’s instruction, centuries before an entire body of research arose to confirm it, is that we must cease to wear our masks, stop pretending to be perfect, and accept the graces of growth that can come to us from the wise and gentle hearts of people of quality around us.

humility such as this gives us energy to face the world. once we ourself admit what we are, what other criticism can possibly demean us or undo us or diminish us? once we know who we are, all the delusions of grandeur, all the righteousness that’s in us dies and we come to peace with the world.

every day we have gives us another chance to become the real persons we are meant to be.

community – family – is that place everywhere where we can fail without fear of being abandoned and with the ongoing certainty that we go on being loved nevertheless. perfection is not an expectation in monastic life any more than it is an expectation in any healthy environment where experience is the basis both of wisdom and of growth.

a contemporary collection of monastic tales includes the story of the visitor who asks of the monk: “what do you do in the monastery?” and the monastic replies: “well, we fall and we get up and we fall and we get up and we fall and we get up.” where continual falling and getting up is not honored, where the wise ones who have gone before us are not present to help us through, life runs the terrible risk of drying up and blowing away before it is half lived.

the idea that the spiritual life is only for the strong, for those who don’t need it anyway, is completely dispelled in the rule of benedict. here spiritual athletes need not apply. monasticism is for human beings only. the abbot and prioress are told quite clearly that they are to see themselves as physicians and shepherds tending the weak and carrying the lost, not as drill sergeants, not as impresarios. what we have in monasteries and parishes and all fine social movements and devoted rectories and most families are just people, simple people who never meet their own ideals and often, for want of confidence and the energy that continuing commitment takes, abandon them completely. then, our role, the rule of benedict insists, is simply to try to soothe what hurts them, heal what weakens them, lift what burdens them and wait. the spiritual life is a process, not an event. it takes time and love and help and care. it takes our patient presence. just like everything else.

there is no failure, except in no longer trying.

the function of prayer is to bring us in touch with ourselves, as well. to the ancients, “tears of compunction” were the sign that a soul knew its limits, faced its sins, accepted its needs and lived in hope.

every life needs points along the way that enable us to rise above our petty daily problems, the overwhelming tragedies of our lives and begin again, whatever our circumstances, full of confidence, not because we know ourselves to be faithful, but because our god is.

and finally, never lose hope in god’s mercy.

what benedict wants is simply that we keep trying. failures and all. pain and all. fear and all. the god of mercy knows what we are and revels in weakness that tries.

these tools of the spiritual life – justice, peacemaking, respect for all creation, trust in god – are the work of a lifetime. each one of them represents the unearthed jewel that is left in us to mine. each of them represents the gem that we can be. benedict says that in the dark days of the spiritual life, when we have failed ourselves miserably, we must remember the god who walks with us on the journey to our best selves and cling without end to the god who fails us never.

monastic spirituality teaches us that everything we want to do will not succeed, but monastic spirituality also teaches us that we are never to stop trying. we are never to give in to the lesser in life. we are never to lose hope in god’s mercy.

we will fail often, but god will not fail us and we must not stop.

long life, in other words, is given for the gift of insight: to give us time to understand life and to profit from its lessons and to learn from its failures and to use its moments well and make sense out of its chaos.

god is in the here and now in benedictine spirituality. it is we who are not. it is we who are trapped in the past, angry at what formed us, or fixated on a future that is free from pain or totally under our control. but god is in our present, waiting for us there.

be blessed.

list of favorite books, first installment

in the midst of procrastinating, i’m going to make a list of my favorite books. i finished my erasmus paper. it’s on to john cassian and the practice of the virtues, focusing on discretion/discernment in light of humility and their affects on spiritual direction. wish me luck. but, instead of working on that, here are some of my favorite books.

Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott
Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott
Grace (Eventually) by Anne Lamott
Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
The Rule of Benedict by Joan Chittister
Called to Question by Joan Chittister
Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope by Joan Chittister
Barabbas by Par Lagerkvist
Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
Farewell Summer by Ray Bradbury
Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
The Lemony Snicket’s Series of Unfortunate Events
Harry Potter Series
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
Children of God by Mary Doria Russell
Maus I and II
The Poetry of Robert Frost
The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris
Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith by Kathleen Norris
Slaughter-house Five by Kurt Vonnegut (may he rest in peace)
Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut
Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut
The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis
Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis
Perelandra by C. S. Lewis
That Hideous Strength by C. S. Lewis
The Philokalia
Conferences and Institutes by John Cassian
The Stranger by Albert Camus
Life of the Beloved by Henri Nouwen
P. G. Wodehouse’s books, especially the Jeeves and Wooster Series
Night by Elie Wiesel
The Judges by Elie Wiesel
A Long Way Down by Nick Hornby

that’s all i can think of right now.
maybe i’ll have better luck when i’m sitting in front of my books, and not at a coffeeshop. and, yes, i have more favorite books. books are one of my greatest loves. i want to write them. and, yes, i think they can be sexy. clothbound hardbacks are included in the sexy books category. i’m special, i know. thanks for putting up with me.

churches are emaciated

as stated in some earlier posts, i’m writing a paper on desiderius erasmus and his role in the reformation of the church. what i am realizing is how emaciated the church is, well, i’m realizing more of why the church is so emaciated. don’t get me wrong. there are many reasons…but, i happen to be fixated on monasticism, and therefore one of my greatest sorrows this semester in the history of christianity II has been to read about the experiences the reformers had with monasticism. the reason for this sorrow is that their bad experiences with monasticism added to the fact that you likely will not find any monastic groups outside of the roman catholic or episcopal churches. i grieve the loss of monasticism in protestant and evangelical churches. this loss is a reason that the church is emaciated. i don’t yet know if i want to become roman catholic or not in order to become a nun. i don’t believe i do, but, at the same time, i want to be involved in the monastic life, and luther and erasmus did not leave me many choices. back to my paper, i think.

i love writing, but not this.

i love writing. it’s a huge passion of mine.
but, 20 page papers…with deadlines…i don’t know. just not my passion. just not my greatest love. i don’t want to do this. but, alas, i must. so, back to erasmus and then on to john cassian tomorrow. and, yes, both of these dead, old guys are worth reading. john cassian has a lot to say about the practice of the virtues. i’m writing about discretion/discrimination through the virtue of humility. it’s fascinating. and no, it’s not fascinating enough for me to have written the paper yet. but, still fascinating, nonetheless. both of these papers are the kind where i think to myself: dang it, i learned the material. i read the stuff. it’s great. it’s fascinating. just believe me, and i won’t write the paper. so, now, i’m going to finish a paper. i know, i should have the guts to say that to my professors, that they shouldn’t make me write these papers, but i don’t feel like getting laughed at today. thanks for reading my ramblings which are a form of procrastination.

who am i? should i even be asking this?

on friday night, i found myself writing on a sonic cup…and one of the words already written on the cup was “your”. so, i wrote, “who are you?” oddly enough, the phrase fit in well with the conversation going on around me that i was having a hard time paying attention to for the conversation going on within me, but it also fit well with questions i have been asking myself for a long time. the topic came up again with a friend the next night. just today, as another friend brought up these thoughts that have been rolling around in my head, i decided to blog about it. so, here goes.

for a long time, i have striven to find my identity, as we all have and are, i think. i see myself differently than others see me, and than i see others. i see my faults and my struggles most prominently, and i begin to believe that that is my identity. i am reminded of AA groups here. now, the 12 steps have some fabulous things to offer the world, and they have done much good. but, they are steps. you don’t sit in the step of admitting that you are an addict, though often we sit there and find our identities there. i used to see nothing wrong with finding my identity in my struggles. i thought that admitting that i had them meant that i was dealing them. hi, my name is meg, and i struggle with this and that was done to me and it hurts. i was confused and believed that the only way for me to deal with these things was for me to find my identity there. but, when i do that, i always come back to what happened in the past, and what i struggle with. i incorporate it into what i have to be. i struggle with x or y, and therefore have no choice but to eventually fall prey to that temptation, so why not now? i think that is wrong. but, i think what i, at least, must do in order to fight that tendency and temptation is to find my identity somewhere else, but where? my identity is so multi-faceted. the word identity is often used in struggles with “sexual identity”. People must find themselves to be heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual. what does this mean? someone who struggles with homosexuality must then be labeled as homosexual, even though they are choosing not to choose that as their identity, since they definitely do not fit into the heterosexual or bisexual category, and they’re not asexual. therefore, we create anxiety by pushing people to decide not only who they are today, but who they will be forever. we do not know what tomorrow holds. we know what yesterdays held, and we know what has happened thus far today, but that’s it. what if we allow people to admit that they know where they have been, and they know where they are right now, and who and what is around them, and let it stop there? how about we let people sit where they are, instead of pushing them to decide where they will be forever and ever? how about we admit that we don’t know everything? how about we let ourselves sit in the tensions, in the unknown, and REST? there is no rest when we push the question of identity, unless we are telling people to rest in something they don’t want to forever be in. can we let people rest without telling them they have to admit what their sexuality will forever be, that they have to admit what their struggles will always be, that they have to tell us what they will always like, wear or drink? i think we can do that. i think people can get over being surprised at the fact that i’m drinking tea instead of diet coke, or diet coke instead of diet dr. pepper. i plan to not try to know what tomorrow will hold. but, then again, i plan to do that tomorrow. we need to change our language, and the questions we ask, and how we define ourselves and others. i am meg. i am some things right now that i will not be forever, thankfully. i can admit that i am those things, but they are not forever. they are where i am today. i can rest in today, and wait for tomorrow to unfold, because i am not in charge of everything, though i still make choices. and i, myself, make the choice to rest in today, and let my yesterdays be yesterdays. i choose right now not to let my struggles and pains define me, but i am also letting them exist right now. they will exist where and when they exist, but they do not define.

there is no failure except in no longer trying.
where are you right now? who is around you? are you willing to give up your supposed hold on tomorrow and those days that may or may not follow?

if you haven’t already, read erasmus.

i’m writing a paper right now on desiderius erasmus, praise of folly (a satirical book he wrote) and its affects on the reformation of the church. it’s pretty fascinating, actually, and quite humorous. so, read it if you have a chance. he doesn’t hold back, but he’s also a gentleman who loves the church and God, especially, with all he’s got. he doesn’t want to give up, but can’t stand a lot of what he sees. maybe we can learn some lessons from this guy. maybe there’ll be more to come on erasmus. for now, i’ve got to write 20 pages of it for a professor. sorry, guys and gals, but you are coming in second place, at least.