Hope is Stirring

2011-02-20T12:49:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, it feels like my hope disappeared with the sunny skies. It is easy to have hope when life is manageable, but when the uncomfortable comes, it dissipates. Over the past years I have managed problems with faith, but I haven't been recently. And I have been pretty vague, haven't I? Well, my dad is sick: cancer, they think, but the doctors aren't sure. And we anxiously wait. I believe in God, but does that mean that right now I need to believe he good? God is good, I know that. I say that when life is good. But believing that God is good when life isn't is a bitch. So what now? I go on, I guess, but now using curse words when I pray (thanks, Avett bros). And today Sarah told me that this is why our community is so important--so that when my hope is waning, the hope of those around me fills in. Chesterton said that "hope is the ability to be cheerful in circumstances which we know to be desperate." But can't we cry out in pain here and there, too?

Nevertheless, life continues; it twists and turns and hurtles forward. My birthday yesterday was good. I am surrounded by love and joy, and yesterday I could be cheerful; I could, as Oliver says, "admire, admire, admire the things in this world that are kind."

Heavy by Mary Oliver (from Thirst)

That time
I thought I could not
go any closer to grief
without dying

I went closer,
and I did not die.
Surely God
had His hand in this,

as well as friends.
Still, I was bent,
and my laughter,
as the poet said,

was nowhere to be found.
Then said my friend Daniel
(brave even among lions),
It's not the weight you carry

but how you carry it--
books, bricks, grief--
it's all in the way
you embrace it, balance it, carry it

when you cannot, and would not,
put it down."
So I went practicing.
Have you noticed?

Have you heard
the laughter
that comes, now and again,
out of my startled mouth?

How I linger
to admire, admire, admire
the things of this world
that are kind, and maybe

also troubled--
roses in the wind,
the sea geese on the steep waves,
a love
to which there is no reply?

2011-02-08T19:54:00.000-08:00

Last night I had the pleasure of eating Pad Thai with some friends to celebrate a birthday. Thank God for good friends, good conversation, good food, good drinks, and good Pulitzer Prize winning authors to listen to post-dinner. It was a refreshing night. Happy Birthday Scott!

I also had the pleasure of running into an old student at the lecture. He is a freshman in college, and that sure made me feel old. But he is a sweetheart, and he even told me that he was enjoying reading Home. He was a good and happy kid, and it was exciting to see that he still is.

I also felt old when I couldn't remember my age. Really. I told my hosts that I was turning 25. And I didn't feel too confident in that statement as I said it, but I couldn't remember being 25. This past year has whizzed by, and I think I took it for granted. (Thankfully Lynda knew better and corrected me.)

After last night, then talking to my principal about next year, understanding God's will, this community, then coming home and cleaning, and then talking to another good friend about Wendell Berry novels and poetry, I just feel the hope continuing to rise, and I am excited. So excited, in fact, that I think I will have a hard time sleeping.

ps. Have you noticed how long the days are getting?! Hallelujah!

2011-02-01T20:18:00.000-08:00

It is 1 February 2011, and I have been away from this for awhile now. The break has been good, and now it is time to come back... I think.

In nineteen days I will be hitting my upper-twenties. When I turned twenty-one, being 26 seemed so far off, but now I am anxiously awaiting my twenty-sixth year. I have no idea what will happen, and I don't want to always wait for the future, but right now I am excited about what will happen this coming year.

Since moving to this small town in August, I have felt pretty restless and antsy; I don't know why. I enjoy this kind of life--time for cooking, crocheting, quilting, reading, crafting, etc. etc. whatever. But I miss plays and concerts and coffee with friends and kayaking. There is so much more that I want, and here I don't even have the drive to find it. I fell asleep this afternoon while reading Frankenstein. I had lucid dreams of being as lonely as his monster (which is ridiculous! I may be antsy, but I am not lonely), and I woke-up with a start: "I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH MY LIFE!!" So here I am, on the second snow day of the week, writing to no one in particular about my coming year. I have hope for it.

This, unfortunately, has been the winter of my discontent, and "Spring seems far off, impossible, but it is coming. Already there is dusk instead of darkness at five in the afternoon; already hope is stirring at the edges of the day." (Kathleen Norris, Dakota)