Faith to be Strong, Strength to be Faithful

Last Post

2008-03-03T20:15:00.001-08:00

Sorry for any panic. The last post here.
Chalk it up to a pre-surgery need for distractions or part of the developing of my own voice in the blogosphere, but I've made a change.
I'm leaving both Written Wind and Faith to be Strong.
I'm moving to WordPress and For the Means of Grace.
Ultimately, it's time. I think I'm ready to meld these blogs together. And I think liked some of the options WordPress offered. I have no plans to take the Blogger pages down--I want to preserve the comments. But new posts will be on the new site.
I've already moved all of my posts over. The formatting is a little odd in some cases, but not to the point where it challenges understanding. (I hope, let me know if I'm wrong.)
So far, the changes I've made to this blog have been steps forward and opportunites to learn more about what I'm doing and what I want to be doing. I believe this move will be similar.
I look forward to seeing you all at For the Means of Grace.

(I'm cross-posting this on both of my Blogger sites.)

Meme

2008-03-02T18:33:00.000-08:00

Thrice tagged me for this meme. First, the rules:
1) Link to the person who tagged you. 2) Post the rules. 3) Share six non-important things / habits / quirks about yourself. 4) Tag at least three people. 5) Be sure the people you tagged KNOW you tagged them by commenting what you did.
And here goes:
1> I have no internal sense of time, especially when reading. I can finish a book in one sitting (for an average novel this is 3-4 hours) and feel like it's only been 20-40 minutes.
2> I can read really fast. My Dad used to subtley quiz me on books I'd read to see if I was pretending to read them. I wasn't and eventually he stopped.
3> Science fiction, theology, and history make up a good chunk of my reading lists. Not necessarily in that order.
4> I am not a vegetarian. Not even a little. But sometimes there are great vegetarian entrees which I will eat happily.
5> One of my pet peeves is when people ignore high pitched beeping noises. (ie hourly beeps on watches or when you have the door of the car open while the keys are still in the ignition) This is also why alarms are quite effective. I have a strong desire to make them stop.
6> I am convinced that cold cereal is not actually a proper meal. A great snack, sure, but not a meal.
Tagging people???
Hmmm, How about you (whoever you are). (Thing 7 would have been "I don't always like following directions precisely.":-)

why I write

2008-02-28T11:11:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I wonder why I write. And then I wonder why I blog. And then, sometimes, I get an answer.
I was poking around the blogosphere today and I stumbled a blog which linked back to here. Observant readers of Written Wind will note that I also link there, however, visiting hasn't made the high priority list this past week. The poem for today was, for me, an answer.

Riveted

It is possible that things will not get better
than they are now, or have been known to be.
It is possible that we are past the middle now.
It is possible that we have crossed the great water
without knowing it, and stand now on the other side.
Yes: I think that we have crossed it. Now
we are being given tickets, and they are not
tickets to the show we had been thinking of,
but to a different show, clearly inferior.

Check again: it is our own name on the envelope.
The tickets are to that other show.

It is possible that we will walk out of the darkened hall
without waiting for the last act: people do.
Some people do. But it is probable
that we will stay seated in our narrow seats
all through the tedious denoument
to the unsurprising end--riveted, as it were:
spellbound by our own imperfect lives
because they are lives,
and because they are ours.
--By Robyn Sarah from A Day's Grace

I write because poetry doesn't stay where we put it. I write because I need to for me, to work out and say things that I think and feel and believe and notice. I blog because my writing isn't my own, it doesn't stay where I put it, it gets up and tries to sneak off into your lives. So, it's easier to just give it away.
And today I needed this poem to sneak off into my life. I needed Robyn Sarah's reminder that life isn't always what we expect or want. And I needed the reminder that life--imperfect and unexpected, is still spellbinding, still something we all want.
Because this past week in my life hasn't been spellbinding. It has been tough and sad and I've spent too much of it crying or wanting to cry. This past week hasn't been what I expected and it hasn't been what I wanted. But it has been my life. Mine. The tickets, or the pre-operative orders, have my name on them. Mine.
Lord, give me faith to be strong. Amen

No Vacations

2008-02-26T16:51:00.000-08:00

One of my friends and I were talking recently about how long it has been since either of us has truly been on vacation. Something about being perpetually nearly broke students gets in the way. So I've been thinking about vacations. About how much fun it would be to escape from the day to day aspects of life (laundry, homework, making meals, cleaning) for awhile. To go somewhere--perhaps the stereotypical beach getaway with little umbrella topped drinks, and play and sleep and laze about for a few (relatively) guilt free days.
Tonight I was thinking about how different these health issues are for me than for my family. For my family this is a rude and startling interruption of all of our lives. For them this has a beginning (a series of phone calls last week) and will have an end (successful surgery). I know that is a more stark view than they would voice, because I have seen their stress over my MRI scans and blood work. I know that this is not clear cut for any of us. They, however, achieve respite, vacations if you will. They have stress, but it is based on more isolated incidents.
For me, there is never any vacation. I live with the medications, treatments, and vigilance over any signs of reoccurrence daily. I live in the pattern of doctor's visits and tests. And I don't get vacations. It has been years now of being soaked in this way of life, this world. It has been long enough that it no longer always weighs heavily on me, but I am never unaware of all of the possibilities. And despite all of that, this still caught me completely off guard. There was no warning, nothing I could have done to prevent this.
No vacations. No respite.

Explaining the last post

2008-02-25T21:12:00.000-08:00

As a few of you know, and long-term readers of my other blog may have suspected, I've had a fairly eventful life, healthwise. And apparently, it is not over.

Last week I learned that my previous health issues have reoccured. Which means that I get to do have this procedure again in about two weeks.

This is both serious and, as far as serious issues go, rather ordinary. It is deeply upsetting for me and my family and throws my entire life up into the air.

Which is part of the reason I have started posting here. I have come to the conclusion that I want to reserve my other blog for poetry, but I also need a forum to sort through some of my issues and rants, and I wanted to share this news with you all. This world has become important to me and this is the kind of news that needs to be shared.

There are a hundred things I want to say and the words for any of them escape me. I will have more to say here than I do now.

This is another day, O Lord. I know not what it will bring forth, but make me ready, Lord, for whatever it may be. If I am to stand up, help me to stand bravely. If I am to sit still, help me to sit quietly. If I am to lie low, help me to do it patiently. And if I am to do nothing, let me do it gallantly. Make these words more than words, and give me the Spirit of Jesus. Amen.

Bad news

2008-02-22T20:06:00.001-08:00

I've noticed something, there is no good way to deliver bad news. There's no way to gently lead into it. There's no way to share bad news, the really bad life shattering kind, without hurting everyone. Each person leaves these conversations in pain. Pain because their life has been shattered. Pain because the life of someone close to them has been shattered. Nothing lessens the blow. The world always seems a little skewed at the end of these conversations. A little starker. The grays become more pronounced; the shadows more menacing.
I hate this. I hate what it does to me, to the people around me. I hate how much it hurts.
And I know that this too is life. The good and the joyful inextricably mixed with the sad and the tragic. It happens all around us. It happens to us.
Lord have mercy.
Christ have mercy.
Lord have mercy.

Holidays and Family

2007-12-19T11:40:00.000-08:00

Over the last 6 and a half years I've slowly begun that process of not necessarily being at home for holidays. It was the 4th of July, and then Easter, an odd New Year's away, then Thanksgiving, and this year it will be Christmas. This isn't because I don't love my family--I do. I even enjoy spending time with them and genuinely like their company. Admittedly there's a two to three week limit on this, but I think that's pretty good.
No, I've missed holidays at home because of realities in my life--realities of money and time. Practical realities. And this is something that is only going to happen more often. My life, the one I chose, includes a fairly demanding schedule and certain inflexible areas which often fall around holidays.
And I'm okay with that. Partly because I knew this when I made my choice. But also because my family is not one of those families which has a dozen Christmas traditions. I wish that was different. Which is also why this is strange. I know I would make the same choice and I would still not be going home for Christmas this year. And I know that this would make being away from home more difficult. But it would also give me something of Christmastime at Home to create here. It would help me feel connected to my family, even over hundreds of miles and really practical realities.
And all of that makes me a little sad. Because I will miss my family. Because of the story of why we don't have many Christmas traditions. Because I don't know where we will all be next year or what we will be doing.
I don't see an easy solution to this. For a lot of practical reasons neither my family nor I are ever likely to find it easy to travel for Holidays.
Which is, well, not fine, but part of life and something we'll work through.
Right now, though, I wonder what traditions I want to start building for my own life and if and how or when I could invite my family into those traditions.

Division

2007-12-08T20:14:00.001-08:00

I'm quite openly Episcopalian. I know I haven't been here long, but trust me, this is a hard fact in my life. And my church has been getting a lot of press in the last few years. There was the gay bishop and now there's this division that will be in the headlines.
And I am sad. I am saddened by the pain that is behind this move. I am saddened by those who will see this as a good move. I am sad for my GLBTQ friends who understand themselves to be Church-less, or even worse separated from God, because we humans have been too good at alienating and belittling them. I am sad because there are people who will be glad-on both sides of this division. I am sad for the people who wish they did not live in and undoubtedly love the Diocese of San Joaquin but do not approve of this. I am sad for the people who wish they did live in DofSJ.
There are many people who feel excluded, ignored, and injured. And this is why I am sad.
There does not seem to be a clear correct path for us to walk down. There does not seem to be a way for reconciliation, for mutuality.
I am afraid that the most pastoral option we may have is to let them go. With grace. I am afraid that we won't. I am afraid that the Church DofSJ visions is not one in which I would be welcome. I am afraid that this will be dragged through the courts and that we will all become bitter and that this will be our legacy. I am afraid that this wound will not be healed. In my lifetime. Ever.

I disagree with several of their theological conclusions. I don't think that this was the way to leave the Church. I don't want them to go.

I think that my Church will be the poorer for the lack of their voices. I think that this gives us a way to not face the debate(s) we have within us.

I believe that our faith in the fact that Jesus Christ died and rose again to show us God's love and God's promise in our lives should be greater than these differences.

I believe that this is not great enough to stand in the way of Holy Communion with one another.

But apparently I am more alone in this than I want to be.

So, today, I am sad and I am afraid.

Because, today, there is good reason to be.