Your Astonishing Light
I have crossed the wobbly bridge of in-betweenness, but I have not yet found my footing here at home. Everything seems strange, and I am separate from it. I have wandered in mist and cloud, watched the rain splash into the pond, felt the pillowy bolster of soft sycamore leaves beneath my feet, and tried to still my thoughts.
I miss my little family in England. I miss the walk on sidewalks from blue door to blue door, the tumble of toys and noise and tension and tenderness in my daughter’s house, the newborn baby in my lap, the boisterous, brilliant boy. I miss the gentleness, the muffling that distance gave, yielding to brief forgetting of what was happening back home across the sea, focusing on the immediacy of love.
Sometimes this ranch is an island apart from the world, a place of comfort and peace. Now everything seems at risk, and it is futile to hide. Our country is on a dangerous path, and I don’t want to devote my writing space entirely to this, but it is the undeniable backdrop, and each of us must figure out how we are going to navigate, help make things right, endure and prevail.
“If you’re anxious, you have a firm grasp on reality,” Robert Hubbell said on a live podcast Saturday morning. (Hubbell is one of the voices I listen to for information delivered in a calm, constructive way.) He acknowledges the egregious wrongs, but reminds us not to attribute superpowers to those currently running the show. “They are in over their heads,” he says. “There will be a reckoning.”
No one is denying we have hard times ahead, and the deck is stacked against us at the moment. But there is a greater context and a longer view, and what worries me most is when I hear good people declaring that it is hopeless. Foregone conclusions are risky and unwise; despair and cynicism are poison.
Friends, take heart. Shall we review a few things we can do? Join boycotts and protests; join or donate to local grass roots organizations; make phone calls; send letters; speak truth and demand it of reporters; join the call for a “shadow cabinet” of capable, qualified not-crazy advisors; donate to those making a difference, particularly (in my opinion) reputable entities fighting the legal fights right now. Volunteer for a worthy cause in your community. Visit a lonesome neighbor. Be kind. And let’s start gearing up for the crucial midterm elections. Listen to sources of information that are trustworthy and constructive; by now you know who these are. Please let us not underestimate or undermine ourselves.
An oft-quoted line from the 14th century Persian poet Hafiz comes to mind: “I wish I could show you when you are lonely or in darkness the astonishing light of your own being.”
I admit I have had moments lately when I could not perceive my own light and felt myself sliding into depression. But I have learned what to do when that starts to happen. I go through the motions to prime the pump until the real thing kicks in. I whistle in the dark. I read poetry. I take a break. I seek out friends. I work on something tangible. I meditate or pray or write. A walk in nature is always restorative, and for a time, in Wendell Berry’s words, “…I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”
The grace of the world. It does not fail us. Yesterday, after I began writing thoughts for this blog post, I stepped outdoors. The greening has begun--suddenly the grass is a verdant expanse and springtime feels near. I glimpsed a bobcat in the brush, and the sea was like molten silver, and two horses drew near a fence to greet me by the road. There was a Valentine in my mailbox from someone dear to me, and I visited a friend--we sat and talked in the afternoon sunlight and we touched upon meaning and mortality, and we each felt less alone. I still know people who stand outside to taste the rain, who talk to trees, who dance with water and understand the language of birds. And I am still amazed. This life is infinitely beautiful and precious and not to be surrendered without a fight.
Our nation is flawed and unfinished, but our principles and ideals are worthy, and our rights hard-won, and how dare anyone step in and tear it all apart? Hubbell points out that this president won by a narrow plurality of those who voted; two-thirds of the American people did not even show up to vote. This is not a ringing endorsement, and many were deluded about the true agenda and will be bitterly disappointed and tangibly hurt. In the meantime, he says, “Do not give up. Even if you only endure and abide, just still be here. But we can do so much more than that.” Our cause is just. We will outlast them.
I have been reading a book by the Irish writer Nyall Williams, who tells stories with the lyricism of a poet. “Some people make you feel better about living,” he has written. “Some people you meet and you feel this little lift in your heart, this ‘ah’ because there’s something in them that’s brighter or lighter, something beautiful or better than you, and here's the magic: instead of feeling worse, instead of feeling 'why am I so ordinary?', you feel just the opposite, you feel glad. In a weird way you feel better, because before this you hadn't realised or you'd forgotten human beings could shine so.”
It’s true. I know such people. You probably do too. And each of us can aspire to be such a person. There is something powerful and contagious about it.
I am wrapping this up now because my dear friend Kelley is coming over for a Sunday morning stroll to a place we call the church. We will summon our faith and savor the wonder, returning fortified.
“All of me knelt down,” Williams writes in another lovely passage. “All of me bowed. Inside the chapel of myself, all my candles lit.”
I shall kneel and bow, stand back up and find my footing. We can rediscover our own astonishing light. And we can prevail.