Why All the Best Ideas Come in the Shower (An Original Poem)

Why All the Best Ideas Come in the Shower

Because you can't hear the phone ring,
and if you can,
you still can't answer it.
Because no one can expect you
to solve a problem
or take care of an immediate crisis,
real or imagined.

Because the warm rainfall
descending on your head
mimics the flow of inspiration,
pouring downward
in an abundance
that catches you by surprise.

Because water is a gift
so precious
that on good days
when you remember to stand
in gratitude
you're more receptive
to other gifts too.

Because you can relax
taut muscles
and breathe deep in ways
that you don't think to do
if others might see,
and if tears need to flow --
who will know?

Because the sound of the water
doesn't just soothe,
it quickens
and helps your mind
make liquid connections
that suddenly!
create so much beauty,
so much sense.

Because unclothed
feels vulnerable but also free,
the same way you feel
on the best creative days
even you're bundled
into protective layers.

Because --
(oh, wait, there were more reasons,
I know, but they have
gurgled softly
down
the
drain -- )

oh yes
Because being cleansed
makes you feel alive
and whole
and covered by
refreshing waves of grace.

(~EMP, 7/31/15) 

Two Men at Breakfast: A Trimeric Poem

My friend Sandy recently posted a picture of her husband and grandfather breakfasting together while they read from their Bibles. The beautiful photo got me thinking about the ways generations share love and faith. It also got me playing with a poem in trimeric form.

This is a relatively new poem form which I first heard about on a blog last year (I think it was a Monday Poetry stretch at Miss Rumphius Effect). It was invented by Dr. Charles Stone, who defines it as:

 "Trimeric \tri-(meh)-rik\ n: a four stanza poem in which the first stanza has four lines and the last three stanzas have three lines each, with the first line of each repeating the respective line of the first stanza.  The sequence of lines, then, is abcd, b – -, c – -, d – -." 

Dr. Stone has written a lot of trimerics. He tends to write very spare lines, which I appreciate (and he is, after all, the inventor of the form!) but one reason I enjoy playing with the form is that it seems to lend itself so well to tiny narratives. This is only the second one I've written, but I hope it won't be the last.

Two Men at Breakfast

They keep the Bible near to hand --
the old man and the younger one.
At the table, they enjoy coffee
and sweet fellowship in prayer.

The old man and the younger one
have long shared a love of mornings
and the God who made them.

At the table they enjoy coffee,
sip the bitter and the sweet,
share their worries and their cares

and sweet fellowship in prayer.
These are the moments that bind
generations together in love.

~EMP 7/28/15

One Child at a Time: Reflections After VBS

We had a tiring but terrific VBS week. This was the fourth year we invited in a local CEF team, recognizing that we don’t have the people power to design, implement, and carry out an original program right now. I also like that it connects us to other churches and a wider community of faith. Yes, there are differences in presentation and emphasis within different Christian communities, but sometimes I think we gain more by working together, even in the tensions, than we would working separately. At least that’s one of the gleanings I took away from this week, in which I sensed the Lord was working in me as much as he was in the kids.

The kids had a great time. With the exception of the first night, when we only had 8 children, we had about 18 coming every night, with a good core coming back multiple times and being there the whole week or at least 4 out of 5 nights. A number of these kids came last year as well. It was a good reminder that, as my dear husband says, when we open the doors, the children come!

There are years (and this was definitely one of them) when I wasn’t sure we were prepared to open our doors; we hadn’t had the energy to do much preparation ourselves and our pool of volunteers to draw on seems to get smaller every summer. Our little family has been feeling a bit burned out lately, and D. and I have been asking ourselves some questions about our ministry call and the best way to carry it out in this season. I have also been struggling a good deal with some physical issues and extra tiredness on account of them.

And yet a marvelous thing happened when we did open our doors and step out in faith. The children came, and God was there to meet them, exactly where they were. God was also there to meet us. He gave us energy, enthusiasm, a renewed sense of realization about how deeply these children need an encounter with his love and a chance to hear and see the gospel.

Since we weren’t doing the heavy lifting as teachers, he also gave us time to just sit and be with the kids during meals (at least some nights; S. and I ended up handling the kitchen for the last three nights) and during the lesson time. That meant time to listen to them and laugh with them and ask them questions (in addition to directing and guiding them…and keeping them out of the bathroom when they shouldn’t be in there…and keeping them from clunking each other on the head or shoving each other around too much when they got frustrated or mad at each other). It meant time to do the goofy hand motions to the songs and to encourage them to repeat the Scripture verses. It meant time to observe and interact with and pray for some of the kids who came with extra special needs: we had a deaf boy as well as two boys who were autistic.

Wednesday night, midweek, felt a little overwhelming. We had a large attendance with no one to sit and be with the kids except us and the CEF team, two of whom were very young this year. Some of the kids got loud, rowdy, and rambunctious and just keeping order became the main task of the evening. In the midst of it all, you could tell there were kids who were doing their best to listen, drinking in what they were given. We quickly recognized that many of them had little to no familiarity with the evening’s Bible story, which happened to be Noah. 

At the end of the evening, I was grateful when two lovely ladies in our church who do outreach to the deaf community came downstairs from the Bible Study they’d been holding. I had contacted them to let them know about the little boy who was attending who is deaf, and they were able to have a conversation with him. One of the ladies was able to come back the next two evenings and really forge a connection with this little boy; she signed the lessons to him and also just spent a good deal of time with him in signed conversation. She also made some beginning connections with his family, who is in need of the some of the resources and personal help she can provide. That turned out to be one of the huge blessings of the week.

Still, by the end of the evening, I felt discouraged. I kept thinking “there is so much hunger here, and we have no real way to meet it. There is so much need for attention and presence, and we have so few people to provide it. Even just attempting to reach the children within a few block radius of our church feels overwhelming.” That feeling persisted for me until the following morning, when I opened the daily intercessory email I get from an amazing mission organization working in India. Guess what the first line read? “How do you transform a nation of a billion+ people? You start with one child.”

Suddenly, our task didn’t seem quite as daunting. Or if it did still seem daunting, God had at least given me the “perspectacles” I needed. Our task is truly not as overwhelming as the task of church planters and Bible teachers in India, but with them we share a common task and calling, a common gospel. And even, in one sense, a common strategy. “You start with one child.”

That phrase changed the whole way I looked at the next two nights, even when they seemed to feel overwhelming. One hungry little boy prayed to accept and trust Jesus the next night. And that night, and the next, there were other opportunities, some of them small, to tell and show individual kids how much God cared for them.

In the midst of all of that, God directed my attention some other words I needed to hear. One was in the book Discipleship in the Present Tense (by James K.A. Smith) which I’ve been wending my way through this month, and the other was in an old seminary magazine.

Let me mention the words from the article first. I’ve been going through old magazines, some of them years old, pulling articles or photos I want to keep and recycling the rest of the pages. I was skimming through a nearly ten year old interview with an alum from my seminary who was talking about his own then-daunting task of a particular ministry, in which he had humbly realized he lacked “tools, talents…and finances.” (Sounds familiar!) But he went on to say that because of that, they had constantly relied on “seeking God’s provision and direction” (also sounds familiar!). He finished with the words “This is a ministry bathed in intercessory prayer.”

The other light bulb that went off for me was in Smith’s book, which is really a collection of essays and interviews. I was reading an interview in which he recapped much of the terrific content from his book Desiring the Kingdom, which I read last summer. Toward the end, he commented that that no matter how small you or your community might feel, it’s important to remember that “you’re in a story of immense cosmic significance.”

Yes.

• Remember you are in a story of great cosmic significance
• Bathe the ministry in intercessory prayer
• Focus on one child at a time

I don’t know entirely what the future of our church’s or even our family’s ministry and calling may look like, but it seems to me that these are wise and important reminders that I know I needed to hear this week.

Limitations and Confidence

I had one of those conversations today that got me thinking about limitations and confidence. As I contemplate my ongoing work as a teacher (in the midst of parenting, ministry, and writing) I often struggle to find the distinctions between knowing and acknowledging my real limitations and simply lacking confidence.

Does anyone else have anything in their life that they feel this way about?

I got into teaching very much through the back door. I’ve never been trained as a teacher; everything I’ve learned as a teacher I’ve learned from experience. I rarely get opportunities for ongoing conversations or professional development that help me grow as a teacher, except in the cracks and crevices of an ongoing learning life of my own.

And these days, I seem to be teaching everywhere: as a homeschooling parent, as a children’s ministry worker, as a graduate school adjunct, as a teacher for an online diocesan lay institute, as a curriculum developer and writer. There’s almost no part of my life that isn’t suffused with teaching of one sort or another, and this past year I literally worked with students as young as three on up through retirement age. The fact that the door keeps opening for me to teach leads me to believe…I hope, I pray….that it’s a calling I’m supposed to be embracing.

I love teaching. There are parts of it I know I do well. There are other parts I know I don’t do so well, sometimes due to lack of time – time to read, think, process, discuss, experiment, grow, pay attention, check out new scholarship. Other lacks that frustrate me at times are lacks in financial resources and decent technology. There are other parts I know I don’t do so well because I just don’t do them well. I don’t know if I could ever develop certain skills as a teacher because I’m not sure I am gifted in certain areas. Like most teachers (I guess?) I try to build on my strengths.

But there are times when I am called upon for a teaching project when I find myself standing in front of it, feeling so unsure if I am adequate to the task, and not always knowing if it’s just me being tired and overwhelmed and lacking confidence, or me coming up against a real wall because I just don’t have the brain and the gifts needed to go any further. This is not intended to be some sort of false humility, by the way. I’m serious about the fact that I sometimes feel very limited as a scholar and teacher, especially when it comes to my work in formal academia.

I don’t mean to be navel gazing. It might sound like that’s what I’m doing, but I honestly wrestle with this question, which becomes a question of practical import when I’m trying to decide which projects to take on and how to approach them. It may not be popular to talk about limitations, but I sometimes need to face the fact that I have them – both tangible and intangible ones. I don’t like the fact that lack of confidence is sometimes part and parcel of the limitations I face, but I suspect it often is. Trying to detangle all that is difficult. Sometimes I retreat and sometimes I take the plunge; sometimes I serve my students better than others. 

Grateful for opportunities, but I do confess sometimes I wish I could put my energies into one or two places, at most, and really dig in wholeheartedly and deepen in those places. Given the current season of our lives and our family's needs, I don't think that's going to happen any time soon, which means I need to keep on learning to do as well as I can putting together the myriad small pieces that make up the mosaic of my working and creative life.  And being as faithful as I can to do them well, even when I can't give some of them the attention they deserve.

Reading Round-Up: Early Summer Edition

Summertime! Our recent trip to Virginia to see family, coupled with the fact that school is out, means I am getting some long overdue reading time. Even though I have a heavier teaching load this summer than usual (at the seminary) I am still enjoying some good reading time.

Here's a peek at some of what I've been reading lately.

Young Fiction

The sweet girl (aka Jedi Teen...who by the way truly has officially reached her teen years now!) has been busy recommending books to me, deep into her own summer reading. Some of these she's found on her own and some we've ferreted out together via book lists. So far I have really enjoyed Savvy by Ingrid Law and One for the Murphys by Lynda Mullaly Hunt, two mid-grade books I might not have read but for the sweet girl's encouragement. I enjoyed Savvy, an interesting mix of fantasy and realism, for its creative story-line and highly creative use of language. One for the Murphys, the debut novel of author Hunt (whose second book Fish in a Tree the sweet girl and I both enjoyed earlier this year) is the story of a young girl in foster care. It reminded me a little bit of Katherine Paterson's The Great Gilly Hopkins, though Gilly had less overt sentiment.

Jedi Teen and I reviewed the graphic novel Smile together, and she's gone on to read two other graphic novels by Raina Telegemeier (I've started Sisters, but haven't had a chance to finish it). We both also read the seventh (and perhaps last, though we're not sure) Clementine book by Sara Pennypacker, Completely Clementine. It's so funny to realize that the sweet girl started reading these when she was about Clementine's age. Clementine has only made it through her third grade year in these seven terrific books, while my daughter has shot past her by years. But we both still love them, almost the way you love to and return to a good Ramona book. And that's saying something.

Mysteries

I've needed a lighthearted return to mystery reading this summer, and decided to dive back into my exploration of the books of Patricia Wentworth.  I'm not sure quite how many of the Miss Silver mysteries I've read now, but I know I've done three since late spring: She Came Back, The Gazebo, and Out of the Past. All of these were written in the 1950s, I think, and she definitely had her formula down by then. I'm cottoning on to what makes a Wentworth a Wentworth -- I actually managed to guess the murderer in the last one -- and I'm very much enjoying the camaraderie between Miss Silver and Inspector Abbot, who looks upon this school-teacher-ish maiden-aunt woman with both amusement and awe. I love that he trusts her detecting instincts so completely that he'd pretty much follow her blindfolded in a snowstorm. It's a great early example of an amateur and professional partnership.

Non-Fiction

So much really good non-fiction on my plate right now...it's sort of an embarrassment of riches. I'm inwardly singing with joy over the beautiful essays in James K.A. Smith's Discipleship in the Present Tense, which seem to be "speaking my theology" in ways I've only felt with a few authors in the past. I'm revisiting a gem of a book I loved years ago and recently rediscovered in a library book sale: Henri Nouwen's Return of the Prodigal -- and I need to hear what he has to say just as much as I did then. It's one of those beautiful gospel-centered books that we all need to revisit from time to time for the good of our hearts. And it's reminding me how much I love the artistry of Rembrandt and his Prodigal painting in particular.

I'm learning a ton of history I never knew from David Garrison's A Wind in the House of Islam, a book that is both challenging and encouraging. It's a carefully researched and well-written account of some of the many amazing things that God had done among Muslim communities in centuries past and is currently doing among Muslims in this century. I was going to call it a book of mission history (which it is) but I'd rather give it the bigger parameter of Christian history or just history (thinking about Justo Gonzalez' reminder that we too often separate the study of missions from the rest of church and world history).

I'm still working my way through N.T. Wright's Paul for Everyone: 1 Corinthians, which is taking me longer than I expected, mostly because I find myself wanting to chew thoughtfully on his insights. I keep meaning to jot some of the things that are particularly speaking to me -- from Wright, Nouwen, Smith, and Garrison especially -- here on the blog. Maybe I will have a chance to do that soon.

Seeing Stars

I keep meaning to mention that the sweet girl and I have started a mother-daughter review blog. We're talking books and movies together over at Seeing Stars, where we're known as Obi Mom and Jedi Teen. Come on over and visit if you're so inclined!

End of Another Year

Well, we've done it! Today was homeschool evaluation day, which for me always feels like the official end of our school-year, even if we finish actual schooling earlier. This year the sweet girl has had dribs and drabs of things to finish, mostly in math, so she's actually been doing a bit of "summer school" (about an hour a day) but even that is almost over now. With the official sign-off from our terrific evaluator, who loved seeing how much S. has "grown and matured," 7th grade is DONE! Thanks be to God!

Typing, Naming, and Praying

Once a month I type up revisions to my parish's prayer sheet. This is a sheet that gets distributed to the congregation each month with updated lists of people to pray for: people in need of healing, people we work with in church outreaches, local and national community leaders, missionaries and ministry workers connected to our church in some way, people being persecuted for their faith. It's a long list. Included in it are also diocesan and international prayer cycles: we pray for various bishops, priests, deacons, and lay people at work in our diocese, in our national church body, and in the wider Anglican communion.

I long ago discovered that it's easier for me to type in the rotating lists of names than to try to lift them from online sources and paste them in. That's particularly true for the communion-wide list, which is printed online in such a way that moving names via copy/paste would wreak formatting havoc with my document, leaving me with lots to clean up and reformat. Despite the fact that it may seem a little tedious to have to type all names in one at a time, especially when some of the names are unusual to this English speaker and not easy to spell, it's still faster and tidier than doing it any other way, in my humble opinion. But more than that, it gives me time to think, ponder, and pray my way through the list as I type.

There's something wonderfully grounding and connecting about typing in a person's name (and making sure you've spelled it accurately). Even though you may never have seen or even heard of this person, typing their name somehow gives you a tangible link with who they are. Since all of the names I'm working with are names of leaders, mostly bishops and archbishops, I know that each one of them has a challenging role and a lot on their hearts, no matter where they serve. Some of the names I type in with ease, and some I stumble over, breaking them into unusual syllables and then putting them back together, wondering if my mental pronunciation is anywhere close to how you actually say the name. Some of the bishops are in countries torn by war or where Christians face daily persecution. As I type their names, I find myself lifting each of them to God and praying that the Lord will watch over his servant.

And I love the names. Some of them have three or four names, many of them biblical. Then there are names (first, middle, or last) that evoke a picture: names like Godson, Maker, and Coffin (all fascinating names for bishops, I think). There are African names like Aladekugbe and Asian names like Iso. There are names that bring to mind Irish, Scots, or Welsh saints.

Sometimes  I confess I am tired when prayer-sheet revision time rolls around, and part of me doesn't feel like taking the time to scroll through the lists and type in the letters. But most of me realizes that by the time I'm done, I will feel more in tune and more connected with people of God all around the world, and more gratefully aware of the myriad of stories that are all connected just in this one slim chapter of the story of the communion of the saints. I know my typing in these lists is just a tiny service but it's one that refuels me every month to remember what a privilege is it to be part of the worldwide body of Christ and to pray for my family.

It Must Be June

We turned the calendar to a new month today. To all intents and purposes, our school year is "done" -- at least officially. I've tallied up attendance records and we've hit our requisite number of days. All that should be left is portfolio and evaluation.

But S. still has some things to wrap up: she's still writing her final research paper for her writing course, she's got a review unit still to do in math, a few stray grammar lessons to finish up to complete the workbook, and some ongoing work in Spanish (ditto). What makes me happy is to see her willingness to keep going with all of this, in a good, disciplined way, even though it's June and we're both oh so ready for a break. The nice thing, of course, is that she can tackle these things pretty systematically on her own and still have plenty of time leftover to begin some relaxation.

The other nice thing is that we're not feeling rushed in the mornings. Which, wonderfully, means more chances to explore learning trails. This morning we lingered at the breakfast table and had an awesome conversation about missions history and the shifting of the Christian world from global north to global south, which got her so excited she actually did a little cheer for our "missionary God!" (which made my heart want to sing, naturally). At lunch, we tackled the Smithsonian magazine that arrived on Saturday and I read her the Pluto article while she ate. She did a big paper on Pluto last year, so I knew she'd find it fascinating, and she did. We're excitedly looking forward to July 14, the big NASA encounter with the dwarf planet.

So yes...it must be June. Learning continues, but it does so in a more relaxed, chasing-your-passions-down-learning-trails way. That's good for us both.

June also marks the beginning of the summer diaconate course I'm teaching, along with four independent studies. Considering I'm still grading for spring, I'm feeling like I'm not getting much of a breath, but grateful for the work. I've got final edits on some S&T work too, and a doctor's appointment this week. Never a dull moment!

Just as Geeky as my Grandmother

One of things I sometimes miss is being able to afford magazines. While I know there are many cool things that can be seen and read about online, I still love the feel and look of a magazine, especially one with good writing and gorgeous photographs.

When we recently got an offer to subscribe to Smithsonian magazine for less than a dollar an issue for a year, I confess I leaped at the chance. Our first issue came yesterday, and I gave myself some late Saturday evening/Sunday afternoon time to enjoy a few of the articles, including a great cover story about lions and a fascinating look at the current NASA mission due to fly-by Pluto next month.

It dawned on me somewhere along the way that I had a very clear picture in my mind of someone else devouring articles with a Smithsonian magazine in her hands: my grandmother, in the years she lived with us when I was growing up.

Apparently I am just as geeky as my grandmother. Which makes me absurdly happy.

Sorting Papers: Quotes and Poem Scraps from the Daybook

I'm spending part of today sorting through a mountain of papers (a long overdue chore). Most of these have been stuffed into boxes over the past few years, but some of the papers go back much longer. In and among the boxes, I'm finding old student papers, scraps of poems I've written, love notes and drawings from the sweet girl from when she was little, photocopies of articles I saved for teaching or writing purposes, mission newsletters, old sermon notes, and collections of quotes and images. It's a plethora of stuff that looks like spillover from my overactive and far too busy writer-teacher brain.

Every once in a while, when I'm going through mountains like this, I pause to jot down a few of the things I'm finding. I thought I'd share a few quotes from what would be a daybook if I ever had time to make one!

"Don't feel like a failure if you're finding it difficult to pursue God's call or can't discern fruit." (~That's from some very scattered sermon notes from 2004! Eleven years ago...and I still need to hear it. Maybe more now than then.)

"Use what talent you possess. The woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best." (~Henry Van Dyke, not sure what source)

"The little purple house
with a roof like a cap
perched on the hill
and took a little nap

It shuttered its eyes
and dozed in the sun
and when it woke up
it was almost one

It yawned a big yawn
and its door opened wide.
It invited some friends
to come inside

And into the house
with a roof like a cap
we went right inside
and we too took a nap"

(~EMP, original/undated poem scrap, next to a doodle of a little purple house with a roof like a cap)

Planning for 8th Grade Science (First Semester)

It’s been a long time since I’ve done a homeschooling post on the blog. We’re wrapping up 7^th grade year in the next week or two, so I’m busy pulling together the portfolio of the year (made more fun this year by not having a working printer in the house)! But that means I am also in one of my favorite parts of homeschooling: planning coursework for the fall.

We rely rather loosely on a classical framework, which among other things has meant that we’ve done history and science in four year cycles. The history cycle is ancient, medieval, early modern, and modern, and the science cycle is life science, earth science, chemistry, and physics. In the grammar years, it was basically an introduction to those topics, while the logic (mid-grade) years have given us a chance to press deeper into the topics and focus a bit more within each. For instance, last year (roughly 6^th grade) we spent part of the year on general earth science, covered geology in a more in-depth unit, and then did close to a semester of astronomy. 7^th didn’t lend itself to quite so many nifty detours, as we basically stuck to mid-grade chemistry the whole way, but chemistry lends itself to more lab-work, which the sweet girl enjoys.

For 8^th grade, I’ve been going back and forth for a while about what to do. Our introduction to physics, back in the grammar years (4^th grade) did not go too well. It was due to a lot of things: a harder year overall as we moved toward the logic stage, a curriculum I bought with great enthusiasm, thinking it would work for us, only to find that it really didn’t, and the fact that I have very little aptitude for teaching physics. The bottom line may simply be that it’s also the branch of science that holds almost no interest for S. I’m sure it would have helped if I could have lit a metaphorical fire under her and sparked that interest early, but alas, it didn’t happen.

Knowing that we’re approaching what should be a physics year in the cycle again, I think we’ve both been feeling a bit worried about what we’ll do. Since part of the beauty of homeschooling is that we get to play to our strengths, part of me thought of just dropping it entirely and moving straight back into the life sciences. Then again, another beauty of homeschooling, at least from my perspective, is that we can encourage a student to try something again or to stick with things that may feel harder without too much grading pressure. The learning is the adventure. If it turns out not to be your favorite subject – eh, that’s okay. But at least you can say you gave it a try and got a taste of it.

With that in mind, I’ve decided to compromise. For eighth grade, we’re going to do one semester of physics, and one of botany. The botany will give us a jump on biology in high school, and will also give the sweet girl something to look forward to in spring semester after working hard in the fall at something that isn’t as much her cup of tea.

This has turned out to be incredibly freeing for me as a teacher too. I find that planning in semester implements can feel much less daunting than planning a whole year. It helps me to think outside the box in turns of resources, including the use of resources that might make a great unit or cover several weeks, but wouldn’t work for a whole course. And I’m very happy with what I’ve managed to put together so far, though I can’t actually build the course schedule until I get some things ordered, which probably won’t be till part-way through June.

Here’s what I’m planning to use:

Physics for Middle School by Rebecca Keller, PhD

(RealScience4Kids)

Despite the fact that they’re a bit pricey for our budget, we love these resources from Gravitas. We’ve used both their astronomy and chemistry books for the mid-grade year. Basically the text provides ten lessons and the accompanying lab book provides labs that go with each of the ten lessons. One of the things I appreciate about them is that they are well-organized, covering important topics in the field at age-appropriate levels. Because they’re good at covering important/key concepts, I can use them as jumping off places to help the sweet girl find other reading and resources that build on the information in the text. They’re also nicely designed, with colorful images and good-sized text in a slick looking paperback that feels approachable to hold and read. Finally, the teacher’s guide actually offers some further information and some possible stepping-off points for discussion.

Developing Critical Thinking Through Science, Book 2

(Critical Thinking Company)

Since S. is a hands-on kind of learner, I wanted to make sure we have at least one more good lab resource on hand, and I’m hoping this will prove to be useful. The description I’ve read indicates that most of the labs can be done with household items and a few other things you might need to buy ahead. I think it’s technically listed as “grades 4-8” which means there are probably some easier/some harder lab options throughout, which will give S. a chance to ease into things.

Exploring the World of Physics by John Hudson Tiner

(Master Books)

I can’t tell you how happy I was to discover Tiner’s Exploring the World of Chemistry this year. We found it late, alas, but we’re still trying to get it all in because we’ve enjoyed it that much. He does a fine job of looking into the history of a scientific discipline, stopping along the way to explain concepts that were discovered or developed. The writing is an interesting combination of straightforward and yet complex when it comes to the actual science being described or explained. S. enjoys exploring the history of science and has liked the Chemistry book, so I’m planning to weave the Physics book in and around the lessons and labs from our other resources. I’ve also discovered that Memoria Press provides supplemental questions and even quizzes/tests based on Tiner’s series, so I plan to pick that up as well.

I’ve already got Botany plans in the work for second semester, but I’m still exploring resources, so I’ll share more about that later.

Caring for the Vulnerable Among Us

Watching someone you love struggle with dementia is never an easy thing. My mother-in-law's challenges in the past few years -- and prior to that, her challenges as a caregiver for her husband, as he struggled with Alzheimer's -- have made me do a lot of thinking and praying. They've also made me recall the years my grandmother lived with us when I was young. How do we care best for people we love who struggle with memory loss and confusion? How do we show our love and care for them from afar, when we can't be with them all the time? How do we support the people who are their main caregivers if we're not?

There's a very helpful and thoughtful article that deals with those kinds of questions posted at the her:meneutics blog on Christianity Today. One the things I appreciate is the honesty of Benjamin Mast, the author being interviewed, when he talks about the vulnerability of elderly people with dementia and memory loss, and how easy it is for the church to overlook them. They are part of what he terms as an almost invisible demographic.

I've been wrestling with this a lot since our last family visit to Virginia to see my mother-in-law. She has been part of a moderately large non-denominational Bible church for over forty years. Yes, the same church for over forty years. While I was touched at how warmly she was welcomed to her Sunday School class when we took her to the Easter Sunday service, it was apparent that no one had been in touch with her much at all in the intervening months since she'd last been able to make it there. She struggles a great deal with loneliness, and yet from all I can ascertain, it is very rare that she receives calls from anyone at this church, and much more rare for her to receive an actual visit.

I think there are probably lots of reasons for this. Chief among them may be the contemporary, post-modern mindset that assumes that individuals would rather muddle along privately than rely on others for help. I think there is an assumption that family will do the caring, and absent that, that social services and retirement communities (my mother-in-law lives in one) will plug any care deficit. While it's true that there is a chaplain at my mother-in-law's care facility (maybe more than one?) that person is responsible for a great number of people. It also seems odd and painful to me that the local church, which would seem to be the best representative of "family of faith" there is, would so quickly fade out of the picture, even when someone has been a faithful member of that church for decades.

It may call into question how our churches can lack inter-generationality (is that a word? Well, it is now...) By that, I mean generations spending intentional time together. I don't think this has to be all the time. There are certainly times and places where it is appropriate for people to gather with people of their own age and life experience to learn at levels that fit the seasons of their lives. Young children and teenagers aren't the only people who could benefit from that. I think fellowship groups or Sunday School classes for middle aged people could be very beneficial, partly to learn and pray together over the challenges of aging! But when churches are very age-segregated, that can lead to other challenges. I know for many years that my mother-in-law had felt most at home in her own Sunday School class for older people. More and more, she felt out of place at worship, which had grown more casual and contemporary than she felt comfortable with. The people she was most connected to were her age or older, and now when she is struggling, probably many of them are as well.

All of this has made me feel deeply grateful (again, and for yet another reason) to be a part of a historical, liturgical church tradition. Anglicanism, steeped as it is in the threefold ministerial offices of bishops, priests, and deacons, reserves a very important and biblical role for deacons as leaders in pastoral and practical care for the people of God. (I love deacons! And not just because I consider many of them good friends, and have been blessed to teach in the diaconate study program in my diocese for a number of years.)  My dear husband and I have reflected lately on how glad we are to belong to a church tradition that has a long, historically-enriched, biblical practice of pastoral care. It doesn't mean that each and every church we've ever been part of has always practiced it perfectly...that's not possible. But it means that there is a much greater chance of such care being available and humbly and lovingly offered and practiced than in traditions that are shaped more by contemporary values than by historical and biblical ones.

As the body of Christ, we are to rejoice when another member rejoices and suffer when another member suffers. We are also to carry one anothers' burdens and practice loving care amongst the household of saints. And that's true no matter how old and frail the saints may be. Our love for the most vulnerable and "invisible" among us is surely a mark of our love for God. 

Mansfield Park Revisited

Over five years ago, I posted a reflection on my re-reading (and love of) Austen's Northanger Abbey. At that time, I dubbed myself "fully 5/6 an authentic Janeite," because I hadn't yet fallen head over heels in love with Mansfield Park. At the time of writing that post, I full expected to be re-visiting Mansfield for another read within a few months. Alas, it took me over five years to get back to the book, but re-visit it I finally did.

I think it's been re-reading Pride & Prejudice with my husband and daughter (my umpteenth time to read it, but the first time I've ever read it aloud, and their first time to encounter it) that made me realize I was up for a fresh look at the only Austen novel I've never felt completely at home with. I was a tad bit worried that I might not be able to lose myself completely in its pages. This mirrored the worry I felt back in 2009 when I did my second re-reading of Northanger. As I said then:

I confess I felt nervous as I took the book off my shelf. It felt too smooth, the binding too uncreased, the pages too new to be one of my beloved Austen books. And what if...perish the thought...my reading experience remained the same as the first time and I still didn't "fall into it completely"?

Silly me. If Jane is an acquired taste, then I have so long ago acquired it that reading her now feels like second nature. I should have realized that I've spent so much time with Jane in the intervening years that I would recognize her voice as soon as I began reading. I should have known that one can never really have the same reading experience twice, because wherever one is today is not where one was ten years ago (or five, or one, or possibly even last month).

I could have essentially written those words again this time out! 

I was definitely "ready" for Mansfield Park in a way that I wasn't when I first read it many years ago, still new to Austen's music and her way of looking at the world. Gone was any sense of stiffness or unfamiliarity. This was simply Jane again, Jane whom I love to spend time with, and I thoroughly enjoyed my reading of the novel this time out.

That said, may I confess -- and still consider myself fully a Janeite -- that I'm still not sure I fully "get" Mansfield Park? I don't mean I don't understand the plot, but there's something about the characters and the underlying tone that still doesn't quite work for me on some level. My memory of Fanny Price, from my one long-ago read, was that she lacked the sparkle and vivacity of some of Austen's other characters, and while that's true, I didn't feel the loss of that so much this time, maybe because I've now come to know and love the complexities of some of Austen's other heroines (Anne Elliot doesn't precisely "sparkle" either, but I love her dearly -- and really, how many of us sparkle in real life?).

In fact, this time out I found myself impressed with just how authentic Fanny Price's character feels. Yes, she's insecure and naive and perhaps a trifle rigid and judgmental, but what else can we expect her to be, given her life situation? She also shows a marked amount of determination not to give into social pressures and romantic intensity, even when she's being wooed with seeming sincerity by Henry Crawford.

It's the men I don't fully understand this time out, both Henry Crawford and cousin Edmund. Mary Crawford I understand more -- she's a schemer and a social climber but underneath it all, not an awful human being. She's easily swayed and led into error by others and there's a part of her who would like to be a lot more noble and real than she is, but she just doesn't have much backbone. Fanny's got the backbone and a much deeper heart, which is one reason why I wondered about Edmund's inability to see that (can he really be as smart as he's supposed to be if he's that dense about women)? Even though he claims, in the end, to realize Fanny's worth, I've got an uneasy feeling that somehow there's a part of him that might feel like he's "settling."

Henry's truly the one I don't understand. I'm not sure how Austen wants us to feel about him. She gives us far more time with him than she gives with with Wickham or Willoughby, scoundrels in other novels. Like them, he is the immature schemer who trifles with women's emotions -- at least at first. But at some point in the novel, he actually appears to grow. He sees Fanny's real worth, falling for her in spite of the fact that he'd initially looked upon her as just a conquest to pass the time. It feels as though Austen wants us to take him on the level at this point. At least I can't help feeling that she does. He is trying to change, he wants to be a better man, he wants to be the kind of man who perseveres and actually deserves a woman like Fanny. In the end, he fails, but -- and here's the problem with the way my emotions felt engaged -- I felt sad that he failed. There was a part of me rooting for Henry to actually become what he claimed he wanted to become. The fact that we see his spectacular fall from grace off-scene (just through letters and hearsay) made it all seem sadder. Fanny was proved right not to trust him, and while I was glad she'd been wise enough to not succumb, there was a part of me that wondered if her inability to forgive his past wrongs didn't have something to do with the fact that he ended up failing. I'm not putting the responsibility for changing him on Fanny. Getting into a relationship with the intent of trying to change someone doesn't seem healthy. But what if she'd at least taken him at his word when he was telling her how much he loved her? What if she'd found it in her heart to speak the truth: "I don't love you that way because I love someone else. But I recognize that your feelings for me are respectful, tender, and good, and I hope that you will find someone else to love that way some day."

Meanwhile, I knew I was supposed to be rooting for Edmund (and I know if I get around to watching the film adaptation with Johnny Lee Miller in the role, I no doubt will!) and I did find him endearing on many levels, not least of which was the fact that he was the only person at Mansfield who was truly kind to Fanny from day one. But he felt so incredibly big brotherly in his role of older cousin that it was harder for me to root for the romance. Added to which, as I already mentioned, he drove me a bit batty with his inability to realize the depths of Fanny's feelings. He looked right past her and latched onto the pretty but shallow Mary Crawford, although he knew at almost every turn that the two of them weren't right for each other. Unlike Fanny, he falls into the trap of thinking that he can love someone so much they will change their essential nature. Austen seems to be telling us, in both love stories, that such change doesn't come easy.

And that makes me a little uneasy. Granted, I think on one level she's right. We are who we are, often for better or for worse, and it takes a lot to truly change us. Austen may be saying something deeper here (without actually saying it) about the limited powers of even the best romantic love. It can be a wonderful thing to love another person, but ultimately, it's the grace and love of God that can change us from the inside-out. What I'm stumbling over is the fact that often that love is mediated to us through other human beings. It's through being forgiven and embraced, even in our messy brokenness, that we often find ourselves most changed.

I've been coming to realize that's one of the things I love about Darcy's character in P&P. It feels stronger to me this time out...how much his love for Elizabeth changes him. It's true that Darcy's failings are not the kind indulged in by Wickham or Crawford. He's not a flirtatious trifler with emotions. But he is unbending in his opinions and highly condescending. He has a hard time looking past appearances and confessing his own weaknesses and shortcomings. His love for Lizzy changes him in good ways, partly because he has to learn to bend, to become more fully human. Interestingly, it's really his love for her (before she ever understands how to return it; she's changing too!) that begins the changing work in Darcy. Because both characters change and grow, there is something about their union that is highly satisfying. Edmund and Fanny, likable as they are, don't seem to change much. Their temperaments are also more alike than not (they both have trouble with the whole notion of play acting and its potential impropriety, when no one else in their circle can see that at all). You could say that Edmund grows wiser, I guess, but somehow there just doesn't feel like there's as much movement in their characters. They don't move toward each other so much as they both stand still and finally manage to see past what they need to in order to come together in the end.

All this is merely my "second impression" (to slightly mangle an Austen reference) of a novel I'm sure I will turn to again. Perhaps on a third reading, I will come to an even better understanding of the characters and its overall tone. There's a lot here to enjoy and love, including the wonderfully sketched background characters like Fanny's Uncle Bertram and her conniving Aunt Norris. And as always, some truly artful scenes.

Austen Spring

Last year we had a Tolkien summer, and this year it's an Austen spring. We're reading Pride and Prejudice in the evenings as a family. It's the sweet girl's first encounter with Austen, her dad's first encounter with an entire Austen novel (he's seen numerous movie adaptations with me, and I've read him excerpts). It's also my first time to read an Austen novel aloud. So we're all enjoying something new and fresh in the experience!

Having pretty much internalized P&P after multiple re-readings, it's interesting to read it aloud and discover how challenging it actually is to read aloud. Austen's long sentences, which meander a lot in the middle before reaching their main point, are harder on the tongue than I expected. They flow more easily when I read silently, but I'm enjoying the challenge...and remembering how Alison Steadman, the actress who played Mrs. Bennett in the 1995 A&E version, said she thought Austen's lines were harder to deliver than Shakespeare's.

And speaking of Steadman, hers is the acting voice that influences me most when I read. It's almost impossible for me not to read Mrs. Bennett's without her cadence, which isn't a bad thing perhaps!

The sweet girl has found it interesting, but has been surprised at the sheer number of words she needs help in defining. I confess I had almost forgotten, due to long familiarity, just how gorgeously dense Austen's vocabulary is. And sometimes I am stymied when faced with defining a word (especially a few of the more archaic ones) because I realize I have spent years understanding it from context but not really knowing its precise meaning. With some of the denser passages, she has also required a little help of that "could you explain what just happened there please" variety, but we don't mind stopping and providing a little extra help. I feel like a tour guide! And that's fun too.

There's also the delight of realizing anew how many words Austen loves with such relish that uses them frequently. ""Felicity" and "amiable" (or "amiability") being two of her very favorites, though S. keeps noticing how often prejudice and pride crop up too.

I've not tried much in the way of voices -- too busy just trying to read it in a lively and engaging way to promote clarity -- but it strikes me how much fun it would be to play Lady Catherine in a stage version. Such commandeering condescension! Lizzie is also a wonderful role -- a tad bit snarkier than you realize when you read her quietly on the page. Some of her lines just drip caustic wit. Despite the fact that Austen gave Lizzie's sister Jane her own name, you can't help but feel that she must have seen something of herself in her main heroine. Though the older I get, the more I think I empathize with Jane Bennett and her attempts to see the best in others. I think I am somewhere between Jane's naivete and Lizzie's cynicism. And I think part of Austen's underlying message is that both can get you into trouble. Lizzie thinks of herself as a realist, but there are bits of underlying bitterness in her dealings with the world and the unfairness of her own situation that color some of her prejudices and help make the plot go.

Everything We Have Comes From Him

I'm in the midst of a several day slog through a lot of work deadlines, which in actuality is part of a longer series of months where I've been pushing at a pace I know I can't keep up much longer.

My mind is tired. I am running out of creative ideas (both teaching and writing). I am running out of energy and hours.

My heart is tired. We have friends going through the unfathomable sadness of accompanying one of their children through terrible illness that looks as though it will end soon in death.  I have turned twice to news reports in recent days about the persecution and killing of Christian brothers and sisters in other parts of the world.

My mind and heart are also bursting with love and gospel goodness, which in the midst of all the heartbreak and heartache feels ever more precious each day. We have been loving our nearly teenage daughter through a ton of very hard questions about God, life, Jesus, the Bible, and the world -- incredible questions that come faster than we can possibly answer (her mind works at such an amazing pace sometimes). I spent part of the morning trying my best to answer questions from a seven year old who told me he really wants to see God.

Tonight I was glad to come across these words from the end of 1 Corinthians chapter 1 in The Message:

"Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of “the brightest and the best” among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these “nobodies” to expose the hollow pretensions of the “somebodies”? That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. Everything that we have—right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start—comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That’s why we have the saying, “If you’re going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God.”

What a rich treasure God has given us -- all of us who weren't much when we were called, but who by God's grace have been given everything we need, including a clean slate and fresh start.

 

Upside Down World

I'm working on a proposal for a youth curriculum lesson based on Acts 17 and 1 Thessalonians 1. The Acts 17 passage has that wonderful verse where Paul and his friends are accused of having "turned the world upside down." The people of Thessalonica didn't mean that as a compliment -- Paul and his fellow missionaries were proclaiming the gospel, and it had upset their whole way of thinking and being! (Sometimes having your world turned upside down isn't very comfortable!) But their words were truer than they probably realized at the time.

And what was true then is still true now. The gospel changes everything!

My dear husband gave me the terrific idea of having the kids look at an "upside down map" for one of the activities. If you've never had a chance to check out a map with a south-north orientation, do. It will blow your mind and get you thinking about the world in highly creative ways. It might humble you a bit too, especially as you ponder how many tacit assumptions we sometimes make about our place in the world based on the accepted construct of our maps.

Holy Week and Easter

"He became naked so that we might be clothed; he who was truly fit to rule took all our dishonesty and unfitness to rule upon himself; he rose from the utter dependence of death with an imperishable body, "more fully clothed," so that we, too,clothed in his merciful robe, might be fully knowing and fully known in love's full embrace.  Like God.  As we were meant to be."
                                       ~Andy Crouch, Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power

A blessed end of Holy Week, and a joyous Easter!

The Penderwicks in Spring

I don't usually pre-order books, but with The Penderwicks in Spring, the fourth book in Jeanne Birdsall's planned five book series, I made an exception. Not only had my twelve year old daughter been eagerly anticipating the next installment since she was nine, I love these delightful books too. When I had a gift certificate around Christmas, I plugged the pre-order into my purchase...and almost forgot about it.

You can imagine the excitement when the beautiful yellow and green jacketed hardback arrived on Friday. The sweet girl and I promptly treated the book like Nick and Tommy Geiger treat their beloved football, passing it with great enthusiasm. She read it in two days, managed to not give me any major spoilers, and handed it off after telling me that she loved it. I also read it in two days (knowing we will both go back to savor it more slowly later) partly because I knew she was longing to talk about it. Which is what we did for a good bit of yesterday morning.

Without providing too many spoilers, I do want to give a shout-out that this book is every bit as lovely as its predecessors, and in many ways moved my heart more deeply than the first three. The books have always been a wonderful mixture of humor, sweetness, and some bitter sweetness. Birdsall manages to balance multiple emotions while providing stories with lively pacing and character defining moments for her beloved cast of characters.

Fans of the books should know – and this is nothing you can’t discover online or on the book flap – that the events in this book take place about five years after the last one. That means that Rosalind, Skye, and Jane Penderwick are nearly grown up – 18, 17, and 16 respectively, with Rosy off to college in Rhode Island and only home for occasional visits. That makes Batty almost 11, about the age Jane was when we last spent time with the Penderwicks, and Ben (their stepbrother, the son of Iantha) now 8. (One of the first things the sweet girl said to me when she was in the midst of reading was “Ben really talks now!” which made me laugh.) There is also a new Penderwick on the scene, rambunctious Lydia, age 2.

The book belongs to the younger Penderwicks, with its heart and soul reserved for Batty. While I missed more time with the older three…though they do come into the story in important ways, and still feel very much themselves in spite of being teenagers…I was so glad that Batty finally got her book. I don’t know if I feel a special affinity for Batty because we share the role of “fourth child” in the family, but I’ve always loved this youngest (well, used to be youngest) Penderwick sister, ever since she wandered into the pages of the first book wearing her butterfly wings. Batty has long since outgrown the wings, but this book is, in many ways, about her learning to fly. 

In case you’re wondering, Jeffrey makes a couple of important appearances, and the Geiger boys (now young men), are also prominent this time out, especially the oldest Geiger, Nick, who turns out to be an important mentor for Ben and a good friend to Batty when she most needs one. Tommy Geiger, Rosalind’s long-time suitor, is offstage for most of the narrative, but have no fear…Tommy being Tommy, he shows up when it counts.

Ben has turned into a delightful kid, with a love for action figures and rock collecting and a personality as big as it needs to be to help him hold his own in a houseful of girls. Mr. Penderwick and Iantha have small roles this time out, but they’re still their usual loving selves, supportive and helpful parents with the humor they need to help their children sort things out. Mr. P still spouts Latin whenever he gets the chance, but since Skye is now taking Spanish and Jane is learning French (badly), little Lydia, in the parroting stage, is quite the polyglot.

I won’t say a thing about Penderwick animals (fearing to give too much away), but animals are important in this story, as they almost always are.

The moments of humor are delightful, as always, especially when Rosalind brings a potential suitor home from college, a handsome guy whose terrific cheek bones can’t make up for the fact that he spouts all sorts of pretentious silliness about books and films.

Keep an eye out for echoes from the first books, including the very first book. The Alcott echoes continue to feel strong in this book too. Oh, and don’t be surprised if there are a few secret MOPS meetings, as well as MOOPS, MOYPS and even a MOBAB. (If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you need to get to your nearest library quickly and pick up a copy of the first novel. Go! Now! What are you waiting for?)

The moments of pathos are also beautifully rendered in this book, especially as Batty does some soul-searching, both about her musical gifts and about her place in the family. Since the four girls’ mother died not long after Batty was born, Batty has always been the liminal character, the one more than anyone else who seems to straddle the family as it originally was and the family as it has come to be. We see in the book that sometimes that perch can feel a little precarious, but it also has its gifts.

I both laughed and cried in the final chapters. The Penderwicks in Spring is a worthy penultimate installment in a great series. The sweet girl and I both eagerly await book five and whatever surprises and familiarities that may have in store.

Big Vision, Difficult Tasks, Lasting Fruit

A letter from a missionary organization hit my electronic mailbox this morning. In it, I found this wonderful prayer its leaders have been praying recently, one which I think I need to adopt as a prayer of my own. They are praying for:

"A vision bigger than what our faith believes. Tasks bigger than our own hands can accomplish. Fruit that will last longer than our lifetimes."

Very Amen!

The World is Almost Too Beautiful

The world is almost too beautiful. The variegated petals of a tulip, the wisps of straw fluttering from the open door of the white birdhouse where sparrows are once again busy setting up housekeeping, the way the light looks on a late March afternoon when you’re not yet used to the lingering softness of the light. It is almost too beautiful, almost, until you remember, your throat aching with mingled joy and sorrow, the echoing beauties of redemption, forgiveness, release, and deep, deep peace. And you recall the beauty of the Author of it all, beauty past recounting, rhyme or reason, beauty that can only make you stutter in worship and fall down in praise. 

(Just a little prose poem on this Palm Sunday.) 

Middle School Reading: Then and Now (Or Old Books and New)

An interesting post hit my FB page earlier today, with a link to this list of middle school reading in Minnesota today and Minnesota of 1908. (And all Betsy-Tacy fans will almost immediately think, "Margaret Ray would have been in middle school just a few years after this!")

The accompanying article, which I confess I only had time to skim, addressed the significant differences in the time periods, thematic elements, and reading levels addressed by the books in question. Under time period, she was chiefly pointing out that the 1908 list didn't hesitate to recommend reading to students that had been published 50-100 years before, while the current list mostly features contemporary work of the past 20 years.

While I think the article makes some valid and important points, especially on reading levels and on our current trepidation about giving young people older books, I think the discussion could be even more fruitful if we allowed ourselves to notice that at least some of the contemporary books appear to contain literature that provides some cultural perspective beyond Anglo-American. I agree with the writer of the article that we need to give our young people literature that helps them understand the foundation of the United States and of western civilization. (And I totally agree we need to give them language and sentence structures that challenge them.)

Without addressing the merits of the individual books in question on either list (some of which I know pretty well, and others I don't know at all) wouldn't it be wonderful if we could both give them the foundational literature of our country and culture and the more contemporary literature that tries to broaden our understanding of the complexities of American history, the riches of the American melting pot, and the responsibilities and joys of global citizenship? Just a thought, but wouldn't having the grounding in foundational American and English literature prepare them to better read (and appreciate in context) some of the literature that is being produced in the English-speaking world today?

Seems to me that we would all be well-served by C.S. Lewis' idea of varying our reading diet to include three old books for every new one (not a challenge I always meet, but one I appreciate). If you haven't ever read Lewis' Introduction to Athansius's On the Incarnation, where he explains this idea and the reasons behind it, it is well worth your time. In fact, the whole book is worth your time, and one of those delightful exercises in reading something "relatively new" (the Lewis introductory essay) and then something very old, the Athanasius work. As someone who has sometimes questioned my own ability to read, comprehend, and absorb older literature, I occasionally read Lewis to bolster my courage and enthusiasm. He helps me want to dive and dive deep, even if I end up getting in over my head. (Was it Karl Barth who once used the metaphor of surfing to describe reading theology? It sometimes feels just about that vigorous!)

George Herbert, Jane Austen, and My Forty-Seventh Birthday

It's my forty-seventh birthday, and I woke up thinking about people who have died young.

Heh. Don't worry. I am not feeling terribly morose (far from it...it's been a lovely day) and that comment is not nearly as somber as it sounds. I just found myself reflecting on the Scriptural admonition "teach us to number our days," and thinking about people who gifted the world even during very brief sojourns.

This has been on my mind since I read Timothy George's essay "George Herbert in Lent," the other day at First Things. I either didn't know or at least didn't recall that George Herbert, the extraordinary Anglican poet and priest, died in March of 1633, just short of his 40th birthday. I'm pretty sure that I never realized before now that he never saw any of his poems published. He left them to his friend Nicholas Ferrar; they were all published after his death.

I suspect that both George Herbert and Jane Austen, who died at the age of 41, would be astounded at the strength of their legacies so long after their deaths. They were quiet people whose influence, during their lifetimes, was in relatively small spheres. And yet their influence, their creative power, has spread to so many others, in ever widening circles as the years pass. While it's true that not all of us have the creative genius of these two, I think that the imprint they left behind doesn't have to do only with their words, but with the faithful lives they lived and the quiet but faithful ways they used the gifts they were given. I love the Richard Baxter quote that Timothy George provided regarding Herbert: he was "“a man who speaks to God like one that really believeth a God, and whose business in the world is most with God.”

The older I get, the more I begin to realize that it's the quiet but loving moments that may have the most staying power in my own life, and the most influence for good on people I'll eventually leave behind. Those circles of quiet and loving influence feel so big in my own life. I know, I know. Sober sounding reflections for a 47th birthday. But right now I'm not feeling particularly glum about how old I am, just tremendously grateful for the years I've been given so far and hopeful that in the years ahead, I can stay a faithful course and love even more deeply. I'd like someone to be able to say about me one day that she is "a woman who speaks to God like someone who really believes in God, and her business in the world is most with God."  That's a legacy worth having.

Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal: A Worldwide Cinderella (Book Review)

This past Friday, we treated ourselves to a rare event: a movie in the theater. My daughter's love of Cinderella and my love of Kenneth Branagh directed films, not to mention my upcoming birthday, all combined to compel the family to the new Disney version of the classic fairy-tale. It was a stunningly lovely movie, so very well-made, and I hope to still find time to write a real review! (The short version: if you love fairy-tales, see it. If you love Kenneth Branagh movies, see it.)

Seeing the familiar story play out got me thinking about the film's source material, not only the 1950 Disney animated film but the classic Perrault and Grimm versions. That got me thinking about other versions of the tale too, which took me into my book review archives. I dug up a review I wrote over seven years ago and decided to dust it off and give it a rewrite.

Without further ado, here's my slightly revamped review of Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal: A Worldwide Cinderella, a beautiful picture book written by Paul Fleischman and illustrated by Julie Paschkis. It was published in 2007 by Henry Holt.

********

Almost everyone knows and loves the story of Cinderella. We can easily sketch the tale because we know its images and contours so well. There's poor lonely Cinderella, abused by stepmother and stepsisters, clad in rags and sweeping up the ashes, overworked almost to death. Look! Here comes her fairy godmother! Away Cinderella rolls to the ball in her pumpkin coach, glass slippers on her feet. She loses one at the stroke of midnight, but her beloved prince picks it up and vows to find the woman who has lost that tiny sparkling shoe and stolen his heart in the bargain. And so he does find her. The stepsisters are aghast. Wedding bells ring. Happily ever after.

Am I close? Is that just about the way you know and remember it?

Maybe...or maybe not.

What author Paul Fleischman has given us in the lovely and unusual picture book Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal is not just a familiar re-telling of Cinderella as many of us in the West have growing up hearing it told. His Cinderella has gone global. Fleischman's fascination with the Cinderella story led him to look for it in other cultures than our own. What he discovered was that people the world over love to tell this story. And while the main shape remains the same, the details change in wonderful ways from culture to culture. His book is an attempt to weave those varied details together into one rich tapestry. He calls it "a worldwide Cinderella."

Fleishman chooses to tell the worldwide Cinderella as one story, with the different versions woven together. An easier route, less creatively challenging to author and reader, might have been to simply tell the story several times over and let the versions stand side by side for comparison. Instead, Fleischman has woven various cultural strands together and attempted to tell one coherent story.

He is helped in this task by the vibrantly colored gouache paintings of illustrator Julie Paschkis. Her illustrations have a definite "folk art" feel. The main pictures and text are bordered but appear on colorful, busy backgrounds of motifs and patterns that arise in the story. The backgrounds reminded me of batik cloths or other bright textiles.  If you look carefully at each background, you will see the name of a country printed. It almost looks like a little tag "sewed" into the backdrop. That little tag lets you know, on each page, what country's folk-tale tradition is being pulled on for the particular details.

So you move from the way the story is told in Mexico (where the potential stepmother appears kind at first, offering sweets like pan dulce for little Cinderella to eat) to the story as told in Korea  (where poor Cinderella learns what a hard taskmaster her new stepmother can be, and has to spend long days weeding in the rice fields) and then on to Iraq (where Cinderella remembers how she'd wanted her father to remarry and laments "I picked up the scorpion with my own hand").

Although the story often devotes one whole page or a two-page spread to a certain country's telling, there are some pages on which you shift cultures more rapidly. This is set off visually by background color changes, and by setting the text off in smaller boxes (and always with the name of the country near the appropriate text, embedded in the background). The rapid shift is a fun way for the author/compiler to pile up a lot of details and to quickly show readers the plethora of storytelling choices available when one reaches important parts of the story. For instance, when it's time for Cinderella to be clothed in something beautiful for the ball, you might be expecting a fairy godmother, but you won't find one here. In Laos, she simply reaches into her mother's sewing basket. In Russia, she finds clothing in a hole in a birch tree. In Indonesia, a crocodile swims up to her, and in its mouth was a sarong made of gold... or if you prefer the Chinese and Japanese versions, presented immediately afterwards, a cloak sewn of kingfisher feathers or a kimono red as sunset.

It's fun to see the different ways people around the world tell one story. The pages where the details come quickest remind me of those old "choose your own adventure" books! You and your young reader may find yourself wondering about the missing details you don’t hear from the different cultural versions, which might inspire you to go looking.

Another strength: the book introduces different cultural traditions and expressions, especially from cultures that we're not as familiar with in the West. The only nods to North America are the few places where the story moves into a folk telling from Appalachia. It’s an intriguing way to illustrate how different places in the world have different ways of telling stories, different expressions, and different ideas of what's beautiful to wear or delicious to eat, as the varied menu at the  wedding feast near the book's end so amply illustrates.

The literal jumping from place to place and the piling up of different cultural details is both the book's strength and a potential weakness. The story doesn't quite work as one coherent story. There's still a rags to riches storyline and we get to the happy ending, but Cinderella (never named in the actual text, just the title) changes so rapidly in the text and in the accompanying illustrations. As she morphs from culture to culture, it might present a visual and creative challenge to very young readers or listeners, who could struggle to keep up or to comprehend all the changes. For that reason, I think I would recommend the book primarily for children 7 and up, who will likely have an easier time grasping the concept and probably have a deeper interest in comparing the different versions.

As an adult with a real love of fairy-tales, I found this weaving of global tellings of Cinderella quite enchanting. If you know a child who loves fairy-tales, Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal could be a lovely way to introduce them to the way stories are told and changed as they move from culture to culture.

Tired But Blessed

Tired I am (says this mom in Yoda-speak). It's been an incredibly busy month filled with more work than I've been able to handle well, though I've given it a good try, and plenty of other stresses too. And yet today....

• I am super grateful for the fact that spring is almost here! Despite today's 40 degree temperature that felt colder in the wind, we are really and truly out of single digit temperatures. The sunshine is strengthening, the days are lengthening, there's a mess of purple crocuses blooming down the road, and I've seen two robins this week.

• I am deeply blessed to have mailed two cards today: one for my parents' 61st wedding anniversary (this Friday) and the other for my mom's 83 birthday (Saturday). 

• And I am thankful for the gifts and blessings of the Lenten season.

What Makes a Hero a Hero?

My 12 year old has been in major Star Wars mode this month, which means we recently watched the original trilogy in all of its original theatrical release glory. (Tonight we get the special release of the first film, complete with all its extras…longer Death Star run! Greedo shot first! Slithery CGI Jabba! It will be her first time to see Episode IV with all of Lucas’ changes.)

Watching these films has gotten us thinking about heroes and villains. Her fascination with Luke and Darth got me pondering, and I decided to pop over to the American Film Institute’s Hero and Villains list to see where they showed up. AFI, in case you don’t know, presents a list of the top 50 American film heroes and villains (along with lists of many other things connected to American film).

Here’s the interesting thing: Darth Vader shows up at #3 on the all-time villain list. And Luke Skywalker…doesn’t make the cut.

I was not surprised to see Han Solo come in at #14 on the hero list – we love scoundrels-turned-heroes. But Obi-Wan Kenobi at #37? Really? I mean, I love Alec Guinness and the gravitas he brings to the role, which ups the whole tone of the first film especially. I’m not sure anyone else could have brought the weight needed to lines like “You must learn the ways of the Force…”

And yes, of course he sacrifices himself in battle, another mark of heroism. But his role in really more of mentor-to-hero than hero; it’s his exit from the land of the living (though he continues to show up in ghostly form in the next movies) that allows Luke the room he needs to grow and come to grips with his destiny.

Luke is the one who has the classic hero journey. He not only ends up besting the #3 movie villain of all time in battle, but that villain is his father, and his continued reaching out in love and forgiveness to that villainous wreck of a father is what eventually enables Darth to do the right thing and find redemption. And he blew up the Death Star! How much more heroic can Luke be?

Of course, he doesn’t get the girl (primarily since the only girl for miles around in this galaxy turns out to be his twin sister, hidden from their dastardly father at birth) and one wonders if that factors in. Of course, it’s also a teensy bit frustrating to consider that Leia herself does not make it to the hero list (there are women on the list) since she seems to be at least as heroic as Han, both of them in supporting role kind of ways.

So what do you think? Should Luke have made the list?

In case you’re curious, here’s how AFI defines hero:

“For voting purposes, a "hero" was defined as a character(s) who prevails in extreme circumstances and dramatizes a sense of morality, courage and purpose. Though they may be ambiguous or flawed, they often sacrifice themselves to show humanity at its best.”

Consider Him...(Pondering Hebrews 12:3)

Except for a lovely worship service and church school class this morning, followed by a great lunch at church, I have been working all day. This is not my usual kind of Sunday, but this particular semester, I've discovered that I often have to work on Sundays because of my class schedule and my deadline schedule with Spirit & Truth. Reminder to self: must find some sabbath time to take the place of what I'm not able to have on Sundays!

Because I've been working for several hours....work of the really needing to concentrate and think and write creatively type...I'm too tired to write the post I've been planning in the back of my head since this morning. That would be a post on John Newton, author of Amazing Grace. (I mention it here in hopes that it will spur me to actually come back sometime this week and write it...we shall see.)

For now, I just had to share this verse, which has also been running around in my mind and heart much of the day (it's been a crammed full to bursting mind and heart day)....

"Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted." (Hebrews 12:3)

This is a bit of Scripture that's been engrained in me for so long it nearly took my breath this morning in worship when I felt like I heard it "anew." I think I heard it back to front -- the words "weary" and "fainthearted" smacked me in between the eyes, because I must confess I've been feeling a lot of both lately. Then I backed up to the beginning of the verse, and the remedy for weariness and faintheartedness: "Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself..." jumped up for my attention. The enduring of hostility, going all the way to the cross, to restore us in love while we were yet sinners (yes, Romans 5 still singing through my head...thank you, Paul) -- what an amazing God we have.

But it was the "CONSIDER HIM" that really lodged in my heart today. It's an active verb. It's something we are to *do* so that will not grow weary or fainthearted....which suggests that the writer of Hebrews knows all to well how easy it is for us to become those things in this world.

Consider him...or as some other translations have it....
"just think of him"
"keep your mind on him"
"go over that story again"
"think constantly of him"
"think of what he went through"

Sounds like an important spiritual discipline, not just for Lent, but for any season!

Praying that I will find real and loving ways to consider him this week.