T.S. Tuesday: What Trees and T.S. Eliot Have in Common

The seatbelt cut into my chin and my jellied feet dangled above the floor. If we were coming home from gymnastics practice, my hands and hair would be covered in white chalk and I’d still be sporting a velvet leotard that I would probably not even take off to sleep that night. If we were coming home from the neighborhood pool, we’d still be suited up, seated atop damp beach towels, our shoulders would be pink and the bridges of our noses would boast both a smattering of new freckles and a fresh goggles indentation. If it was any other occasion, I’d probably be wearing my favorite purple sweatshirt with a cat on the front paired with a matching purple sweatskirt—yes, they made sweatskirts in the 80s.

Even if we’d been driving just a few minutes, I’d already be able to hear my younger brother’s sleepy breathing and the punching of buttons as my older brother battled evil forces on the glow of his Gameboy.

As the car swayed back and forth through the winding roads, I wouldn’t be sleeping or playing, I’d be dutifully staring out the side window.

I was still so small, so low in the car seat that I had to crane my neck to see above the child lock and power window buttons to the outside world. And even then I could only see sky, the green-tinged points of pine trees, the triangle tops of shingled roofs on two-story homes, spiky tv antennas, sweeping power lines, and the concave dip of the few satellite dishes that speckled the neighborhood in the early 90s.

It would all pass by in a lightening fast (for a five-year-old) blur of 25mph. We could be anywhere: coming back from a friend’s house, carpooling from gymnastics, or with my dad making the long trek home from Circuit City (which I always thought was a city in Utah). From my vantage point, the scenery was indistinguishable, a blur of meaningless shapes and colors.

We could have been anywhere. Hours from home. Minutes from home. I never knew.

Until I spotted the gnarled branches of an old oak tree that stretched into my line of sight: the Remembering Tree.

The Remembering Tree stood out among the forest of pines that lined the winding roads of my small Northern California neighborhood. Even in the dark, I could make out its distinctive bough clumped with patches of moss and mistletoe, and I would know we were almost home. The Remembering Tree was three houses down from my own house, closer even than the bus stop.

As soon as I saw the tree, I’d breathe a sigh of relief and settle in to my seat. I’d lean my head against the passenger door and shut my eyes in feigned sleep with hopes that my dad would carry me in to my bed.

For years my entire family referred to the old oak tree as the Remembering Tree. It was always there to orient me. To help me remember that I was almost home.

We've long since moved away from the house beyond the Remembering Tree. But I haven’t forgotten the concept. I still seek out signs and symbols for security, safety, and a sense of home.

Now, instead of scanning for scarred branches, I memorize poetry. It sounds pretentious, but I assure you it stems not from a haughty, artistic elitism, but from the childlike need for familiarity in a rushing world.

I've developed the habit of repeating poetry at the end of every long run I take. As I round the corner or approach the front steps to my house, the same words release themselves from my lips, practically unbidden.

When I repeat the words of my favorite poets, like T.S. Eliot (And the darkness shall be the light and the stillness the dancing) or ee cummings (i thank you god for most this amazing day), when I say the same words in the same order time after time, I dwell in the words like I used to dwell in the branches. And, even if I’m miles and countries away from where I started, I’m reminded that home, and the One who makes His home in me, is much closer than I think. 

T.S. Tuesday: Redeem the Dream

“But the fountain sprang up and the bird sang down

Redeem the time, redeem the dream

The token of the word unheard, unspoken” 

T.S. Eliot, Ash Wednesday

T.S. Tuesday: A Whirl of Words

Today's T.S. Tuesday tongue twister is taken from the talented teller of tales' text titled Ash Wednesday:

“And the light shone in darkness and
Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled
About the centre of the silent Word.” T.S. Eliot, Ash Wednesday

Typical Eliot,writing in circles around my brain. But I love the alliteration, the paradox, the wordplay (it's not really appropriate to write Wordplay, is it?) and the reminder that Love is the center of it all.

Also, I just learned that in Spanish The Word--as in Jesus--is translated as El Verbo.  Literally, The Verb. Turns out Spanish speakers knew a thing or two about "Love does" before Bob Goff came on the scene. 

T.S. Tuesday: Stairway to Joy

In T.S. Eliot’s poem, Ash Wednesday, he describes the climbing of a spiral staircase: climbing, spinning, revisiting the same space, the same struggles, over and over again on a never ending journey up and up.

The figure steps. Climbs. Rounds the corner.

“At the first turning of the second stair
I turned and saw below
The same shape twisted on the banister
Under the vapour in the fetid air
Struggling with the devil of the stairs who wears
The deceitful face of hope and of despair.”

Like Eliot’s figure, I've rounded a corner. I’m here in Guatemala. I've stepped out (or up?) in faith.

But I look back and see the same the shapes, the same hauntings, the same oscillation between hope and despair. I look forward and those stairs look so dang steep and my legs are so tired and I wonder “haven’t I arrived yet?”

I’m working to relinquish burnout. I’m learning to trust the spark. I believe that God will restore my JOY. Not just the joy of his presence, but the joy of participating in work that brings me LIFE. I've been itching, waiting, squirming for joy.

I wanted it the easy way.

I bought a gratitude journal over a month ago. The lines remain blank.

I’ll write them when something really big happens, I reasoned. When joy is restored. When the feelings come rushing back.

I wanted to get whacked with Joy. I wanted healing to be quick. I wanted a big Kaboom. I wanted it big and vivid and unmistakable. And I didn't want to work for it.

God’s big enough, isn't He?

Now, rounding the corner, I pause in the stairwell. I glance back at the familiar figures of discontent, unease, despair.

I've played the woe-is-me-game, and I've won. Which actually means I lose.

It’s a lesson I've learned a thousands times.

As Ann Voskamp writes, “Eucharisteo—thanksgiving—always precedes the miracle.” ― One Thousand Gifts: A Dare To Live Fully Right Where You Are

How do I not know this yet?

I blogged about it all last year. I reaped the fruit of faithful gift charting, joy stacking.

And yet I got here to Guatemala and thought the gifts would be as vivid as the woven scarves and blatant as the bold buildings all around me so I wouldn't need to write them or convince myself of their gift-worthiness.

How could I forget the stacking of gifts, the cataloging of daily delights, is what brings Joy in all its glory?

Not the other way around.

And so I recommit to stacking joy. To stepping forward in gratitude. To building my life on thanks. As I round the corner, pause for a moment on the stairwell, I take a deep breath, grab my journal and pen, and begin to climb again this spiraled stairway to joy.

T.S. Tuesday: Shaping the still unshapen

From T.S. Eliot's play, Murder in the Cathedral:

"Destiny waits in the hand of God, shaping the still unshapen:
I have seen these things in a shaft of sunlight."

In a shaft of sunlight I see the dust swirling, spinning, 

spiraling, mostly unseen, unnoticed, unwanted. 

The shaft of sunlight reflects the sparkle of water, glittering, glimmering, 

gleaming atop the surface of our lives. Reveals the specks of a world that reels 

from dust to dust. 

Flashes slivers of dreams still unshapen.  Proof of a potter's hand working,

whirling the unseen together for our good. 

T.S. Tuesday: A Discussion on Whimsy and Dance

"At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,There would be no dance, and there is only the dance." T.S. Eliot, Burnt Norton

There is only the dance.

Today I awoke seeking meaning, seeking purpose, seeking the scheduled. I wrote a list a of 23 things I wanted do to feel more "on top of" my life, my job, my tick tick ticking time in Antigua.

I awoke frenzied for the familiar. For a routine. For certainty that I'm spending my time wisely.

And it's only been two days.

Don't get me wrong, I love it here. I think this way when I'm back in the States, too.

That's the problem.

I've been reading through Bob Goff's new book, Love Does, with a dear friend. Love Does takes schedules and predictability and throws them to the wind. Bob writes of a life "drenched with the whimsy of God’s love and the spontaneity of following where he leads when he says “Go!” 

Whimsy. Now there's a word that doesn't sit well with me. Intentionality, yes. Flexibility, yes. Even scheduled spontaneity I can handle. 

I didn't know how much of a problem I have with whimsy until reading this book. Every other line I read I find myself involuntarily exclaiming, "Yeah right"or "That's not possible" or "what about normal people?"

I bristle. I squirm. 

But it's good for me. To be reminded that God's love is bigger than my plans. For Bob Goff, whimsy and disorder and spontaneity aren't ends in themselves, but the means to a life of radical trust, engagement, and freedom. When I let go of my desire to control, to manipulate, and to regulate, I am free to lay my feet, my palms, my plans at the feet of Jesus. 

Bob Goff writes:

"I think God is more of a Half Dome traveler than a Hampton Inn Traveler. Jesus doesn’t invite us on a business trip. Instead, He says let’s go after those things that inspire and challenge you and let’s experience them together. You don’t need a lot of details or luggage or equipment, just a willingness to go into a storm with a Father who’s kicking footholds in the the steep sides of our problems while we kick a couple in ourselves too… 

Somehow in all of this, the terrain we navigate doesn’t seem as scary either, because when we’re on an adventure with God we’re too excited to be afraid and too engaged to be thinking of anything else.”

When we're on an adventure with God we're to excited to be thinking about schedules or task lists. We're too engaged to question how we spend our time.

In Guatemala they don't use the term "spend time" with someone, they say you "share time" with someone. Share time. Share life. Share a meal. Share a story. 

"Compartemos tiempo," my friends here tell me. We share time. 

That morphs the framework. What if instead of asking myself if I'm spending my time wisely, I asked myself if I'm sharing my time wisely, joyfully, fully? 

Why spend my time when I can share it? With friends, with strangers, with family, with God? 

I've thought of my time in Guatemala as being an exercise in spontaneity, uncertainty. An effort. An act of will to unplan my life. Something forced. Something controlled. 

But that's not what I want. I want to be on an adventure. I want purpose and engagement and, gasp, even whimsy. 

I don't quite know how daily life will look here (and believe me enough people asked me last week in San Diego that I think I rightfully find this uncertainty a bit nerve wracking). I don't know how many hours will be devoted to my new job, how many new friends I'll find to go salsa dancing with, or whether or not I'll take more language classes, but I do know Who I want to share my life with, and that is God. The author of purpose and whimsy and adventure. 

The One who leads us to adventures where "we’re too excited to be afraid and too engaged to be thinking of anything else.”

T.S. Eliot writes, "Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is."

His dance isn't characterized by movement--spastic flailings or graceful twirls--but by being. The dance just is. The dance exists in the place where God is. The dance is God. And there, at that still point, is where I want to share my time. 

God has led me this far--to the cobblestone streets and volcano crested-town that called to me from a place deep within my dreams. God has led me this far, and I am sure as shootin' going to find some dancing*. 

How are you sharing your time?

*Both literally--salsa, merengue, bachata--and figuratively.

T.S. Tuesday: Recovering What Was Lost

In his fabulous book on vocation called Let Your Life Speak, Parker Palmer writes, "Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you. Before you tell your life what truths and values you have decided to live up to, let your life tell you what truths you embody, what values you represent."

I first read these words fresh out of college, at a time when I was slowly recovering from a deep depression/crisis of self after an eye opening and even traumatizing study abroad experience. Horrified at the poverty and injustice I saw throughout Central America, I thrashed from angry to hopeless to numb and back for months after my return.

But I don't count it as a waste. In fact, the very darkness that threatened to envelop me provided the space and silence to actually learn to listen to what my own life was speaking to me. To tune my ears to my true self. To see the values and truths I embody when expectations are thrown out the window.

Out of the darkness, out the rubble, I learned to hear God's voice. I learned to listen to my own voice and learned to gauge and discern my own responses, my attractions and repulsions. Out of the silence I found life. I found hope. I found a job that brought me more joy and purpose than I could have ever imagined. I found a church that fed my soul and helped me to experience God as a personal, present, powerful source of Love within me.

I had learned, to some extent, to let my life speak.

But now, after a year of burnout and tears and agonizing over whether or not I should leave the job that had once brought me so much joy, I find myself at loss for what I really want.

While trying to survive burnout, to end my job well, to live up to all of the responsibilities I had taken on, I somehow forgot how to listen to my own life. I find myself here in Guatemala, fulfilling a long time dream, and yet I still feel hollow, like I've become a stranger to myself.

These last few months I have written, I have banked on, what I think God would or should be telling me instead of what I really hear.

And I've been calling it trust.

I haven't really been hearing from God. Not like I used to. I've been remembering what He told me. I've been rewriting His past promises. Is this being true to myself? How can it be bad to remind myself of God's character, voice, and promises? When does it become untrue? When am I feeding the emptiness, the expectations? When does anchoring myself on the past become an excuse not to listen for His voice today?

In his poem East Coker, T.S. Eliot writes, "There is only the fight to recover what has been lost

And found and lost again and again."

I am fighting to recover what was lost--my joy at work, my sense of purpose, my ability to hear from God, the patience to listen and discern what my own life is telling me. In the clinical sense, it's a journey to overcome burnout and depression; in the spiritual sense, it's a journey to recover my true self, who I am in the eyes of God who loves me. 

As of right now, I don't really know what I want. I know what I am SUPPOSED to want, but I don't know what I REALLY want. 

I SHOULD want to blog.

I SHOULD want to connect. 

I SHOULD want to hear from God.

I SHOULD want to help people.

I SHOULD want to spend my time wisely and be a voice for the voiceless. 

I SHOULD want to do something about the poverty and injustice I see around me.

But really I want to disconnect. I don't want to care or get involved or commit myself to anything. Just because I am no longer crying everyday or agonizing over my decision to leave, doesn't mean I am healed. Doesn't mean I am myself again. 

I take heart in T.S. Eliot's words, that it's a fight to recover what was lost and found and lost again. It is a journey.  It is a process. And this time I know the Healer. 

So in the next couple of weeks, this blog may be a little silent as I visit friends back in the States and also take some time to listen--to God and to myself.

T.S. Tuesday: Experiencing God Together

“What life have you, if you have not life together?”

T. S. Eliot (The Rock, 1934)

This weekend, Love drove out fear.

My fears. Of moving to another country. Of leaving everything I know behind.

Fear had begun to fester. Worry set in. Then disengagement, disconnection, isolation.

I don’t do well when I can’t name things, explain things, write it all out and flourish it with a pretty little bow.

I don’t do well with in-betweens. And right now I’m in between jobs, in between countries, in between lives.

To put it mildly, I’ve been shutting down. Not an earth shattering break down, just a slow dulling of emotions, tamping down of fear, tuning out of daily life to be lulled by the constant hum of doubt and second guessing.

My prayers of gratitude shifted to pleas for peace.

And on Saturday morning, God answered my plea.

My friends and roommates threw me an incredible “Brunch Voyage” going away party complete with every delicious brunch food imaginable and all of my favorite people in San Diego.

Not only did my gooey pancakes topped with Nutella, raspberries, and chocolate sprinkles fill my belly, the company was sustenance for my soul.

I don’t write about my friends very often because I haven’t really figured out a way to talk about them without sounding like every other social media user who writes “my hubbie is the BEST <3” or “FAB weekend with my girlz.”

Of course most people think their friends are the best ever. But I really do think I’ve got a unique thing going.

My friends from college have become my family. They have been the most shaping influence on my life. They daily challenge me and encourage me and draw out my hideous witch cackle laugh like nobody’s business.

And this weekend God used them. He used them to remind me of who I am.

A speaker at my church once said, “The people we love the most reveal our God-given identities,” and I’ve found that to be exactly right.

On Saturday my San Diego family joined together to remind me of who and whose I am.

When my own prayers had fallen flat, when I’d become caught in a cyclone of burnout and apathy, when I began to doubt my own ability to experience God, my friends showed up.

With their words and pancake toppings and hugs and prayers, they breathed life back into me.

They reminded me that I am not alone. That I don’t have to hear from God alone. That I was created for community. 

The most meaningful and humbling part for me was when they spoke words of affirmation. They affirmed my character and my dreams, reminding me of who I am and who I want to be. They recounted the promises God has spoken to me. They told stories of the shifts and triumphs I’ve already experienced.

More than just offering reassuring words (everyone likes to hear good things about themselves), my friends’ words revealed the thread of God’s presence and purpose and love in my life.

And it was this Love that drove out my fears. My friends’ love for me. Their love for God. Their reminders that Love is with me and goes before me, even all the way to Guatemala.

When everyone finally cleared out of our living room and the final plates were scrubbed of maple and boysenberry syrup, I found myself stunned.

Overwhelmed by their words and overwhelmed by God’s grace. And in awe of the transformation that had taken place in my heart in just a few hours’ time.

Numbness had given way to a full array of emotions. Weeping had turned to laughing. Sadness to joy.

And, like most meaningful times in my life, all I can say is Thank You.

To my friends I say thank you for your prayers for safety and purpose and community and vision.

Thank you for your cards and quotes and books and letters. They are more meaningful than you know.

Thank you for your time given up on a Saturday morning.

Thank you for your tears and emotion shed for me.

Thank you for speaking to my God-given identity.

The day was life giving.

The day was hope bringing.

The day was from God.

And to God I say Thank You as well.

Thank you for speaking through my community to remind me of your goodness, to remind me of who I am, to point me to who you are calling me to be by reminding me of your promises and your work in my life.

Thank you for loving me and shaping me and speaking to my heart. Thank you for this life we have together.

Amen. 

T.S. Tuesday: An End and A Beginning

For last year's words belong to last year's language
And next year's words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
~T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding"

This week marks the beginning of new era for me. I wrapped up my job at Plant With Purpose last week and have about a month of bucket listing, bridesmaidsing, and packing before I move to Guatemala.

The last couple days, as I've stared at my screen, fingers perched, or opened my journal, pen clutched, I've found myself voiceless. Like Eliot writes, I'm caught between "last year's language" and not yet confident in my next year's voice.

Usually my words flow profusely, involuntarily. But this transition, from full time, productive member of the working world to, as ee cummings puts so eloquently, a "human merely being" has been tough to process.

I'm sure this voids any sympathy you were feeling for me
in my "tough transition," but this is how I spent my first
morning of "funemployment."

I don't know exactly how God is moving. I don't know if I'm supposed to be sad to say goodbye to my friends and coworkers or if I'm supposed to be excited for the new adventure that awaits. I've found myself torn between the bitter and the sweet, wondering what to make of it.

I'm scared that I've made a mistake. That I'll get to Guatemala and be lonely out of my mind. I'm scared that my writing will wither when I don't have to spill words onto a screen before work, when blog posts aren't squeezed into lunch breaks, and when I look at my schedule and see wide open spaces.

For the first time in 4.5 years, I don't know exactly where I'll be on Monday mornings or how much will be deposited into my bank account every 15th and 30th of the month.

It's a little disorienting to say the least. But also exciting, exhilarating. When I was in high school, one of the most meaningful things I heard from God was the promise,

"You will grow."

The one thing I am sure of as I look at this next month, this next year, of unknowns is that I will grow.

I am excited to learn more of my identity outside of Plant With Purpose. I am excited to make new friends in a new country. I am excited to see God move in new ways, to count new gifts and chart new graces. I am excited to await another voice of a new year.

And though I'm scared, I am excited to make an end and a beginning.

T.S. Tuesday: Communing with the Dead

T.S. Eliot

I have friends in dead places, and, according to Scott Cairns and T.S. Eliot, that is okay.

I recently read a chapter by Scott Cairns--who taught a spiritual writing class I had the privilege of taking last semester--in the book, A Syllable of Water, about poetry, Cairns' forte.

After 15 weeks of class, I wasn't surprised by Cairns' emphasis on the ongoing dialogue between the writers of today and the writers who have influenced them, dead or alive.

He breaks many of the myths about poetry being self-focused and self-referential, doodling verses composed by closed off hermits and dreamers and maybe even hobbits, too.

Cairns writes,

"Solitary as it often seems, the discipline of poetry offers us a way out of our private isolations, our culturally encouraged solipsism; it is a journey that joins us to an amazing community of like-minded folk, the poets who precede us... I'm talking about the living and the ostensibly dead."  

I'm glad to hear this because I commune with a lot of dead people: poets and theologians and writers of all stripes whose works offer me the chance to grow and learn, to recreate and regenerate my own thoughts and works. From T.S. Eliot to Henri Nouwen to Jane Austen, some of my most kindred spirits are not living.

Scott Cairns--still very much living--became another kindred spirit when, later in his essay, he mentions the seemingly omnipresent T.S. Eliot (convenient for this post, eh?). He quotes Eliot's "Tradition and the Individual Talent:"

"No poet, no artist of any art, has his complete meaning alone. His significance, his appreciation is the appreciation of his relation to the dead poets and artists." 

Both Eliot and Cairns assert that the point of poetry specifically, art in general, and--I hope--the words shared on this blog, is to continue the conversation, to engage in the ongoing recreation of the world. To create space for continued dialogue. To leave my thoughts and words in a way that you can make of them what you will.

I don't claim to be a poet or an artist for that matter, but I am grateful to the many "like-minded folk" who have preceded me and allowed me to learn and glean and grow from their art.

And even if you don't consider yourself an artist or a poet or a writer, I want to extend a welcome to this community, an invitation to share your thoughts, and encouragement to join in a great conversation between friends, both living and dead.

***
Who are the most influential authors you've read? Your favorite "friends in dead places"? What pieces of art--poetry, other types of writing, or otherwise--can you come back to time and again learn something new? 

T.S. Tuesday: Attempts at Sowing Proper by a Girl Who’s Not So Proper

“All men are ready to invest their money
But most expect dividends.
I say to you: Make perfect your will.
I say: take no thought of the harvest,
But only of proper sowing.” T.S. Eliot, The Rock

I’m the kind of person who likes to have all of her ducks in a row. I like to know what I’m doing, where I’m headed, or at least be able to give an explanation of where I’m not going and why you won’t see me there.

I like to be aware of where I’m investing my time and what kind of dividends I will reap.

But T.S. Eliot takes a different view on planning. He says to “take no thought of the harvest, But only of proper sowing.”

I try to wrap my mind around the sentence. I drive out my desire to control. I tune my ears to hear what He is saying to me.

Follow Me alone, He whispers.

Follow My pleasing will.

Sow proper when corners cry out to be cut.
Sow proper in the mundane.
Sow proper when resentment burns.
Sow proper when you want to evade.
Sow proper when anger is easier.
Sow proper when laziness hangs.
Sow proper when no eyes are upon you.
Sow proper and don’t be swayed.

Today I remind myself that I follow You alone and I surrender my conduct to your pleasing will.

Amen. 

T.S. Tuesday: Where is the life?

In addition to T. S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, last week I cleared out the Eliot section at the library. So far, I'm devouring his Collected Poems 1909-1962. 

My latest obsession includes excerpts from The Rock, a play that he wrote in collaboration with E. Martin Browne and the Reverend R. Webb-Odell. Though it was first performed in churches in the 1930s, I would venture to say that much of his wisdom and critiques of the Church are even more applicable today.

He writes,

"Endless invention, endless experiment,
Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness;
Knowledge of speech, but not of silence;
Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word"

In this age of information we see a lot of words. We're constantly skimming, scanning, cramming. But what's the point?

"Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?"

I am going going going. I am reading, writing, texting, tweeting, meeting, running, chatting. Where is the life I have lost in living? Where is the wisdom I have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge I have lost in information?

I write a lot words, but do I know the Word?

I so deeply desire stillness, silence. I crave rest. I long to experience the depth of His stilling presence.

I long for Life.

What do you long for?

T.S. Tuesday: You've Cat To Be Kitten Me Right Meow

On Sunday night I came across this internet meme and my new favorite cat pun. Which is ironic because yesterday at the library whilst browsing the 821.912 section, which for those of you who don’t know, is the glorious Dewey decimal ranking devoted to the poetry of T.S. Eliot, I discovered something earth shattering, for me at least.

I discovered that T.S. Eliot had a not-so-secret affinity for cats, well, writing about them at least. I found a marvelous collection of zany cat poetry titled, “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.”

According to the shameless book flap, “These playful verses by a celebrated poet have delighted readers and cat lovers around the world.”

He originally wrote the poems in a series of letters to his godchildren. Later the poems were compiled into book form and shared with the public. Many of his memorable cat characters were later adapted for Andrew Lloyd Weber’s musical, Cats. 

As a single female writer/blogger I am hesitant to admit this, but if T.S.-freaking-Eliot can boldly proclaim his love of cats, then so can I. I love cats.

So you can imagine my cat-ostophic delight at this discovery. I’ve just read a few of the poems thus far, but I must agree with Time’s assessment (circa 1993, again the book flap unabashedly proclaims) that there is “Enough ferocious fancy and parody to knock the spots off most cat books.”

Now I don’t read many cat books (please stifle your surprise), but Eliot’s collection of cat poetry may quite plawsibly be the best.

Alright, alright, any more puns from me would be a feline-y, so I will defer to the master himself.

Here’s my favorite of Eliot’s cat poems, The Ad-dressing of Cats, being performed by talented mew-sicians in the musical, Cats. Enjoy!

And because we’re talking about cats, I just have to share my absolute favorite cat video on the interwebs. I warn you now, you might pee your pants.

For those with a lower tolerance for parody, but still enjoy a bit of punnery, check out the Princeton Tiger’s compilation of 56 Movie Titles Made into Cat Puns.

Whelp, cat’s all, folks! 

T.S. Wednesday: The Meaning of Life

“Time past and time future

What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.”   T.S. Eliot, Burnt Norton, Four Quartets

Transitions are tough for me; I think they’re tough for everyone. I’ve spent the last months, nay year, deciding whether I should stay at my job, stay in the country. I’ve oscillated between living in the future, what could be, and the past, what has been and what could have been. Both the memories and the dreams sear vividly across my eyelids as I sleep to the world in front of me, the day before me, the moment that flits by.

My bathroom wall used to don a Lululemon poster that contained—along with myriad other inspirational quotes and phrases—the saying, “Living in the moment could be the meaning of life.”

Before I read Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts and before I immersed myself in Eliot, I would have chalked the phrase up to pop psychology and over-priced yoga pants propaganda. Not now.

As I contemplate Ann’s excursions into eucharisteo, or thankfulness, in every aspect of her life, I can see her journey to joy, to God, to meaning, is a pilgrimage to living in the moment. To naming the graces. Counting the gifts. Stacking the joy.

The journey to God is the quest to unlearn our clinging to the past. The challenge to relinquish a life lived solely in the future.

Naming gifts brings meaning as the moment is acknowledged, fully lived.

Eliot writes in his poem Burnt Norton,

“What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden. My words echo
Thus, in your mind.”

I am tired of straining to hear the regretted footfalls thump-thumping against untaken paths. I grow weary of a world of speculation.

And so I will keep at this naming of gifts, this stacking of joy. I will scrawl in my notebook the thanks of the moment:

     * A time of extended merriment with friends old and new.

     *Soft mist blanketing, softening the valley as the miles dart by on quiet freeways.

     *The sharing of stories and journeys and pig cheeks' carbonara.

Another way I will orient myself to the present is by implementing a Bucket List for my last two months at my current job. Instead of withdrawing, disconnecting, and playing the Lame Duck Grant Writer, I will engage. I will create new challenges. I will try new lunch spots with my coworkers. I will write new blog posts. I will dance my butt off at our newly scheduled weekly Wii dance parties.

I will celebrate the past and I will dream for the future, all the while pointing to the present. 

***

Questions: Are you more apt to relive the past or spend your time dreaming and scheming for the future? What helps you live in the present, in the moment? Any suggestions for my work Bucket List?

T.S. Tuesday: Shall

In my writing this week about the God of movement and transformation and transfiguration, one of my favorite T.S. Eliot lines has been illuminated.

Believe me.

This. is. ground. breaking.            

These words are a part of me. They flow involuntarily from my lips, like curse words and Help-me-Jesuses from the mouths of the shocked and endangered.

My favorite phrase from all of Eliot’s poetry (and that's saying something) has been transformed. 

“And so the darkness shall be the light

And the stillness the dancing.”

I noticed a new word the other day.

The darkness SHALL be the light.

Shall—like, not yet.

Not yet.

That's not how I pictured it. With Eliot’s poetic prowess, his omission of the second “shall be” in the phrase “The stillness the dancing,” stillness and dancing became one in my mind. The words interchangeable in the syntax; the images interchangeable in my mind.

The phrase evokes a sense of darkness = light. Stillness = dancing.

But that’s not what Eliot says.

Darkness BECOMES light.

Stillness BECOMES dancing.

As Ann Voskamps puts it in One Thousand Gifts, they are transfigured.

“Darkness transfigures into light, bad transfigures into good, grief transfigures into grace, empty transfigures into full.”

Darkness transfigures into light. Stillness transfigures into dancing.

Darkness ---> Light

Bad ---> Good

Grief ---> Grace

Empty ---> Full

Stillness ---> Dancing

Eliot’s not calling us to pretend that we see things we don’t or to imagine that our motionless bodies are boogie-ing. But to anticipate. To be patient. 

Because “the darkness SHALL be the light and the stillness the dancing.”

And this, this is comforting. 

T.S. Tuesday: More Than Enough

I’m back to reading Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts. So today is my Voskamp/Eliot mashup, if such a thing is possible.

I huddle in my sheets, drinking my coffee as I read,

“I awake to I AM here. When I’m present, I meet I AM, the very presence of a present God. In His embrace, time loses all sense of speed and stress and space and stands so still…and holy.

Here is the only place I can love Him.”

When I say,

          I don’t want this day

          I don’t want this moment

          I don’t want these tasks or this conversation or this job

I am saying, I don’t want this God.

This I AM that is present in the moment. That is Himself the present tense.

I start. I flinch. My coffee jolts.

Is that what I’m saying?

When I reject the present, I reject the I AM.

The I AM in the moment.

He is present in every one. In every moment.

My very breath proof of His presence.

I flash to Eliot, a phrase from Burnt Norton that caught my heart many years ago: “Wind in and out of unwholesome lungs.”

I am the unwholesome and He is the wind. In and out. In and out. In the rhythm of I AM.

All day I try to embrace the moment. I really try. I write notecard reminders. I consecrate my desk and my space and my tasks.

Dissatisfaction oozes in.

They can’t occupy the same space: gratitude and discontent.

I can only see the NOT ENOUGH.

Ann has a cure for this too.

She recounts the story of Jesus feeding the masses with the not enough of loaves and fishes. A phrase jumps out to her, this woman “sleuthing for glory.” She sees right there in the text that before the miracle, before the full bellies, before the multiplication of the not enough, HE GAVE THANKS.

She writes,

“Gave thanks…I’d missed it and all of my life?

I’d never considered those two words, the bridge words there in the middle, the crossing over that took the not enough and made it enough.”

Gave thanks.

Counted gifts.

Stacked joy.

But, I protest, I can’t give thanks until I know what the future holds. Thankfulness is bondage to complacency. Saying things are okay right now ensures certain paralysis, right?

I am born to move and grow and learn and leave. Where does thanks fit in?

I don’t give thanks because I feel this moment, this circumstance, is not enough.

But wait. Isn’t that what Ann just said?  The moment of not enough is precisely when Jesus gives thanks.

“Jesus embraces his not enough…He gives thanks…And there is more than enough.”

Later that day I am at the beach. Saved by daylight savings and one more hour of sun and surf and life. I run, I splash, sand wedges its stubborn way into my shoes. Children erupt in squeals of cold and glee, emerging from the emerald waves with strands of shimmering seaweed. 

I reach a doggy beach painted with doggy paw prints with doggy yips and doggy paddles under a piercing blue sky of endless doggy summer. I stop my body, but my breath pants on, the wind in and out of unwholesome lungs.

And at last I gasp, give thanks, “It is more than enough.”

I am born to move and grow and learn and leave. This gratitude in motion is second nature. It's the sedentary thankfulness that will require more discipline.

Today I write more notecards. I consecrate my desk and space and time once again. Calm in my-not-so-ergonomically-designed desk chair, I force myself to notice my quiet breaths: wind in and out of unwholesome lungs.

And give thanks, waiting for the more than enough. 

T.S. Tuesday: The Sun Away

Don't think I forgot T.S. Tuesday. It's a little late, but finally here. 


"Time and the bell have buried the day,
The black cloud carries the sun away.
Will the sunflower turn to us, will the clematis
Stray down, bend to us; tendril and spray
Clutch and cling?
Chill
Fingers of yew be curled
Down on us? After the kingfisher's wing 
Has answered light to light, and is silent, the light is still
At the still point of the turning world." From T.S. Eliot's Burnt Norton

The black cloud of night carries the sun away. Away from our ambling conversations, from the rusty red bricks of garden planters, from the flowers that clutch and cling. Cling and clutch. Clutched to the smooth cold, concrete, drawing light. Light draws us like a sunflower. 


The sun away, it is only us. Us soaked in rays, in freckled remnants of radiant light, burned across our very skin. 

T.S. Tuesday: Journey of the Magi Part 3

Today is Part 3 of the Journey of the Magi series. Check out my thoughts on the first two stanzas in Part 1 and Part 2. Here is the third and final stanza of T.S. Eliot's "The Journey of the Magi."

“All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we lead all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I have seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.”

At this part in the poem, the Magi have arrived. They have reached their destination. They have seen the Christ child. 



And are their thoughts ecstasy and enlightenment? No. Instead they say something quite peculiar. That this birth they have witnessed feels the same as death.

“I have seen birth and death, but had thought they were different.”

Besides loving the language, the poetry. I love the truth in this statement. Our faith is built on the idea of dying to self so that we may have new life in Christ. A birth and death and resurrection in one.

I’ve never imagined the wise men feeling let down. Feeling alien. Feeling out of place.

They have found what they were looking for, the destination they were seeking, but instead of bringing them glory and comfort and peace, they are left “no longer at ease” with their old way of life, with their old homes and old gods. 


I’m reminded of a quote by C.S. Lewis that says, “All joy emphasises our pilgrim status; always reminds, beckons, awakens desire. Our best havings are wantings."



The Magi (and T.S. Eliot himself I assume) have experienced a joy so grand and so real and so marvelous that the “old dispensation,” the old beliefs, the status quo, cannot hold the things they’ve learned. They are marked by the wanting of a new Kingdom. A longing for justice. The longing for love. They have seen in part and they want to see in full.

The part I think is beautiful, and what I think C.S. Lewis and T.S. Eliot were getting at, is that the presence of their longings points to the presence God. Both the image of a God at work within them and a God at work in the universe—stirring hope. Pointing to the fulfillment that is to come.

T.S. Tuesday: Journey of the Magi: Part 2

Today’s T.S. Tuesday is Part 2—after Part 1--of a three part series on Eliot’s poem, The Journey of the Magi.

My attempted nuggets of wisdom will come from the second stanza, which describes the three Magi’s journey to see the newborn Messiah of the Jews: 

“Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,

Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;

With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,

And three trees on the low sky,

And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.

Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,

Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,

And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.

But there was no information, and so we continued

And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon

Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.” 

I’m struck by the line “But there was no information, and so we continued.” Not “and yet” or “but” we continued. No, “and so.” There was no information, AND SO we continued.

T.S. Tuesday: Thankful Thievery

"Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal." T.S. Eliot

Today, at the bequest of T.S. Eliot, I am stealing one of my favorite poems (of a different author) to share with you.

by e.e. cummings

i thank You God for most this amazing

day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees

and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything

which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,

and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth

day of life and of love and wings: and of the gay

great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing

breathing any--lifted from the no

of all nothing--human merely being

doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake

and now the eyes of my eyes are opened)