. In a bit we're headed out to share a fall feast with our daughters: Jesse is coming up from Brooklyn and we will meet at Michal's forest home in Monterey. Sometime this weekend we'll also celebrate Jesse's 34th birthday, too...I hope Michal bakes some of her award-winning bread! Dianne baked some whole-wheat herb crackers for the party and I know there will be some Monterey goat cheese (as Michal works there part-time.) One of the joys about being back in this neck of the woods - beyond the obvious joys and challenges of our new ministry - is being closer to the girls. Living on the other side of the United States became way too tough to continue given how important these two young women - and their husbands - are to Di and myself.
Being the father of these two adult women continues to be fascinating - and humbling - and joyful. And sometime during each visit, I almost always find myself full to overflowing with tears for some unexpected reason. Buechner speaks of tears nicely:
Y
ou never know what may cause them. The sight of the Atlantic Ocean can do it, or a piece of music or a face you've never seen before. A pair of somebody's old shoes can do it. Almost any movie made before the great sadness that came over the world after the Second World War, a horse cantering across a meadow, the high school basketball team running out onto the gym floor at the start of a game. You can never be sure. But of this you can be sure. Whenever you find tears in your eyes, especially unexpected tears, it is well to pay the closest attention.They are not only telling you something about the secret of who you are, but more often than not God is speaking to you through them of the mystery of where you have come from and is summoning you to where, if your soul is to be saved, you should go to next.
So... we're heading out now to see the kids. (These tunes from my favorite Joni always speak to me of autumn, children and getting together for feasts as the days roll by.)
3 comments:
I can feel the warmth of your words! I, too, love the fall and even winter as we hunker down and it seems, pay closer attention to the insides of our lives!
Amen to the fall, and the leaves and the somnolence leading to winter's sleep. Amen to the smell of cooking fruit, awaiting the jars for preserving. Amen to the terrifying reality of being parent to grown children.
The Fred Buechner quote is similar to one in Lion Country, where the protagonist suddenly feels like weeping, in the middle of a swim meet that he is watching. Those tears presage the journey of the remainder of The Book of Bebb.
Thank you, dear friends. Peter told me last year about the importance of paying attention to the emotional/spiritual aspect of the seasons and it has helped me. Thank you, Steven for reminding me - and Peter I have to check out those books. Last night's feast was sweet in all the right ways - and Michal's new pepper jelly with goat cheese on Dianne's herb crackers... OMG! Heaven on earth.
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