Every Wednesday for three years I spent an hour-and-a-half with Mary Harris, a wise woman in her 80’s. I told myself I wasn’t going to her for therapy, but therapy was what was going on in her living room. I was in Seminary at the time. I had come to California from a big church in Texas. I figured I had exactly what California needed. How Texas of me.
One morning it occurred to me that maybe Mrs. Harris needed a dose of the old-time religion. I asked her if she’d ever heard a really good sermon. She said she wasn’t sure. I told her I had one. She asked me, “Whose?” I told her, “Mine.” She told me she’d be glad for me to bring it by next time. I touched her hand and told her I’d be right back. (I happened to have one in the car).
I fully expected her to pop it into the player immediately. She didn’t. Maybe she was waiting until after I left.
I fully expected her to call me on the phone that night and rave on and on about me.
She didn’t.
I came back the next Wednesday. She didn’t mention it. She didn’t mention it the next Wednesday either. Finally, I asked her if she ever heard the tape.
“Yes,” she said. “I heard it twice the day you left it with me.”
“What did you think?” I asked her.
“I don’t think you are ready to hear,” she said.
I told her I was ready to hear. I assumed she was afraid I would become too inflated from all her praise.
She said that both times she heard it she kept getting a recurring picture:
“There was a big test tube filled with people, like ants, working. There was a house 100 yards away from the test tube. Every day you would come out of the house carrying a tall ladder and a bull horn. You would lean the ladder against the test tube, climb to the top, lean halfway in and shout instructions down to the workers. But no one ever listened to you because they all knew you had never been in the test tube yourself.”
The next summer I fell in. It about killed me, but it was the most fortunate fall I’ve ever taken. I ran into God who had been living and working down there all the time.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Grace Will Find Us
The longest year of my life was the six months I spent as a volunteer chaplain on the transplant floor at Santa Rosa Children’s Hospital. When it was good it was very, very good; and when it was bad…
A five-year-old boy was waiting for a liver. The clock was ticking. His parents would come to see him every day, before and after work. One afternoon I didn’t want to see them. Everything was too sad, plus I was out of gas. I snuck out early. At 4:45, I headed downstairs for the parking lot. I got off the elevator in the lobby and saw them pulling into the handicapped space near the front door. I ducked into the bathroom.
I was looking in the mirror when I heard someone coming. I hurried into the last stall. Someone came in. I climbed up on the toilet, bent over and held my breath. I heard a flush, water in the sink, then his voice:
“I know this is hard. It is hard for everyone. We don’t expect you to be God, just our friend. We know you need to take care of yourself. We want you to. You can go home without feeling guilty about it.”
He opened the door and went upstairs. I stayed frozen in the stall, king of the toilet, for another ten minutes. Then, I walked out into the parking lot to my car and went home.
I discovered something that afternoon; something terrible and wonderful. Grace will find us wherever we hide.
A five-year-old boy was waiting for a liver. The clock was ticking. His parents would come to see him every day, before and after work. One afternoon I didn’t want to see them. Everything was too sad, plus I was out of gas. I snuck out early. At 4:45, I headed downstairs for the parking lot. I got off the elevator in the lobby and saw them pulling into the handicapped space near the front door. I ducked into the bathroom.
I was looking in the mirror when I heard someone coming. I hurried into the last stall. Someone came in. I climbed up on the toilet, bent over and held my breath. I heard a flush, water in the sink, then his voice:
“I know this is hard. It is hard for everyone. We don’t expect you to be God, just our friend. We know you need to take care of yourself. We want you to. You can go home without feeling guilty about it.”
He opened the door and went upstairs. I stayed frozen in the stall, king of the toilet, for another ten minutes. Then, I walked out into the parking lot to my car and went home.
I discovered something that afternoon; something terrible and wonderful. Grace will find us wherever we hide.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
The Worst That Could Happen
I was in Seminary in Berkeley when I discovered a psychiatrist named Fritz Kunkel. He practiced in Los Angeles. When he died his wife donated his papers to the Church Divinity School of the Pacific (Episcopal) in Berkeley. I began a dissertation on his life and thought and received permission to read everything---letters, lectures and an unfinished book. I spent several months snooping through his stuff.
I ran across a lecture he gave in Chicago in the early 50’s. I don’t remember anything in it except one sentence written sideways in the margin in pencil. It was so smeared I could hardly make it out.
It said,” The greatest contribution a human being can make to life is through what’s wrong with him.”
I read it again, “The greatest contribution…through what’s wrong with us.”
I thought about it for days. Of course! What do we know more intimately than what is wrong with us? It haunts our dreams. It stares back at us when we look in the mirror. We can’t outrun it.
I am thinking of a recovering alcoholic in Austin who is a true “man of the cloth.” His cloth is a towel. He wipes faces, floors and beds of alcoholics when they come in sick. He is a high school teacher.
I am thinking of a woman who lost her baby sister in a fire. She was just a girl herself when it happened. She sometimes blames herself. She brings immeasurable depth of understanding and generous compassion to any situation. She is a stockbroker.
I was in a hospital room with a cancer patient doing my best in the middle of bottomless sadness. Suddenly the door opened and a cancer survivor came into the room bringing light and hope. She is a florist.
I’ve seen it in divorce, infertility, SIDS, abortion, drug addiction, death of a partner, job termination, chronic pain, bankruptcy, rape, crime…you name it.
It is just like God, isn’t it; to use the worst thing that has happened to us, the humiliating thing, the wrong thing, the thing we thought would kill us, to help in the healing of another.
I ran across a lecture he gave in Chicago in the early 50’s. I don’t remember anything in it except one sentence written sideways in the margin in pencil. It was so smeared I could hardly make it out.
It said,” The greatest contribution a human being can make to life is through what’s wrong with him.”
I read it again, “The greatest contribution…through what’s wrong with us.”
I thought about it for days. Of course! What do we know more intimately than what is wrong with us? It haunts our dreams. It stares back at us when we look in the mirror. We can’t outrun it.
I am thinking of a recovering alcoholic in Austin who is a true “man of the cloth.” His cloth is a towel. He wipes faces, floors and beds of alcoholics when they come in sick. He is a high school teacher.
I am thinking of a woman who lost her baby sister in a fire. She was just a girl herself when it happened. She sometimes blames herself. She brings immeasurable depth of understanding and generous compassion to any situation. She is a stockbroker.
I was in a hospital room with a cancer patient doing my best in the middle of bottomless sadness. Suddenly the door opened and a cancer survivor came into the room bringing light and hope. She is a florist.
I’ve seen it in divorce, infertility, SIDS, abortion, drug addiction, death of a partner, job termination, chronic pain, bankruptcy, rape, crime…you name it.
It is just like God, isn’t it; to use the worst thing that has happened to us, the humiliating thing, the wrong thing, the thing we thought would kill us, to help in the healing of another.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
The Death of a Dream
My favorite game growing up was “The Game of Life.” I still like it. I played it yesterday.
Players start out with different color cars and cruise through the big choices of life: Will I go to college, or start a career? Borrow tuition, or get a job? Graduate? Career? Salary. Pay taxes. Vote. Choose a spouse. Get engaged. Get married. Buy a starter home. Have babies (limit two). Go back to school? Lose job. Change career. Sue. Get sued. Send kids to sports camp? Upgrade home? Buy lakeside cabin? Become a grandparent. Visit the Great Wall of China? Collect pension. Retire at Millionaire Estates, or Countryside Acres?
The game is so good and has lasted so long because we are born dreamers. We visualize the unfolding of our life from early-early. If it happens like we hope it’s great, but if it crumbles under our feet it’s an earthquake.
Ken Moses is a psychologist whose specialty is working with parents of “impaired” children. He interned in a Chicago Hospital. During his first week he met with a group of parents. He began by asking them to describe their children.
“We went around the room and everybody talked. I had never seen such emotional extremes: anxiety, denial, anger, betrayal, depression, rage, sadness, resentment. So much pain. People cried easily. Guilt poured out.”
He went back to his office wondering what was going on. The parents had shown all the classic signs of grief, but no one had died. The next week he went back to the group and told them he didn’t understand their grief.
“Your children are alive!” he told them.
Over the next few weeks those parents taught him that what had died was their dream of who and what their children would become.
One mother wanted to be a dancer but her conservative parents said no. So when she married and became pregnant she was sure she would have a daughter with long legs and grace. Her daughter would become the dancer she never was. Her daughter was born with cerebral palsy.
Dr. Moses had dreams for his son. He would become the baseball player Ken couldn’t because of rheumatic fever. His son was born blind.
“I had dreams for this boy,” he said. “Dreams of who he was supposed to be. But if he is blind it won’t happen like I dreamed. Then what am I supposed to do, and how?
What do we do when our children can’t, or won’t, realize the dreams we have for them? Or a friend, spouse, or colleague? How do we cope?
Some cry alone. Others believe dreams aren’t real enough to cry over. But we all know what it is to watch a dream die.
Go ahead and grieve. These deaths are as real as any loss we experience.
Players start out with different color cars and cruise through the big choices of life: Will I go to college, or start a career? Borrow tuition, or get a job? Graduate? Career? Salary. Pay taxes. Vote. Choose a spouse. Get engaged. Get married. Buy a starter home. Have babies (limit two). Go back to school? Lose job. Change career. Sue. Get sued. Send kids to sports camp? Upgrade home? Buy lakeside cabin? Become a grandparent. Visit the Great Wall of China? Collect pension. Retire at Millionaire Estates, or Countryside Acres?
The game is so good and has lasted so long because we are born dreamers. We visualize the unfolding of our life from early-early. If it happens like we hope it’s great, but if it crumbles under our feet it’s an earthquake.
Ken Moses is a psychologist whose specialty is working with parents of “impaired” children. He interned in a Chicago Hospital. During his first week he met with a group of parents. He began by asking them to describe their children.
“We went around the room and everybody talked. I had never seen such emotional extremes: anxiety, denial, anger, betrayal, depression, rage, sadness, resentment. So much pain. People cried easily. Guilt poured out.”
He went back to his office wondering what was going on. The parents had shown all the classic signs of grief, but no one had died. The next week he went back to the group and told them he didn’t understand their grief.
“Your children are alive!” he told them.
Over the next few weeks those parents taught him that what had died was their dream of who and what their children would become.
One mother wanted to be a dancer but her conservative parents said no. So when she married and became pregnant she was sure she would have a daughter with long legs and grace. Her daughter would become the dancer she never was. Her daughter was born with cerebral palsy.
Dr. Moses had dreams for his son. He would become the baseball player Ken couldn’t because of rheumatic fever. His son was born blind.
“I had dreams for this boy,” he said. “Dreams of who he was supposed to be. But if he is blind it won’t happen like I dreamed. Then what am I supposed to do, and how?
What do we do when our children can’t, or won’t, realize the dreams we have for them? Or a friend, spouse, or colleague? How do we cope?
Some cry alone. Others believe dreams aren’t real enough to cry over. But we all know what it is to watch a dream die.
Go ahead and grieve. These deaths are as real as any loss we experience.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Backlash
A father took his son fishing off an old pier. They stood 10 feet apart with a red cooler between them. They didn’t talk, they fished.
The boy made his first cast hoping his father was watching. Lucky for him he wasn’t because something went wrong. Maybe he was trying to cast too far out, but for whatever reason he ended up with a nasty backlash. The line looked like a bird’s nest had exploded.
It was his father’s reel, handed down like an heirloom, like an old watch, from his father. The boy had begged to use it. Now look at it. One cast. He turned his back and tried to untangle it. He couldn’t have done it even if he had fingernails. He was afraid the reel was a goner.
His father finally turned and noticed his son wasn’t fishing. He saw him bending over, working on the reel. He knew what was wrong without asking.
“Let me see the old girl,” he said. The feel of it took him back to his own boyhood, to the same pier and to Saturdays like this one---his father’s arms behind and around him, big hands over smaller hands, casting sidearm, practicing.
He worked at untangling the line but it was hopeless.
“I knew this day would come,” he told his boy.
He sat down on the edge of the pier, opened the tackle box, pulled out a new reel still in the package, unscrewed the old reel, wrapped it in his handkerchief and laid it down in the box like a loved one. Then, he mounted the new reel onto the rod, handed it to his son and said, “Now you are ready to do some fishing with your own rig.”
Backlash. There’s no way around it. And it’s easy to get the idea from well-meaning doctors and friends that we are supposed to trace the mess back to the beginning, find the root cause and untangle our knots. But sometimes all we can do is hand it over to someone who recognizes what is beyond repair and needs to be laid to rest. Often it’s the very thing that stands in the way of beginning again.
The boy made his first cast hoping his father was watching. Lucky for him he wasn’t because something went wrong. Maybe he was trying to cast too far out, but for whatever reason he ended up with a nasty backlash. The line looked like a bird’s nest had exploded.
It was his father’s reel, handed down like an heirloom, like an old watch, from his father. The boy had begged to use it. Now look at it. One cast. He turned his back and tried to untangle it. He couldn’t have done it even if he had fingernails. He was afraid the reel was a goner.
His father finally turned and noticed his son wasn’t fishing. He saw him bending over, working on the reel. He knew what was wrong without asking.
“Let me see the old girl,” he said. The feel of it took him back to his own boyhood, to the same pier and to Saturdays like this one---his father’s arms behind and around him, big hands over smaller hands, casting sidearm, practicing.
He worked at untangling the line but it was hopeless.
“I knew this day would come,” he told his boy.
He sat down on the edge of the pier, opened the tackle box, pulled out a new reel still in the package, unscrewed the old reel, wrapped it in his handkerchief and laid it down in the box like a loved one. Then, he mounted the new reel onto the rod, handed it to his son and said, “Now you are ready to do some fishing with your own rig.”
Backlash. There’s no way around it. And it’s easy to get the idea from well-meaning doctors and friends that we are supposed to trace the mess back to the beginning, find the root cause and untangle our knots. But sometimes all we can do is hand it over to someone who recognizes what is beyond repair and needs to be laid to rest. Often it’s the very thing that stands in the way of beginning again.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Normal
My mother volunteered at the Cerebral Palsy Center. She loved the children and they loved her. She would play with them for hours. Sometimes she would take me with her. I faked every kind of illness to get out of it. Those kids scared me.
Once a year they would pile the children into yellow busses and take them to the circus. One time I went along to help out. One time.
These kids weren’t what I’d call normal. They looked and acted different than any of my friends. They wore braces to walk; some wore helmets and gloves so they wouldn’t hurt themselves. They jerked; they talked loud and laughed most of the time. I couldn’t understand what they were saying to me. The harder I listened the less I understood. Sirens were going off in my head. I felt stupid. They touched me without warning. They pulled on me. They hugged me. They tore my shirt. I yelled at them and made them cry.
Naturally, we had front row seats under the Big Top. When the clowns came in the kids exploded. Anyone sitting nearby eating and drinking ran for cover. I watched our kids more than the circus. They were becoming the greatest show on earth.
They didn’t hold anything back. They were natural in a peculiarly human way. Like when the lions scared them, they screamed. When the trapeze artist fell, they pointed and cried. When little trick dogs jumped onto the backs of beautiful white horses they shrieked, jumped and waved their arms like windmills. I wanted them to tone it down. I wanted the strangers around us to be comfortable. I did the same thing in restaurants to my daughters when they were just children being children.
Something else. They were contagious. I started laughing instead of chuckling. I even shrieked a couple of times! I didn’t realize the circus was such a magic rollercoaster.
I don’t know what “normal” is, God knows I don’t, but I believe these rare children are closer to God’s idea of normal than we are. We are the disabled ones. We disable our hearts so we won’t hurt too much, or be too disappointed. We control our laughter so nothing comes out our nose. We dance better drunk.
I wasn’t tempted to run away and join the circus that day. I was tempted to run away with them.
Once a year they would pile the children into yellow busses and take them to the circus. One time I went along to help out. One time.
These kids weren’t what I’d call normal. They looked and acted different than any of my friends. They wore braces to walk; some wore helmets and gloves so they wouldn’t hurt themselves. They jerked; they talked loud and laughed most of the time. I couldn’t understand what they were saying to me. The harder I listened the less I understood. Sirens were going off in my head. I felt stupid. They touched me without warning. They pulled on me. They hugged me. They tore my shirt. I yelled at them and made them cry.
Naturally, we had front row seats under the Big Top. When the clowns came in the kids exploded. Anyone sitting nearby eating and drinking ran for cover. I watched our kids more than the circus. They were becoming the greatest show on earth.
They didn’t hold anything back. They were natural in a peculiarly human way. Like when the lions scared them, they screamed. When the trapeze artist fell, they pointed and cried. When little trick dogs jumped onto the backs of beautiful white horses they shrieked, jumped and waved their arms like windmills. I wanted them to tone it down. I wanted the strangers around us to be comfortable. I did the same thing in restaurants to my daughters when they were just children being children.
Something else. They were contagious. I started laughing instead of chuckling. I even shrieked a couple of times! I didn’t realize the circus was such a magic rollercoaster.
I don’t know what “normal” is, God knows I don’t, but I believe these rare children are closer to God’s idea of normal than we are. We are the disabled ones. We disable our hearts so we won’t hurt too much, or be too disappointed. We control our laughter so nothing comes out our nose. We dance better drunk.
I wasn’t tempted to run away and join the circus that day. I was tempted to run away with them.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Waiting
Waiting tables is no picnic. I lasted a couple months at a Café in west Texas. It started out a one-night stand filling in for my college roommate, Wayne. Halfway through my shift the owner motioned me over to the register and asked me if I wanted permanent work. I nodded. End of interview. End of Wayne.
The owner was huge. His nose weighed more than my niece. His thighs would throw sparks when he wore polyester. When things were slow he would sit me down at his special teaching table and “edgeecate” me on the general public. He told me they’ll swallow anything if you say it with a smile. Invaluable advice for the ministry. He told me to practice smiling in the shower and to keep repeating aloud, “I’m HAP-PY! I’m HAP-PY!” He taught me the two big questions: “What can I get you?” and “What else can I get you?”
He rehearsed me at his teaching table near the register and stopped me whenever I seemed insincere. When I’d get it right he’d let me bring him pie. He developed a high tolerance for insincerity.
The real money was tip money which was bad news at this joint. I got blamed for late food, raw food, burned food, cold food, wrong food, old food, ugly food, small food and hairy food. But I would stand there and take it like the Cheshire cat, invisible except for the smile.
An old farmer named Tom was impossible to please. At the end of his meal he would reach into his overalls and pull out his coin purse. It was a green plastic thing from the bank shaped like a football with a slit across the top. He’d squeeze the ends with his fingers and it would open like a mouth. He would reach in and delicately pull out a dime and three pennies. He would hide the change under his saucer so I’d be pleasantly surprised.
They call it “waiting” tables but it is a different kind of waiting. It is active, not passive. It is doing something for someone else. It is waiting, hand and foot, on somebody. Being present, attentive, patient and busy.
Imagine waiting on God. Also a different kind of waiting. Not being still, but serving. “What can I get you?”
Any chance we’ve misunderstood Isaiah? “Those that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength…”
The owner was huge. His nose weighed more than my niece. His thighs would throw sparks when he wore polyester. When things were slow he would sit me down at his special teaching table and “edgeecate” me on the general public. He told me they’ll swallow anything if you say it with a smile. Invaluable advice for the ministry. He told me to practice smiling in the shower and to keep repeating aloud, “I’m HAP-PY! I’m HAP-PY!” He taught me the two big questions: “What can I get you?” and “What else can I get you?”
He rehearsed me at his teaching table near the register and stopped me whenever I seemed insincere. When I’d get it right he’d let me bring him pie. He developed a high tolerance for insincerity.
The real money was tip money which was bad news at this joint. I got blamed for late food, raw food, burned food, cold food, wrong food, old food, ugly food, small food and hairy food. But I would stand there and take it like the Cheshire cat, invisible except for the smile.
An old farmer named Tom was impossible to please. At the end of his meal he would reach into his overalls and pull out his coin purse. It was a green plastic thing from the bank shaped like a football with a slit across the top. He’d squeeze the ends with his fingers and it would open like a mouth. He would reach in and delicately pull out a dime and three pennies. He would hide the change under his saucer so I’d be pleasantly surprised.
They call it “waiting” tables but it is a different kind of waiting. It is active, not passive. It is doing something for someone else. It is waiting, hand and foot, on somebody. Being present, attentive, patient and busy.
Imagine waiting on God. Also a different kind of waiting. Not being still, but serving. “What can I get you?”
Any chance we’ve misunderstood Isaiah? “Those that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength…”
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