Searching for Meaning: A response to Sandy Hook

A Message of Death

When 32 people were shot and killed at Virginia Tech in April 2007, I was in the middle of the desert.

I’d been there for over a week, hiking through the canyons of Utah, doing invasive species removal with a group of volunteers for the National Park Service. We were too far to be reached by telephone signals or electrical wires.

But not too far to be reached by death.

The park ranger’s brother passed away unexpectedly while we were in the field. The Park Service flew signal plans over the canyon where we were camped, lights blinking trouble-trouble, until he climbed to the top of a nearby ridge where we could get a weak radio signal.

Come back, they told him, there’s been an emergency. So we cleaned up camp, cached our tools, and hiked the 7 miles back out of the desert, returning a few days earlier than planned.

I noticed the minute my feet hit the concrete: all the flags were at half mast.

Then I found a newspaper.

It was a strange way to find out about national tragedy. For days our little group had communed only with each other and the stars. We had worried only about getting our work done, about not disturbing sleeping snakes, about properly purifying our water.

It is shock enough to come back from the wilderness, but it was worse to come back to a different reality than the one we’d left.

Indeed, grief is a far-flung messenger that will find you no matter where you hide.

Meaning Beyond Absurdity

It didn’t take so long for the message of Sandy Hook to reach me.

Friday morning, as events unfolded somewhere else, I was playing piano at a funeral for a beloved woman I never knew. It was a message of death that was bittersweet, welcomed at the end of a well-lived life, and we, her congregation, gathered to eat and sing and pray together, to give thanks for her life and death, to speak hope for life beyond.

I heard about Sandy Hook the minute I turned on my car radio.

When I heard the number of deaths, I had to pull over to put both hands on my face. Out to dinner that night, I cried in a public restaurant just trying to speak of those children, of the children in my life that I know and love.

Didn’t we all pull over and cry in public? Didn’t we all lean on each other, rub our knees raw, search for something meaningful to say about tragedy and violence?

Aren’t we still searching?

Ten days before his death, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel did a television interview for NBC. When asked if he had a special message for young people, he nodded.

Remember that there is a meaning beyond absurdity.
Be sure that every little deed counts, that every word has power,
and that we do, everyone, our share to redeem the world,
in spite of all absurdities, and all the frustrations, and all the disappointment.
(Interview transcript can be found here)

Even if we do not know what to make of this tragedy — in the face of absurdity, frustration, and disappointment — there is yet meaning. Though we don’t know what to say or do that can possibly be adequate, we try anyway, because we cannot say or do nothing.

Every little deed counts; every word has power. And together we are responsible for redeeming the world.

Tikkun olam, as the Jewish teaching says, heal the world.

The Work of Redemption

And then it’s Christmas.

We have been waiting this Advent. We knew we were waiting for redeemer come, but we did not know we were waiting for this — for a message of death, for absurdity and grief.

Death came anyway, and we are still waiting for that redeemer to be born, tiny and fragile, into our midst. Has Advent ever felt so long?

Over the weekend, we asked our youth to hold a moment of silence for the victims, and one boy asked Why? It doesn’t make any difference to remember. Why should we hold silence?

But it does matter.

Our waiting — in this Advent season, in this time of grief, in this very moment of silence — matters.

Our grieving — for brothers lost unexpectedly, for beloved grandmothers who lived life full, for tiny children who were only strangers — matters.

Our hoping — for peace in our communities, for the healing of our hearts, for the coming of our redeemer — matters.

May we not tire in waiting, grieving, and hoping — for this is the work of redemption that belongs to each one of us.

Being free and being home

It’s a quiet morning around here.

For reading and writing, spooning yogurt with fruit and sipping coffee. For savoring gentle morning sunshine and wandering barefoot around the house.

Reunited

I recently moved across the country — from Berkeley to Boston — and things are finally getting unpacked and set up. Doesn’t that process always seem to take centuries? But, at last!, the number of boxes is dwindling!

It’s been strange to see all my stuff again.

I moved out of my parents house at 18 when I went to college. Since then, I’ve lived in 3 dorms, 5 apartments, and 2 houses. I spent a few months staying in a staff house while I was a trail guide and a few months living in an author’s house (along with her dog, Sir Barks-a-Lot) while she was on Sabbatical. I also spent a significant amount of time traveling and staying with friends & family.

When I list my previous residences for background checks or lease applications, there are enormous multi-month gaps where I was living in my car or tent more than I was renting.

Needless to say, I haven’t been able to keep a lot of material possessions with me. They’ve spent most of the time in storage bins or my parents’ basement.

But now, they’re here. My car, my backpack, my piano, my books, my clothes, my wicker mirror, my childhood journals, my bicycle, my houseplants… they’re all in one place.

It’s amazing how many things I own that I forgot about.

Hello chicken timer!

“Is she free?”

Yesterday, I was telling my Pastor about a visit to my boyfriend’s mother, who lives in a sweet little country house in Western Mass. He expressed surprise that she could afford to buy a house in her late 60s.

“Well,” I explained, “she lives frugally.” And she does. Her aesthetic tends toward the sparse and utilitarian. She barely has any material possessions at all.

“Oh. Is she free?” he asked.

“What?” The question caught me off guard.

“Is she free? If she doesn’t have any material possessions weighing her down, she must be a free spirit.”

I had to chew on that one for a while.

“I guess we aren’t all weighed down by the same things,” he admitted eventually. But I wondered, as I settled into my new home, reunited with my old stuff.

As someone who dislikes clutter and likes back-country backpacking, I can certainly appreciate the freedom that comes from living minimally. As someone who has spent almost a decade wandering place-to-place every few months, I can also appreciate creature comforts. (I have internet now! In my house!)

Being home

While most people I know seem to be going in the other direction — worrying over too much stuff, too much technology, too much busy-ness in their lives – I’m sitting on a chair I inherited from my grandmother and deeply appreciating the comfort and consistency of home.

I am overwhelmed with gratitude each morning I bike to work along the gorgeous pond-circling tree-lined path, every night when I tuck my clothes back into my childhood bureau, every time I can sit on my porch and watch the summer storm clouds gather.

Right now, it doesn’t feel like too much to me. It feels like downpours of blessing.

But the minute I feel like my soul’s freedom is in question, it all goes. All of it. Starting with that chicken timer.

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Happy that Imperfect Prose is back over at Emily’s! Go visit

Rearrangement

There’s nothing like a cross-country road trip to bring summer to a close.

After a long drive, I am officially on the East Coast — settling, nesting, adjusting.

Things have been a little quiet around here while I re-arrange my life and unpack my boxes.

Be loved and be well. Life is for soaking up, moment by moment.

Constellations and Beginnings

Goodbye to this constellation

When I said goodbye to my wonderful therapist last week, she said: “We’re not saying goodbye to each other. We’re saying goodbye to our being together in this particular constellation in time.”

No one knows when or how our paths might cross again, but for now, we are parting. We are celebrating our time together and marking its end with tears and hugs.

I’m saying goodbye to many particular constellations in my life right now.

Goodbye to the San Francisco Bay and hello to the Massachusetts Bay. Goodbye to my cozy tiny apartment and hello to life in close community. Goodbye to the children of Oakland public schools and hello to the children of my new church family.

Hello to new beginnings

Moving is difficult and emotional and exciting — especially big moves across entire continents, from one ocean to another.

In this time of new beginnings, I am grateful to remember the wisdom offered by those who have gracefully gone through new beginnings:

There is nothing to fear in the act of beginning.
More often than not it knows the journey ahead better than we ever could.
Perhaps the art of harvesting the secret riches of our lives
is best achieved when we place profound trust in the act of beginning.
Risk may be our greatest ally. … There can be no growth
if we do not remain open and vulnerable to what is new and different.
I have never seen anyone take a risk for growth
that was not rewarded a thousand times over.
(John O’Donahue, To Bless the Space Between Us, 2)

Drifter

As we walked passed, he looked up at us from the curb, half-smoked cigarette hanging from his lips, and asked for spare change.

“I don’t have any money,” I tell him.

And I don’t. All I grabbed on my way out the door was my camera. This time was for art-making, not for shopping.

“Will you take my picture?” he asks when he sees my camera.

“Sure,” I say, and I kneel down to snap a few photos of him. It’s dusk and the last light is about to bleed out of the day.

“It’s a little dark,” I say, “so you might come out blurry. Try to hold still.” He tries.

After I take the picture, I sit down beside him to show him. Then I ask him his name.

He thinks for a moment, then tells me: “Drifter.”

I walk past the same spot the next day, but Drifter isn’t there anymore. He’s moved on to somewhere else.

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