Feat #19: Tradition

I don't know how many years ago--maybe ten?--Dad and I started a new summer lake tradition that I love. I take the shore path about three miles to Black Point, and he takes the sailboat. We meet at the pier there, then sail back home.

We did it today. Perfect wind and weather for it! And, it was my birthday. Can't think of many things I'd rather do to celebrate.

Normally, I wouldn't count this as a physical feat, but I accidentally gave Dad the estimated time it would take for me to run, not walk to our meeting place. I haven't actually run at all since last fall because I'm nursing my right knee, which has bothered me off and on since I slipped on our stairs and smacked it on the tile floor in our front hall.

He'd have been fine tacking back and forth in the boat while I walked, but I didn't want him to wait too long for me. So I decided to run intervals on the parts of the path that were grassy or smooth pavement or packed dirt and walk on the parts of the path that had more challenging footing, like uneven flagstones or lots of loose gravel. I figure I ran at least half of the distance.

Not bad for this particular 51-year-old.

Sunday Synchronicity

I texted Jack, who was up at the cottage. "It is wild and windy and not too hot here on the point! Bright blue sky and big fluffy clouds! Wander down and breathe the fresh air!"

Back to my book. The author was writing about Israel.

You stand on the high hills and look out at a thunderstorm rolling in from the Mediterranean. The depth-less blue sky becomes a steel gray, rain and hail lash down on you and you struggle to hold your footing in the violent wind. Rivers arise out of nowhere and rush in the canyons below you, sweeping away everything in their path.

The next moment our own sky turned to a steel gray. My sister Maryann said, "Look!" and we watched the sudden squall across the lake, headed right toward us. We quickly packed up our stuff and I yelled to Dad who was fixing something on the sailboat. He turned, saw, grabbed his tools and jumped off the boat.

Maryann and I couldn't run up the hill fast enough to escape the rain, but cousin Jody was waiting at her front porch to open the door for us. Dad took cover down on the point in the lee of a shed to keep an eye on the boat, which wasn't tied down to the hoist.

Ten minutes later, the rain stopped and we walked the rest of the way up the hill to our own cottage to change into dry clothes. By the time we got there the sun was shining again.

Back again to my book to pick up where I left off.

Ten minutes later the storm is gone but the world is covered in a glistening dew. The olive and lemon trees glow under the sun and the red earth under your feet throws off the smell of rosemary. God is here, you think. His glory and grace just appeared with might and fire.

Summer Hours

I am about to have an extra crazy month. House guests, conference, annual pilgrimage to the lake, parties, work. So I may or may not post anything until the middle of August. It is summer after all.

In the mean time, here are a couple of useful things I learned today:

If a person hits the emergency button on his cell phone and calls 911 without meaning to, then hangs up as soon as he discovers what he did, they will call him to find out if he either (A) meant to call and accidentally hung up or (B) accidentally called and meant to hang up.

If a person happens to get oil on his shorts while he and his friends are taking apart the old broken lawn mower, just spray some degreaser from the auto supply store on the stain and then throw the shorts in the wash.

Into the Wild

My friend Shelley is a stay-at-home mom with four children under six, including her youngest who spent the first 8 1/2 months of her life in the NICU and who continues to need lots of ongoing medical attention.

Shelley also has the soul of an adventurer. It can be tough for an adventurer to be so utterly grounded, no matter how much she loves her children.

The other day, as she sat with her baby in the hospital, waiting for her to wake up from her 37th trip to the OR, she wrote on her blog about tapping into her reserve of memories of past adventures across the globe to sustain her, but still wishing she could enjoy the exhilaration of, say, driving through the desert in a jeep.

I thought, "Hey, I have a jeep!" and "Hey, I know a place nearby that feels exotic and worlds away!" So I secretly made arrangements with her husband and then whisked her away into the wild for an hour or two to feed her adventurer soul.

Processing

I'm still processing the morning I spent with a 90-year-old neighbor and friend yesterday. I called to check on her about 9:00 and discovered that her shoulder was giving her tremendous pain and she was unable to get out of bed. So I went over to see what I could do.

It took a few hours to track down someone who knew where her pain pills were stashed, and during those hours we talked. As long as she did not move her shoulder, she was sort of okay, but the slightest movement caused her great agony.

While we talked, I fed her a piece of cinnamon raisin toast and some cherries that a neighbor had brought over from her tree. I told her that she was like Cleopatra, reclined in her bed, being fed grapes. I helped her take the dozen or so pills in her Sunday a.m. pill box, hoping that one of them might be a pain pill (none of them were).

Over and over, she said she knew the time had come to move to a care center. She was distraught at the thought of leaving the home she'd lived in and loved for so much of her adult life, but she'd begun to accept that she couldn't live alone anymore. I could tell she was trying to get used to the idea, to convince herself, with every repetition.

I remembered other visits, when she'd talked over and over about a friend who'd finally resigned herself to using a wheelchair and about another friend who'd decided she had to give up driving after living a fiercely independent life. I wonder if she'd been subconsciously processing through her friends' experiences the decision she knew deep down she was getting closer to having to make.

It will be okay. She's got a place to go where she'll be taken good care of. She'll be closer to family. And she's a spirited gal.

But still, my heart is broken for her.

Can We Go Back in Time Just a Little?

Technically this picture of Dr. Who was taken yesterday, Jack all spiffed up with the tweed jacket he found at a thrift store for five bucks and a bow tie he borrowed from Dad. But it's the same guy who drove us home from church today in our five-speed TARDIS-er, Jeep.

Barriers

We pulled into a gas station for a bit of respite from construction traffic in Chilpancingo as we drove south from Mexico City a few weeks ago. While I paid for our snacks, I watched Jack crouch down by the floor-to-ceiling windows that spanned the front of the little store, his back to me.

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My niece explained to her eight-year-old son that an important promise he would make to God as he was baptized early this morning is to mourn with those who mourn and to comfort those who need comfort. He was surrounded by hearts full of love and prayers for him as his father gently held him and he worked through the challenge of putting his head under the water. It was especially hard for him, but he wanted to do it and he did.

This past week on Facebook, my dear cousin plead with both the heart of a mother and the heart of a newly converted Jew for the world to pay attention to the news of the Israeli teens who were kidnapped as they walked home from school in the West Bank and murdered. At the same time, a heartrending exchange unfolded on my feed between a friend from East Jerusalem, who was pleading for people to remember their humanity, and her friend--I think a sister--who was struggling to hear her through so many mothers' tears shed when news broke of an Arab teen found burned to death.

Roger and I talked the other day about the recent influx of Central American children crossing the southern border into the U.S. He speculated about the radical transformation that could occur in the hearts of our communities if the impossible were to happen and we openly invited 50,000 families to say to the children, "Come, you have a place here with us in our homes." Impossible because we think that if we allowed it, only more would come. We have the right, we tell ourselves, to protect our way of life.

I recently heard John Shelby Spong, a Biblical scholar who is dismissed as a heretic by many Christians, speak what my soul recognizes as truth. "We need some process," he said, "That will expand our humanity beyond the barriers that we have erected in our need for security . . . [They] have made it possible for us to get to the top of the food chain, but at this moment the barriers that we have created as our defense system in our struggle to survive have begun to kill our humanity."

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I couldn't figure out what Jack was doing, crouched there by the windows, until he stood up and turned, and I saw he was gently cupping a huge insect in his hands. How long had it been banging its wings against the glass unnoticed? He carefully carried it outside and released it into a pot of flowers blooming by the door.

Endowed by Its Creator

Drove down to the edge of Utah Lake tonight just in time to catch the spectacularly blood-orange sun drop behind the purple mountain.

Nature's fireworks.

Good Job!

Jack passed the written test for his driving learner permit today. What I especially love about this photo is that he is smiling a genuine smile, not an I'm-just-smiling-because-my-parents-are-taking-a-picture-of-me-and-they-told-me-to-smile smile.

Attention!

Downtown Mexico City, June 2014.

One of the best street performers I've ever seen. He totally earned whatever money Jack pulled out of his pocket and gave him.

This Way the Adventure Never Ends

Here's to days like today when I wistfully finish a book I started reading on vacation, then dragged out as long as I could so I could pretend for a little bit each day that I was still on vacation . . .

And a dear friend surprises me with the gift of a new book that I can't wait to begin.

Feat #18: Pacific!

This likely won't be the last swimming post of my 50 physical feats project. Because, well, swimming.

I'm not sure the photo quite does this feat justice because it was hard to capture the size and power of the waves. The little dots are Jack's head and my head. We negotiated the post-storm surf several times during our stay in Acapulco to enjoy the relative calm beyond.

It's not hard to get out past the breakers because you can dive through them. Getting back to dry land, though, is tricky. While we did get better at timing our exits, I can't say I always managed the strong undertow gracefully. Or that I didn't end up with lots of sand in my suit.

But I will say that after the last of my dips in the Pacific, I caught the eye of the young lifeguard, and I'm pretty sure the admiring nod he gave me was for my middle-aged bravery.

Feat #17: Lives in My Hands

From time to time, I take elderly neighbors who have given up driving to places they need to go. Grounding themselves is the right thing to do, but it's hard for them to lose their independence. I know it will be hard for me one day, and I hope I manage that transition gracefully.

In the meantime, I love having the chance to push my driving skills beyond the norm. And what better place to do it than Mexico City with a cute little rented stick shift? It may not be the worst city in the world to drive in, but it definitely ranks up there.

I won't lie; there were a few crazy moments. But just like my school French surfaced every time I tried to speak Spanish, the instincts I developed young in Boston were right there when I needed them.

Adorable Fiat parked by Maryann's Coyoacan apartment, all packed up for a road trip!

Don't let her relatively quiet street fool you!

Returning the car without a scratch on it :)

Feat #16: Rest Stop

Almost every time we went on a road trip as a family while I was growing up, Dad would make a point of finding some where along the route to get us in the water. I remember community swimming pools, cold mountain lakes, rivers, ponds, oceans. Pretty much any body of water would do.

And as a kid, I loved it! My hair was long and straight, and changing in and out of a suit was a breeze. Then I became a grownup, I needed things like privacy and a hair dryer, and I married someone who will swim but who rarely actually thinks of swimming. Now I have a son, and I want him to know the pleasure of stopping in the middle of a road trip on a hot day for a refreshing dip.

I've long wanted to check out Sand Hallow reservoir with red rocks to dive from just off I-15 near Hurricane, Utah, and we decided to stop there on the way home from Las Vegas last week. We drove the winding road all the way to the entrance of the state park and discovered a big sign that read "Warning: Swimmer's Itch." So not worth the risk. Hopes dashed.

But we'd passed a sign for Quail Creek reservoir on the way, so we stopped to check it out on the way back to the highway. Not, perhaps, as stunning a setting, but the water was cool and free of swimmer's itch. Ah!

Quail Creek Reservoir, June 2014

(And my hair even looked decent after air drying! A benefit of growing wirier hair as I age, I think.)

Unheard

We've been experiencing quite a bit of seismic activity in our faith community the past few weeks--the kind we have experienced about every 20 years during my lifetime, but which has been amplified this time around through social media as events have unfolded.

Shortly after I heard the news of pending disciplinary action against several members who have been vocal advocates of change in the church, including a woman who leads a group seeking female ordination, I visited one of Diego Rivera's famous murals which depicts figures in Mexican history. The image of Catholic nun Juana Inés de la Cruz happened to catch my eye.

According to the key at the museum, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz was "the most famous poet in New Spain" in the 1600s. "In a sense she was the forerunner in the struggle for equality of women. In her exquisite poetry she defended women's rights to education and culture and to freely express their innermost feelings, a standard unheard and unacceptable at that time (emphasis mine)."

Reading that was a poignant and painful and hopeful reminder both of how far we have come and how far we have to go. I know I struggle daily with how and when and where to use my voice in many areas.

Today this is what I want to say.

For as long as I can remember, I have known women who have felt diminished, for one reason or another, in the patriarchal church. Sometimes it has been me. The challenges that this imbalance between masculine and feminine energy present and the sincere desire some women feel to engage more fully and deeply in the spiritual life of the community are not new and not so mysterious.

What I yearn for on behalf of so many is a genuine attempt to understand their experiences instead of a reflexive dismissal, even when they don't express them in orthodox ways or if the ideas they put forward for change aren't going to fly. I yearn for the respect of real dialogue and unambiguous answers.

It can be pretty tough expressing innermost feelings. A "we hear you" helps.

Feat #15: Yeah, But Here's My Grammie Doing It, Too

Me at 50, Pyramid of the Sun, Teotihuacan, 2014

Grammie in her 70s, Chichen Itza, circa 1985

Grammie and I both made it to the top, and, perhaps more importantly, made it back down again. Hope I'm still climbing pyramids in 25 years!

How My Universe Works

On our way home from Mexico City last week, we stopped for a night in Las Vegas. As soon as we checked into our hotel, Jack and I headed for a swim, which is a great antidote for a day spent in taxis and airports and on airplanes.

I'm still not quite sure what to make of 19-year-old Vito, who started up what turned out to be a lengthy conversation with me in the pool. He was born in Milan, but is lately from Australia. In town for a tech convention.

As we talked, I was trying to remember my short visit to Milan when I was 17. The Last Supper. A transportation strike. And some building with arched glass ceilings, but I couldn't place it.

No kidding, the very next day, a friend traveling in Italy posted this photo of the train station there. Mystery solved.

No Words

It can be challenging to travel in another country when you don't speak the language. Not just because logistics are more complicated, but because it can make you feel so isolated. Our trip to Mexico was Jack's first experience with this, and even though my sister speaks Spanish and could translate for us when we were all together, it was a bit jarring for him.

So I especially loved it whenever we made a human connection without language.

The kind man in the metro, for example, who helped Jack through a turnstile when it didn't work on the first try. The security guard who helped us figure out the keys to get into Maryann's apartment while she was at work. The guard at a museum who graciously lent me the pen in his shirt pocket when I desperately wanted to make some notes but hadn't taken my bag in with me. The energy of the crowd in the restaurant when we watched Mexico hold its own against Brazil in a World Cup game.

And the sandy little girl we met on the beach in Pie de la Cuesta. She struck up a conversation with Maryann in Spanish, but drew us in, too, with a song and a smile.

Sí, Pero No

Maryann in San Angel, Mexico City, 2014

Jack and I had a wonderful time with my sister in Mexico City and Acapulco! Maryann has been living in Coyoacan since January, so she had some good tips for us. One discussion we had about how to gracefully handle vendors who are eager to make a sale was especially helpful.

"No, gracias" ended up being our go-to response, but Maryann explained that many people in Mexico will actually say "sí, pero no" - yes, but no - to get around giving a flat out "no."

I like that it's a way of acknowledging that you hear people before turning them down.

And, hehehe, it's now my go-to response to Jack, when he makes requests like, "Can I have that $20 bill in your wallet?"

Nice try. Sí, pero no.

Hiatus

I'm not leaving town yet, but I'm going to start my blogging hiatus today because I have a lot to do before I go. Will be back to my goal of daily posts in a few weeks!