Practicing the Presence of God

The last time my husband Bill almost died, I got a pretty good but unpublished essay out of the experience. Times have changed, bringing blogging along as a medium. But writing to think things through remains a motivating factor for any writer. So I guess I'll blog my way through this crisis, since I am a late adopter of new media. 

Another new thing in my life is that I am a seminary student. I was at the Earlham School of Religion doing an intensive course in spiritual formation. When Bill had his car accident, I was literally in the middle of the two-week course, miles away in another state, and without a phone signal (TMobile has heard from me about this). So I was in good spiritual shape to make the trip. Good student that I am, I learned a lot on the way. 

how to drive safely at 80 miles an hour;
how to imagine that Jesus was my navigator (I was hoping to get reacquainted with Jesus at seminary, and suddenly there he was in my car, like a handsome stranger had sat down next to me and said, "I'm here to help: take I-465, not I-865");
how to have real honest-to-God faith that God would get me through;

"God doesn't give you more than you can handle" has always struck me two ways. At times it strikes me as a meaningless and insensitive platitude that can annoy a grieving or shocked person. At other times it strikes me as true spiritual folk wisdom. It's true, even if not terribly original.

My husband and this accident help me understand the Bible and biblical history. I think of him as Paul, knocked off his horsepower on his way to Champaign-Urbana (you should see the horse), with God saying, "Bill, Bill, pay attention." It may not seem that way to Bill. But he doesn't mind being prayed for and he is spiritually open, even if uncommitted. And I think the story of the Road to Damascus is a memorable metaphor for abrupt change, catastrophe that is transient -- Paul is blinded only temporarily -- and course correction. 

So I am trying to make God a drinking buddy (I hear his son has a line on good wine) or become more aware of the presence of God in order to get through this crisis. Please continue praying and thinking healing thoughts; Bill has surgery scheduled tomorrow. 

Feedback welcome, especially theological feedback.

Gratefully,
Marcia

Juicy fruit: about fasting

After seeing the documentary Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead  in which two men shrink before your eyes as they go on lengthy juice fasts, my husband Bill and I were inspired to do something similar. He wanted to do it for health reasons and because it involved buying a shiny new machine: juicer. I wanted to do it for health reasons and to lose those five pounds I have been trying to lose for about 5 years or so. We got past the ee-e-w factor (dinner usually tasted pretty green), swilled down a lot of fruit and vegetable juice (pineapples are a natural and carrots save everything), and managed to make it for five days. He lost over 10 pounds and I lost six. We also lost a certain amount of sleep, since neither of us all that well for the duration and felt especially cold at night.

The experience has given me whole-grain religion and some new guidelines for eating that are really simple: 

• put color on my plate
• drink more water
• avoid coffee in the afternoon
• cut back on alcohol
• eat more slowly

This is about eating mindfully instead of shoveling it in while reading a book or newspaper. I've seen these recommendations often, but never trained myself to follow them. I ate my first solid meal in five days slowly, with attention and appreciation.

Barcelona

As pretty as Paris. And it has the Mediterranean Sea. Does it count as a green vacation when you've flown to a verdant Mediterranean area?

Stop the plane, I want to get off

They call you a "distressed traveler" when an airline cancels your flight and puts you up at an hotel. I was in deep distress when I woke up earlier this week at 7 a.m. in an Atlanta airport hotel, almost three hours after I had requested a 4:10 a.m. wake-up call that I didn't receive. The predawn wake up was necessary for me to make a 6 a.m. flight on which I had been rescheduled the midnight before, after my 9:15 p.m. flight out of Atlanta's large (and not particularly well-signed) Hartsfield Airport had been cancelled. The flight was cancelled because the airplane door wouldn't seal shut, which the crew didn't notice till we had taxied down a runway. I got home the next day after another reschedule and an hour's weather delay.

Think about air travel today: large groups of people are herded on and off airplanes that don't leave or arrive on time, afford precious little seat space, and can experience mechanical malfunctions. That's just the plane. Before you get into your cramped seat (where you will have time to sit and pray to the weather gods), you stand in a long line to check in at Generic Airport, or a short line to get rid of your bag (will you be using a credit card to pay for that?), or you shlep through the airport with a carry-on that you hope will fit in the overhead luggage bin and that contains -- properly packed -- the quart-size bag of creams and liquids (remember: 3-1-1!) that you need to remove from your bag for security scanning. Now comes the fun part: will you be having the body-scan or grope? You've got time in the security line to contemplate the prospect, while you take off your shoes. For this, we can thank the handful of wacky homicidal terrorists who changed the rules for us millions who are trying to peacefully get from point A to point B.

Even apart from weather delays, air travel is always a perfect storm of contingent things that have to go right in a coordinated way. Weather and machinery must behave; it is definitely preferable to fly on a plane on which all parts are in working order. People on the plane must behave, too, even if airlines can no longer afford to feed them, a quaint amenity that left the too-large terminal a while ago.

The ifs and inconveniences of air travel exact a price beyond the cost of the ticket. Minutes on the tarmac or in the terminal feel a lot longer than 60 seconds. We're all in this together; millions of people fly each week and routinely experience delay or cancellation by the planeload -- I was one of 50 people on my aborted flight. There's no point in complaining about the weather, nor any point in complaining about wacky homicidal terrorists. Complaining loudly seems to be working with TSA about its new grope-search. But there's no getting out of a security search; it's just a matter of degree.

For me, the air travel honeymoon is over, and I want a divorce. I do love having a bird's eye view of neat green fields, orange city lights at night, and astonishingly tall mountains. But I hate airports. I hate long lines, overpriced coffee and cocktails, tight seating, and waiting, waiting, waiting, inevitable lateness even if I get to the airport early. It's lost time and a lost cause. I give up.

I will be taking the train. I already have a few times this year. At least I know it will be late and I can plan accordingly. I won't get a bird's eye view, but I can see my country, up closer. I get space and time to work. No one will frisk me. Train food will never make the Michelin guide, but it ain't peanuts. I want the right scale of things, and I don't want to be subject to the whims of weather and terrorists with a box cutter to grind. I am bailing out of air travel and hopping on board the train.

Give her a gold watch already

Oprah begins year 25 -- the farewell season -- with not a lot of celebrities, which is appealing, and a trip to Australia for her diehard fans. As we say in Chicago, ubi meam (where's mine)? Seriously, folks, not a lot of people do the same job for 25 years and manage to keep their interest and their edge. Check out the Oprahification machine ; I can't bear to post my result. Some things really are better if private. So I'll stick with my book jacket.

Eid mubarak

Submitted to the local paper:

I’ve been really troubled by the eruption of hostility toward Muslims in America that has been touched off by the proposal to build a house of worship and community center near Ground Zero in New York. I have a number of friends who are Muslim, and from them I’ve learned a lot about the world’s second largest religion, and also about the world. I’ve learned a lot about the value of regular prayer. I’ve learned a lot about charity, which is one of the duties of Islam. I’ve learned a lot about discipline. It takes discipline to fast for 30 days during the daytime, not even drinking water. I had the great good fortune to be introduced to the religion by a woman, an accomplished professional. I don’t think Islam teaches that women are subordinate any more than Christianity does. Cultures may get that wrong; cultures also get wrong the Christian teaching of nonviolence with distressing regularity.

Apart from whether there are rights or sensitivities at issue with respect to building the Cordoba Center, I see this matter mostly as unneighborly. Muslims aren’t them, folks - - they’re us, if “us” means Americans, neighbors, and local residents. Thousands of Muslims live in the western suburbs; I’ve eaten gracious Ramadan iftars – meals to break the fast – with some of them. I wish them all a happy Eid, the celebration that marks the close of Ramadan.

I work as a book reviewer and recently received a beautiful new edition of the Koran from the publisher Oxford University Press. To stand with, and better understand, my Muslim friends and neighbors, I’ll be reading my Koran on Sept. 11, not burning it.

Why it's hard to climb Mt. Whitney

We weren't surprised that there was snow on this 14,496-foot mountain in early June, but there's snow and then there's rotten snow. Rotten snow is the kind you sink into because it's soft and melting. That makes for slow going, what with stepping carefully and poking with your walking stick to see if the snow will hold your weight. And of course it also makes it harder to see the trail. This part of California got lots of snow this past winter, so there was more to contend with, and more to melt, swell creeks, and refreeze at night. We had to think a few minutes to plot a path across a creek just 20 minutes up the path: the water was stunningly clear, cold, and rushing downhill in a hurry.

Another factor is sheer height. As mountain trails go, this one is not forbiddingly steep, merely long; it becomes more doable under better conditions. We backpacked for five hours up to Outpost Camp, the lower campground (10,300 feet), where we had a tent back-window view of a snow-fed waterfall. The deciding factor, however, was that one of us got sick. When that happens in the wilderness, there's no running to the urgent care clinic. The first rule of safe mountaineering is know your limits, and there they were. Most people we encountered on the trail did not make the summit; most of them also looked to be in their 20s, with really strong legs. In a spirit of prudence and disappointment, we turned back. (The picture is a placeholder till I load ours.)

The gospel according to Desmond Tutu

I recently had the privilege of interviewing Nobel Peace Prize winner Tutu. We talked about peace and reconciliation somewhat indirectly, as the subject was Tutu's forthcoming Children of God Storybook Bible, which will feature his favorite Bible stories and center on themes of reconciliation and forgiveness. But peace was certainly in the room. He has an infectious laugh and lots of personal warmth. I had read his brand new Made for Goodness, which answers the good question, " 'How do you keep your faith in people when you see so much injustice, oppression, and cruelty?' " The answer in the book takes more than 200 pages, so here is a summary that uses the bits I couldn't stick in the Bible story.

He said: "This is a moral universe. This is a universe where right and wrong do matter. When you look at the evidence of history, (Stalin, Hitler, and their ilk) end up being part of the flotsam and jetsam. At home in the darkest hours, that what's we used to say: 'the apartheid government has already lost. ' It's not just whistling in the dark. There is a heck of a lot of evil around. Where the heck is God in all of this? Yes, God is there. ... Yes, people are good and in the end that good will remain."

After spending only a brief time in his presence, I felt deeply encouraged. As much as his joy, his hope -- he doesn't consider himself an optimist, but does have hope -- is contagious.

Wee things

The temperature has gone beyond 80 degrees F in our cold frame and spinach, lettuce, and radish have all shown themselves, though not their true green leaves as yet. Word picture: spinach is skinny-leafed, radish is round-leafed, lettuce is little-leafed. What the camera sees -- they're the green things.

Imagine that

As a book reviewer and journalist who covers publishing, I sometimes think that everybody should read the same book I am, or, horrors, no one is going to be reading any books in the near future because they're all playing with their smart phones. Then I go to a Reading by a Famous Author -- Neil Gaiman as part of Naperville Reads -- and am seated in an auditorium with a thousand other people who like this author, and am enthralled to hear him read and it's all good. They sure sold a lot of books, too.

Gaiman reads his own work exceptionally well (OK, the English accent helps, but maybe he'll pick up a little ya-dere, hey-dere from living near Minneapolis) and is exceptionally able to write across media (scripts, prose, graphic novels) and audiences; he writes for kids and adults. In this day and age of narrowcasting to specific groups, he's broader than many and way more imaginative than most. Maybe the energy of his young fans was contagious, but imagination has energy too. A lot of us still and always love stories, never mind the form.

Lettuce pray

The Nelson garden got a jump on the season with a new cold frame on our south-facing second-floor deck. Bill made the box out of lots of leftover materials, including leftover insulation. We started lettuce, spinach, and radishes and installed a thermometer (the one new item) to keep track of the temperature inside the frame. It snowed last night over the frame, and the temp went down to 40 degrees inside. No one is awake yet.

Sto lat Irena Sendler

Sto lat is the song/greeting with which Polish people are feted on their birthdays or name days (the latter being more important). It means "may you live 100 years," and today would have been the 100th birthday of Irena Sendler, who was 98 when she died in 2008. Irena is a personal hero of mine; she was a social worker who smuggled Jewish children out of the Warsaw ghetto during WWII and worked with the underground organization Zegota until she was arrested in 1943 and tortured, but she managed to escape execution. She was recognized as a righteous person by Yad Vashem in 1965 and lived in relatively obscurity until she was "discovered" by Kansas students doing a history project. Sto lat, sto lat, niec zyje zyje nam.

Eat food. Mostly plants.

Wish I had said that, but Michael Pollan, who was on Oprah today, got there first. I'm amazed at how rapidly and thoroughly food production has changed. I live near the line between urban and rural. When I was a local news reporter, it always amazed me to hear about city kids coming to a local dairy farm to find out where milk came from. They didn't know. The store, right? I lived through this once already, going back to the garden in the '60s, before highly processed food was king and when Wonder Bread was just that -- a labor-saving wonder. Is cheap food all that cheap if it's making us fat and chronically ill? I'm up for a change, starting in my own back yard. The next revolution will be in the garden.

RIP Union maid Stella Nowicki

I attended a memorial service for Vicky Starr, a union organizer in the 1930s on Chicago's South Side, mother of my husband's very good friend, and a subject (she's Stella Nowicki, her "underground" name) of the Academy Award-nominated 1976 documentary Union Maids. Time passes, and that's history. In attendance, all these white-haired folks, singing the chorus of Union Maid by Woody Guthrie (as sung by Pete Seeger). These used to be dangerous Commie agitators; now they've got white hair and walkers and have outlived chief FBI paranoid J. Edgar Hoover and are a little forgetful of who is listening to their stories. We listeners forget that cops shot union organizers; we forget a whole lot. Union Maids is a great little slice of history, showing how history is made: somebody decides to do something, and that somebody is not a hero, just a mom of someone you know. Vicky did her job with dignity. Amen and thanks.

What I'm reading

The Zookeeper's Wife. Diane Ackerman.

If Hitler had a hierarchy of hate, Poles were somewhat better off than Jews, but not by many rungs. Ackerman's book is a truly fresh perspective on the Holocaust, from inside Warsaw (85 percent destroyed in WWII) and from the viewpoint of Antonina Zabinski, wife of Jan, keeper of the Warsaw Zoo. Animal life took a beating along with everything else in the war -- the zoo was bombed during the 1939 invasion. In a beautiful twist, the mostly empty zoo became a place of shelter for 300 Polish Jews during the war years. The Holocaust and WWII are so overwhelmingly evil and destructive that I am compelled to understand the resistance to Nazis. It is documented at Auschwitz, and documented here; at the Zabinski home, Jews lived in hiding alongside Jan (who worked with armed Resistance forces), Antonina, their little boy Rys, a chicken, a hamster, a badger, a muskrat, a rabbit (those were among the various house pets.) A wide circle of species, interconnected, learning survival.

My O-pinion

Oprah Winfrey had the temerity to announce the ending of her talk show in 2011 while this Oprah expert was otherwise engaged. It ain't over tomorrow, but The End Is Near. This is completely consistent with her style of doing things that are economically prudent and psychologically smart (she would say soul-smart); when you get the lesson, it's over. There are new worlds to conquer on cable; a lot of us can sympathize with the need for ongoing learning and new challenge. She sure doesn't need the money. She also has some time to cultivate a structure for succession that is not now in place. Ellen? Dr. Oz? Oprah already helps produce the latter's show. As the O-empire has grown, she has taken her hands off lots of things. The culture pundits say her influence will wane; I think it's morphing, going where the action is, with niche audiences and concerns.

Setting a place for a stranger

For the past three Thanksgivings we have hosted foreign students from the Illinois Institute of Technology who don't have any place convenient or special to go on the American holiday of Thanksgiving. It's always delightful to share experiences and lots of American food with our intrepid visitors so far from their comfort zones. Yesterday our guest was Long from Wuhan, China, who had never visited an American home before. Welcome to ours, which was clean, about the size he was used to, and filled with food and a lot of laughter that we sometimes had to explain to our guest. (We tried to explain what a pun was.) He wasn't used to turkey, and his mother had lost her job in China when she violated China's one-child policy and had his little brother. I've been a stranger myself in strange lands, and know that a lot can be learned over a plate of food.

Riding on the City of New Orleans

The trains do run on time these days, give or take 15 minutes, which is a lot better than most airlines can say about themselves. I took Amtrak's City of New Orleans from Chicago to the Big Easy for the Society of Biblical Literature annual meeting. What a trip. Big windows, legroom (a lot better than most airlines can say...), space and time to work, space to walk. Easy access: I walked into the New Orleans train station less than half and hour before my train left and was aboard the train 10 minutes later, no security lines, no overpriced remote parking, no quarter-mile walk to the departure gate.

Then there's the view (when I'm not working, of course): the weird big waterbirds of the Louisiana bayous, pelicans and egrets standing stock-still or flapping their big wings aloft. Knobby-kneed cypress forest that looks a little primeval to my Midwestern eye. Shack dwellings made of corrugated metal and tar-papered roofs, landscaped with old cars and really old dead appliances. Little towns, big cities: Memphis, Jackson.

Then there's the company: my dinner companion was a woman returning from her class reunion at Xavier University in New Orleans, the only historically black Catholic institution of higher ed in the western hemisphere. We talked about her growing up years in pre-civil rights Selma, Ala. In the morning I met a couple from Atlanta. She had come from England in the 1960s and her interest in religions had led her to try Sufi dervish dancing. He was a vertical caver with a keen interest in Robert E. Lee (who founded a journalism school, which this journalist did not know) who ran a county dial-a-ride program for old folks. I can't remember having these kinds of conversations on airplanes or in airports.

I love the scale and I love going this slowly; I'll get there when I get there, pretty much on time. Hooray for public transportation and the train and the tune the City of New Orleans, the folk song made famous by Arlo Guthrie, but written by a Chicago folksinger, the late great Steve Goodman. I actually did say to the scenery: Good morning America, how are you?

The sincerest form of flattery

is when someone else's book cover looks a whole lot like yours.

Back to the '60s

This morning's Oprah Winfrey Show made the '60s look pretty innocent as well as pretty old. She remarked on how memorable the era's commercials were: "Cleans like a white tornado!" (Ajax, of course)This made me think of the huge role played by early television in forming Americans' material culture and giving them words and slogans to talk about it, or jingles to sing about it. This picture of the '60s made it look pretty innocent; not much on free speech, free love etc. It's the Mad Men version: nostalgia for nice suits. But keep my father's HA (Hair Arranger, green in a bottle), please.