Smart Phone

I got a smart phone.  This makes me feel "more connected" than ever before.  I don't know how I feel about that; I know it doesn't make me feel happy.  No more getting lost by bicycle or other means.  One step further from my once-hermetic life.  Will I rely less o other people now that I have this little machine?  Will I spend less time with my own thoughts?  I've gained this piece of technology.  Who will I lose?

Sundays

I feel infinitely left out on Sundays because I am still unsure of Deity.  I want to enter into the conversation, but I feel like a little kid again, with older siblings and adults carrying on a conversation without ever so much as looking my way, except maybe to "shush" me and ask me to wait until later - a later I'm sure will never come - a later they will forget about in the meantime.  But when they do remember, long after we've parted ways, they will pray that I will "just get it" in my own time.

Meanwhile, I will take the conversation about the Myth of Redemptive Violence and file it away with John Paul Lederach and the study about how children as young as six months can identify and show preference toward "helpful" characters and my own theses on the impact of violent hero characters in the media on our children's character development, perpetuating this Myth.

My narrative differs from the narrative of the church-folk conversation and, despite my fancy high-heeled church shoes, when I leave this place I hope to put my foot to the ground and travel slowly, carefully, through the woods, listening to the land.  I learned today that after Cain said to God, "Am I my brother's keeper?" God answered, "Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground."  I will listen.  The ground and the rocks will cry out.  I want to halt my ongoing conversations of everyday life for this.

This attentiveness to the land, to the purpose of land and the tragedies of the land, this is why I travel by bicycle.

Falling

Sometimes people talk about falling in love,
and sometimes it really is like that.
One day you're living a very pragmatic existence,
soon you're sitting up late on your best friend's bed trying to convince yourself you're not falling in love
(When you both know you are).
A couple months later when He moves away, you seek solace in the arms of a friend, heaving sobs from a place deep within yourself you didn't even know existed before Him.


This falling is much more subtle, much less dramatic.  All week long I've been picking my way along the desolate rocky shore, searching for glimpses of something not lost, something I know must be there.  Rarely do I spot it, shining from beneath a shallow pool , partially obscured by snail shells.  I treasure the fleeting beauty of these precious stones.


Yet as I stand above, looking down into these pools, their depth grows infinitely deeper.  i might choose to dive in but know my breath could not hold for such a journey.  I take a seat and stare across the sea toward the horizon.


On this eve of a new day I wonder: Will I take one step forward and set sail on the endless sea of sadness or will I continue my hunched pace along the beach, hoping for something more?

Birthday

On Monday I celebrated my birthday, my 25th birthday.  I wrote this that night near midnight.

It's my birthday, my 25th birthday.  I suddenly feel a little hesitant heading int othis year without much reflection.  Tired, even.  25. In some way, that's supposed to be significant, right?  I can rent cars without paying extra daily charges.  I'm supposed to have a quarter life crisis ~ for which I'm open to suggestions.

I briefly thought about quitting my job here and moving to Mexico City to live with my sister and brother-in-law and to take care of my nephew.

My friend Elise, at the request for suggestions, paused and thought about it then said pointedly, "You know, Emily, you already lead such an adventurous life - there's no need for one."

Adventurous.  This is not a word I would have used to describe myself.  I feel I pale in comparison to my friends and acquaintances.  I work nearly 50 hours a week, I'm beginning to dabble in church commitments, I spend my free time daydreaming about work and planning for work.  I like to visit my grandparents and sometimes I just wish for more quiet in my life.

I once sat, exasperated, across a coffee shop patio table from a now-ex-boyfriend and I banged my head down on the table.  "I just need to meditate!"

"So do." Then he drove me home, gave me a hug and a kiss and left me there, quiet, still and alone.

I ache at that memory, at that big empty space.  I remember standing in my un-air-conditioned house on that sweltering day, marvelous.  I stand at the edge of a field of crisp, amber wheat beneath a pure blue sky.  Oceans of yellow and solid, steady blue.  I am awash in it.  I long for such lazy, hazy days when my spirit rises up around me, my back pressed firmly into the the land on which I was born, the aromas of my wheat-filled childhood wafting up around me, releasing their pollens into that eternally steady sky; the sky of promises, the sky on which I rely.

If I knew how to dance to ask for rain, I would do so now.  I would ask the gods of the sky to look down upon me and see this lonely child looking up to them, basking in their glory, wondering, wondering, asking for wisdom as I open this next chapter of my life.

I hope for this year to step off of solid ground and set sail on a sky so blue it reflects the bright light of the sun.

Having Been Warned in a Dream

Feliz Dia de los Reyes from Mexico City!

These guys (the 3 Kings) are some of my favorite characters.  I'm not sure why.  Maybe it's their mystical following of a celestial figure to right where they're supposed to be.  I like to think maybe it's like this past summer when I just knew I was supposed to embark on a solo bicycle journey to Nashville, TN.  Sometimes you just know.

But I'm sure these guys had plenty o' people saying, ¨Hunh? Why?¨ and ¨What are you doing?¨

Then, when it was time for them to set out on their mundane journey home, they actually paid attention to what they considered a significant dream, which as it turned out, altered history.

Sometimes I have dreams that offer clear, concise directions.  These dreams I take to heart and consider each time I come to an intersection.  Some dreams aer bigger than others (THE dream, for instance, that I've been carrying at the center of my heart for as long as I can remember; the dream around which I've oriented my life thus far), while other dreams pertain to smaller theaters in my life - a recent dream about a toilet, for example.

I just hope that have the courage to pursue the true route encouraged by such dreams, even in the face of the death penalty.

Babies

Sometimes it baffles me that there is still so much to-do about a baby born a couple thousand years ago.  We get all excited and sometimes lost and overwhelmed in the preparations for this holiday, but when it comes down to it - to this moment - there is an air of anticipation.


I grew up going to church and this day, this Christmas Eve day, is my most favorite of church-going holidays.  Waking up on Christmas Eve day means the promise of baked treats wafting from the kitchen.  It means getting  my hands dirty doing what I love: helping prepare the traditional Swedish smorgasbord food we eat every year.  In the evening we go to church, where we finally still ourselves; we sing the traditional carols under and amid dim white lights.  Quietly we leave, back into the world for the brief time it takes to retrieve ourselves and gather 'round Mom and Dad's fancily-laid table, steam rising in front of everyone's plate.  After our taste buds have remembered that once, long ago, they hailed from Sweden, the anticipation yet lingers.


I suppose as a child, this anticipation may have centered on the presents under the tree, the promise of tomorrow's gifts for me.  As an adult, I anticipate the Christmas morning present-opening tradition in the Johnson household as a culmination of the months of deciding on the precisely perfect present for each beloved person.  There is still another cause of anticipation, however.  It is the gift of a little baby's birth that we celebrate.  Whether it's Jesus' birth, or your birth, the birth of your child or a stranger's, each baby is a promise of a new and ever-unfolding gift.  This is the miracle that I celebrate tonight: the mystery of each person's contribution to our world.  This is why I love my work.

R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

I'm a teacher.  I recently had a conversation with another teacher, who expressed appreciation for parent-teacher conference conversations in which the parents are emphatically concerned with the question, "Does my child respect you and other teachers?"  I also appreciate parent-teacher conferences in which the parents ask about more than a student's academics, but something about this conversation has continued to gnaw at the back of my mind (not in a migraine kind of way, just a bit of unsettling of my soul).


I stand with my back against the countertop, hands wrapped around a mug of warm water - known in my family as silver tea - scanning the busyness of the room.  On the carpet, a couple boys build towers with the knobless cylinders, a potentially potent, but for now peaceful, mix of personalities and material.  I become enthralled watching Zoe work with coloring pencils and paper on the table by the fish tank.  Minutes pass; she and I are "in the zone," Csikeszentmihalyi's flow, we are absorbed in our work.  As she dutifully arranges her pencils above her paper and settles into her seat, I note her determined, focused, concentrated countenance.  From somewhere deep within her, she felt the need to do this work - the outcome of which still remains a mystery to me.


Each day I watch as children engage in freely chosen work, unveiling more about their inherent personality, more fully owning skills that propel them into the future, as they will continue to become distinctly beautiful human beings.  Watching Zoe at work, absorbed in her peaceful inner drive, peace settles on the shores of my soul; I understand my respect for the child far outweighs the child's need to respect me, for as she creates a meticulously multi-colored abstract drawing on that blank piece of paper, she acts to create herself.