A Contemplative Life

March 10, 2017March 9, 2017

Making Sense of Ash Wednesday and the Crosses on my Children’s Foreheads

It was a beautiful thing to do in the middle of the afternoon, in the middle of the week, at the beginning of Lent. We crowded into our church’s small chapel, the adults in chairs, the children sitting on the large, red carpet at the front. We prayed together, and we confessed together. We sang hymns together.

We’ve attended Saint James for nearly three years now, and this was the third time in my entire life I attended church on Ash Wednesday. Every time, it surprises me. Every time, I sit there and watch my children walk to the front, receive on their clean little foreheads a dirty cross of ashes (made from the palm leaves of the previous year). Every time, I hear the priest say over them,

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

Every time, I feel the tears well up in my eyes as I think of this reality. They are dust. I am dust. And, someday, to dust we shall all return.

* * * * *

Richard Rohr, writer and Catholic priest, has done a lot to help me make sense of the transition we made three years ago from Evangelical to Episcopalian. I say transition, though it’s been more of a melding, more of a taking on than a laying down. In a recent homily, he proclaimed these words:

There’s a tragic sense to life. What Lent is about is somehow asking for, and hopefully receiving, the grace to accept the essentially tragic nature of human existence. On Wednesday, this church filled up all day. I’m always amazed. Why do you all come on Ash Wednesday? You don’t have to, you know. But people pour into church. The cynic says, “Catholics come to church anytime they get anything for free, whether it’s palms or ashes. They all show up.” There might be some truth to that, but why do we want these dang ashes on our foreheads?

Somehow, we know that we need to be told that we came from the earth and we’re going to return to the earth and everything in between is a school. Everything in between is growing up, waking up, cleaning up. Becoming the full image that you were created in, which is always and forever, the image of God.

* * * * *

Maybe there is more than one reason these ashes bring tears to my eyes. Maybe it’s not just about the sadness of death. Maybe they’re hopeful tears, hopeful in the way we sometimes cry at weddings, or births, knowing the hard things are so intricately tangled up with the good things. Maybe I cry because I so desperately want to grow up, to wake up, to clean up, not in a sanitized way but in the way a fresh spring cleans the rocks it pours over. Maybe the emotion comes because I can sense how infinitely close we all are, and also how far away, from becoming the full image of God.

The kids always come running back to us after the service, their cross of ashes on their foreheads, and we gather in an impromptu, instinctual, group hug, as if to comfort each other, as if we know in that moment, as in all moments, that we need to hold one another close, that we need each other in this image-becoming.

One of the main themes in my upcoming book, The Day the Angels Fell, is death and questions surrounding death – what will we do with it? What is its role in our lives? Could it be possible that death is a gift? If you’d like to have me come to your church this fall to talk about the role of death in the Christian world view – incarnation, death, resurrection, and redemption – click the “Contact” button at the top right of the page and let me know. I’d love to see you! In the mean time, you can preorder my book HERE.

February 16, 2017February 15, 2017

That Round of Golf I Played With Tiger, and What it All Meant

Recently on Facebook I shared a dream I had that left a very strong impression on me. When I woke up, I had a very clear idea as to what the dream meant. Here’s the dream. What’s your interpretation?

I was golfing on a small executive golf course with Tiger Woods, and he was playing terribly. I kept thinking I needed to get a photo with him so that I could share it online. I actually remember thinking in my dream that Bryan Allain (a friend of mine who likes to golf) would never believe that I was golfing with Tiger.

We were walking to the next hole and I finally worked up the courage to ask him if we could take a photo. He was very kind and suggested we take one at the next tee. We got there and I suddenly realized it was the most beautiful course I’d ever seen! The next hole stretched down a long hill and beyond the green, the ocean. Mountains in the distance. Amazing.

Suddenly, a crowd came out of nowhere and I was trying to take this picture with my phone, but my phone was suddenly an iPad and it fell to the ground in the melee and broke. I felt frantic. I had to get this photo taken! I sat there on the tee and tried to put the iPad together but I couldn’t. I spent the rest of my dream trying to put the iPad together. When I looked up, Tiger was gone.

So, any ideas? Here are some of the more interesting interpretations my Facebook friends offered up:

“Focusing on technology can rob us of even the most significant events. The effort to “capture” it can actually make it disappear.” – Ken

“You actually hate Tiger Woods.” – Jason

“Smashed dreams are overshadowed by the beauty of the moment.” – Elie

“1) don’t miss the beauty (the scenery) in search of fame and celebrity (tiger). 2) dont wait to act, have courage or the moment might pass you by. 3) experiencing things > documenting things 4) play more golf with Bryan this summer.” – Bryan

* * * * *

Dreams are funny things. I certainly don’t think they all have deeper meaning, but I woke up with such a clear sense that there was a message hidden in this one for me. Immediately, I thought to myself, “I have to worry less about fame and notoriety and more about enjoying the course I’m on. It’s actually a beautiful life.”

Have you had a strange dream lately? Or maybe you think you have a better interpretation for my round with Tiger?

February 1, 2017January 31, 2017

Some Thoughts On La La Land and Living

La La Land. I told Maile as we walked out of the theater that I had tears in my eyes throughout the movie because the various parts about trying to make it as a creative person hit too close to home.

There’s a part where Mia and Sebastian, two young folks trying to chase down their dreams in Los Angeles, are having it out. He has just delivered the news to her that she got a call back for a rehearsal and they really want to see her. This could be her big break.

But she’s failed too many times in the past. She’s tells him she’s finished.

* * * * *

Mia: Maybe I’m not good enough.
Sebastian: You are.
Mia: Maybe I’m not.

Mia: I don’t want to do it anymore.
Sebastian: Why?
Mia: Because I think maybe it hurts just a bit too much.

* * * * *

Oh, man, that’s it, isn’t it? We have these things we want to do, things that are connected to the deepest parts of ourselves, but we’ve tried so many times, and nothing has hit the mark. We try and try again, and each time it feels like a crap shoot, the toss of the dice. We think we know what we want to be, we think we know where we want to be, and it all seems so impossibly far away.

I started chasing my dream of being a writer seven years ago. And I’ve made a living at it these long seven years. But there’s always something out there, something just beyond my reach. I remember standing at that kitchen island in Virginia, telling Maile we didn’t have enough money to get through the winter. I remember the two of us unpacking our things into my parents’ basement. I remember all the various contracts that fell through or didn’t happen, for whatever reason. The rejection emails from agents and editors and the low traffic at the blog, no matter how hard I tried.

There are a million and one reasons to quit, and they come at us fast. The disappointment hurts. The sense, not that people hate what you’re creating, but that they honestly couldn’t care less.

The ache I felt in the movie, the ache that resonated with me, had nothing to do with what Mia and Sebastion did or did not manage to do by the end of the movie (no spoilers here, at least not on purpose). The ache I felt was in response to this knowledge that there are things we are meant to do, no matter what road they lead to.

Does that make sense?

I truly believe I’m meant to live this life as a writer, and that will stay true for all the years I live on this planet, whether I have a New York Times bestseller or simply continue on writing books that handfuls of people read. And that’s the ache, the oh-so-sweet ache: this is my life. I’m living it. It is neither more nor less than what it is.

Can that be enough? That’s the question. Can this life I’m living be enough?

* * * * *

Here’s to the ones who dream
Foolish as they may seem
Here’s to the hearts that ache
Here’s to the mess we make

– “The Fools Who Dream,” La La Land

January 23, 2017January 23, 2017

Driving a Transgender Sex Worker From Here to There #RidesharingConfessional

It’s always a strange thing, picking someone up from a hotel late at night. Especially when they have their bags with them. Occasionally I’ll get someone who wants to go to a club or a bar, but this one was different.

I got the call at around 11pm and drove to a hotel just south of the city. The road is dark there, where Prince Street becomes Route 222, where the street lights end and the trees lean in over the road. This city of ours ceases to exist rather abruptly when you drive south, over the bridge. I cruised past the beautiful bed and breakfast my aunt renovated before she died of cancer last summer (she had convinced us she would live forever). There is a pulsing wave of energy whenever I drive past there, as if she is on the porch, waving or laughing or wanting me stop in and tell her my latest ridesharing confessional.

I pulled up to the hotel’s entrance, looking for Paul. A woman waved me down and motioned for me to come over, so I pulled to the curb. Apparently this was Paul: African-American, maybe mid-20s, and a woman, wearing high heels, a very short skirt, and a very large hoodie. She wanted to go to another motel on the north side of town. I helped her load her bags. We drove back through the darkness, towards the city.

She was very kind. She told me about her hometown, how she liked Lancaster, how her week was going. The lights on Queen Street sent a strobe light through the sun roof. She loved my car. She was fidgety and sick and coughed a loud, barking cough every few minutes, always profusely apologizing.

“Oh, my, I’m so sorry. I’m actually getting better,” she’d say, as if embarrassed by her sickness.

She wanted to stop at Walgreen’s, so we stopped. She left her bags in the car. I left the car running. She said she’d be back out in a few minutes – usually that means I’ll be waiting a long time. But she came out quickly. She thanked me again and again for making the pit stop.

My turn signal blinked to enter the motel parking lot, and I waited to cross traffic. Her phone rang. She answered.

“Yes. I’ve been trying to reach you. Don’t give me that s***,” she said in an angry voice. “I had a client. He paid me $200 and wanted to take me to an ATM so that he could tip me $100. That’s why I couldn’t call you back.”

She paused.

“F*** you,” she said. “Why are you always on my back? I’m not stringing you along. No. Well, I called you, didn’t I? I have to go.”

She hung up. We were in front of the motel. I helped her get her bags from the back of the car and wondered what the people standing outside the entrance thought of us, me helping her with her bags, her so obviously being what she was. I realized I care far too much what other people think of me. Meanwhile, the phone call had left her distracted and upset. I didn’t know what to say, what to do, if anything. What business was it of mine, what she was doing, who she was talking to, where she was going?

“Good night,” she said in a tired voice, but then, suddenly, she was professional again, in control. “Thank you.”

“Good night,” I said, feeling hopeless and very sad.

She disappeared through the door, and I drove away, wishing I would have asked her if she was okay, if she needed help. I wondered if we really know anything about people, anything about our world. I think about the stereotypes and the angry rhetoric we’re given, words meant to direct how we think and feel about particular kinds of people, words meant to somehow make us feel safer. I think we forget we’re all tired, we’re all trying, we’re all in over our heads. Every single one of us.

There are certain people I keep my eye out for when I drive through the city, certain people I wish I could talk to again. But, most of the time, I don’t get a second chance. We so rarely do get those second chances, with anything. It’s a first-chance kind of life, and we have to do our best with it.

January 12, 2017January 12, 2017

What I Discovered in an Old Christmas Video From 2009

Seven years ago, Maile and I had just gone through one of the most difficult holidays of our young lives. I had just turned 33. We had walked away from a failing business, left a community we loved, and moved into my parents’ basement. We brought along with us our four children, $50,000 in debt, and a nagging sense that we were failing at this thing called life. All of our friends seemed to be doing very well for themselves. They seemed to be right where we imagined you should be when turning the corner into your early 30s: decent vehicles, a mortgage, and well-rounded children playing soccer and the violin and learning three different languages.

We, on the other hand, were starting over. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.

This period of life came to mind again as we watched some old home movies with the kids between Thanksgiving and Christmas. In fact, it didn’t just come to mind – it was right there in living color for us to experience all over again. The Christmas of 2009.

There the kids were in the video, unwrapping a meager stash of gifts in my parents’ basement. I don’t remember how we paid for gifts that year. I can’t really remember. There sat Maile and I, looking somewhat depressed, somewhat dazed. Life had run over us with a steam roller, and the kids didn’t seem to have a clue.

While we watched that video (it seemed to come on the television out of nowhere), Maile looked over at me and wrinkled her nose.

“I’m not finding this one particularly enjoyable,” she whispered.

“Me, neither,” I said.

But the kids were caught up in it, remembering this, remember that. And they were so tiny, their voices squeaky new: Cade only 6, Lucy 5. Abra and Sammy were just babies: 20 months and 5 months, about the same ages as Leo and Poppy are now.

Tonight, though, as I think back through that time and the images in the video, one sentence came to mind: “That’s what trust looks like.”

* * * * *

I love Henri Nouwen’s take on trust:

Trust is the basis of life. Without trust, no human being can live. Trapeze artists offer a beautiful image of this. Flyers have to trust their catchers. They can do the most spectacular doubles, triples, or quadruples, but what finally makes their performance spectacular are the catchers who are there for them at the right time in the right place.

Let’s trust in the Great Catcher.

Even after I finished my post last week – An Honest Reflection on Self-Employment, Canceled Contracts, and Hope – I continued thinking about it quite a bit. I felt like it was unfinished, that perhaps I had left something unsaid that needed to be said. And I realized that this is it: the most important ingredient in this life of self-employment has been trust.

Not that I have always had perfect trust in God. Not that I haven’t been assailed with worry or anxiety from time to time (or more often than that) – my distrust becomes evident mostly in times when I begin working on a resume. Yet, the single most important thing that has taken me from this day to the next has been a determination to trust that God knows what God is doing. God knows what Maile and I are going through. And God is using it all in this tapestry of mercy and grace, a creative endeavor of which I only ever receive the smallest glimpse.

* * * * *

This is not meant to be a sermon, or a guilt trip. If you are not doing what you feel you are called to do, or if you are not “living the life” the televangelists are shouting about, I am not here to tell you that the reason is a lack of trust. I don’t believe that God approaches us with a Trust-Me-Or-Else approach. Trusting God is not something that will always bring monetary rewards. It is not something that will elevate you above your peers or bring you a world’s helping of success.

But I will say this: trusting God is a conscious decision to move into a gentler movement of mercy. I have practiced trusting all these long seven years, and I can feel it strengthening in me. I can tell when I am moving away from it, when I am trying to force things in my own timing, when I am operating out of fear. And I can sense the deep sigh of relief when I move closer to absolute trust.

Where are you in this journey? Can you trust your life to an invisible force that cares only for your greatest good? Can you even believe in that? Sometimes I can. Other times, I simply hope.

* * * * *

This is a very long post. I will end it with my favorite words of all time about trust, written by Brennan Manning in his book Ruthless Trust:

The way of trust is a movement into obscurity, into the undefined, into ambiguity, not into some predetermined, clearly delineated plan for the future. The next step discloses itself only out of a discernment of God acting in the desert of the present moment. The reality of naked trust is the life of the pilgrim who leaves what is nailed down, obvious, and secure, and walks into the unknown without any rational explanation to justify the decision or guarantee the future. Why? Because God has signaled the movement and offered it his presence and his promise.

Find the gentle movement of God in your life. And then trust it.

* * * * *

As a complete aside, I am offering a few writing classes that begin in February: Creative Writing for Kids, Fiction Writing, and Memoir Writing. If you’re interested and would like to learn more, you can check those out HERE.

January 11, 2017January 10, 2017

When Maile is Away For Five Days

We have an old house, and the cold leaks in around the windows, the bottoms of the doors. There is an old chimney behind one of our walls, and if you press down on the carpet the slightest of chilly breezes creeps in under the baseboards. The heat escapes, like some invisible thing drawn inexorably toward the sharp stars. Winter in this old house is all about slippers and warm clothes and keeping the laundry door shut.

Maile is away this week. She took Poppy and left the other five home with me, which isn’t as challenging as it sounds. It’s all fairly straightforward. Except for Leo. Nothing is ever straightforward with Leo. His new thing is that he’s realized we’re not crazy about him saying “No” when we ask him to do something, so instead he says, “I can’t!” or “I don’t know!” An interesting diversionary tactic.

“Leo, please stop throwing things at your sister!”

“I don’t know!”

It’s so nonsensical, I’m not completely sure how to respond to it.

* * * * *

There seems to be so much chaos in the world that at times I’m not sure how to respond to that, either. Syria and crazy weather and Trump and Russia and what can I do, Shawn Smucker who lives in a row home on James Street in the middle of a small but wonderful city? I turn off the news and close my laptop and do the good in front of me. I give Leo a bath and make dinner for the kids and do a few loads of laundry. I pray for peace and give a small amount of money to Preemptive Love and work on the stories others have entrusted me with. I say hi to people I pass on the street and listen when I’m driving for Uber or Lyft.

And I go to bed at a decent time and try to eat better and wonder what the future has in mind for me or these seven other people I share a house with.

* * * * *

When Maile is away, I sleep on her side of the bed. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s so her side isn’t empty, and then it doesn’t feel like she’s quite as gone as she is. She’ll be back in only a few days. Still, I climb into her side and the whole room feels new, like I’m seeing it in a mirror.

No matter which side of the bed is empty, though, it is quickly in high demand. Tonight Sam sleeps in the bed with me: our rough-and-tumblest, our most confrontational, our boisterous one. I told him he could sleep there if he stayed way over.

“Over here?” he asked, hanging one arm and one leg over the side. I rolled my eyes.

“You don’t have to be falling out of the bed. Just don’t kick me.”

Now, he’s tangled up in blankets using Maile’s Boppy for a pillow. He’ll be sleeping sideways in the bed by midnight, I’m sure, and I’ll spread a blanket and pillow on the floor for him and wrap him in it. Then I’ll have the bed to myself.

* * * * *

These are the days when we need simple grace more than ever, when we need to speak the truth loud and clear but also remember, with humility, that we are only who we are. These are the days when we must be grateful for what we have and fight as hard as we can to hold on to hope. It may be hard to believe, but these might be very good days. They will be very good days, if we can live the life that’s been put in front of us, and give it our best shot.