Last Run of 2020 ... a metaphor

My last run for the year 2020 is in the books.  My family and I  decided to spend new year's weekend at the lake.  I haven't run out here in the winter so, since it was the first time, I decided to take a route I knew well and was reasonably short.  The route choice turned out to be sort of a mistake.  I was glad I intended it to be a short run and it wasn't too cold. In retrospect, I realized that the run today was pretty much a metaphor for 2020. 

The run started out on the road in front of the lake house, just after sunrise.  It is a dirt road and the footing was a little dicey but not horrible.  I took extra short strides, kept my feet under me, and stayed on the part of the road where it looked safe and where I thought I had some decent traction. 

Then, in the middle of the run, the situation deteriorated and I realized I was totally unprepared for what I was facing.  I turned down an unpaved back road that ran along a lake.  In the summer it is beautiful.  Today the road surface was ice-covered and so slippery I had to walk in places to keep my feet under me.  A man in a pickup truck stopped to ask if I had ice cleats on and told me to be very careful because it was bad all the way back to the main road.

At this point, I realized that my plan for pace and cadence on this run was thrown out the window.  There was little I could do but accept the situation and press on.  I resumed my run, moving along carefully, each step a decision, and then, after the foot was planted, a short wait to discover if I'd chosen poorly as I began deciding where my next step should land.  I was thankful to be warm, not rushed, and not in any major distress.  I was determined to stay that way.  

Towards the end of this back road portion of the run, there is a steep hill.  It's a struggle to get up without walking on a good day.  Today the hill was completely iced over with small puddles of water scattered at random places.  The water seemed to have polished the ice to a smooth, transparent sheen before collecting into these little basins.  I ended up slogging through a snowbank, nearly in the ditch to even get up to the top of the hill and back onto the main road.  

Now, about a mile out from the house, the footing was getting better but was still very tricky.  Of course, there was the added danger of traffic to contend with. Many drivers had no sense of how slippery the road was or maybe knew but didn't care.  Perhaps they felt it was their right to ignore the conditions.  A few times I paused my run to step into a driveway allowing some vehicle plenty of clearance and allowing me an escape path if I needed one.

At the end of my run, I looked back and realized that I made it without getting hurt.  Perhaps not the way I intended, certainly slower than I wanted, but I made it nonetheless.  For that I am thankful.

Tomorrow, for my first run of 2021, I'll take a different route, but will be just as careful.  I learned a lot today.  My expectations are different for tomorrow's run and I'm already looking forward to the time when the chances of falling are greatly reduced.  

My Dream, RIP Mom

My mother passed away on the evening of  October 26, 2020.  On the night of November 13th, I had a dream about her.   When I woke up, I had the sense that there was much more to the dream than what I was able to recall. What follows is the small fragment that was able to remember.

I was walking with a lady.  I could not see her face but I knew it was Mom.  She was bundled in what seemed to be dark-colored winter clothes or maybe furs, but it wasn’t cold. The clothes obscured any real form of her body.  There were wisps of fabric or fur around her head and covering the sides of her face, a little like the old fur-lined hoods of winter parkas. It was as if a slight breeze was blowing into her and disturbing the material around her head and shoulders. My view of her seemed slightly out of focus, there was no crispness or detail to my view of Mom.  

We walked together in silence.  I sensed that we had been talking but were now in the midst of a quiet lul in the conversation. Then, realized I was running.  It was a typical running workout.  I was running at a comfortable speed and enjoying the workout, but not working hard.  I was wearing my yellow running jacket, and black running tights, but I wasn’t cold or hot.  I was running along and Mom was just ahead of me.  She wasn’t running or even walking.  I was not chasing her.  She was just there, slightly ahead of me, and to my right where I could not see her face.  It was nice to have her so near.  I was comfortable.

I looked down and realized I was running on the top capstone of a high fieldstone wall.  The capstone was not quite as wide as a sidewalk and was grey and smooth like the capstone of the garden wall at our house.  It was plenty wide enough for me to be running along.  The wall was very tall, maybe ten feet high and I could see that it rose, fell, and made sweeping bends into the distance. It followed the rolling hills and landscape of open green fields as far as I could see.  I was filled with the anticipation of a wonderful run, and mom stayed just a step ahead of me, to my right.  She began to say something to me but I could not hear her.

I was running comfortably until I began losing my balance for a second.  I had drifted to the left side of the capstone and was about to step off the left side of the wall.  I started to panic and was a little frightened because I knew I wasn’t going to recover quickly enough to stay on the wall.  Just as I was about to step off the capstone the ground appeared and I now running on a sidewalk stepping onto a dirt and gravel path that ran along the sidewalk.  My left foot landed on the path and I was relieved that I wasn’t going to fall.  After another step or two, I recovered my balance and was back in the middle of the sidewalk which then became the capstone of the high wall again.  I think mom giggled.

I ran along on the capstone just a little more when I looked up and couldn’t make out the path of the wall anymore.  It went into a thick flowing fog. Occasionally when the fog momentarily thinned a little I could see glimpses of places where the wall looked broken or maybe not completed yet.  It frightened me and I was unsure what to do.  That was when mom turned to me.  I wasn’t running anymore.  I was standing on the wall and mom was facing me. I still could not see her face or focus on her but I could see her hand clearly.  She put something into my hand. I don’t know what it was she was giving me because it was hidden in the palm of her hand.  I put my hand out, palm up and she moved her hand over mine and handed me the item by dropping it from the palm of her hand to the palm of mine, in the way you might tip a valet.  The item had no form or weight that I could sense and I could not see it, since it was mostly hidden under Mom’s hand.  The edges I could see were dark forest green had wisps that resembled the fur that was about Mom’s head.  Her hand was still over mine, obscuring the gift and I was trying to figure out what it was when Mom said, very clearly, “Trust your friends.”  I thought that was a strange thing to say and I knew it was somehow related to this gift and to the fog shrouding the path ahead of me.  Then I awoke.

It was a frustrating dream. I think I understand some of the most obvious imagery, but there is a lot I don’t yet grasp yet.   I hope to make sense of it someday.

Lois Regina (McPhail) Limer

1936-2020

Running In the Spring of 2020

Be thankful for the darkness, for without it there can be no dawn

Almost every day I go for a run.  The distance and speed vary depending on many factors, but I like to run outside, year-round.  It is a personal habit, some might call it an obsession, that has its origins many years ago.  About 10 years ago, running also became a social event for me when I began running with the Early Air Running Club.  Every morning, 6 or 8 of us meet at 5:30am in the gym parking lot and run for an hour or so.  We talk and laugh, running in pairs or threesomes and exchanging relative positions in the pack and running mates all through the run, talking about anything and everything...  then in March 2020, COVID came to Binghamton, bringing with it all of the fear and changes that shook our world in ways we were barely able to comprehend.  

On March 15, 2020, any gathering of people became a cause for fear.  No one wanted to become infected and no one wanted to pass the virus on to anyone else.  This plague that had been a problem for China and Europe, then the West Coast had migrated to this small town much like the Spanish Flu had arrived 100 years earlier.  There was little reliable information on the situation.  The only certain thing was that no one, not even the "experts" knew what was happening or what was necessary to stay safe.  There was no reliable information on how the virus was transmitted, how dangerous it was, and how to manage it.  There was plenty of unreliable information and this illustrated the gullibility of the general public.  Every day there were new theories, often contradicting the ones from the day before.  The recommendations were incongruent.  The gyms closed, the schools closed,  almost everything closed and our group runs stopped as fear gripped the community.

I could not stop running though.  Running is how I handle stress, and there was plenty.  Running for me is the bleeder valve that keeps the stress from eating away at my health and mental stability.  My morning routine had to change though since the social interaction associated with running stopped. Motivation now came from a different place, it was no longer fueled by the community aspect and getting together with friends.  It was fueled by self-preservation. My personal stress level was nearly unbearable at times.  My morning runs evolved into a solitary time and I used that quiet, focused space to think and pray.  Solitary running was my release.

For six or eight weeks I mostly ran alone, only very occasionally getting together with one other runner and carefully keeping a distance.  Running alone meant starting from the house in the often chilly darkness of the early morning hours, warming up alone in my driveway rather than with running partners in the gym parking lot.   

There are only occasional streetlamps along our road so my headlamp became a critical part of my gear. Initially, the first mile of my solo runs was a little spooky.  The headlamp illuminated what was directly in front of me for a distance of ten feet or so.  I could hear animals further in the darkness, mostly deer, moving around.  I didn't know much about the neighborhood dog population and hoped that I would not startle one and have a problem.

The route I took was usually the same.  I derived some comfort from the routine.  Occasionally I would vary the route but mostly I stuck to a fairly well-defined 4.8-5.2 mile loop (depending on whether I went by the high school).  The first half-mile of the route begins with a slight uphill grade then drops by about 1,100 feet.  Yes, it's a steep hill.  This was the worst part.  I'm generally not quite warm at the point where the downhill begins. This part of the road is very dark, and it's a struggle to simultaneously keep a decent warmup speed while not tripping and tumbling onto my face.  Downhill segments also work different muscles so there were always unusual aches and pains that further distract my attention from avoiding the faceplant.  Fortunately, there is rarely any traffic to be concerned with, but the road is narrow and I have to pay attention just in case.

By the end of the first mile, I was generally in a better place.  The road gets wider and has a more reliable surface. There is a little more light and elevation changes are more of a series of mild inclines and declines.  The outbound leg of the route is mostly in the northern direction. At about the halfway mark, I turn east for a couple of blocks before heading back south.  

The turn east at this time of the year is always nice.  I run along a large football practice field and generally into the sunrise as it shows its morning color and silhouettes the hills.  The transition into the morning is always striking to me.  I recall something once said to me about managing hard times,  "Be thankful for the darkness of night.  Without it, there can be no dawn".  The couple of blocks I run toward the dawn reminds me that someday this will be over and, I pray, we will learn to be smarter and safer. 

My route includes a stop in the parking lot of a local Catholic church.  Churches are closed too and this has been another big change to my personal routine.  I have occasionally missed weekend mass, but since March I have not been in a church building and prayed with a community or even played my guitar.  This pandemic is coming close to piercing my spiritual armor and this short visit in the church parking lot, under the cross is my last line of defense.  Here, I take a moment to recover my breath, express my gratitude for my health, and pray for strength, wisdom, and perseverance.  

After the few moments of meditation at the church, I continue my run.  At this point, I am faced with the beginning of the uphill climb back home.  From the church parking lot, there is a mild uphill climb for about a quarter-mile but then it gets rapidly steeper.  I claw my way back up the hill as much as I can.  It is frustrating because I always end up walking the last quarter-mile or so of the worst part of the hill.  Once it reasonably plateaus, I can return to an easy, recovery pace for the last quarter mile back to the house.

It is different, running in the solitude and darkness.  I miss my running community.  I know that this will someday be behind us, but I also know we will move through it slowly.  COVID has caused everyone to think in longer timeframes than days or weeks.  We may be in this for months or even a year.  I hope I have the strength to make it to the end.

 

Author's note:  I started this post in the midst of the pandemic of COVID19 and am finishing it as the State of NY "reopens" and the worst seems to be behind us, though it's not over by a long shot (hoping for a vaccine in the spring of 2021).  On one hand, it is wonderful to be working on this essay (and hopefully finishing it) on the other side, in September of 2020.  On the other hand, I think the anxiety, fear, and utter powerlessness of those days will not come through in this writing because I am not in it now.  I am already looking back at it as one might remember a bad dream and, honestly, I am not really motivated to put myself back into that frame of mind so I can write more authentically.  It was bad and scary and I hope to never be in a position to write about it from the inside again.

Second note: Now, in October, we are in a second wave of infections.  What was a low rate of infections has skyrocketed, mostly due to idiots in bars.  My family has had one scare and now we are in the midst of a second.  We should hear on my wife's test shortly.  Not sure what we'll do if one of us gets infected.  Been running alone again until we know.  Can't wait for 2020 to end.

Morning at the Lake

A couple of weeks ago was our sleep-over at our new cottage on the lake.  We waited a few weeks until we had beds purchased and delivered so our first night would be able to comfortable.  When I headed to bed that first night, I noticed the bedroom here is much darker than our master bedroom at home.  There are no streetlights here, only the moon and stars.  Here, at the lake, neighbors are not leaving halogen front porch lamps lit through the night, awaiting the return of a teenager from a night out with friends.  There is no traffic along this private dirt road.  There is only the lake, the dark shadows of the cottages surrounding it, and the moon and stars above it.  This little corner of the world seems to know how to rest quietly in the night.

At about two o’clock in the morning, I woke up and decided to make a trip to the bathroom.  I call it a trip because, at the cottage, the bedrooms are upstairs, and the only working bathroom is downstairs, through the main room, and then through the kitchen.  So I rolled out of bed to begin my journey, taking a moment to steady myself and to get accustomed to the strange, new surroundings before moving too quickly. The experience of this darkness and quiet was at first disorienting while also refreshing.  Neither feeling overwhelmed me. They wove together into a calmness that settled on me like a flannel shirt on a cool fall evening; warm, weighty but comforting.  

After a moment or two of acclimating in the darkness, I reached over to the nightstand and felt for the small flashlight set out for just such an occasion.  With very little confidence in my knowledge of the house’s floor plan, I moved slowly without the benefit of the light lest I wake my wife.  Heading the general direction of the bedroom door, I stepped slowly and carefully hoping to avoid any trip hazards.  I could hear my wife's soft regular breathing which is always a source of calm reassurance when I find myself awake in the middle of the night.  After sliding my hands along the door surface for a moment I found the doorknob without too much exploration.  I pulled on the doorknob and could feel the door was rubbing just a little on the doorframe.  With a little more force, the door released from the frame with a small pop and opened.  I listened again to my wife’s breathing.  She seemed undisturbed and soundly asleep.

I stepped out into the tiny hallway at the top of the stairway and pulled the bedroom door closed as best I could without making more noise.  I looked over at my daughters’ bedroom door and saw that it was closed so I knew that if I turned on the hallway light it probably would not wake them, but I chose to leave the lamp off.  The nightlight at the bottom of the stairway lit my path well enough and the brighter stairway light would necessarily disturb the cozy darkness of the night.  I descended the stairs slowly and carefully.  The banister on the left side had been removed to prepare the walls for painting and the other side of the stairway is open to the main room.  The stiffness in my knees and ankles made for an added reminder to descend the stairs slowly and carefully.  Safely at the base of the stairs, I turned and walked through the main room, turned another corner, and walked into the kitchen.  Without a nightlight, the darkness in the kitchen was opaque.  The flashlight now came into use.  I wondered for a moment if the light of my little torch would be visible to any of the neighbors and if so, what would they think of a flashlight in the main house after not seeing any light in this house at night for the better part of a year or so.  I put the idea out of my head, of course, they would assume that we were staying the night.

Returning from the bathroom, I made my way back through the kitchen, turned off my flashlight, and paused for a bit in the large, open, main room of the house.  The small nightlight at the bottom of the stairway provided a dim, glow that did not quite reach across the entire length of the room.  The ceiling and corners of the room remained dark but became more visible as my eyes adjusted to the faint illumination of the tiny nightlight and the brighter moonlight outside.  

We haven’t invested in furniture yet, so the room is mostly empty except for the two wooden columns evenly spaced across the center of the room and extending from the wood plank floor to the wooden archway that divides the room into two halves.  One side has a low, barely visible, freshly painted, white ceiling.  The other has a higher, also freshly painted ceiling that was hidden in the darkness.  The wood plank floor and wood trim give the large room the feel of a dance floor in a small country/western bar, nicely swept, clean, and closed for the night.  The windows along the full length of the front of the room look out over the yard and then the lake.  The view is wonderful.  Through the windows, I see the moonlight reflecting off the lake and the long shadows of trees.  The houses around the lake are dark and nearly invisible except for random points of light that leak out from some nightlight or maybe through the closed curtains of a lit room where someone, like myself, is up in the middle of the night.  

Pausing for a few minutes, I try to take in the beauty of this moment and appreciate what I have the remarkable opportunity to experience.  I say a short prayer of gratitude for this moment and make my way back to bed.

Focusing on the positive

It has been an interesting spring.  I tease my daughter when she uses the word "literally" inappropriately but she pointed out to me that when she said, "literally everyone in the world is affected by this pandemic" I could not argue with the usage.  No one was spared.  We all were impacted in some way.  Has it been a struggle? Certainly, it has.  Has everyone been impacted the same way?  Of course not.  My heart goes out to those who have lost loved ones, those who feel the additional burdens associated with the quarantine and shutdowns.  In my personal experience, has it all been negative?  Well, no... not really.

I am generally a "glass half full" sort of guy.  When I have struggled with the reality we find thrust upon us, and I do, I have tried to take the time to really consider my situation.  When I get regularly caught up in the fear and uncertainty, which happens more frequently than I would expect, I have been trying to take a moment and seriously consider the silver linings that may be held within the dark storm clouds surrounding me.   I can say that my running routine has changed (mostly for the better) my relationship with my family has changed, (for the better) and my work/life balance has changed but that changed has caused me to see that it needs to be brought back into alignment.

Every day I go for a run.  It is a personal habit, some might call it an obsession, that has its origins many years ago.  For the last 10 years, running has been a social event with a running club.  There would be 6 or 8 of us meeting at 5:30 in the morning and running for an hour or so.  We'd talk and laugh, running in pairs or threesomes and exchanging positions and running mates all through the run...  then March happened and COVID19 and all of the fear and changes that shook our world.  Any gathering of people became a cause for fear.  My morning run routine changed and became a solitary time to think and pray.  For six or eight weeks now I often run alone.  I start right from the house in the chilly darkness of the early morning hours.  Motivation comes from a different place.  I start my run and begin thinking about how the night is transitioning into the morning I remind myself of a quote I heard long ago that reminds me to "be thankful for the darkness, for without it there can be no dawn".  

In this COVID time, our relationship with our neighbors has changed.  It is hard to articulate the change.  It sounds a little silly as I write it, but our neighbors became neighbors and not just the people who live across the street or in the house next door.  Since everyone is home, without errands that seem critical to accomplish right now, or kids to cart to sporting events, we have the chance to interact.  All of our neighbors are nice people, we just have not had a chance to interact with them.  We are beginning to get to know them in a deeper way, slowly but definitely.

We have been eating diner as a family much more regularly, almost exclusively.  There are no events to rush off to, not rehearsals and practice to coordinate.  There is beauty in that family time.  COVID is terrible and has caused a lot of pain, and death, anxiety, and change, but I will try hard to see also the beauty and good that it has also brought to the world.

  

Our New Frame of Reference

It used to be that I got annoyed when my Amazon Prime order didn't show up in a day or two.  I would get antsy when the line for a restaurant was more than a couple of tables deep. Heck, I'd get annoyed that the Kerig seemed to take a full 30 seconds to warm up and another entire minute to fill my cup.  That was in February, then March 2020 came, and with it the COVID pandemic.

I've spent a lot of time trying to figure out where the main source of anxiety is for me.  I feel it as keen as anyone but I can't seem to identify the source.  Is it a fear of the pain of illness, the finality of death?  Maybe it is simply the fear of the unknown, the inability to predict the future beyond tomorrow or the next day.  In any case, this anxiety is a burden.

Our units of measure have changed.  We have been conditioned to expect things faster and faster, easier and easier, with less effort.  The idea of 18 months for a vaccine is as incomprehensible to many people as is a trillion stimulus package. 

We are discovering things we have taken for granted for our entire lives like what the school day will be like in September.  The unknowing is agonizing.  There is no way to know.  It is not the simple case of not being told, it is unknowable right now.  The news media demagogues are relishing in the unknowing.  It is their lead story because it is true and accurate and brings consumers back to them day after day looking for answers.

There are no answers to be found.  We have to trust that it will get worked out and trust is a very rare commodity right now.  Trust requires faith and there is little faith in our leadership.  I will, I must, therefore, put my trust and faith in God.

Heavy

Some days are light and easy to carry.  Some are heavy and it is a struggle to get to the end.  On the worst days, the weight seems to be overwhelming.

The burden is always a strange thing.  It has no mass, no source, no form.  I cannot get my arms around it.  If I could grasp it then maybe it could be set aside, but as soon as I believe I have a handle, it changes form.   My friends and family can't see this burden and so they cannot offer help.  I carry it alone.  It frustrates me that I cannot see it myself.  Make no mistake, though it seems invisible to the eye, it exists, making me tired as I struggle against it, its weight pressing upon me, draining my energy.

In the quiet of the night, I feel the weight most keenly. Maybe I have brought it onto my own shoulders.  I don't remember hefting it.  Maybe it has grown over time, one little grain of sand after another until the weight became overwhelming.

I have my coping tools though.  I run.  I run a lot.  Sometimes I can outrun the feeling of dread and the pressure.  I run out from under it, for a while..., but it catches up.  When I'm running the weight seems manageable, least for a short time.  If I could no longer run I think the weight would crush me.

I realize that I'm not special.  Many people are burdened, struggling to get through the day.  I hope that this understanding through experience will help me become more aware of others that are struggling to manage their day to its end.  I hope I can see the weight someone is carrying and help them, for their sake and my own.  Helping others manage their way, helps to make me stronger under my own burdens.

Authors note: I am fine.  This may be one of the more personally intimate things I've written, and I don't want any readers to be concerned.  We all of rough days and I wrote this, a while ago, at the end of one of my rougher days.  I liked it though and I debated for a long time whether to publish it.  I decided to go ahead and put it out there for reasons I may write about some other day.  

Knock and It Shall be Opened

God has a sense of humor.  I have been a member of our church choir for many years.  I have always been interested in singing the psalm, but never really had the courage to put myself out there.  I did it once or twice over the 20 years I was the director, but only in emergencies when the only alternative was for it to be recited.  I never felt confident about singing it. Frankly, I was afraid.

The psalm in the Roman Catholic liturgy is taken from the book of psalms in the bible. It is an opportunity for the faithful to participate in the liturgy of the word.  The psalm should be sung (though it can be recited). It is presented during the mass in a call/response format.  The cantor sings a short response and the assembled faithful echo the response.  Then the cantor sings a psalm verse with a very simple accompaniment, often just a chord struck on a piano or guitar, after which assembly sings the response again.  There are generally 3 or 4 psalms verses separated by the response.  The cantor sings alone and there is nowhere to hide if you miss a note and flub the words in some way.

In my quiet times of prayer, God would say to me "Do not be afraid, I want you to do this".  I would reply that I wasn't afraid, it was simply that there were others, more qualified to present the psalm and, of course, it was important to have the most qualified singers present the psalm.  The psalm is a critical part of the liturgy.

This went on for years.  While I was directing we were blessed with many talented singers and there was always someone that could sing better. After I passed the director's baton to Jim, I still felt that presenting the psalm was something I was being called to do, but I could never muster the courage to volunteer.  I knew that Jim would help me prepare, but it is amazing how creative you can be when it comes to the rationalization of inaction based on fear.

Then, one day, Jim came into practice and told the group that he had an issue with his vocal cords.  He had been having some pain and the doctors told him he must rest his voice.  He was told that if the situation didn't improve then surgery may be needed.  It is important to understand that, in addition to being the director of the music ministry at St. Ambrose, Jim is a professional musician in a popular band, and the chairman of the music program at a local high school (and their choir teacher).  His voice is critical to his ability to make a living.  This was a pretty serious situation.  He was singing at mass 3 times every weekend along with his responsibilities to his students and his band.  Resting his voice was going to be a problem and I felt I had to find some way to help him out.

I thought about it and prayed about it and it didn't take long for me to understand that there were ways I could help.  The psalm was something Jim had been preparing and presenting every week.  I offered to take that on for him as often as I could.  Jim readily agreed.  It may not have been much, but it was something I could do to help him rest.

Jim worked with me on the psalm for the next Sunday.  It wasn't a particularly complicated melody that week but it was plenty scary to me.  One of our violinists (Tom, who is also a professional musician and accomplished guitarist) offered to play the guitar on the psalm so I would not be distracted by the extra attention required by my instrument.  I remember rehearsing before mass.  My knees were already shaking.  My hands were sweating.  In the quiet time before mass started something occurred to me.

The Lord had brought me to this point.  This was something I was being called to do.  I was doing it for all the right reasons with a humble heart and attitude of service.  I recalled the story of Pentecost where the disciples, inspired by the Holy Spirit, began to preach and the people in the assembled crowd each heard them in their own language.  I realized then that Spirit will transform what I do to suit God's desires.  The assembled congregation will hear what God wants them to hear, what they need to hear.  This revelation gave me substantial comfort.  I knew I would put the words of God, the psalm, set to music, into the world and I prayed the Lord would have the words and music land on His people in the way they needed that day.  Maybe I would make a mistake and someone would notice and dwell on the psalm that day and that was God's plan for them.  Maybe that same mistake would be ignored or go unheard by others.  Maybe some would hear a new voice, and pay attention in a way they had not before. Maybe some would sense the tremble in my voice and know they are not alone in facing a fearful situation.  All I was called to do was to prepare thoroughly and use my gift to the best of my ability to put the words and music into the world.  The rest was the business of God.

I don't remember many of the details of singing that first psalm, but I guess it went okay.  I hit most of the notes and avoided stumbling over any of the words.  My first inclination following the celebration of mass was to seek out someone who might give me some feedback on how they thought it went, but I stopped short of that.  I decided that if I believed what was revealed to me, then looking for feedback was really looking for approval, looking for a foundation for a feeling of pride.  This is vanity.  I realized that so long as I take the responsibility of presenting the psalm seriously, and prepare in ways that allow me to present the psalm at the level I am capable, then the way it is perceived by the people is a concern of God not of me.  If I fail to take the time to prepare, relying upon (testing?) God to make what I present perfect for his purpose then that is a wholly different issue.   But it seems easy enough to understand that it was not appropriate for me to ask for feedback.  After considering the situation a little, I decided that there was nothing wrong with accepting feedback graciously, listening carefully to constructive criticism and even feeling good when I felt I had done my best, but that is an entirely different situation than actively seeking validation.

I continued singing the psalm on Sunday and occasionally Saturday as well for a few weeks.  Jim went to see a specialist and discovered that the issue was not with his vocal cords, per se, but was a side effect of a medication he was on. A change in the medication resolved the problem.  This was very welcomed news for everyone.  It was then I realized how God may have intended me to benefit from the situation.  Certainly, there were intended impacts for Jim, his band, his students and his family.  Maybe there were impacts on his doctors or nurses and on out in concentric circles of people touched by the situation.  But, for me, I was led through a door that had been opened for some time, but from which fear had kept me from crossing the threshold.

These days I present the psalm fairly regularly.  I try to keep my understanding
of my role at the forefront of my mind.  I prepare as best I can and let the Spirit do God's will with those who hear what I present.  I accept and appreciate feedback or criticism when it is given but I don't seek it out.  That is hard, but I believe very integral to the nature of what I've been called to do.

Discerning Gifts

I took my family to a community theater production one evening a while ago.  The show was a review of the theater company's 30 years of musicals.  It was fun to spend the evening at the theater with my family and the show was excellent.

The theater was set up in a cabaret-style.  I was seated right in front of the stage with my wife.  My daughters were seated at a table just to my right, their excitement and anticipation bubbling across the table to join with my own.  We were served desserts and coffee before the show. Then, after some brief introductions, the performance began.  The singing was wonderful. The actors filled the space with energy and that energy was absorbed by the audience like greenhouse plants absorbing the sunlight, and then the energy was reflected back to the actors in a perpetual cycle for the entire show.  These performers had the talent of professionals, a nearly tangible love for their art and a sincere desire to share the music and emotion with the community.

As I sat and listened I began thinking about my skills and what fun it would be to participate on stage.  I did a little acting in high school and a little in college; took a couple acting classes, was in a few productions.  I loved it.  The skills I developed through those experiences have served me well in many other areas of my life.  I harbor no illusions about my skill though. My particular talents are not that of a professional. I am also well aware that participating in the production of a show requires time and focus commitment that is beyond what I have to offer.  So that begs the question, what do I have to offer and to whom?

For many years now my most creative outlet has been through the contemporary choir at my church.  I've directed, and played the guitar and sang.  This was, necessarily, never a performance.  It was and continues to be, a venue for me to make use of the talents I have been blessed with for a wholly (holy?) other purpose than entertainment.  The role of the church musician allows me to put positive energy into a community.  The difference from a performance is that all the energy is meant to be directed to God who, through his Spirit returns that energy to us (me) as his grace and blessing.  The offering is the focus and intent.  Grace and blessings are unsolicited gifts.

The stage is different.  The focus is on the audience and the thrill is the energy exchange between the actors and the audience, back and forth in a direct fashion.  The intent if the gratification of both.  I have been part of that process and it is incredible and awesome when it clicks.  When it doesn't, it is drudgery.

So where do these two creative outlets converge?  I'm not really sure.  Maybe that's why this particular post has sat in draft form for so long.  The discernment of the answer eludes me.  

Grateful on Thanksgiving

It is Thanksgiving morning 2019. Today I am feeling both grateful and thankful.
I am grateful for the sacrifices others have made on my behalf and for the opportunities that I have had presented to me. I am grateful to my teachers, mentors, and friends who have spent with me though they may not have understood the value of it to me. I am grateful to those who took the calculated risks with their life's journey that ultimately led to opening opportunities for me, not the least of which are my father and mother and grandparents. These people made decisions that affected my world. They made the decisions intentionally for that reason, to allow their children and grandchildren to be in a position for a better life.

I am thankful that I slept in a warm bed last night next to my wonderful, beautiful wife. When I got out of bed, the furnace warmed the house when I pressed a button. The lights went on when I flipped a switch. I had a hot cup of coffee as I sat and considered my blessings.

There is food in my cupboard and beer in my fridge. I have the choice of what I want to eat today and good food is easily accessible to me. I took a hot shower and I have clean, warm clothes to wear. My girls are home, healthy and laughing. My son and daughter-in-law won't be home but I am thankful that it is because they are moving to a nicer apartment this weekend. I'm excited for them.
I am thankful today for what I have been truly blessed with and I am grateful to those who came before me, who took risks and made sacrifices so I could have the opportunities to succeed and the understanding of what it takes to excel.