Conspirations, December 2
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Tag Archives: wonder
Conspirations, December 1
December “Conspirations” for Peace
“Conspirations” by Nanso Cleaver, Jen Curley and Ann Keeler Evans! It’s true, we conspired together to create a series of meditations to take you through the entire month of December! Here’s the intro. Be inspired! Breathe! Star of Wonder! Joy to the World! Peace on Earth!
Sometimes Sabbath Peace is enough, llvl
Whether it’s a little boy laughing and flirting in a cafe or a grandmother with a lapful of love in sleepers reading her two boys a story, there are just times that the innocence fills your heart. And you know, the force for Peace is powerful.
But those two little boys in my friend’s lap face a far more uncertain world than the little in the cafe because they’re black and he is not.
That has to stop. We have to change that. We do. Because loving, giggly, happy boys deserve a chance… And the world deserves to know what gifts of wonder those little boys can become.
Sweet Sabbath Peace be with us. Wish me luck I’m preaching a difficult sermon on this today… For those celebrating the sacred season of Advent, I wish you Hope.
Peace Offerings, llvl
It often seems that the sacrifices we make these days are of the things that might save us. We’ll sacrifice relationships for rewards. (And we develop relationships with people on FB rather than, say, people.)
Let’s be clear, I’m not pointing any fingers here. There are plenty of cues I miss… Plenty of times I opt out of life.
Sacrifice seems so last mid-century. Everyone sacrificed. It was hard work, we didn’t like it. So we stopped.
Now things continue that we could change. But we don’t.
Was there a perfect era? Was everyone happy, safe, homed, fed? No.
Was there a sense of connection to something communal? Yes. Does that instill in us a sense of obligation to that bigger thing? Yes. Did it take investment? Did it take sacrifice? Yes, that too…
When we don’t take Peace seriously, when we are not responsible to it, the world continues to devolve. Someone asked an expert on Palestine the other evening what would change the war. He said what was required was for the trickle of interaction between the people would need to become a river and then a flood. That everything in the economy of other countries was angled toward that particular war. Only the people can change it.
It would take hard work. It would take sacrifice. But Imagine. We might be part of what brings Peace. The Peace on Earth Season is right around the corner. Let’s consider Peace. Let us make offerings small and large to Peace. That might put wonder back in the holiday season!
Peace Monuments, llvl
I sometimes wonder if the Universe doesn’t find little ways to amuse itself. Now maybe whoever built this house in 1860 carefully calculated how to capture the sun on the equinoxes and at no other time of the year.
Or maybe the Sun, on one of it’s endless rotations noticed this dark hallway and thought, huh, I can do this. Wonder if anyone will notice.
Did all the other inhabitants of the notice? I can ask one of them. There’s a guy in town whom I’ve been following from rental to rental… I’ve told him the next move is into his house. Small towns. everything has provenance and you can figure it out.
Or did it take this Earth-centered witch to hang the crystal and notice both the molten gold and the rainbow. When you work at home, you practice being present to all sorts of things! Whatever. It causes me to rejoice. I start checking about a week before, hope for sun on the days I’m looking on those late afternoons and wait for the magic to happen on this very dark stairwell. Ah! there it is!
Tiny little Blessings show up lots of places and give you Peace. Let’s pay attention! Let’s hear it for Peace.
Sabbath Seal Peace, llvl
Well, it doesn’t get much more local than yesterday. It was hard not to be present to every seemingly perfect moment. The day before was the day of seeing the seals. They were hilarious. Look, the neighbors dropped by! And there they were in a big-eyed smiling circle, just hanging out…
Marg, my first Swedish sister, who lived at my house when my brother was an exchange student, took me out for our daily constitutional, hup, hup. We ended that with a plop into the sea. It’s gorgeous on the coast, but there’s not a lot of shade because it gets scoured by winter storms. So the water felt wonderfully refreshing. Silly Swedes were saying, oh, how warm (70˚!)… i was gasping a bit, but really… it was so clean and clear AND it was warm enough to discourage man o war jellyfish from the day before. yikes.
I need to fasten this ability to stop daily life and be present to the moment in my brain. it’s good to do this now and again. look at this. look at that. look at this. oh, taste this. summer, summer, summer. sea, wind, water, sun. and love! 45 whole years of it.
Tomorrow I move on, and I’m both sad and excited. This time is so worth the work and the wait and the resources required. I tried to think yesterday… didn’t work to well. Love will keep growing if you just pay attention. Connections will be woven.
Today is Sunday and there’s a cake party underway. two cakes being baked. I’ve been assigned to assemble the meringue torte… under strict instructions. but what the heck. meringue, raspberries, blueberries, whipped cream. for that, I’ll follow anyone’s direction, do it just the way they want.
Yesterday was a tired day. couldn’t remember how to walk or speak swedish or do anything, so i stuck to doing the dishes and folding up the wash.
We finished the evening sitting on the patio until it finally got dark at about 11:30 (sun went down at about 10:10!). Two of Marg’s friends dropped by and there was a lot of laughter and tales of days gone by. Life is for the Living. the Sabbath is for the noticing. (I’ll be noticing the four cakes!) and for the reflecting as I pack down my suitcase for the next time… Heaven has been spotted many times. The bad news is that there are 4 inch slugs in Paradise. and i stepped on one… urgh. Peace. Gratitude. Beauty. Wonder. Love. ahhhhhhhhhh. Keeping the sacred in the sabbatical.
Variations on Peace, llvl
It’s all well and good for me to appreciate the glories of my local life, whether at home or at my friends’ homes. It is good to appreciate. But at the same time, I think, you hold the tension of life where things are not going well… There are always horrifying things, but today there seem to be so many.
With a dear friend, living with AIDS for 23 years now, I’m aware of the huge scientific loss of the Malaysia flight in addition to the humanitarian loss. What, you wonder, would make people think this violent act was a good idea? And then list all the other places in the world where people suffer horrendously for other people’s greed…
I’m grateful to know that a sister UU church is standing up and saying No to the hatred in Texas — And I’m sure there are plenty of other churches along side them… but horrified there are churches standing together on the other side of the street, that the welcome being extended is a counter protest.
So, when life is breathtaking in a little village in Sweden (or a little village in Pennsylvania), I think we must store that up against the horror — store it up so we have fuel to get back to work when the time is right… It was a beautiful day touring around the bay yesterday. The beauty is outrageous. The skies were clear and the temperature was perfect. The whole day was a prayer of gratitude and beauty.
And somehow the intermingled stories of the oysterwoman and her priest brother were just so simple and lovely. So I breathe in the love, the wonder, and the simplicity and let it soothe my soul. And I try to be present to each of the fabulous moments. There are so many right now. I am so lucky. I am so grateful. I am at Peace.
Peace Dreaming, llvl
Dreaming… It’s so important… Imagining something bigger is the first step to Peace. To envision sitting someplace with people unlike you in appearance but so like you in heart and soul; people who live somewhere so different from where you live… ah… that is a great and luxurious pleasure.
Dreaming is more than day dreaming, dreaming is serious business. It’s fun to simply float along, but it’s good to have a dream that looks to become reality. That sort of dreaming stretches our hearts and our heads…
It’s been fun to go to sleep on this bed with the map on the wall above me. and of course central to the map is Sweden. My whole life changed in Sweden… For a lot of reasons, I relearned friendship. I learned to speak another language and thus listen differently. I lived in another culture. I lived in another family. I was transformed, my heart fundamentally altered. It was such a wonderful experience. I came from such a safe wonderful but supremely little world. And then my life was broadened… even though I moved to another little world…
I love sitting betwixt and between… being here and remembering that life can be restarted… and looking at home where life is also burgeoning. (Deb Slade always knows how to capture our attention, doesn’t she?) Love. Peace. Growth. Possibility. The world really is much bigger than we think. Let us give thanks for the Wonder of it all!
Circle of Peace, llvl
Yesterday I received a call, asking me if I were free to perform a wedding. He and his partner are taking advantage of the new changes to the law in Pennsylvania and choosing to protect their relationship of many years. He called me because he had participated in a celebration of life service that I did.
Turns out that the memorial was for a dear friend whose wife is one of my besties. The poignancy of that connection was piercing. And where did I go in the midst of all that sniffling? Well, right to this week’s picture-perfect puzzle piece of the Sky. There we were, this world and the next, neatly folded together.
So that’s another piece, the way someone’s vision inspires and explains my own. another easy fit. Something you can find if you open to the possibility of its being there. Something that is there if you ask…
And, today, there will be another picture. How can it be as wonderful as this one? I often ask myself that… but then it is. and it is because the seasons keep turning and something shows up that’s worthy of our notice. And that’s the lovely sacred, sweetness of Life and Joy and Peace. We have to make space for the Wonder and the Hope, or people won’t pay attention. Yes, that’s our job, making space for the incredible. Sometimes just saying Oh, look at that, changes everything. It’s pretty simple if you think about it.
Life moves from Winter to Summer and back again. Life moves from Death to Commitment. Live moves and we get to be part of that — and we get to have companions on the way. Pretty damn’ sweet!
