Mystery...

This may strike you as odd, but I mostly wanted to bring a new puppy into our life so that I might learn to share a little better.  In reflecting on my life and ministry, one of the things I am discerning is that I want to become quieter, more reflective, better at connecting to my own natural rhythms as well as those of creation and more able to share time, love and listening.To say that these commitments have been a growing edge within me over the past 30 years is true; to note that they have not always been real for me and those I love is equally true, too.  In a word, learning to let go and trust God - rather than hustle and organize my way into success - makes me a work in progress.

So I've been actively resisting even thinking about a new dog for the past two years. But when my daughters were gushing over the new puppies they had seen at a local farm last week-end over dinner, something started to unlock within me.  You see, I don't think it was coincidental that this awakening started to take place during the celebration of my ordination anniversary.  Bob Dylan once sang: "Something's going on all around you and you don't know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?"  Jesus was more gentle: "No one knows which way the wind (that is Holy Spirit) is blowing." So, the more my girls talked, the more I realized I was wanting to check out these pups.  And with sage-like wisdom, Dianne sat quietly back and let the Spirit work her magic.

At first, I put on a disinterested air when planning the logistics - I have a lot of practice - and I was still uncertain at a deep level.  As the Monks at New Skete write:  Caring for a dog is a lot of hard work. Canis familiaris, the pet dog, cannot take care of itself.  From the moment of its adoption until the day of its death... it is a highly dependent creature that will count on you for all the essentials of life... so understand this: while there are a number of legitimate, practical reasons for getting a pup... none of them should ever exclude or override the chief one: the desire for companionship and the willingness to accept the obligations this entails.  For the first five years of this phase of ministry, I wasn't ready to share my time, my house, my quiet or my life with anyone.  I need to be grounded.

But now something else was stirring and I was sensing that not only did I want to practice loving and being loved in a new way, I was being called in that direction, too.  Truth told, I never would have thought it would have included a puppy.

These days we live a quiet life - I guess that is relative because yes, I still go at 100 miles an hour when I'm active - but I am learning to chill and be chill, too.  Walking Lucie when I would rather be asleep in the morning, figuring out how to get all the "chewable" things out of her path so that they aren't destroyed or just letting her fall dead asleep on my chest at the end of a long day is taking me deeper still.  It is a mystery why and how we were called to welcome her into our home at this moment time.  But I am ever more comfortable with mystery.

Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous
   to be understood.

How grass can be nourishing in the\
   mouths of lambs.
How rivers and stones are forever
   in allegiance with gravity
      while we ourselves dream of rising.
How two hands touch and the bonds will
   never be broken.
How people come, from delight or the
   scars of damage,
to the comfort of a poem.

Let me keep my distance, always, from those
   who think they have the answers.

Let me keep company always with those who say
   "Look!" and laugh in astonishment,
   and bow their heads.
(Mary Oliver)