Truth be told, I cherish days like this: slow stretches of solitude in service to the ordinary. I sing to myself and try to listen to what bubbles up. Yesterday, as our visiting was coming to a close, my grandson Louie sat next to me at my desk. After looking through a few pictures on my computer of his mother and aunt when they were young, he said, "Gwad, you retired so that you could do other important work, didn't?" I looked over at my little buddy and smiled as he continued, "So you didn't really stop working. You just do NEW work now." My little man doesn't miss a trick. He listens carefully to everything taking place even when it doesn't look like it. He ponders his reality profoundly - and feels free to share his observations with those he loves and trusts. Doing my house work this morning led me to reread this morning's poem that has Louie all over it:Missing It by Naomi Shihab Nye
Our cousin Sarni said at night when he can't sleep
he thinks about everything he missed that day.
Which way didn't he turn his head?
Whose face didn't he notice?
He gets the answer to the problem he missed
on the test. He finally remembers where they buried
the one cat who sat in anyone's lap.
Walking, talking, playing, listening, and praying with Louie and Anna this weekend - as well as with their parents and auntie/uncle - filled me with joy. The NY Times columnist, David Brooks, wrote about joy and happiness last week and this words right true.
Happiness usually involves a victory for the self. Joy tends to involve the transcendence of self. Happiness comes from accomplishments. Joy comes when your heart is in another. Joy comes after years of changing diapers, driving to practice, worrying at night, dancing in the kitchen, playing in the yard and just sitting quietly together watching TV. Joy is the present that life gives you as you give away your gifts. The core point is that happiness is good, but joy is better. It’s smart to enjoy happiness, but it’s smarter still to put yourself in situations where you might experience joy.
There was the method of kneeling,
a fine method, if you lived in a country
where stones were smooth.
The women dreamed wistfully of bleached courtyards,
hidden corners where knee fit rock.
Their prayers were weathered rib bones,
small calcium words uttered in sequence,
as if this shedding of syllables could somehow
fuse them to the sky.
There were the men who had been shepherds so long
they walked like sheep.
Under the olive trees, they raised their arms—
Hear us! We have pain on earth!
We have so much pain there is no place to store it!
But the olives bobbed peacefully
in fragrant buckets of vinegar and thyme.
At night the men ate heartily, flat bread and white cheese,
and were happy in spite of the pain,
because there was also happiness.
Some prized the pilgrimage,
wrapping themselves in new white linen
to ride buses across miles of vacant sand.
When they arrived at Mecca
they would circle the holy places,
on foot, many times,
they would bend to kiss the earth
and return, their lean faces housing mystery.
While for certain cousins and grandmothers
the pilgrimage occurred daily,
lugging water from the spring
or balancing the baskets of grapes.
These were the ones present at births,
humming quietly to perspiring mothers.
The ones stitching intricate needlework into children’s dresses,
forgetting how easily children soil clothes.
There were those who didn’t care about praying.
The young ones. The ones who had been to America.
They told the old ones, you are wasting your time.
Time?—The old ones prayed for the young ones.
They prayed for Allah to mend their brains,
for the twig, the round moon,
to speak suddenly in a commanding tone.
And occasionally there would be one
who did none of this,
the old man Fowzi, for example, Fowzi the fool,
who beat everyone at dominoes,
insisted he spoke with God as he spoke with goats,
and was famous for his laugh.
In my spiritual tradition, joy comes from a generous heart and a compassionate soul. It is deep speaking to deep. It evokes dancing, illumination, exuberance, song, and celebration where there is unity between the holy and the human. "In thy presence is fullness of joy, in thy right hand there are pleasures for ever more.(Psalm 16: 11) The New Testament is equally formed by encounters with joy: "I have come," testifies Jesus, "that my joy may be in your and your joy may be full." (John 15: 11) Both the Hebrew and Greek texts honor the centrality of living into joy. The Hebrew text uses שִׂמְחָה (simchat) 97 times to describe the experience of gladness, mirth, festivity and rejoicing; and the Greek text utilizes χαρά (chara) from xáris (charis - grace) 57 to tell much the same story.
How then did our religion become so deadening? Deadly? Judgmental, harsh and punitive? Our Judeo-Christian heritage is all about exodus and freedom, grace and renewal, welcome and homecoming for even the least of our sisters and brothers. Don't misunderstand: I still read and revel in the holy words of my tradition and seek to root myself in our heritage of joy. But more often than not, it takes the poetry of contemporary women and men of grace to help me reconnect with what the holy breathed into me at the dawn of creation. Poets - as well as dancers, artists, musicians and little children - put me back in communion with my essence and my birthright as one created in the image of joy.
a fine method, if you lived in a country
where stones were smooth.
The women dreamed wistfully of bleached courtyards,
hidden corners where knee fit rock.
Their prayers were weathered rib bones,
small calcium words uttered in sequence,
as if this shedding of syllables could somehow
fuse them to the sky.
There were the men who had been shepherds so long
they walked like sheep.
Under the olive trees, they raised their arms—
Hear us! We have pain on earth!
We have so much pain there is no place to store it!
But the olives bobbed peacefully
in fragrant buckets of vinegar and thyme.
At night the men ate heartily, flat bread and white cheese,
and were happy in spite of the pain,
because there was also happiness.
Some prized the pilgrimage,
wrapping themselves in new white linen
to ride buses across miles of vacant sand.
When they arrived at Mecca
they would circle the holy places,
on foot, many times,
they would bend to kiss the earth
and return, their lean faces housing mystery.
While for certain cousins and grandmothers
the pilgrimage occurred daily,
lugging water from the spring
or balancing the baskets of grapes.
These were the ones present at births,
humming quietly to perspiring mothers.
The ones stitching intricate needlework into children’s dresses,
forgetting how easily children soil clothes.
There were those who didn’t care about praying.
The young ones. The ones who had been to America.
They told the old ones, you are wasting your time.
Time?—The old ones prayed for the young ones.
They prayed for Allah to mend their brains,
for the twig, the round moon,
to speak suddenly in a commanding tone.
And occasionally there would be one
the old man Fowzi, for example, Fowzi the fool,
who beat everyone at dominoes,
insisted he spoke with God as he spoke with goats,
and was famous for his laugh.
Rolling in the grass with Anna as Dima laughed and held her with tenderness made me think of something Louie said to Dima (Dianne as grandmother) one Easter afternoon. To her question "Aren't these flowers pretty?" Louie replied, "Aren't all flowers pretty?" I believe, I believe, O Lord, help my unbelief.
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