To the Pheasant living at the corner of Linwood and Gladstone

5/4/2020

Dear Bird,

I confess that your family’s presence here in the city is more than a little shocking.

Last week, during an early morning walk with Becky, I saw what must be a cousin of yours in the side yard of a house two blocks down. A few weeks before that, I drove past another one on Woodrow Wilson St. right by the on-ramp to John C. Lodge Freeway. And then back before Christmas, one of your clan spent the better part of a day back in the weeds behind our duplex.

Yesterday, when I was taking a long Sunday afternoon stroll, I saw you. You were strolling too--through the houseless corner lot at Linwood and Gladstone. I can’t say it was an empty lot because a thriving dandelion empire occupied the space, and a good number of violet villages were in residence as well. Anyhow, you were promenading through the dandelion domain as though you rule it. Perhaps you do. You certainly look like royalty: dazzling in your deep burgundy and iridescent navy headdress. Your carriage is absolutely regal, and your tail feathers long and lordly. (A peacock’s got nothing on you, in my opinion.)

I was quite awed by you and wanted to approach you and offer my regards in person, but it seems that you were anxious to avoid me. I know you saw me because I watched as you dropped your imperial posture, flattened yourself into the grasses, and scurried behind a rotting stump, making sure to keep it between us as I walked past. I understand, of course, that a noble pheasant such as yourself can’t be associating with mere peasants like me. Still, I wanted to express my admiration of your beauty and gratitude for your presence here among us. I trust this letter will find its way to you and will sufficiently convey the sincerity of my praise and my best wishes for your health and well-being.

May you live long and may your tribe increase.

Humbly,

Miriam

The pheasant himself (and his tree stump)

Stay-at-Home Ponderings

I wrote these thoughts out the day the Michigan governor announced the stay-at-home order. Now 97% of Americans are under a stay-at-home protocol. While we're beginning to adjust to a new normal, we're also still reeling in many ways and grappling with our new reality.

Personally, I don't really know exactly what to think of it all (especially the swirling politics). What I do know is that this is a time for love, kindness, trust, and generosity. It's a time for prayer (if you're a person of faith) and grieving with the suffering, for creativity and patience. I'm seeking to lean into those things, and so are most of the people that I know personally. And if we lean toward kindness together--if we lean towards each other--this can be a time of hope and renewal for our planet.

Bloodroot in Maybury State Park, Spring 2020 (a solitary quarantine walk) 

Exposed

3/23/2020

We feel these days deeply and painfully.

As though we are relearning something about ourselves and our existence:

life is fragile.

We are fragile.

This time, it’s not 4 airplanes and 3 crash scenes that remind us

suddenly 

on a Tuesday morning

that we are fragile.

It’s not the news of the impending tsunami making landfall and claiming 230,000 lives.

It’s not an individual tragedy--a phone call with a diagnosis, discovery of an accidental overdose, a family disruption, a job loss--that we experience in isolation from those around us.

This.

This has come to all of us.

It is, at once, a sudden and a creeping thing.

It rose rapidly but lingers with uncertainty. 

We cannot wrap our minds around it, because it is always shifting, changing, evolving.

The narrative keeps unfolding.

This is a virus.

And it’s established a monopoly on our TVs, radios, internet sources, social media feeds, and even our private conversations.

It’s become a household name. A global terror.

A pandemic.

And we are exposed.

Exposed to change.

Exposed to harm.

Exposed, yes, to a virus,

but, oh, so much more.

We are exposed

to our mortality,

to the vulnerability of our lives that, God knows, we tried so hard to make safe, secure, and comfortable.

We are exposed

to raw emotions (our own and others’),

to needs we cannot fathom,

to suffering we cannot alleviate,

to information we cannot make sense of,

to disruption we cannot evade.

We are exposed to our fragility.

This violent virus, microbial menace.

Today, the governor announced a stay-at-home protocol for the state of Michigan.

Some feel this as governmental overstepping; others, as too little, too late.

The diverse perspectives reiterate our tensions, our loss of control, the invasiveness of the whole situation.

We each respond in a different way. But we all respond, think, feel, something. After all, our lives are being invaded. 

No one is immune

to this fragility,

our humanity.

We are reminded again.

By a microscopic organism.

Reminded that our precious lives are uncertain.

Reminded that we are fragile.

Reminded that we are human.

It is a good reminder:

we are all human.

Dear humans, let us love well.

Lent 2020

“Remember that you are dust and to dust you will return.”

Each year for many of us, Lent begins with the pronouncement of these words and the smudging of an ashy cross on our foreheads. A sober reminder of our fragile humanity.

This year, however, the Lenten season has come to us with even deeper and more far-reaching impact, and regardless of faith tradition, we as human beings have faced our mortality and vulnerability with renewed awareness.

The traditional season of contemplation, fasting, and mourning has entered our lives in new, invasive, and uncomfortable ways in the form of a pandemic.

Lord, have mercy.

Christ, have mercy.

Brothers and sisters, members of the human family, we are dust. 

We are vulnerable, but love is strong.

Let us love well during these days.

From the Coffee Shop Window

“It’s snowing,” reports my brain.

The corner of my eye had caught the motion of graceful white flakes drifting towards the earth.

Hearing this, my soul lights up and instinctively half-turns to welcome the wonder of falling snow.

From somewhere in another corner of my brain, a grumpy realist voice rasps, “It's sunny and May. It’s not even snowing. You know that. What are you thinking?”

Conflicted, my soul stops in its tracks and throws a questioning glance toward my eye: the resident data collector.

Eye, suddenly defensive, glances out the window to verify its initial observation.

And.

Heartmelt.

We were all right. It IS snowing, but not snow-snow. Small white petals from the crab-apple tree outside the window gently waft downward, coaxed by the light breeze.

Beautiful. Wonder-full.

And even the realist, too pleased to monologue, dances with delight.

Image by Alois Grundner from Pixabay

A Night in Moscow

I recently visited my brother's family in Turkey. What follows is an account of the night I unexpectedly spent in Moscow.

Istanbul airport - photo creds: Tim Keesee

Saturday early afternoon, I flew out of the new Istanbul airport. It literally opened this week. Security checks went smoothly, and we boarded on time and then sat on the tarmac for an hour and a half. According to the captain's voice over the intercom, we were delayed "due to heavy airport traffic." This was not good news, since my layover in Moscow was only an hour and a half. We finally took off, landed in Moscow shortly after 7:00pm, and taxied for a long time. The minutes dwindled, and it became more certain I would miss my connecting flight. Sure enough, by the time we deplaned, the Aeroflot agent at the transfer desk said boarding for my 7:40pm flight was already closed. Of course, I wasn't the only one trying to make a connecting flight, so I wandered off, found a restroom, and then waited till the lines died down and those with a chance of making connections (“Shanghai! Shanghai! Shanghai!”) got through. When it was my turn to be helped, the lady was efficient and kind: rescheduled me for a 9:20am flight, gave me a 1000-ruble voucher for supper in the airport, and told me to go to the service desk in the terminal at 10:00pm for hotel shuttle arrangements. 

I went through passport control and into the terminal. Wandered around, located the service desk area, sat there for a bit, connected to the wifi, checked bus and train schedules from NYC to Boston, rearranged my bus tickets for the next day, texted the people who needed updates, and then went looking for food. I felt rich and at ease, me with my 1000 rubles wandering around and scoping out prices. Landed at an upstairs restaurant with decent food and a server who didn’t seem happy to see anyone. I ordered freshly squeezed grapefruit juice and a salmon and mango salad. I ate and texted and read, but, thanks to my grumpy waitress, didn’t feel free to hang out there till 10pm, so I ventured back downstairs, refilled my water bottle, found a sitting place, read till the appointed time, then made my way back to the service desk. 

Join the crowd. Turns out there were two flights that had issues. One from Istanbul, the other from Amsterdam. I was standing just outside the desk area next to a guy that I thought might be English-speaking. I made an offhand comment, and he responded. We small-talked. He was from Portland, traveling to India for work, stranded by the Amsterdam misconnection. We were temporarily joined by a third American, also headed to India for business and stranded by the Amsterdam flight. There was no movement at the desk, though, until two Aeroflot agents swept by us with a stack of papers, went behind the desk, and started processing people and paperwork. No small job. Portland guy and I joined the queue near the third guy from earlier, and the three of us kept chatting. The line moved slowly. Very. The key difficulties seemed two-fold: 1) Russia requires a visa for entry, which none of us had, of course, so red tape was everywhere and 2) the airline was understaffed. 

3rd guy got taken care of and moved off, and a 4th guy came up. “Are you guys Americans or Canadians? I heard you speaking English.” Portland and I responded that we were Americans. (Like good international travelers, none of us exchanged names.) 4th dude was from New Jersey: extroverted, shaved head, returning from vacation in Istanbul. He carried a violin case and his enthusiasm quite prominently. (I had observed him give up his seat to women and elderly travelers several times when I was in the service desk area earlier). New Jersey chatted affably, while Portland and I edged closer to the desk. Eventually, all us had our docs and waited together at the edge of the crowd outside the service area. It was pretty close to midnight, and we were assuming that the next step was to head to the shuttle. 

We were wrong. 

Since we didn't have visas, we had to go through passport control again. All 69 or 76 of us. By now, we stranded passengers seemed to have about five Aeroflot agents assigned to us. They literally walked around counting noses. Not really a fun night for them. The passport control person responsible to process us had also had better days. She was meticulous and curt, and the security process was excruciatingly slow. 

Portland, 3rd guy, New Jersey, and I were basically an identifiable foursome by this point. We talked about places we’d traveled, travel experiences, vocations, cultures, the effects of communism, and much more. A Russian guy, who spoke decent English, lives in Germany, has dual citizenship and a great sense of humor phased in and out of our conversation. Being tri-lingual, he could talk with everyone around him and usually evoked smiles. He reminded me of my old Bulgarian manager, Stan: physically a little, but even more, his ironic wit and cross-cultural humor.

After the four of us made it through passport control (we were roughly in the middle of the line), we waited in the waiting area together and continued to chat. 3rd guy and Portland discovered that they’d be returning from India on the same flight as well. I joked that they were basically travel buddies now, even though they didn’t know each other’s names yet, and I observed our careful allegiance to the no-name traveler code. That’s when we finally exchanged names. New Jersey introduced himself as Mark; I, of course, am Miriam. Portland was Mitch, and 3rd guy, without missing a beat, said, “and I’m from Minnesota.”  We laughed. His name is Frank. 

By this point, we had stood in lines for hours. Stan’s look-alike joined our square. He markets gambling machines, and the conversation drifted to some of his experiences. Eventually, Mitch bowed out and went to sit down in the hallway. I followed suit shortly. 

The meleé of Russian, German, Chinese, Turkish, Korean, and French, continued to swirl around us. A Chinese family, led by their patriarch started to become testy, hassling the already-harried Aeroflot agents. Two elementary-aged children played Marco Polo up and down the tile hall lined with luggage, legs, and one lanky teenager unapologetically stretched full length on the floor. Some people attempted sleep. Others sat with their devices. Most huddled in small groups with sporadic conversations. 

(It’s hard to convey the surreal and yet incredibly mundane and human texture of circumstances like these. The surreal feeling comes, in part, from the weariness and displacement of traveling, coupled with the stress of undesired changes and uncertainty. The mundaneness of it comes from people showing respect and kindness and taking things in stride. We all know no one likes this, and everyone is put out by it, to a greater or lesser extent. But here we are adjusting, making arrangements, and working towards a communal making-the-best-of-things. Hence, the jokes and the smiles, the understanding nods, the periodic eye-rolls, and the sympathy for those a little more bent out of shape. We get it. Sometimes life stinks; even normal everyday life requires lots of patience and flexibility. You gotta roll with the punches. And that's what we're doing. We’re practicing our life-skills in a slightly different context, under a little more pressure and uncertainty. That’s all. In a very real sense, it feels normal. Even deja vu sometimes.)

As the process wore on, some of the travelers with early morning flights decided it would be a waste of time to go to the hotel, and opted to just stay at the airport. Mark was one of those. We were down to three. Choosing to stay at the airport was all well and good except for the fact that apparently Passport Control Lady had to accompany us to the bus, so when people decided they wanted to go back into the terminal, she had to re-process them to allow them back in, thus delaying our departure even more. Finally, a little after 1:00am, we headed downstairs with our Aeroflot-assigned babysitters counting noses all the way. (I think that, since we didn’t have visas, Aeroflot legally had to keep tabs on us at all times.) We got downstairs and waited again. This time for the bus. 

A bus came. 

It took all but eight of the passengers. Mitch, Frank, “Stan,” me, and four others. We stood in the entryway with good ol’ Passport Control herself (we were almost growing fond of her; Mitch and I had created a narrative for her) and two other agents, waiting for a second bus. The door was propped open, and the cold Russian night air found us easy prey. We consoled ourselves by saying that, at least by the time we got to the hotel, the others would have received their room assignments already, and we wouldn’t have to stand in line there as well. 

A second bus came, and we and our escorts boarded and drove the 15-20 minutes to the Novotel hotel. The bus pulled past the main entrance, circling around to a seedy back entrance. Our agents got off the bus first and stood as we filed past them into the building. No joke, a security officer met us at the door, muttering into his earpiece. He crowded us all into an elevator, closed the doors, and pushed a button. The elevator began to rise, and Stan hummed a tune. He would. “Elevator music?” I said to him. He chuckled; we relaxed. The worst was over, we felt. The doors opened, and a second security guard was waiting for us. They led us through doors that said things like “staff only” and “do not enter” in both Russian and English. “They’re taking us to their maximum security rooms,” I muttered to Mitch. “I’m wondering how we get out of here in the morning,” he replied. My eyes fell on the security guard’s name-tag: Maxim. It seemed appropriate. 

After all the lines and waiting, the official rush and crispness of the last few minutes was making us hopeful for hot showers and beds soon. We blew through a set of double swinging doors, and Frank let his breath out suddenly. We were at the back of a long line again. The hotel hallway was filled with our traveling companions. All of them. Still. 

Maxim moved through the crowd to the check-in desk. There, he and another hotel official began photocopying passports and assigning rooms one by one. 

We fell in behind a young Korean couple. 

Stan joked that there wouldn’t be enough rooms, so we’d still be sleeping in the halls or sharing rooms. (I wish you could hear the mix of accents in these dialogues.) 
The Korean wife, who didn’t know him as well as we did by now, turned around. “Are you serious?” 
“Yes,” said Stan. “Four to a room. Four Chinese. Four Germans. Four Americans...” 
She hesitated, not sure if he was joking or serious. “I don’t think so...”
“This is how they do it in Russia,” he insisted. 
We suppressed grins. She looked at her husband for support. 
“We were here three years ago and that’s not how it was.”
“But you had a visa then.”
He started smiling, and she realized he was teasing, and turned back around, unsure of how to take his humor. 

“Wonder how New Jersey’s making out at the airport,” Frank commented. “You’ll have to let him know about this in the morning.”
I rolled my eyes and nodded. 

The sturdy old-fashioned copier took its time documenting our presence, and slowly but surely the line dwindled. Eventually, it was our turn: the end of the line. Mitch and Frank and Stan motioned me forward, “Go ahead.” 
“Thanks, guys.”
“Passport, please,” said Maxim.
He copied it while the lady at the desk signed me in. “Breakfast will be delivered to your room at 6 o’clock; come back here at 6:30 for your shuttle. Your room is 1177, down the hall on the right” (remember to read that in a Russian accent). 
It was after 2:30am. Maxim handed me back my passport.
I nodded to the guys. “Goodnight, y’all.”  
“Goodnight. Sleep fast.”

And the encounter was over. Just like that. Four hours of making the world a better place for each other, and we’ll probably never see each other again. I liked those guys and prayed for them as I settled into my room.

A long hot shower and 2.5 hours of real sleep. Worth it.

At 6:30, one other passenger, I, and two Aeroflot escorts were at the desk. Maxim checked us out and led us through the back passageways again to where the shuttle was waiting to take us back to the airport.

Once inside the airport, our agents released us back into general circulation. I wonder how many shuttle trips they made that day: taking us back to the airport and turning us loose in groups of twos, threes, and fours. Bless their hearts.

This time the flight left on time: 9:20am, and I landed at JFK in New York 9.5 hours later.

Expectations and Trust

“...you will conceive and bear a son…

call his name Jesus.

He will be great

& will be called the Son of the Most High.

The Lord God

will give to him the throne of his father David,

& he will reign over the house of Jacob forever,

& of his kingdom there will be no end….

The child to be born will be called holy--the Son of God.” (Lk. 1)

This is what You told Mary to start with. This was how her story started. These were the expectations that You set. This happened before all the shame, before Joseph and the turmoil of the engagement being threatened, before the Roman politics and the tax census. This happened before Simeon’s terrifying and cryptic words, before the visit of the Magi, the horrifying actions of Herod, and the escape to Egypt. This happened before Mary's life was completely disrupted, turned upside-down, destroyed.

You sent an angel to a young woman with a message full of wonder and promise and presence. And she believed it.

And, God, from where we stand, it all went downhill from there. Why You do ‘dis?

Also from our perspective: things often go this way, and at the end of the path of an obedience that began with hope and light and certainty, we, like Mary, find ourselves standing at the foot of a cross, heartbroken. Looking up at the bloody, mangled remains of the gift that came to us with such promise and hope. What is this awfulness? No wonder we feel like fools when You ask us to hold onto faith and hope for a Resurrection. But where else can we go?

“Behold, I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me like you have said.”

So...please...heal our cynicism and skepticism. Our hard-heartedness.

God, we have hurt often and long and hard at how Your words and promises come true in real life. Apparently our expectations are usually wrong and Your purposes are inscrutable (You actually told us that ahead of time). We often feel like there’s a terrible bait-and-switch going on, and like we can’t take Your words at face value (but we’re afraid that we’re going to be punished if we don’t--cue the Zechariah story: “you’ll be mute because you didn’t believe my words that will be fulfilled in their time”). It’s hard for us to believe that You will end things in a way that is “better than we could ask or think,” since things regularly go worse than we expected/hoped (based, we thought, on things You had said). We feel our smallness and our inadequacy in understanding and interpreting the things You say to us.

The more this happens, the more suspicious we become of angels and angel visits and angel messages and anything else that seems too good to be true, too full of goodness and joy. Suspicious of You and Your trustworthiness.

I guess I don’t think You blame us, though. You actually understand. You know that faith is a tall order. That’s why You value it so much. You like to be trusted, because You know just how confusing and hard things can get from our side of the coin.

So help us to trust You. May the Spirit fill us again today and convince us that You do love us. Give us the willingness and ability to trust You. We actually do love You. You loved us, and You planted love for You in our hearts. No matter how much we struggle, we actually do love You and want You. So breathe life back into our faith today.

And when we are confused or hurt or afraid or cynical or angry, come down and be near to us: be our Jesus who saves his people from their sins and is our God with us.

“We will trust in You.”

^^^This miracle brought to us by the Spirit of the Holy One who overshadows us and places life within us. Just like he did in Mary.

*written 11/8/18

Image by Free Photos from Pixabay

Lament

Teach us to lament with You,

O God.

We feel Your grief; it rises strong

in us.

The hurt that fills Your heart

now floods

our own and makes us know

that You—

Ancient and Wise beyond our grasp—

still feel

the brokenness and pain that seem

always 

to come, to cut, to curse, to cure.

And yet,

You have not made Yourself

exempt

from all the harm of humanness.

You came,

and as a Man, You shared our lot.

You bore 

the bitter days of darkness, worlds

of grief;

absorbed into Your heart 

the ache

of all that evil’s rage has marred

in us.

Your life and death continue on:

the Church

reflects You, Three-in-One.

We share

with You in life and death, relationships and harm

and grief,

and, weeping, raise our own

lament.

God is Happy with You

Thoughts from Psalm 149.

“...let the children of Zion rejoice in their King!

For the Lord takes pleasure in His people...

...let them sing for joy on their beds.”

Did you catch that? Did you hear what the psalmist just said? "Be happy," he says, and then tells you why: “because God takes pleasure in you.”

Among the reasons for joy, this is an unexpected one. 
Did you know, human being, that you make God happy?

And He wants you to be happy about making Him happy and also happy that He’s happy with you.

According to the psalmist, it’s the kind of happiness that you take with you to bed and night and enjoy as you prepare to go to sleep. "Let them sing for joy on their beds." (You know how you felt when you found out that that person that you liked actually liked you back...it’s like that.) You make God happy, and God is happy with you. Child of the royal city, be glad.

“Child of the royal city.” Child of the royal city: that's kind of an interesting title, though. Does it remind you of anything else?
It should. 
It should remind you that, a couple thousand years later, this message about God being happy with you hasn’t changed.
A long time after the psalmist wrote his song, some angels came to earth and sang something really similar:

“Don’t be afraid, because I’m bringing you good news of great joy for all people: a Child has been born in the royal city, and He is the Savior. You can go see Him....Praise to God in heaven, and here on earth, peace for those with whom He is pleased” (Luke 2).

There it is again: there’s good news to make you happy.

God is here, and He is pleased with you.

And He always will be. Because the Child born in the royal city is ruling the Royal City now, and He’s going to gather you and all the other children of the Royal City to come be with Him. He’s the King, and He delights in His people.

Sit back.

Take it all in.

Think about it for a long time and let it sink in (even Mary had to do that, and she was there).

Take it to bed with you and turn it over in your head and heart till you fall asleep.

God is here, and He is happy with you.