Once again, a new year comes round. It's a time when looking back and looking forward comes naturally . We review the past twelve months in all kinds of ways. Columnists and tv news shows present their "best of" lists. Some of us are extra good and gather the data to submit taxes sooner to get that early refund. Others organize photos and other things in real or digital scrapbooks. And a lot of us do the usual resolution dance which, be it about weight, exercise or learning to knit, ends abruptly within a few days or weeks.
This is the season of the Hot Stove League when true baseball fanatics weigh the trades and injuries and last season's stats with the religious fervor of ancient Roman priests examining chicken entrails to know the future. Baseball fans contemplating the upcoming season are like the rest of us, hopeful about the year ahead. Last year's players are joined by new ones. Everyone hopes their team will do well and maybe win it all in a blaze of glory. The empty whiteboard of the next twelve months, we hope, will get filled with all good stuff, whatever that may be.
But take it from an early-on baptized member of Red Sox Nation, hope doesn't always float. Meteoric early won/lost records can reverse in a heartbeat. Stuff happens, predictably. What I can do is enjoy each moment as it comes. Even a ball game with a bad outcome has its moments -- a good hit, a great inning-ending pitching series or a sweet play on the field.
A favorite baseball game image of mine involves one of my grandsons playing tee-ball with other five year olds. When an opposing player hit a fly ball over a group of them clustered around second base, he and his team mates covered their heads with their gloves and let the ball drop harmlessly among them.
May your new year be mostly filled with fly balls you catch. And if you need to, cover your head sometimes for the other ones. There's always next time.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Holy Nights and Christmas Blues
I love Christmas, especially being close to family and friends and kids from all directions. I'm a sucker for Christmas movies, especially the variations on Dickens (thank you, Bill Murray and the makers of SCROOGED!). I enjoy choosing presents for loved ones, and delight in their getting them, though not without a little anxiety on my part to see if I chose well. The December ritual of getting and sending cards is yet another thing that cheers me on these cold gray days.
I tend to be a positive person, probably annoyingly so to some. Nevertheless, I sometimes get the Christmas blues. The song, "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas," sung bluesy and slow, can bring me to tears. Why? Often I'm not aware of any specific thing bothering me, but at other times I am. It's the gap between what is and what I wish life were, for me and the rest of the world. The last line of "I'll Be Home For Christmas," is "...if only in my dreams," and I think of service men and women and their distant families in this season.
One of the great persons of the last century was blessed Dorothy Day. Her journey took her from midwest normal family life to radical journalism and activism and finally to conversion and the founding of THE CATHOLIC WORKER newspaper ("a penny a copy") and movement. Dorothy's radical charity and pacifism appealed to the Quaker artist Fritz Eichenberg and he donated some stunning free art to the newspaper (http://sacredartpilgrim.com/collection/view/19).
One of his most powerful images was "The Christ of the Breadlines," in which a haloed Christ, broken and bowed, stands in line with other destitute people waiting for food. Another Eichenberg image was an unusual nativity scene: all kinds of poor people, kids and adults, just outside the unseen stable of Jesus' birth, drawn by the light from within. Quite an image.
If I were to imagine an Eichenberg nativity scene for our era, I see figures like kids of all races and immigrant status', homeless veterans, mentally challenged folks, displaced workers from closed factories, bullied gay young people, alcoholics and addicts and their families, despondent people who'd thought of suicide in recent dark nights -- all the broken, grieving and lonely people who look for some kind of light, some kind of hope, some prospect at least of joy ahead.
I know a New York City firefighter whose own response to the attacks of 9-11 included funding a second child in a major overseas charity he supports. He made some light out of a dark time.
If it's hard for you to find light in this season, make some. Reach out. Connect. The world could use it. Happy holidays.
I tend to be a positive person, probably annoyingly so to some. Nevertheless, I sometimes get the Christmas blues. The song, "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas," sung bluesy and slow, can bring me to tears. Why? Often I'm not aware of any specific thing bothering me, but at other times I am. It's the gap between what is and what I wish life were, for me and the rest of the world. The last line of "I'll Be Home For Christmas," is "...if only in my dreams," and I think of service men and women and their distant families in this season.
One of the great persons of the last century was blessed Dorothy Day. Her journey took her from midwest normal family life to radical journalism and activism and finally to conversion and the founding of THE CATHOLIC WORKER newspaper ("a penny a copy") and movement. Dorothy's radical charity and pacifism appealed to the Quaker artist Fritz Eichenberg and he donated some stunning free art to the newspaper (http://sacredartpilgrim.com/collection/view/19).
One of his most powerful images was "The Christ of the Breadlines," in which a haloed Christ, broken and bowed, stands in line with other destitute people waiting for food. Another Eichenberg image was an unusual nativity scene: all kinds of poor people, kids and adults, just outside the unseen stable of Jesus' birth, drawn by the light from within. Quite an image.
If I were to imagine an Eichenberg nativity scene for our era, I see figures like kids of all races and immigrant status', homeless veterans, mentally challenged folks, displaced workers from closed factories, bullied gay young people, alcoholics and addicts and their families, despondent people who'd thought of suicide in recent dark nights -- all the broken, grieving and lonely people who look for some kind of light, some kind of hope, some prospect at least of joy ahead.
I know a New York City firefighter whose own response to the attacks of 9-11 included funding a second child in a major overseas charity he supports. He made some light out of a dark time.
If it's hard for you to find light in this season, make some. Reach out. Connect. The world could use it. Happy holidays.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
WIND CHILL
It was pretty cold and windy this Northeast morning on the walk I do with my friend Bob. We both used the old runner's trick of putting petroleum jelly on our exposed cheekbones to ward off the wind's bite. And as long as we kept moving briskly, we were fairly warm. Swinging my arms helped also, and at least my inside temperature was pretty comfortable. I said a prayer for all the people who have to work outside all day in this cold.
The rewards of such a cold walk, I kept telling myself, do outweigh the dread I experience just before going outside to begin it. There's sharing the discomfort which makes it more bearable. I often get to hear (or sometimes tell) a good story. And I get to listen to my own or another's heart a bit through something one of us is passionate about -- from kids and grandkids to politics and so much more.
There's a smile on both our faces after we're done, inside the house, drinking coffee and eating a pb&j on toast. Two older guys grateful for still being able to move our bodies in challenging conditions, congratulating ourselves just a little for not letting this first cold snap of winter keep us huddled indoors. The warm living room felt pretty sweet after forty-five minutes of the cold wind.
Many thoughts come up for me. We saw a gorgeous winter morning sunrise sky, all deep blues and magentas splashed across the remnants of the little snowstorm we had yesterday. We were also blessed to have the clothes and the health to walk comfortably in, and to have that warm house to return to. We're just a few days away from the Winter Solstice, a day our ancient forebears marked as earth holy because it signalled the return of longer days and the promise of spring, sleeping under the cold, but soon to be marching toward warmth again.
The very sharpness of this cold weather might be, I think, a clearer invitation to feel connection with everything. Feeling the alive energy of a cold morning can be a way of finding something to be grateful for rather than something to fear or only bundle up against.
Praise cold and its winter gifts.
The rewards of such a cold walk, I kept telling myself, do outweigh the dread I experience just before going outside to begin it. There's sharing the discomfort which makes it more bearable. I often get to hear (or sometimes tell) a good story. And I get to listen to my own or another's heart a bit through something one of us is passionate about -- from kids and grandkids to politics and so much more.
There's a smile on both our faces after we're done, inside the house, drinking coffee and eating a pb&j on toast. Two older guys grateful for still being able to move our bodies in challenging conditions, congratulating ourselves just a little for not letting this first cold snap of winter keep us huddled indoors. The warm living room felt pretty sweet after forty-five minutes of the cold wind.
Many thoughts come up for me. We saw a gorgeous winter morning sunrise sky, all deep blues and magentas splashed across the remnants of the little snowstorm we had yesterday. We were also blessed to have the clothes and the health to walk comfortably in, and to have that warm house to return to. We're just a few days away from the Winter Solstice, a day our ancient forebears marked as earth holy because it signalled the return of longer days and the promise of spring, sleeping under the cold, but soon to be marching toward warmth again.
The very sharpness of this cold weather might be, I think, a clearer invitation to feel connection with everything. Feeling the alive energy of a cold morning can be a way of finding something to be grateful for rather than something to fear or only bundle up against.
Praise cold and its winter gifts.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Here Comes Everybody
Nancy and I spent the other day in Brooklyn. First we went to a Christmas party held at a renovated firehouse in Red Hook that houses a drop in and counseling center for firefighters & their families, other first responders and veterans. The lively crowd of active duty and retired firefighters, families and staff was having a great time.
We then moved on to a vegetarian restaurant in our old neighborhood of Park Slope. Great lunch and interesting people watching as the Slope is always known for its characters. Think of it as Santa Cruz East.
Finally we went to Bay Ridge to a big clothing store, Century 21, that has great prices on some really good things. Here's where an excellent day began to touch my spirit even more. In that crowded and item packed store was an array of people from all over the world, all sizes, colors, ethnicities and probably at least twenty different cultures. African, Russian, Arab, Indian, Chinese, Latin American were just some of the folks both on staff at the store and shopping like us. The Brooklyn young people on the store staff were themselves a great mix of these cultures and races. And they couldn't have been warmer, more helpful or more patient with the sometimes frazzled crowd.
There was a day when that sort of experience would be a sure set-up for me to lose it or, at best, to barely hang on by my fingernails. Crowded places full of determined and impatient people would put me on edge and layers of civility and respect would peel off me in a heartbeat. Not this day.
This day I was afforded the grace to be grateful and appreciative. One man patiently pushed his disabled partner in her wheelchair all around a crowded set of aisles. Clerks were polite and cheerful even when their customers weren't so much. Lots of folks, including us, spent significant time finding just the right size or color of sweater or shirt to gift someone else. Outside a Bay Ridge volunteer ambulance corps was doing a fundraiser, supported by a radio station remote truck sending the sounds of pop music up and down 86th St.
If that afternoon of shopping were a microcosm of this country these days, or even of the whole world, there's a lot to celebrate. Don't we all look grand? as my Irish grandmother used to say. Don't we, indeed.
Here comes everybody.
We then moved on to a vegetarian restaurant in our old neighborhood of Park Slope. Great lunch and interesting people watching as the Slope is always known for its characters. Think of it as Santa Cruz East.
Finally we went to Bay Ridge to a big clothing store, Century 21, that has great prices on some really good things. Here's where an excellent day began to touch my spirit even more. In that crowded and item packed store was an array of people from all over the world, all sizes, colors, ethnicities and probably at least twenty different cultures. African, Russian, Arab, Indian, Chinese, Latin American were just some of the folks both on staff at the store and shopping like us. The Brooklyn young people on the store staff were themselves a great mix of these cultures and races. And they couldn't have been warmer, more helpful or more patient with the sometimes frazzled crowd.
There was a day when that sort of experience would be a sure set-up for me to lose it or, at best, to barely hang on by my fingernails. Crowded places full of determined and impatient people would put me on edge and layers of civility and respect would peel off me in a heartbeat. Not this day.
This day I was afforded the grace to be grateful and appreciative. One man patiently pushed his disabled partner in her wheelchair all around a crowded set of aisles. Clerks were polite and cheerful even when their customers weren't so much. Lots of folks, including us, spent significant time finding just the right size or color of sweater or shirt to gift someone else. Outside a Bay Ridge volunteer ambulance corps was doing a fundraiser, supported by a radio station remote truck sending the sounds of pop music up and down 86th St.
If that afternoon of shopping were a microcosm of this country these days, or even of the whole world, there's a lot to celebrate. Don't we all look grand? as my Irish grandmother used to say. Don't we, indeed.
Here comes everybody.
ENTHUSIASM
One of our grandsons, 12 years old, is passionate these days about a skill and hobby called fingerboarding. He uses two fingers to maneuver a minature skateboard up and over minature ramps, stairways, half-pipes and the like. He loves to practice moves that are based on actual skateboarding tricks. He'll spend hours and hours at this craft, making very difficult tricks often, but just as often not quite landing it the way he wants to. So he repeats the move until he nails it. His joy in those moments is infectious.
He is also very generous with this activity he loves. He put together a little board for me, and is very encouraging as I fumble trying to push it around and over the obstacles. His enthusiasm for this and other things he loves is a great quality of his character and personality.
Enthusiasm in its Greek root actually means possessed or inspired by God. When we're really passionate or enthusiastic about something, when we're into it, time and worry slip away. We're in this moment, right now. And the word enthusiasm suggests we're close to spirit or the deepest of powers in such moments.
The takeaway for me is the contrast between my grandson's enthusiasm and my flagging zest for life which goes weak or feels like it has disappeared sometimes. On some mornings, I could be the poster child for the old saw of waking up with "Good God, it's morning!" instead of "Good morning, God!"
My favorite prayer in the world was written by Dag Hammerskold, the late deeply spiritual diplomat and peacemaker. He wrote:
".....for everything that has been, thanks!
For everything that will be, yes!"
I can't always bring the same enthusiasm to that prayer each time I say it as my grandson does to his fingerboarding. But just saying that or something similar at any point in the day can head me in the right direction.
You'll kindly excuse me right now. I have to go practice landing my ollies.
He is also very generous with this activity he loves. He put together a little board for me, and is very encouraging as I fumble trying to push it around and over the obstacles. His enthusiasm for this and other things he loves is a great quality of his character and personality.
Enthusiasm in its Greek root actually means possessed or inspired by God. When we're really passionate or enthusiastic about something, when we're into it, time and worry slip away. We're in this moment, right now. And the word enthusiasm suggests we're close to spirit or the deepest of powers in such moments.
The takeaway for me is the contrast between my grandson's enthusiasm and my flagging zest for life which goes weak or feels like it has disappeared sometimes. On some mornings, I could be the poster child for the old saw of waking up with "Good God, it's morning!" instead of "Good morning, God!"
My favorite prayer in the world was written by Dag Hammerskold, the late deeply spiritual diplomat and peacemaker. He wrote:
".....for everything that has been, thanks!
For everything that will be, yes!"
I can't always bring the same enthusiasm to that prayer each time I say it as my grandson does to his fingerboarding. But just saying that or something similar at any point in the day can head me in the right direction.
You'll kindly excuse me right now. I have to go practice landing my ollies.
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