HOPE in Kansas City

I know, I know, this has been the longest blogging hiatus EVER.  Yoo-hoo!  Anyone out there?  I hope so, because I have something exciting to share.

First, though, let me say that I have missed blogging.  I took blogging time off during Lent, and then I just haven’t gotten back in the groove.   Truthfully, I am not in any groove right now.  I haven’t been writing.  I haven’t been reading.  I haven’t been thinking and analyzing and ruminating.  I don’t think I’ve been me.  I miss me.  I need to start nourishing my soul again.  She’s hungry. 

This weekend, I am going to nourish my soul by participating in something very exciting for Matt (who, btw, has a photography website set up here).  He was asked to contribute a photograph to be auctioned off during the upcoming Leukemia and Lymphoma Society fundraiser.  The theme of this year’s fundraiser is “Hope in Kansas City,” and Matt came up with a brilliant idea.  Those of you familiar with Kansas City have probably driven downtown at night and noticed the Marriott lit up with a design or a message.  Matt’s idea was to ask them to design the word HOPE to be displayed on the side of the building, and then he wanted to take a picture of it to be auctioned off.  There was only one little problem.  They never say yes to requests.  If they did, they would probably have proposals and baby announcements lighting up downtown every other night.  Matt was persistent, however.  He called one person.  They said “no,” but you can talk to so-and-so.  He called so-and-so, who said “no,” but you can try talking to this other so-and-so.  He tried calling this other so-and-so, who said “no, but you can try asking….. ”

You get the picture. 

Finally, after a month of voicemails and waiting and lots of “no’s,” he got the right answer: Yes!  So tomorrow night the word HOPE is going to light up the night in downtown Kansas City.  Can you imagine it? 

HOPE

It gives me chills to think about it. 

A middle-aged man who just lost his job will trudge the streets of KC on an evening walk, trying to clear his head and not panic about the future, and he will see it:  HOPE

A young mom will be driving to the hospital, yet again, to spend the night curled up on the couch next to her son’s bed, and through tear-filled eyes she will see it:  HOPE

A runaway teenage girl, strung out on drugs, will stumble upon it:  HOPE

A scraggly homeless man will wander out of his alley to go look for some food, and he will look up and see it:  HOPE

HOPE. 

I need it.  Your neighbor needs it.  Your co-worker needs it.  And so does that annoying kid in your son’s first grade class.  Your mom.  Your dad.  Your son.  Your daughter.  Your partner.  Your best friend.  You.

HOPE.

Come see it for yourself tomorrow night.

peace

“Peace is not the product of terror or fear.
Peace is not the silence of cemeteries.
Peace is not the silent result of violent repression.
Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all.
Peace is dynamism.
Peace is generosity.
It is right and it is duty.”

- Archbishop Oscar Romero, quoted in a November 2008 posting on Daily Verse and Voice

Happy Easter

SEVEN STANZAS AT EASTER
by John Updike

Make no mistake: if he rose at all
It was as His body;
If the cell’s dissolution did not reverse, the molecule reknit,
The amino acids rekindle,
The Church will fall.

It was not as the flowers,
Each soft spring recurrent;
It was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled eyes of the
Eleven apostles;
It was as His flesh; ours.

The same hinged thumbs and toes
The same valved heart
That—pierced—died, withered, paused, and then regathered
Out of enduring Might
New strength to enclose.

Let us not mock God with metaphor,
Analogy, sidestepping, transcendence,
Making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the faded
Credulity of earlier ages:
Let us walk through the door.

The stone is rolled back, not papier-mache,
Not a stone in a story,
But the vast rock of materiality that in the slow grinding of
Time will eclipse for each of us
The wide light of day.

And if we have an angel at the tomb,
Make it a real angel,
Weighty with Max Planck’s quanta, vivid with hair, opaque in
The dawn light, robed in real linen
Spun on a definite loom.

Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
For our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
Lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are embarrassed
By the miracle,
And crushed by remonstrance.

I wish I could grasp this…

All shall be well. And all shall be well. And all manner of things will be well.
~~Julian of Norwich

Lent 2009

So I’ve been thinking and thinking and thinking about what to give up for Lent this year.  I couldn’t think of anything creative, so I was going to go for deprivation by means of soda elimination.  My Coke Zero/Diet Dr. Pepper/Diet Pepsi/Diet 7Up/Diet-who-cares-as-long-as-it’s-carbonated-and-calorie-free addiction.  I would certainly feel deprived.  I just couldn’t think of anything else.

Then, in church on Sunday, the minister talked a little bit about the Law of Attraction.  I hadn’t thought much about the Law of Attraction before, much less how that law would translate into spiritual practice.  Here’s an excerpt from the bulletin: “Our attention is attracted to that in the world around us that is of the same nature as the primary attitude on which we focus.”  In other words, when you find out you are pregnant, suddenly every other person you see is pregnant.  When you break up with your boyfriend, every third person you meet is smooching on the fourth person. 

So during the meditation I was praying about what God wanted to introduce into my life during this Lenten season–what I could use prayer and the Law of Attraction to attain.  And the word that kept coming into my head was Peace.  I long for peace.  I don’t have peace.  I am quite possibly the most anxious person on this planet. 

Perhaps the Law of Attraction doesn’t sound very “spiritual” to you, but if you think about it…it makes sense.  If I spend my waking moments obsessing and worrying and stressing and otherwise feeding the chaos in my brain, do you suppose there’s any peace there?  No.  There’s not.  And I’m pretty sure God has a pretty hard time tripping over my mental clutter to step in with a blessing of peace. 

What contributes to my chaos?  Well, I just wrote out a list, but I decided not to share my list.  Not because there’s anything terribly personal on that list, but I think I’m ashamed of my internal chaos or something.  Hmmmm….

Here’s one thing that was on my list, though: the Internet. I don’t think I spend that much timeon the Internet each day, but almost every time I walk in the living room I jiggle my mouse on my laptop to see if anyone has emailed me or if anyone on one of my doula listserves has anything interesting to say or if some highly fascinating newsletter has dumped itself in my mailbox…you get the idea.  Then there’s Facebook.  It’s so fun catching up with people.  I may not have had a meaningful conversation with them in years, but I can tell you what they’ve had for lunch and how many Girl Scout cookies they just ate for dessert. 

I’m pretty sure that going without the Internet for 40 days is going to be hard.  Really hard.  At least I can indulge myself on Sundays.  I am going to allow myself to get on-line once each day to check and see if I have any emails from prospective or current clients, but all those other emails are going to have to wait. 

My fingers are already twitching, and it’s not even Ash Wednesday yet. 

Maybe I should start using my Twitter account.  I can do that over my phone, right?  And if you really need to tell me how many Thin Mints you snarfed after your pb&j or how many cups of coffee you needed to make it through today, just text me or call me or show up on my doorstep.  I will either be coasting peacefully and prayerfully through my day or I’ll be curled up in a corner shaking and drooling and typing invisible letters on an invisible laptop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I firmly believe that Lent isn’t just about taking away something from our lives to make more room for God–I think it can also be adding something to our lives.  As a family, we are committing ourselves to adding the practice of complimenting each individual in our household each day for something that we appreciate about them.  I am also going to be reading, for the third year in a row, Organic God: Lenten Meditations on the Words of Jesus by Kate Moorehead.

“Anthem” by Leonard Cohen

Anthem lyrics

The birds they sang
at the break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don’t dwell on what
has passed away
or what is yet to be.
Ah the wars they will
be fought again
The holy dove
She will be caught again
bought and sold
and bought again
the dove is never free.

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.

We asked for signs
the signs were sent:
the birth betrayed
the marriage spent
Yeah the widowhood
of every government –
signs for all to see.

I can’t run no more
with that lawless crowd
while the killers in high places
say their prayers out loud.
But they’ve summoned, they’ve summoned up
a thundercloud
and they’re going to hear from me.

Ring the bells that still can ring …

You can add up the parts
but you won’t have the sum
You can strike up the march,
there is no drum
Every heart, every heart
to love will come
but like a refugee.

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
That’s how the light gets in.
That’s how the light gets in.

Lent

Next week is Ash Wednesday.  Once again I find myself pondering what, if anything, I should give up for Lent.  You can read my lofty and poetic Lenten goals from last year here.  And then to read about my ultimate Lenten failure click here (and I would highly, highly recommend clicking on the video to watch a bit of last year’s Tenebrae service.  Watching that video made my heart ache for Wheatland.  How I miss those people/that church!  What a beautiful, beautiful place.). 

<sigh>

So what do I give up this year?  I don’t think I’m up for a lofty and poetic Lent.  This year I already feel like I’m lurking in a shadowy tenebrae.  I feel tied (chained?) to the mundane, the tellurian. 

And so I ponder the question…
and question my motives…
and wonder if I should even bother. 

But maybe, just maybe, if I wander through the shadows of Lent, I will catch a glimpse of light.

Ring the bells that still can ring,
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything.
That’s how the light gets in.
                          –Leonard Cohen

today…

Today was a good day. 

This morning we visited a new church.  I had very low expectations, actually.  I had a preconceived notion of what this church was going to be like.  And I was wrong.  I left feeling more peaceful than I have felt in months.  It was rather beautiful, actually. 

This afternoon Matt and Madison took the kids to a music store.  I decided I wanted to finally sneak in a much-anticipated visit to Pryde’s Old Westport (which leads me to a quick tangent.  Have I mentioned lately how much I love Kansas City?  My mom always led me to believe that if I ventured into Westport I might get shot, but what happens, instead, is that when I enter a building and sit at a table facing an exposed brick wall…when I bond with a friend over bubble tea at Teadrops…when I enjoy a quiet dinner with Matt eating my favorite version of comfort food–green curry–at The Thai Place…when I peruse my favorite store, World Market…I don’t worry that I’ll get shot–I worry that I just might never meander back home!)  ANYWAY…Pryde’s is closed on Sunday.  I was very, very sad.  However, I wasn’t about to go home, because if I went home I would feel obligated to clean, unload the dishwasher, sweep the floors, etc, etc, etc.  No way.  I needed some time to myself.  So, I did quite well what I normally don’t do well at all–I adapted.  I didn’t have my journal with me, but I remembered seeing journals on sale at World Market.  I walked in, ignored the enticing allure that is World Market, bought a $4 journal, and headed across the street to Panera, where I sat with a cup of coffee and my journal.  Bliss.  Pure bliss.  I felt human again when I strolled back out to my car. 

Tonight, then, Matt and I ventured out on a belated Valentine’s Day date.  We headed down to Westport and ate at The Thai Place.  Incredibly yummy.  I love (I mean, really, really love) green curry.  In fact, there are some leftovers in the fridge now that I just might have to eat.  After dinner we walked down to Harpo’s–Matt enjoyed a Guinnes, I sipped a Boulevard Ale.  It sort of reminded me of grad school days.  I hadn’t been in a bar in…forever.  It was so nice to sit and talk.  I miss Matt.  It was great going out for dinner and drinks with my best friend. 

While we were out on our date, our kiddos were in the capable hands of Patrick and Lindsey.  Amélie just couldn’t bear the thought of leaving, so she is staying all night with Sydney.  Jack is asleep, and we are absolutely IDIOTS, b/c we are working our way through the first season of Heroes.  I am no longer relaxed.  I am sipping a little chianti to counter the anxiety I feel watching this crazy television series which I resolve, every day, never to watch again (and yet I do).  It’s Matt’s fault.  Totally his fault.  He’s the one who get me hooked. 

So today was a good day (with the exception of sitting here watching Heroes).  I needed a good day.  I hope I can hang on to this feeling for awhile.

February

February is a difficult month for me.  All throughout the year there is an echo of an ache that lingers in my heart.  But in February, that ache presses to the surface, and sometimes I just can’t shake the sadness. 

Today, I think, is one of those days. 

Today, I will listen to the song I’m posting below several times. 

Today, I will remember standing around the big tree in my front yard at my house in Manhattan, staring incredulously at the snowdrops that somehow managed to push through the cold dirt and wondering at that symbol of hope that seemed so out of place in my heart’s own frigid landscape.

Today, I will wonder if those snowdrops are blooming. 

“You stopped and pointed, and you said, ‘That’s a crocus,’ and I said, ‘What’s a crocus?’ and you said, ‘It’s a flower.’ I tried to remember, but I said, ‘What’s a flower?’ You said, ‘I still love you.’”  ~Dar Williams, “February”

The Basmati Rice Challenge

My dear, dear friend Rachel (who also just happens to be a wonderful cook–I know how to pick ‘em) posted a basmati rice challenge 10 days ago.  You can find the challenge here. 

The challenge ended today, and in true form, I waited until dinnertime to try out my recipe!  So, here are the ingredients and what I did (and I sort of made a lot, b/c I had a feeling I would love it, so you could probably half this). 

Rice Recipe
2 cups Basmati Rice
4 cups water
1 cup milk
1 Tbsp oil
pinch of salt

Sauce Recipe
4 Tbsp canola oil
2 onions, diced (I used red)
1 chili pepper, minced
2 cans coconut milk (I used light, and my sauce was pretty runny.  Next time I might try one light and one regular.)
2 28oz cans of diced tomatoes, drained
1 Tbsp green curry paste
1 1/2 cups peas
salt and pepper to taste

Rinse rice in cold water to remove excess starch.  Combine rice, water, oil, and salt in a heavy saucepan.  Allow mixture to rest for 15 minutes.  Bring mixture to a boil, stirring occasionally.  Reduce heat to low setting, cover with tight fitting lid and simmer for 35 minutes.  Remove from heat.  Fluff with fork and serve with sauce.

Meanwhile, while rice is simmering, heat oil in large saucepan.  Add onion and pepper and saute for about 5 minutes.  Add coconut milk, tomatoes, green curry paste, peas, salt, and pepper.  Bring to a boil.  Simmer for about 20 minutes.  Pour over rice.   

This is d.e.l.i.c.i.o.u.s.
even if I do say so myself.