Remembering and Letting Go

 

I handed over around 30 T-shirts yesterday.

T-shirts that were well-worn and well-loved.

T-shirts that were faded and T-shirts with holes.

T-shirts that I bought and T-shirts that were given to me.

T-shirts that remember times that are over but will always be part of me,

Good or bad.

 

I’m one of those people who attach meaning to objects,

So when trying to decide whether to keep or throw something away,

I have to decide about the memory as well.

And that’s hard. 

Because I don’t want to forget.

Yet I can’t keep holding on to so much stuff.

Holding on is not a good steward of physical space or, 

I’m learning,

Mental space.

Barb the Great often says that things are living rent free at her head.

 

We are the sum of our parts, 

The combination of all of the days, experiences, and people of our past. 

Part of me wants to remember all of those parts, 

Yet part of me wants to free up some head and heart space for all that is to come.

Part of me knows that most things are just for a season,

Yet part of me has trouble moving through those seasons.

 

And so going through my wardrobe and moving out things as simple as T-shirts is a spiritual act for me.

It’s a wrestling act.

It’s Jacob wrestling with the angel. 

It’s a fight. 

It’s back-and-forth.

It’s not easy.

But in the end, Jacob is blessed.

And in the end, when I have more space in my closet and mind for things that are relevant in my life right now, I am blessed too. 

 

I wish I could say I moved the T-shirts out completely.

But I did not.

There are a handful that are going to Goodwill,

But most of them went to Heidi the Librarian who is going to make a T-shirt quilt for me. 

I have six T-shirt quilts.

I helped make two or three of them.

Memories come flooding back whenever I get them out and look at them.

But that’s only when I want to, and it’s not on a regular basis,

And, then, it is the remembering that is the spiritual act.

 

Oh God, 

Help us as we walk the fine line of remembering and letting go, 

Especially when it comes attached to stuff. 

Help us to be good stewards of our space, time, and resources, 

And help us to make difficult decisions. 

Some things are with us forever, 

Regardless of physical reminders. 

Help us to honor those parts of ourselves while letting go of whatever binds. 

Provide for us all that we need and help us to discern what is the rest, 

To share that rest with community, 

And then truly to rest in you. 

Amen. 

Doing A Heidi

 

Yesterday, as I was driving home from a worship leadership practicum in VA, 

I was thinking about heaven and hell, individualism versus community, 

good versus evil, 

fear versus freedom, 

certainty versus doubt,

openness versus judgment,

and the general meaning of life, 

when I got a text from Heidi the Librarian.

She was ecstatic!

 

A couple of months ago, at the countywide Young Authors celebration, a little girl showed up dressed in a coat of many colors. 

The little girl had written about Dolly Parton’s impact on her life.

Heidi being Heidi and loving Dolly herself, 

She immediately befriended the young girl and her family and decided to write Dolly to tell the little girls’s story.

She a picture of Dolly, a self-addressed and stamped envelope, and asked Dolly if she would sign the picture for the little girl.

 

Dolly did it!

 

Heidi received the autographed picture over the weekend and was gleeful!

She immediately wrote the little girl’s family and asked if they could meet. 

They did.

The little girl squealed in excitement and hugged Heidi four times.

Did Heidi know this student any better than any other non-Greenwood student in the world?

Did the little girl know Heidi any better than any other random teacher in the world?

Barely!

Yet Dolly Parton brought them together and Heidi‘s unending thoughtfulness and kindness solidified the connection. 

 

In the middle of my deeply serious thoughts

This story was a breath of fresh air and made me smile. 

And maybe it was the answer to my questions.

 

Maybe genuinely selfless acts of kindness are what this life is all about. 

Seeing a need and acting.

Seeing a way to make someone happy and doing something about it.

Seeing a loss and offering a solution.

Seeing a commonality and building upon what connects rather than what separates. 

Maybe when we do these things,

We are acting out of love,

And love what is saving this world.

The love of God,

The love of Jesus,

The love of the Spirit,

Living together as one community that gives and creates all things good.

 

May we join that community today,

Not living self-focused, individual lives,

But lives willing to write Dolly Parton and ask for an autograph for a little girl we barely know. 

 

Amen. 

Splat! Bam! Boom!

 

Yesterday, I wrote a poem. 

I recorded a moment in time when I was perfectly at peace. 

I posted the poem. 

And then, 

Almost immediately, 

My litany of negative thoughts bombarded me. 

All my fears. 

All my anxieties about death and dying. 

All my worries. 

Splat. Bam. Boom! Right in my face. 

 

“Do you trust yourself to handle what happens when it happens?” I heard Joe the Counselor ask. 

“Yes,” I responded. 

“Your time will come,” I thought, “when everything will feel like it’s spinning out of control.”

“But that time is not now. 

That time is not this moment. 

You cannot worry away what will be. 

Breathe. 

Feel the ocean breeze. 

You are right here, 

Right now, 

And I am with you. 

And I will be with you then, too.”

 

Somewhere along the way,

God showed up. 

And we came back to center again. 

 

Sometimes I feel like Peter.

One moment I live with total presence and faith. 

The next moment I let worry and what-if’s run away with me. 

 

But. 

God is with me through it all, 

Loving me come what may. 

And I am with God through it all, 

Loving God come what may. 

And love is steady through it all, 

Being love come what may. 

And I am thankful to understand this little, huge fact,

As I, little as I am in this huge world, 

Am on this eternal journey of faith. 

 

Amen. 

Mom's Gift

 

Did you know that music is not considered a spiritual gift in scripture?

Clearly, music is important, as it is mentioned hundreds of times throughout the Bible.

But music is not directly considered a spiritual gift. 

As a musician, I find this interesting. 

And yet I understand it.

It seems that In the Bible the emphasis on music is less on the talent itself and more on how the talent serves God and community.

Musical ability, then, is treated as a capacity to be used for worship, teaching, encouragement, and ministry.

 

My mom is a perfect example of this.

She is an excellent musician, and she hones her craft every day.

Whether she’s playing for fun, or whether she’s playing to work out a song for Sunday morning, my mom plays the piano almost every day, even if it’s late at night.

She sees her music as a ministry,

As a means of encouragement,

As a way to draw people into worship,

As a way to tell stories of old.

 

Yesterday, my mom led worship at her church.

As she prepared for the concert, she prayed about songs that would uplift and speak to people’s souls.

She thought of the words that went along with the melodies,

She thought of the movement of the music,

She thought of the need to have a brain break in the middle of the concert,

And she was very conscious of time, of not doing too much or too little, but of playing just the right amount.

She wanted her music to be her sermon. 

She wanted her music to speak the word of God. 

 

And it did. 

 

But it wasn’t the music that did it. 

It was the spirit behind the music, 

The something that goes beyond talent, 

The heart of worship and service that drives everything mom does. 

 

So whatever talent you have. 

Whatever gift, 

Whether named in scripture or not, 

Use it and develop it as a way of honoring the Giver of All, 

In service and in love. 

 

Amen. 

Bullet's Love

 

Today’s Throwback Thursday note is another memory of Bullet, this one from early June 2016. I love Annie Mae and Siggy Ray. But I sure do miss this little guy. 

 

—-

 

Bullet is snoring beside me.

I tried to take him home about 30 minutes ago.

9pm is his curfew.

Instead, he walked me down the driveway, pooped in the middle of the concrete, then turned around and marched straight to the door and waited for me to catch up.

Until that moment, he had been sleeping in the garage.

He was pitifully and poutingly waiting on my dad to come home.

My dad won’t be home for another couple of days.

I am second best. I know it.

And sitting beside this little, fat, white creature who stinks of wet, shedding hair and farts, makes me itch.

I am allergic to him.

Yet I love him.

And I choose to spend time with him.

And I feel grateful that there are people and a God who love and choose to spend time with me when I am at my worst…or my best…or my most natural…and don’t think twice about it when I make them twitch.

Suno

A week ago Saturday night, I had the opportunity to  hang out with an 88 year-old.

While riding to the house concert we were attending, we started talking about music.

He is a prolific lyric writer but does not feel comfortable putting music to his words.

He found an app called Suno that does what he cannot. 

After he played me one of the songs he had created, I downloaded the app.

You can put in your own melody, your own lyrics, or have the app make up a song completely based on your subject.

You tell it the style of music that you would like and give it a few other details and it creates a song!

I knew immediately that I could use the app at school.

 

Fast forward a few days, and I was trying to decide what song to play for the fifth graders as they left their promotion ceremony.

I thought to myself that it would be neat to make an original song.

Then, out of the blue, a simple lyric and melody popped into my head and less than an hour later, I had written the Greenwood Graduation song.

It is fun, quirky, moving, and unique to Greenwood, 

Full of words that my principal says each morning on the morning announcements.

 

I first recorded the melody on my voice recorder app and wrote the lyrics in my notes feature.

I then printed all of the lyrics and recorded the full song on my voice recorder.

I downloaded the song,

Uploaded it into Suno,

Told Suno that I wanted an upbeat inspirational pop song with a female voice,

And it created it!!

It was so cool!

 

I know.

There are ethical implications for this app.

AI demands a lot of the environment and computer generated art seems to take away from the creativity and need for the real work of artists.

But in this instance, when I needed a song fast, this tool was a Godsend! 

It took what I had to offer and made it better.

I used it as a tool,

Not as a replacement for my brain or creativity. 

 

And I think that’s the key: 

Using AI as a tool and resource 

rather than as a substitute for human thinking, emotion, and skill. 

 

Take a listen to the Greenwood Graduation Song and notice how it turned a simple melody and lyric set into a full song. 

The kids were dancing and having a blast as they were waiting to leave.

And my principal slowly recognized his own words, and it almost made him cry.

 

May we use our technological tools wisely

But not forget that our wisest investments are always in people.

 

Amen. 

Land of Plenty

 We live in a land of plenty. If one ever doubts this fact, then all she has to do is turn on HGTV and watch its programming for a couple of hours. Granted, our plenty is not equally distributed and too many of us take for granted the backs on which our plenty stands, but that is a note for another night.

 

A few weeks ago, my mom and I stumbled onto a Tiny House Marathon. Ever since that day, I’ve been turning on HGTV to try to find another Tiny House Marathon. In the process, I’ve found myself watching a plethora of different shows—and talking to the TV quite a bit, almost always making the wrong decision when given a choice between house 1, 2, or 3.

 

Last night, I found myself watching a beachfront property show where the couple was looking for a new home for their family. The husband and wife were both lawyers and their budget was between two and three million dollars. Yes, million. When talking about their children, the couple said that the kids were, “energetic, especially the boy.” When interacting with the kids, the couple was very awkward. And when talking about how happy they were with their new home, the couple was playing tennis, marveling about how much less stress they feel with their new life, and how happy they are to have made the move—and their children were nowhere to be seen.

 

Evidently, this show bothered me so much that I dreamed about it. In my dream, I met the nanny who quite clearly was the person raising the children and said, “I knew it. I knew that they had a nanny. I knew that they were hands-off parents and that those segments were staged.” In my dream, too, the boy was identified autistic, which I would wager money that he, in real life, should be but that he will not be because his parents will not want the diagnosis.

 

I know. I’m sounding very judgmental and investing a lot of emotional energy into something far beyond my reality. But I can’t seem to get it off my mind. Maybe I’m jealous of the money and properties and wishing that I could have three million dollars to invest in a tropical island home. But I don’t think that’s it. I think I’m bothered by how expendable the children seemed in that segment—and in other segments as well. Today, for instance, a couple opted to spend their “nanny budget” on a beachfront property and to push back their efficiency date of having a child exactly one year and nine months.

 

We live in a land of plenty. We have so very, very much. Even our tiny houses are bigger and nicer than many homes around the world. Yet when our plenty causes us to lose site of our children and to live life to our present fullest with little to no thought of leaving the world a better place, is our plenty worth it?

 

Dear God, we come to you tonight aware of the many good things that life has given—and the many people who have died to make these good things possible. Help us to turn our plenty into so much more than we can imagine and to devote our lives—our time, devotion, talents, and resources—not just to living our lives to the fullest but to helping others live their lives to the fullest as well. Children, teenagers, adults. Body, soul, mind, spirit, and strength.--Amen.

 

(Originally written on 5.29.16)