honoring the ebb and flow...

In a few minutes I will load up the car with my musical gear and head off to a gig in Kent, CT. We're playing for a few hours at one of their outdoor/street fair events. On Wednesday, we'll play the Bistro at Infinity, Norfolk, CT for the early dinner crowd between 4:30 and 6:30 pm. Then, we're laying low for a few weeks before returning to the groove in September. During the hiatus, I'll have a chance to reconnect with my buddies at L'Arche Ottawa, celebrate Anna's second birthday, do some more house repair/painting before heading off to Montreal for some late summer, quiet wandering time. This rhythm of engagement and solitude, connection and retreat, called to mind a quote from Henri Nouwen:

Somewhere we know that without silence words lose their meaning, that without listening speaking no longer heals, that without distance closeness cannot cure. Somewhere we know that without a lonely place our actions quickly become empty gestures. The careful balance between silence and words, withdrawal and involvement, distance and closeness, solitude and community forms the basis of the Christian life and should, therefore, be the subject of our most personal attention.

As part of my commitment to strengthening this rhythm, I am going to be a part of Cynthia Bourgeault's on-line wisdom school course this fall. For one hundred days we will pause, read, reflect and practice going deeper into the heart. From time to time, I find I need to renew the core of my spiritual practices. Doing so under the guidance of Bourgeault feels right. It is so easy to get lost in the chaos of these days and lose contact with that love that binds us all together. As Nouwen wrote, to be a part of the movement to change culture and share a bit of God's healing peace in public, I need ample quiet time that grounds me in grace. Let's just say that after a full summer I know in my soul that my season of intentional solitude has arrived. Christine Valters Painters put it like this:

One of the central hallmarks of the monk is a commitment to contemplative ways of being in a frenetic world. Instead of being carried away by the daily demands of modern living, the monk makes space for holy pauses and the silence which holds everything together. Contemplative moments are an act of resistance to a world that judges our value by our productivity and achievements rather than who we are.

Such is the sacred wisdom of August as it matures and yields to autumn, too. In the next 12 months I will be deepening my commitment and presence at L'Arche Ottawa. Not only does the community feel like "home" to me - a gathering of people sharing the values and practices that nourish my best self - but it is also where I sense I can best use my gifts. The time has come to go deeper in so many ways. This poem by Linda Pastan, "Rereading Frost," calls to me:

Sometimes I think all the best poems
have been written already,
and no one has time to read them,
so why try to write more?

At other times though,
I remember how one flower
in a meadow already full of flowers
somehow adds to the general fireworks effect

as you get to the top of a hill
in Colorado, say, in high summer
and just look down at all that brimming color.
I also try to convince myself

that the smallest note of the smallest
instrument in the band,
the triangle for instance,
is important to the conductor

who stands there, pointing his finger
in the direction of the percussions,
demanding that one silvery ping.
And I decide not to stop trying,

at least not for a while, though in truth
I'd rather just sit here reading
how someone else has been acquainted
with the night already, and perfectly.

CREDIT: gun by Ringo Starr