Tag: Spirituality

I Eat Your Joy for Breakfast

Rita Sommers-Flanagan2 Comments

God is indulging in a morning nap, sound asleep on a weathered recliner near the garden shed. I’ve noticed that God can sleep pretty much anywhere. But I’m awake and agitated, stewing about climate change, greed, cruelty, and the limited hours at the landfill.

I clear my throat and speak loudly enough to wake anyone within ear shot. “Someone took a huge gamble when they introduced creativity and choice into their evolutionary efforts.”

God startles and sits up. “What now?” he says, rubbing his eyes, raking his fingers through his holy bedhead hair.

“Creativity,” I say. “The bored human is often a deadly human. We need to create and change things up. But then we compare. We get insecure and try to make ourselves more beautiful and have too many children and accumulate vastly more than we need. This leads to overpopulation, scarcity, and war.”

God swings his legs to the side of the recliner, stretches, and groans. “You’re so right. It’s a huge gamble. And yeah, it hasn’t gone that well so far. But it isn’t over.” He sees my scowl and adds, “I mean it’s always over, and it always isn’t.”

He lays back down, situates his hat over his eyes, and pats the space beside him. I perch on the edge. I do not know how to relate to this complacent, laissez-faire God.

“Blur,” he says in a languid voice. “Blur, mingle, melt.”

He means let go. He means he’ll carry me for a while. He intends to be a source of comfort.

“I can’t blur,” I whisper. “I know you have your ways, but I want to do something on my own. I want to make my mark.”

God sits back up. “And there you have it,” he declares.

The profound irony of what I just said hangs in the air between us.

God sighs. “You are still adolescent apes; you need to play. But your marks will all wash away. Remember, the lasting measure of worth is compassion.”

I look down at my hands. God continues. “And the nature of mercy is upside down. The gluttonous will eventually fast. The lips of liars will be purified. It’s all about balance.” He winks and adds, “When you get it right, I eat your joy for breakfast. It’s delicious.”

I stare across the expanse of my life. Finally, I say, “And when you speak, I stir-fry your words for dinner. They’re tasty.” “Fair enough,” God smiles. “That makes me happy.” But as he drifts back to oblivion, I hear him mutter, “Or at least I think it does.”

Missive from the Beautiful, Horrible Moment

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Every morning I sit in the warm, chunky soup of God, my attention split between robins in the garden, clouds on the move, and my fingers poised above the keyboard. God appreciates the opportunity to clown around, but sometimes they take it too far, and I feel left out.

I want God to notice me. I eat dandelions. I pull clumps of quack grass, pretending there’s a chance to eradicate this long-rooted invader. Quack grass is also known as twitch, quick grass, quitch grass, scutch, dog grass and witchgrass. My own pet name for it is Satan. On more generous mornings, I allow for the possibility that it has redemptive features. Not today.

“How about we all float on our backs?” God suggests, flailing happily in the womblike liquid of themselves, ignoring boundaries such as time and space.

I shake my head. The steady pressure of God is eroding my body. The Ever-Presence is a weighted blanket, a hazmat suit, an open invitation to find peace in what is true. I am not a maker of stars, but I am my own tornado. While I’m still able, I will continue spinning through the garden, yanking quack grass to kingdom come.

All the faces of God smile. “Look!” they say. The arms of God bend, fingers pointing every possible direction. I have no idea where to look.

“You’re too inclusive. Too amped. Could we bring it down a notch?” I ask petulantly.

The many fists of God punch the air, and their faces melt like candles into a singular pool where I see my singular reflection and consider my singular fate. The robins appear to be flirting, ready to mate. The aroma of God is intoxicating, but even so, my stiff hands won’t curl around the quack grass anymore.

My friends and family are floating on nearby rivers, hiking their own circuitous trails, and I wish them well. I wish myself well. I wish God well—the Unitary, the Complex, the Galactic–all of them.

“Thank you,” they say harmonically.

“You’re welcome,” I say automatically.

“That’s unlikely,” they laugh. “Our welcome is usually, um, shall we say overstated?”

I nod. “Well, you’re more welcome than quack grass.”

They grin, poking each other in the side. “Score! We’re more welcome than quack grass.”

I realize God is making fun of me, so I issue a slight retraction. “Actually, that’s not entirely true. Depends on the day.”

Vertigo

Rita Sommers-Flanagan5 Comments

God is a dizzy dame who throws her head back and laughs from her gut. Droplets of saliva sparkle in the air. No politely covered mouth for this One. She’s extravagant, repulsive, and contagious. Early in life, I came down with a bad case of God, and it permanently deformed my worldview. To stay balanced, I learned to compensate.

But now, the crystals in my inner ear randomly come untethered and reality spins like a rolodex. I no longer trust any surface or deity presenting itself as stable or defined.

“Remember that coiled rattler under the burdock?” God chuckles as she guzzles Hutterite rhubarb wine. “That was me!” She’s drunk and proud and dancing.

“I’ve never doubted that,” I say, sober and serious.

“And remember how I taught you to breathe?”

I shake my head. God takes credit where credit may not be due. But who am I to question the Source? To protest the inconsistencies, incoherence, and impossible dialectics? The Sophie’s choices and failed states?

God clicks her castanets, sways her hips, and stomps her high-heeled feet. “Yes!” she exclaims. “That’s the question. Who are you?”

The frenzied beat moves her past the limits. The sky gathers force, and hailstones strip her naked. She throws her head back again, her joy maniacal, her hair, a den of vipers, awakened and writhing.

I am unfazed. Bemused. I’ve seen it all before.

“No,” I say calmly. “The question is who are YOU?”

The scene shifts. God is Tevye, singing as if I were Golda.

“But do you love me?” His voice is gravelly. Vulnerable.

“Do I have a choice?” I ask.

“Do you have a telescope? Or microscope? Can you alter DNA? Of course, you can. But if you plant carrot seeds, do you harvest corn?”

I settle in for a long ramble of nonsensical obfuscations, but God chucks me on the chin and becomes Dr. Seuss, reading from his book Oh, the places you’ll go. “You have brains in your head, feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.”

Despite my instabilities, I know this is true.

“I have no sheep, but there are eight chickens, two pigs, a tiny slice of land, and some hateful, deluded neighbors to care for. Will that suffice?”

“Yes!” Dr. Seuss says. “Oh, love what you love and then love some more. Love so much that your muscles get sore…”

“Shazam. Poof. Be gone!” I wave God away with a smile. “I’ve got work to do.” God winks and squeezes back into that slinky gown. “Me, too,” she says with a toothy grin. “See you around.”

Atlanta Airport

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The Atlanta Airport is not an easy place to kick back and relax, but today we have passes for the United Club Lounge and enough time to use them. God is enjoying the free Budweiser and I’m happy to have found a salad bar, chips, salsa, and windows.

But liberated from the constraints of luggage, what I really want to find is my center. I sit on a worn sofa, consider the ebb and flow of travelers, and examine my life for signs of meaning. So far, it doesn’t look hopeful.

Nearby, a thin man eats pulled pork with collard greens, and a young woman in leather hotpants refills her plate, eyelids heavy with artificially thick lashes. God is busy chatting up one of the waitstaff in a language I don’t recognize.

A blown-up black and white photo in front of me features a row of women standing at attention. Shoes, hair, pigment, purses, smiles, skirts, hats, breasts, height, weight: identical. The shot was likely taken half a century ago. In geologic time, less than a split-second, and yet here we are. I have no explanation for anything I’m observing. None.

“You don’t need an explanation,” God whispers.

“Then why do I want to explain everything?” I whisper back.

God shakes his head. “Let it be. That’s what dogs do. Even the smartest breeds.”

“Then why wasn’t I born a dog?” I ask. I know he’s not serious. We’re just making small talk. Humans are forever asking why and insist on explaining even when we’re wrong. We seem purposefully designed to want to understand.

God grins. “Totally on purpose. Why do you think you travel?”

To those of us born before devices, the one-way conversations around me look like repeated singular insanities. My own device activates itself to urge me along. Time to check in. Time to board. Time to go.

I glance at God, not sure what he’s planning to do. He removes an earbud and looks up. “Hey, you think this place is open 24/7?” he asks, yawning.

“For you, of course,” I answer. “But is this really where you want to hang out?” I look pointedly at the retrograde picture of the lined-up women.

“Ah, those were the days.” God says. “Would you mind saving me a seat?”

“You know it doesn’t work that way,” I say as I gather my burdens. “See you in Montana?”

“You betcha.” God smiles and stretches his legs out so long I can no longer see his feet. “And you can leave your carry-ons with me if you’d like.”

Interruptions

Rita Sommers-Flanagan8 Comments

“Have you noticed how often you interrupt me?” God asks, annoyed.

My verbal output may have been somewhat one-sided, driven by holiday agitation. I was holding forth about the ways of the world, all things irritating or ignorant, the costs of blind faith, and how positive and upbeat I think others should be. Including God.

“Sorry,” I say. “Go ahead. I’ll try to listen better.”

“Never mind,” God says. “I forgot what I was going to say anyway.”

Unlikely, I think to myself. How could the Living Word forget what she was going to say? But I sit politely as if I believe her, and she sits politely as if she’s not upset. As if she’s not reading my thoughts. As if people in the Ukraine aren’t very, very cold right now. As if people in my own community aren’t planning how to cheat on taxes and take more than their share. As if goodness and honesty and peace might have a chance.

Managing ourselves, three dogs, and four piglets in subzero weather has made everyone snippy. When it’s this cold, all manner of things can go wrong. Yes, I regularly interrupt God and the natural order, but isn’t that the human story? Most of us don’t want to die of exposure, physical or otherwise. We burn fossil fuels and hide among falsehoods and fairytales.

I follow God’s gaze to one of my many disorganized bookshelves. It’s a motley rainbow of words in shiny covers. I love books. I would get up and touch them, but I don’t want to spoil God’s revery. It’s obvious she finds comfort in the books, the words, the great and mighty abstractions contained in those bound and precious editions. I’m glad we have this in common.

“Do you ever interrupt yourself?” I ask God after our shared silence has run its course.

“Oh, yes,” she nods with a sad look. “Many times. It’s always tragic.”

She turns her hands palms up, stares at the scars, and like George Harrison’s guitar, she begins to gently weep. This always makes me cry.

She looks straight at me, wipes away the tears, and drops us into a bittersweet world where true words are like heirloom seeds; planted and watered, converting light to something verdant, innocent, and delicious. No comforting myths. No lies. No interruptions.

I know we cannot stay, but I give thanks before we return to the inescapable veracity of dogs, pigs, and fire. Mulled wine. Good cheer. In the chaos of Christmas, God and I make eye contact, and despite the contradictions, we vow to be respectfully conversant with this fragmented, freezing world.

Still Life

Rita Sommers-Flanagan7 Comments 

There are two granny smith apples in the basket, slightly bruised and aging out. 
The thought of eating one sets my teeth on edge. I don’t know why I buy them.
It’s a repeating pattern with me and fruit. I have unfettered access 
and there’s room in my cart, but is that reason enough? 

I sit with the ethereal miracle of vibrant green, tangerine, and sweet potato 
in the loosely woven wicker that holds things together for now.
Minutes and hours fall from the heavy sky. I keep watch, 
and in my own way, I pray.

There’s tea steeping and a bag of chips open in case God comes by. 
She likes the salt. I like the company. I try to be accepting, 
not greedy, not demanding, not intrusive, not filled 
with expectations. Just quiet and receptive.
But it sucks. It’s harder than winter.

The God small in each of us is to blame for tart apples and the long seasons 
of discontent. We are unskilled at listening, even less skilled at loving. 
I hear God in the hallway, dragging something behind her walker.
It must be laundry day.

Well, I can’t wait forever. I have errands and obligations. 
I understand how the self-important God of billions 
might ignore me now and then, but the laundry lady?
When God embodies thus, the roles reverse. 
She’ll ask me for quarters and for help
folding her flannel sheets.

Fittings and Flushing

Rita Sommers-Flanagan10 Comments

At 5:53 this morning, I was chanting fittings and flushing over and over because the new toilet seems to be malfunctioning which I must investigate so it can be returned within the grace period if need be. And I need to call the plumbing fittings store because I’m in the market for a new pressure tank.

I do not allow myself to get out of bed until 6 a.m., so given my distractibility, if I wake early and think of things, I recite them until I’m up and can write them on a list.

This discourages God. The holy art of being chill eludes me even though, as God has pointed out for decades, fretting at dawn does not necessarily enhance the chances of a good day.

But today, the chanting paid off. By 9 o’clock I had called the fittings store; the size of pressure tank we need will have to be ordered, not just picked up. And I’d flushed enough to realize the flapper chain was too short. An easy fix.

Next, there’s the broken screen door handle. And powdery mildew is taking over the garden, and right at this moment, a wasp is buzzing around in the living room. Even though we usually have five or six swatters available, I can’t find a single one.

But I do find God, standing motionless in Mountain Pose on the porch.

“Hello, God,” I say. “What’re you doing out here?”

“Considering autumn. Funerals. Firewood. Frost. Harvest.”

“Want me to memorize a list for you?” I ask facetiously.

“No.”

God picks up one of the onions drying in the sun. She peels away dirt-encrusted layers until she reaches the moist, succulent flesh and releases the pungent signature of onion. “This will take care of it.”

Only God can do this with an onion. She had summer mark this tragic year with three gargantuan pumpkins, renegade tomato plants, and cauliflower heads, white as snow, which we’d forgotten were there.

Spring is one of my worst distractions. We always overplant, but this will change.

Nothing stays the same. Nothing lasts. To know this is a burden and a blessing.

Between impermanence and consciousness are caves and canyons worn by water, made beautiful by clay, resisting, yielding, and resisting again.

Letting go.

Hanging on.

And letting go again.

That tasty cauliflower grew to fruition unnoticed, but the gigantic, neon pumpkins are entirely obvious, frantically ripening a raucous orange on frost-damaged vines. God and I are cheering them on–God perched comfortably on the pinnacle of forever; me, less centered, patting the pumpkin’s belly, dreading the coming winter, but imagining pie.

Existential Angst

Rita Sommers-Flanagan4 Comments

The explanation could be as simple as caffeine. Or scoldings by Ms. Manners. Or a niggling Jiminy Cricket on my shoulder whispering reminders of my failings and violations of the common good. I don’t know, but I can’t seem to get rid of the angst and sense of urgency that rob me of the peaceful existence I deserve. Something or someone is out to get me. I share the paranoia of my era. The exaggerated, anxiety-producing avoidance of death.

My father died nine days short of my 20th birthday. He exited life as I was exiting the teens. He was 44. Somehow, my grief-demolished mother hosted a random set of grandparents for a bleak commemoration of the day I was born. She made roast beef, potatoes, and a cake. It was a dark, dark birthday. I don’t know how we managed to swallow.

“But you did,” God says, joining me gently as I sit with memories flooding by on either side. “Your mother was as brave as anyone I’ve known, but I had to attend that party disguised and uninvited. She was done with me, and I don’t blame her.”

“I didn’t even know you were there!” I exclaim. “I brought a different god. He spewed platitudes and mumbled lies about God’s will and imminent resurrections and such. It was awful. Why didn’t you shut him up?”

“All in good time,” God says, her eyes filling with tears. “I’m not apologizing or defending myself, but there are days I just cry my eyes out.”

I put my arms around God while she sobs as if the loss were yesterday. And for God, it was. And is. And ever shall be. I cannot think of what to do. We are all baffled kings composing hallelujahs. Overthrown by instinct and libido, lust and love. Endless birthing. Endless dying.

“I never intend to fool or frighten anyone,” she says, taking deep ragged breaths to calm herself.

“I know, Sweetheart,” I say. I run my fingers through her unruly hair. “But we judge and fool and frighten ourselves. We can’t help it. The contradictions and losses are too much.” God slowly slips out of my embrace. She moves to the outer edges of the known, opens her thousand wings, and disappears. Behind her the path is littered with breadcrumbs, a trail of her broken self. As I follow, all things extraneous fall away, and I am slightly less afraid.

Who’s to Say What Starlight Might Do to the Skin?

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Yesterday, I was looking for something in one of our outbuildings but within seconds, I’d forgotten what I was looking for. Our sheds reverberate with such potential that I can’t go in and come back out the same person. Touching the chaos causes a quickening; stacks of windows become greenhouse walls; slightly-damaged doors open to somewhere nice; a child pounds joyously on the drum set; strewn with straw, the stall in the corner protects a menagerie awaiting the ark; futons offer rest (or shelving); saw blades are sharpened; the woodstove is hooked up so I can cook in an emergency; empty frames and canvases are masterpieces hung in a gallery where antiques are tastefully displayed, and the scraps of angular metal have been welded into wings.

Our buildings are all named: Yoga Studio, Bug Barn, Playhouse, Solar Shed, Old Garage, Eva House, Lean-to, River Cabin, and of course, the decrepit and dangerous Contemplation Corner. The names reflect aspirations, not content. The structures are salvage yards and sanctuaries filled with failures awaiting transformation.

“God,” I said. “Proportionally, I bet I have as much broken and discarded stuff as you do.”

“Well, hello there, Junior,” God drawled. He’d materialized beside a flat-tired trailer, chewing a blade of grass with studied nonchalance. His thumbs were hooked on the pockets of dirty overalls. “That’s not exactly what I’d call news.”

“Could you get any more stereotypic?” I asked. God shrugged and faded. I squinted into the neon orange sunset and began walking home.

I am chronically derailed by the allure of what could be, and I blame God for this. It takes resources and patience to repurpose the wrongheaded or rejected. There are days I long for everything to burn to the ground; for fire to devour the bulging collections of oddities and unlikely visions; for extreme heat to purify my remaining days.

“Tidiness does not ensure wisdom,” God said, in the voice of a patient teacher. She was resting in a rainbow-colored hammock hung between two thorny crabapple trees. “I found this hammock under a pile of flat soccer balls,” she added. “I like it.” She was wearing a sundress from the ragbag and had tipped one of my straw hats over her face.

“It’s getting dark,” I said to the spectacle that was God. “You may not need that hat.”

 “Maybe,” she agreed, throwing one unprotected, delicate arm over her head. “But who’s to say what starlight might do to the skin?”  I knew she was making fun of me.

“You’re right,” I said, offering her a sweater. “Who’s to say what starlight might do to the skin?”

There Will Come a Day

Rita Sommers-Flanagan10 Comments

When I got out my vitamin organizer to take my supplements this morning, today’s cubby was empty. I must have dipped in twice yesterday. No wonder I feel overwrought; too much B-complex and an overdose of magnesium may account for my anxious dream last night wherein Barack Obama helped me bandage the finger I cut making his family a salad. I don’t like forgetting, and I don’t like anxious dreams.

But dream we must. Forget we must.  Decline we must. Die we must. There will come a day when the puppy digging in the compost right now is an old, grey-faced mutt, and there will come a morning when no matter how watchful I am, I won’t glimpse my sister, half-crazed on her 4-wheeler, chasing down a skunk with her shotgun.

“Sorry I’m late,” God says as she rushes in. “You’ve rearranged your writing space. I like it.”

“Oh, hi God,” I say. “Coffee?”

God holds up her hand. “No, thanks. I had a cup with your neighbor, and I’m going to treat myself to a latte later. Still catching up on the fiascos of Easter/Passover/Ramadan. And Ukraine…” Her voice cracks.

“Hmmm,” I say. “Want some vitamins or something?”

God smiles and leans forward. “You know I’m not vengeful, right?” I nod and wait. “And you know I don’t play favorites, right?” I nod again, wishing I could be an exception. “And you know branches will always grow toward the sun and move gracefully in the wind, and things you drop will fall toward the center, right?”

I nod a third time suddenly feeling quite sad. “And where do the things you drop go?” I ask in a quiet voice, turning my face away. But God sees my eyes welling up anyway. She makes a fist of her giant hand and thumps herself hard in the chest. “Right here,” she says, and hits herself again. “Right here.”

When I sleep, I shroud the windows in purple velvet drapes. It occurs to me that I’d like my body wrapped in these before it is laid to rest in the garden. “Sounds like a good plan,” God says, voice fading. “I like purple.”

I have the intention of wiping my eyes and nodding again, but neither are possible because I have dissipated into the moment. The drapes are sun-streaked, dusty, and elegant. Granted, it may be an idiosyncratic or imagined elegance, but it doesn’t matter. What matters is the gravity-defying blackbird perched on the top branch of the wind-whipped cottonwood.