There was a time in my life when I lived beside a lake and I became attuned to the weather by looking out at the water in the morning to see which way the air was moving, the water was moving. I could tell by the flow whether it was a warm day or a chilly one.
I live now in a place where I can see two ski hills from the second floor windows of the house. I’ve haven’t lived here for very long, so I’m still getting used to the sights and sounds around me. It occurred to me, as a life-long lover of skiing, that this is the best possible view I could have in life. I can look out in the winter and see snow on the trails and feel that joyful sense of anticipation a skier gets. This morning one of the mountains, Stratton, has it’s own cloud formation that has been rolling over the peak all morning. It’s quite beautiful.
My friend Marc was telling me recently how he was getting used to the blackness of night in a country setting. He and his wife go between Brooklyn and upstate New York and in a recent voice message he described his surprise at how dark the nights are.
I had never thought about that, having lived in Vermont now for about thirty years, how a city is always illuminated and when night falls here in the country it’s really dark.
Sometimes, when I am awake in the night I go outside and look at the stars. I tell you, there is no quicker way to realize how small you are than standing beneath a vast starry sky.
I like how all of this nature has kept me in my place. Or at least I think it has. I hope it has. The lake, Lake Champlain, could get rough and dangerous very quickly. Storms would blow in from over the Adirondack mountains and turn the lake into something more like the ocean. Here on the hill the wind whips all around. One time last winter it blew massive drifts that made the driveway impassible. I had to park at the bottom and hike up through hip-deep snow.
Nature tells us best: be ready for change, it’s coming!
I think I might be in danger of getting too serious here, but I’m in that in-between place in Advent where I have been thinking about peace and joy. And whenever those ideas take stage in my life I tend to default to thinking about nature.
I have no idea why we have the themes we do at Advent. Like everything churchy, I’m suspect, especially of carrying over ideas from one year to the next without any kind of actual purpose or thought or meaning. The old default: we do it this way because we’ve always done it this way.
If you ever hire me to be the pastor of your church you can bet that I will be asking a LOT of questions because if there’s one thing that will put a dull edge on amazing ideas like peace and joy, it’s repetition.
Humans seem to love this idea of tradition, but if you’re not careful, all you’re doing is repeating, going through motions, saying and doing the same stuff you did last year … for the sake of continuity? Because change makes you uncomfortable? Because it takes effort to try something new?
I’m not letting humanity off the hook while I’m here. Born in the sign of Taurus, with a set of hefty horns on my head, I will knock down any idea you have that smells like complacency. If you (or an institution) sit in one place long enough you will start to decompose. I’ve worked in hospitals and hospices, I know what happens when a body doesn’t move enough.
I also know what happens when a mind isn’t moved enough.
Jon Batiste, in the terrific film about his work and life, American Symphony, talks about all the pushback he received when he got to Juilliard. Pushback, pushback, pushback …
One of the most talented, thoughtful, smart, creative humans of our time and people thought he was crazy because he was doing music a new way.
I never paid attention to Marianne Williamson until I recently learned that she had been a pastor for a while. It wasn’t a great experience for her, apparently, and she quit after five years, saying When you’re leading a congregation people feel they have the right to tell what you should or shouldn’t talk about.
In my experience, when you’re leading a congregation, people feel they have the right to tell you a lot more than that. I’m ten years into this and there has never not been a time when someone is giving me pushback about the way I do my job.
People. Hate. Change.
Several years ago someone asked me what Christmas traditions my family had, my family of origin. Both of my parents were essentially orphans in this world, so the fact that we had food and shelter and transportation was amazing. Holiday traditions? That would have been a luxury. The only tradition that really has ever mattered to me as a parent, as an adult, is the coming together of people I love, if that’s a tradition. You could serve me oatmeal at Thanksgiving and if some of my kids, parents, siblings are at the table, I’m good.
Life, as I see it, is full submergence in different. I don’t want to do any of the things anyone before me did. If I put the same flowers in the same containers each year when spring arrives, I’d stop seeing the beauty of a flower. I see this all the time: haul out the containers and plop the geraniums in, year after year after year. The Christmas decorations go in the same spot every year, we eat the exact same thing year after year.
People have you seen the smörgåsbord this life offers?
We are here to be creative, to harness the energy of Source and to create new things, new ways, new ideas. My kids thought I was nuts for always moving the furniture, but watch what happens to your brain when it has to figure out a new way around the sofa. This is good! This is staying alive while we’re alive!
All you have to do is sit for a couple of minutes every morning, looking out the window, to see that every single thing about today is different than yesterday. What a trip!
I remember so vividly my college graduation, hearing all the different majors and accomplishments as people I knew went to receive their diploma. I remember sitting there thinking, shit, it’s all over now and I could have done that and that and that and that?! I was so mad that I hadn’t even scratched the surface of all the opportunity there was in that place and time. Four years at a private college was a huge gift and all I did was take the ribbon off. What a loser!
But I ventured forward intent on living my life with curiosity because I don’t want to feel that same way when I die, if there’s a chance to look back over this whole deal. I want to have tried and tasted and felt and seen as much as possible. I absolutely refuse to do the same things in the same order as I did last year and call it tradition to make it feel special or cozy.
Bust a move, folks, the clock never stops ticking.
xomo
Today the clouds are rolling over Stratton, making it look like it has a little cloud blanket!