in the waiting line

nancy's been having a rough week. bipolar would be one good way to express it. bouncing on her bed like a trampoline, slapping her ears, crying, talking about head hurts/foot hurts/bum hurts/ear hurts/hair hurts, wanting to go for walks for the first time since winter started, wanting to sleep in her room all day.

because today is easter. and she can't handle the anticipation.

i want to be more like her. not the bipolar part, but the excitement part. the can-hardly-contain-myself part.

"we know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.
not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies...

meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling...
so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life."
~paul

"call in the morning. easter tomorrow."
~nancy

η δε ελπις ου καταισχυνει

this one is dedicated to them heartbroken lovers...

blue lagoon supplies one of my favourite workout songs: "break my stride." its steady and energetic beat encourages me to, um, maintain my stride.

aside from that, the song is your basic "you done me wrong and now i'm pretending my bitterness is resolve" schpiel. there was a time when it made quite a bit of sense to me. that is, i was quickly able to list the number of goals i hadn't met because i let other concerns sap my energy and focus. and i'd listen to this song, not in anger against those things - no one but me has control over what i pour myself into - but in hope that i'd love my goal enough to maintain my stride.

but before i make this my new take on life, i look at Jesus. you know, just to check. and there's lots of support in his example and teaching. luke 9, for example: "Jesus resolutely set out for jerusalem" and then told potential followers that "no one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God." no turning back, no turning back. eyes on the prize and all that.

so what did Jesus' straight-as-an-arrow path look like?
- teaching about sharing His message, neighbourly love, contemplation, prayer, shining, woe to the religious leaders, hardship and persecution, worry, wealth, repentance, radical generosity, heaven, celebration, forgiveness, reunion, the cost of following, reversal of poverty, and His impending death
- performing exorcisms, healings (four events, two of which were on the day of rest)
- crying over Jerusalem
- counselling humility, persistence, childlikeness, and poverty before God
- making friends with tax collectors
- visiting his friends
- praying alone and in groups

and then He entered jerusalem on a donkey and the passion plays take over. you probably skipped that list but here's the point:

there are so many times that He's on His way from point a to point b and someone interrupts: a woman touches Him, a blind man calls out. you know how Jesus responds? "ain't nothing gonna break my stride?" iiiiiiii don't think so! no, He lets the needs of others determine His agenda, trusting that genuine love cannot interfere with the ultimate goal.

my stride can be resolute while still being open to others. or, anyway, Jesus' was. and i'm of the mind that God's got the same thing in mind for me.

and another thing... do you think Jesus really cared if people "walked all over" Him? do you think He worried about boundaries and enabling? i wonder...


ain't nothin' gonna break my stride
nobody's gonna slow me down
oh no, i've got to keep on movin'

ain't nothin' gonna break my stride
i'm running and i won't touch ground
oh no, i've got to keep on movin'

watch the music video!

"exceptional"

standing in the hallway of the widow's house, i put down my egg salady bagel and said, "i know it's strange to philosophize at a time like this..."
"no, it isn't," dad said.

i laughed. "well, ok, it isn't. anyway, the other night, we went outside to see the lunar eclipse. and i said to adil, 'there's nothing special about this: a rock is casting a shadow on another rock. there's nothing spectacular about it... and yet, it's beautiful.' in fact, lots of people were out freezing their toes and noses off, watching the moon turn red. but there's nothing so amazing about it. same with this," i pointed around me. "it happens all the time. hundreds, thousands of times a day. it eventually happens to every person. there's nothing unusual about it... but it's ugly and painful and shocking, every time. even though it's ordinary."
"yeah," he tilted his head. "in the end, it appears that perhaps everything is extraordinary."

whenever i ask my dad how his day was, he says, "extraordinary." he doesn't mean to imply that something terribly unusual happened, or that the day went spectacularly well. he means it literally: it was unlike every other day he has ever experienced. entirely unique.

we let things become ordinary when they needn't be so. we let it happen to words, touch, rites, exchanged glances, sunsets, numbers, brushstrokes, and elephants. we let it happen and, all the while, say that we seek meaning and hunger for wow. we're, um, ridiculous.

"finding God in the ordinary" and all that isn't about injecting spiritual mumbo jumbo into the banality of everyday life, reinterpreting everything in some tenuous way. and it's not about retreating from the ordinary so that something magical can happen. i mean, sometimes it is, but it shouldn't be.

lunar eclipses and weak knees and friends' deaths and kids' prayers happen because rocks cast shadows and people are attractive and cancer cells grow and parents drag their offspring to church. ordinary, mundane things. but - without ascribing purpose at all - i think it's safe to say that they have the power to shake us out of the ordinary. to open our eyes to that truth my dad spoke, just hours after shaking a shovelful of dirt over his friend's coffin:

everything is extraordinary.