commence au festival...

Well, today was the day I set aside to give my flowing locks some style: my last visit to Ms. Rose, my coiffeuse, was early January 2020 just before our trip to Tucson. While in Arizona, my buddy don E was telling me about a strange new virus that had shut down an entire city in China. I was only mildly curious at that point. Upon our return, however, I was back and forth to Ottawa a few times as information and anxiety was increasing. In early March I sensed things were getting out of control and canceled another planned L'Arche visit - and a few days later our border was shut and the great commonwealth of Massachusetts entered total covid lockdown.

Without any wisdom about when sheltering in place would end - and without a working knowledge of how to live into the pandemic - I thought, "Let me quit cutting my hair until this mess is over." I wondered just how long it might get. And now, eighteen months later, after a joyous midsummer reprieve without masks along with a super abundance of vaccinations in my part of the country (over 70%), it felt like the time had come to bring my living in the catacombs look to an official close. Even amid the new uncertainties of the accursed Delta variant - and the new unofficial mask mandate in progress - it was time to trade my Willie Nelson in for a modified George Harrison.

                     Yesterday                                      Today

We hope to be in Canada on September 11th with our vaccination papers, recent molecular covid tests and passports in hand. Staying masked indoors will be a small price to pay for the chance to truly "get outta Dodge." We shall see. 

All I know is that my quest for incarnational spirituality requires some experiential body prayer to mark the movement of grace in my life. It's no secret that my ancient Celtic ancestors used tattoos and scarification to help tell their story of rites of passage and significant happenings upon their flesh. For almost 30 years I've been following their lead: my first earring came at 40, my second marked a divorce, and my third came with my marriage to Di. My first tattoo marked both the close of my Montreal sabbatical and the realization that after 35 years of pastoral ministry I was being called out of certainty and into the wilderness . My second tattoo gave expression to the journey into retirement and a whole new way of following Jesus. 

So, too now with these silver tresses: as Jack Nicholson wisely and apocalyptically proclaimed in his role as the Joker in the first Batman film: commence au festival! This coming year will be one of profound uncertainty and transition. My prayer is to live into it fully, moving through the pandemic portal (to borrow Arundhati Roy's phrase) in a way that celebrates the blessings that pop up among our sorrows while honoring our shared grief, too.