We have found it so hard to believe, so easy to disbelieve. Every good thing has suffered. –Don Welch, “An Interview with Don Welch,” Mark Sanders, On Common Ground

As I was loading photos into the new digital picture frame I received from my daughter and her family for Christmas, I came upon a photo of my grandson, Griffin, as he worked valiantly to rescue minnows that were being flushed through the culvert under our pond dam after a recent downpour. I remember the day well, how he scooped as though his life depended on it, carrying coffee can after can full of minnows from the river raging through his yard to the pond where he dumped them, returning quickly to bail again. This was Sisypean labor. For every minnow he saved, a dozen more were swept down the torrent that gushed through his yard into a ditch of cattails where they would die. This was a lesson in futility, as we worked, shoulder to shoulder, to save the same minnows that steamed through the culvert again almost as quickly as we rescued them.

But what do you say to a child-hero whose resolve is so pure, whose heart is so full? Oh, I could’ve schooled him on futility, all our scooping and living and loving slipping through our fingers–literally and metaphorically–too soon. I could’ve encouraged him to give up the fight and retreat to the yard for a game of wiffle ball. I could’ve, but I didn’t. Let him believe, I thought. If just for a time as this, let him fight the good fight. For too soon, the bright fry of these days will be swept away into the hard truth of moments during which he’ll see–with clear and grownup eyes–the futility of such acts.

In his philosophical essay, “The Myth of Sispyphus,” French writer and philosopher Albert Camus wrote that “[t]he gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor.” Immortalized in mythology for the punishment he received from the gods, Sisyphus has become the poster child for futility, endlessly pushing a boulder up a mountainside, only to have it roll to the bottom, where he’d begin the act again. In his essay, however, Camus ultimately concludes that “one must imagine Sisyphus happy,” that perhaps, like Sisyphus, we might find a kind of joy and purpose in the struggle.

It’s one thing to be a child who isn’t aware that his minnow rescue mission is futile, but it’s quite another to be a man who sees the futility of the labor to which he’s condemned. Some regard Sisyphus’ fate as an apt metaphor for postmodern life. You work, you pour your life into some venture, people and place–and to what end? For an exceptional few, there are monuments, written records, and legacies marking their labor. For most us, however, poet W. H. Auden says it best in his poem, “Musee des Beaux Arts,” when he concludes with these lines regarding Dutch painter, Pieter Bruegel’s “The Fall of Icarus”:

In Brueghel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry, 
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Yes, for most of us, our lives and deaths aren’t important failures (or successes), and others have places to get to and sail calmly on. This has been the predominant postmodern sentiment, one grounded in a belief that our actions are largely futile and our lives largely unremmarkable.

In going through my father’s files and papers, I’ve been reminded again and again of how he championed a worldview founded on turning defeat into victory by refusing to be defeated. In poetry, he advocated “writing up,” even in the midst of stylistic trends that celebrated “writing down,” rejecting more traditional virtues of beauty, truth, and goodness and replacing them with irony, futility, and utility. In life, he celebrated the lives of those like his grandmother who struggled to keep her farm afloat during the Dust Bowl years and my mother’s grandmother who immigrated from Germany to Nebraska as a teen and ultimately worked as a housekeeper, raising two sons alone when her husband abandoned her. In love, he looked to my mother’s unflagging optimism and courage in the face of cancer, economic and family challenges. He lived his words: There is no more heroic charge than to begin again.

In the first few years after my retirement, I thought a lot about my life’s work. Professionally, this work culminated in my last position in which I was able to use what I’d learned over decades to affect change in one school district. I was–and am–proud of this work, for at the end of my career, I’d learned much from my successes and failures as an educator and was given an opportunity to share this with other educators as a professional development provider. Still, I was scooping minnows–passionately and with purpose–that would quickly be swept away. Within a year of my retirement, there were few remnants of my work alive. There was little to suggest I’d ever worked there, save for the memories of a few teachers. Some could argue that I was rolling the stone of my convictions up the education mountain of fickle preferences and trends, to no real avail. Some could argue that the best work of my life came to naught.

And yet, I’ve also thought about what I’d change now if, when I began my work there, I knew what I now know. And I’d have to say nothing. I’d change nothing. As my sister says (wisely), that was your work to do then. Indeed. There is a kind of heroism in work that some may call futile. After all, what’s the alternative? To regard every task, every word or deed as pointless? To never begin for fear of having to face those for whom your work will neither be an important success or failure? To sit at the bottom of the mountain in the shade, scoffing at those who roll their stones up each day? To sail calmly on as others strive for ends they may or may not achieve?

For years, I faced classrooms of students who quickly decided that the work of American literature or composition was futile because they’d never need such work in the “real world.” Having decided this, they often resolved to get through these courses by refusing to begin at all. That is, they committed to completing only what was absolutely required–without engaging in the work–and resigned themselves to enduring the required semester(s). But there were also those who believed they could benefit from the best thinking and writing of the best authors and speakers, who willingly pushed this challenging work up the mountains of the course, and who suffered every good thing they read and discussed. Most of these students wouldn’t go on to become English majors or to use what they’d learned in literal, practical ways in their careers. Still, they refused to see the work as futile, and instead, regarded it as heroic. This work, they argued, was necessary for those who wished to become better humans.

We’ve all known exceptional individuals like these students. We’ve witnessed the heroic futility of our children and grandchildren as they eagerly take on tasks most adults would regard as futile. We’ve lived and worked among such individuals who often quietly go about the business of beginning again, putting their metaphorical backs into the work of each day. We know these people, and we know futility. But perhaps we don’t recognize the impact of our responses often enough. I’ve tried to imagine what my life would’ve been like if I hadn’t grown up in a family that saw many of my labors–some more futile than others–as heroic. Clearly, there are times to pack it in, to acknowledge that to continue in the same way hoping for different results is futillity (or insanity). But there are other times when we should celebrate the conviction that drives us, even as we fail (especially as we fail).

Like my father, I fear that we may be losing the heart for such celebration. Driven by our well-intended (but often damaging) desires to protect ourselves and others from futility, we may discourage those who would begin again. We may find it increasingly hard to believe in heroes like Vallie Welch and Minnie Zorn. And we may fail to understand Camus’ claim that we can imagine Sisyphus–and others who find purpose in apparently hopeless labor–happy.

  Photo Courtesy of Nebraska Tourism

I would therefore write a kind of elemental poetry that doesn’t just avoid the indoors but doesn’t even see the doors that lead inward—to laboratories, to textbooks, to knowledge. I would not talk about the wind, and the oak tree, and the leaf on the oak tree, but on their behalf. –from “Winter Hours,” Upstream: Selected Essays, Mary Oliver, 2016

In her essay, “Winter Hours,” Mary Oliver declares that she couldn’t be a poet without the natural world, that, for her, “the door to the woods is the door to the temple.” She’s not alone. Over the centuries, there have been many writers, artists, naturalists, and pioneers for whom the door to the natural world was the door to the temple. Like Oliver, they respected the natural world, revered its beauty and power, and were keenly aware that their destinies were irrevocably linked to it. And like Oliver, they strove to represent the wind, and the oak tree, and the leaf on the oak tree on their behalf.

I couldn’t help but think of artists like Oliver, of William Wordsworth and Henry David Thoreau, of Aldo Leopold and Annie Dillard–to name just a few–as I watched the finale of the popular Paramount Plus series, Yellowstone, which aired just before Christmas. Inspired by the 2,500 acre Chief Joseph Ranch in Darby, Montana, the series’ fictional Yellowstone Dutton Ranch is portrayed to be the size of Rhode Island, a whopping 1,034 square miles. Although Yellowstone offers a variety of colorful and unforgettable characters (some who will reportedly star in their own spinoff series), the land itself is the protagonist. The struggle to keep and preserve it is central to the plot in every episode. Throughout the series, the family strives to keep the ranch for their heirs, honoring ancestor and pioneer James Dutton’s legacy profiled in the series’ prequel, 1883. In spite of their commitment and hard work, however, a host of developers and leaders of the Broken Rock Indian Reservation continue to threaten this legacy, throwing roadblocks and creating chaos in each season. When the family finally comes to the painful but inevitable realization that they can no longer cover the ranch’s enormous tax burden, they sell it to the Broken Rock Reservation for a price tag that ensures the Reservation will be able to pay the taxes ($1.25 an acre) and with an agreement to preserve the land for all time.

Yellowstone’s creator, Taylor Sheridan, profiles ranchers and indigenous people in their complex fight to preserve a way of life. And the preservation of this way of life is wholly dependent upon the preservation of the land. Sheridan is not the first, nor will he be the last, to chronicle this fight. Certainly, his series and its prequels have ignited a renewed interest in and passion for the West and its remaining undeveloped spaces.

To those who argue that that this theme has been done–perhaps overdone–and that there’s little more to be gained by plumbing it further, I offer these words from Oliver’s “Winter Hours”: “The pine tree, the leopard, the Platte River, and ourselves—we are at risk together, or we are on our way to a sustainable world together. We are each other’s destiny.” Next to my father, Oliver is my favorite poet, and her mention of the Platte River here solidifies this standing. For years, my parents routinely hosted visiting poets, and when Oliver visited the University of Nebraska-Kearney, she actually slept in my childhood bedroom (be still my heart!) I don’t know this for fact, but I like to think that she and my father discussed their shared love of the natural world over coffee at the dining room table where so many other poets sat and visited. As they talked, I know that my father would’ve shared his love for the Platte River, for the Nebraska Flyway that attracts as many as a million sandhill cranes, geese, ducks, and other shorebirds annually. I like to think that when Oliver wrote these words, she remembered her visit to Kearney. And I like to think that she remembered my father, who, too, spent his life writing the kind of elemental poetry on behalf of the Platte River, the sandhill cranes, the roadside ditches lined with coneflowers, the acres of buffalo grass, the wonderful and terrible natural world.

Oliver claimed that “[t]he farthest star and the mud at our feet are a family; and there is no decency or sense in honoring one thing, or a few things, then closing the list.” And why should we close the list? Why should we forget the family to which we belong? Why should we refuse to see that we are at risk together, or we are on our way to a sustainable world together? Yes, the theme of land preservation has been done and redone; still, we seem to need and welcome the reminder, the renewed awareness, and the wonder of even the smallest and meanest thing in the natural world. We need and want the Mary Olivers and Taylor Sheridans, the Wendell Berrys and Don Welches. Each, in his or her own right, brings new eyes to the natural world that too many take for granted.

A few months ago, I heard someone remark that a new poet was just another in a long line of “nature poets, the likes of Mary Oliver.” And he wondered aloud if Oliver was really as good a poet as people thought she was, or if she just rode out her illustrious career on the laurels of some early–and perhaps lucky–success. Undoubtedly, he would identify me as just another nature poet, too, and certainly not one of Oliver’s caliber. For awhile, I thought seriously about my own writing and about the journals that had rejected it. Could it be that they found my work derivative of nature writers like Oliver and Berry whose themes they’d thrown over for newer social themes? Perhaps so.

I suspect Taylor Sheridan will continue to make television series regarding land preservation. If Mary Oliver and my father were still alive, I know they’d continue to write on behalf of the land they loved so dearly. If they were both alive, I’d invite them to walk the trails with me each morning. And in those moments before dawn, we wouldn’t talk about the muskrat in the north pond and the cedar trees and the berries on the cedar trees–but on their behalf.

Photo by Nicole Louden, Sandhills Prairie Girl

For the past year, Nebraska photographer and writer Nicole Louden and I have been collaborating on a series of photos and poems, and this photo took my breath away. Each time I look at it, I think about how the light breaks into our winter days, and “a weary world rejoices.” For me, Nicole’s photo is a stunning reminder of how “The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” [John 1:5]

The world at the time of Christ’s birth was weary with oppression and hopelessness. Centuries later, the world is still weary. At Christmas, as many move joyfully through their days relishing the spirit of the season, others struggle in desolation as they grapple with grief, conflict, and pain.

So, here is my grownup Christmas wish: May you know the consolation of Christ’s light that overpowers the world’s weariness, today and always.

Hoarfrost

On this day in December, the kettle sings 
and I walk through the house in sock feet, 
the woodstove humming with heat.

I sit at the table with coffee, 
remnants of sleep still matting my eyes,
the house still bundled in the comfort of night. 

But outside, the day breaks 
like a geode, hoarfrost splintering 
the air into carats of delight.

Outside, cold is an aria that shatters
the ceiling of night,
each note sharper, each facet cut 
with the delicate, blue stone of dawn.

In the silence of the room,
I think of you—
gone two years now.

From the mantle of grief
my heart breaks 
in a jubilation of jewels,

the magma of love erupting,
astonishing each fence post, 
each strand of barbed wire,

and crowning a weary world
with light.

Wishing you Christmas blessings, Shannon

Carl Bloch, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” Luke 2: 8-12

To live in a field among sheep, to stay awake, alone and vigilant, to live in solitude through long days and longer nights. For some, this may sound like a peaceful refuge in the midst of a busy, noisy world; to many others, however, this sounds more like a prison sentence. Separated from family and creature comforts, these shepherds faced considerable physical and emotional trials. To face these trials knowing that others looked down upon you, that you occupied the very bottom of the social ladder, and that you were crude, dirty, and uneducated, this might transform the consolation of solitude into desolation. As this solitude flooded your mind and soul with a tsunami of doubt and fear, you might struggle to maintain any peace and joy you’d found. And in your separation from others, you might also feel separated from God.

In his 2008 article “Shepherd’s Status,” Christian author Randy Alcorn explains the status of shepherds at the time of Jesus’ birth: “[S]hepherds stood on the bottom rung of the Palestinian social ladder. They shared the same unenviable status as tax collectors and dung sweepers.” To share the same status as dung sweepers is to share no real status at all. Add to this the fact that because shepherds were perpetually dirty from living in fields among sheep, they would’ve been regarded as ceremonially unclean, unfit to be in the presence of God. We could argue the stable was already unclean and question whether a few unwashed shepherds could contaminate it further. Still, this was a holy place with a Savior King, and a group of lowly shepherds would’ve been customarily barred entry.

God had another plan, though, as He brought the good news first to shepherds, invited them to see the sign themselves, and to worship the Messiah, their Lord. On a Sunday 30 years ago, God had another plan for the church I was attending. After our contemporary service ended and as we were hauling off musical and sound equipment to prepare for the traditional service which would begin in a few minutes, a man quietly entered the back of our sanctuary. I saw him tentatively make his way down the aisle and went to greet him. I quickly discovered that he couldn’t speak English, and given that my Spanish was woefully limited to a few conversational phrases, I couldn’t really communicate with him. There was an urgency in his voice, though, and as I led him down the aisle towards the front of the sanctuary, I could see that our pastor was already coming to us.

I won’t forget this moment. My pastor stuck out his hand in greeting, but the man shook and lowered his head, ashamed to offer his own filthy hand. He’d obviously not washed for days. His clothing was soiled, his hair matted, and his skin blackened with dirt. But my pastor smiled, never breaking eye contact as he grabbed his hand and welcomed him. This man wasn’t a shepherd, but he was the equivalent. He’d hopped a train at the border and was making his way to his cousin in Kansas. And here he was in southern Iowa, having unknowingly overshot Kansas and traveled many rail miles beyond. As our group stood near the pulpit and parishioners were filing in for the next service, our pastor looked out into the pews and yelled, “Does anyone speak Spanish?” A timid hand went up in the balcony, and a small woman made her way down the stairs. Through her translation, we learned the man’s story and his need to unite with his Kansas cousin.

A period of silence ensued during which the organist didn’t begin the prelude and the church service was delayed. In a huddle near the pulpt, our pastor and several of us formulated a plan. My husband, who worked for the railroad, took him to our home to find him a winter coat and a few provisions for his trip. Then, at some risk to his employment, he drove him to the trainyard and helped him hop the right train, the one that would bring him to his Kansas family. On that Sunday morning, we were less concerned about doing church and more concerned with being the church.

For years, I’ve thought about the courage of this man who was as unclean and lowly as a shepherd. I’ve thought about how he humbly offered his hopes and needs before us–before God. And I’ve thought about this encounter as a powerful affirmation of how God uses the lowly, the sick and weak, the alien and estranged, to bring us back to the manger. At the manger, we are all ceremonially unclean, humbled in our shared humanness. At the manger, we are all shepherds, perplexed and amazed that God would bring the Good News to us. At the manger, we kneel before a baby who will one day sleep, unbathed, under the stars, who will work with his hands, fish for his supper, and ultimately save the world.

On that Sunday morning so many years ago, we were able to offer some consolation to a man in desolation. On that night in fields outside of Bethlehem, God offered great consolation to a group of shepherds who’d undoubtedly experienced the desolation of their position and status. As tinseled and bedazzled as our Christmas seasons often become, this splendor pales in comparison to what must’ve been an amazing sight: shepherds kneeling at the manger and taking their honored place as Jesus’s first visitors. This Christmas, may we take consolation in the assurance that the last will be first, the meek will inherit the earth, and the spirit and good fortune of these shepherds lives in us.

And she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. Luke 2:7

When one door closes, another door opens. We’ve all heard the saying. Undoubtedly, it’s been used by well-meaning folks to console us when doors are shut in our faces and the entry into places we’d intended to go is blocked. We may find these words cavalier, too dismissive of the disappointment we truly feel because a closed door is, first and foremost, a denial: no entry, no vacancy, no possibility.

Although the inkeeper in nativity plays is not mentioned in scripture, we faithfully cast him as an integral actor. He is the story’s foil, the gruff-speaking man at the door who barks, “No room!” As he shuts his door to a pregnant woman and her husband who’ve just made a 70-mile trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem, he becomes the reason for a king’s humble birth in a stable.

It takes little to imagine Mary and Joseph’s desolation as they stood before the closed door. Alone and facing an imminent birth, they were desperate to find an open door. In traditional crèches, we often find cozy, clean stables and sweet-smelling mangers, serene-looking parents and well-groomed barn animals. It’s as if our crèche makers are saying, “Look how beautifully another door opens!” The reality of Jesus’ birth–in a stable or cave, as some suggest–was cold, foul-smelling, and crude. If there were a hotel rating system at that time, Jesus’ birthplace wouldn’t have even earned 1-star; it would make economy lodging look luxurious.

Yet, the King of Kings, the Savior of the World was born into this desolate place. And herein lies one of the greatest consolations: that God sent His Son into this desolation to live among us, to celebrate and suffer with us. Jesus is no door-slamming innkeeper; rather, He is the hotel clerk who smiles, opens the door and says, “Come in! There is always room for you.” Even in times of greatest desolation, even when life’s doors shut in our faces, He stands on the other side of a door which is always open for the asking:

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Matthew 7: 7-8

And yet as St. Ignatius cautioned, even this consolation may fade into desolation as life throws down its gauntlet of trials. Decades ago, I suffered a period of infertility and miscarriage during which the door to motherhood was resoundingly slammed in my face time and again. I recall sitting in the waiting room of my gynecologist, a small room burgeoning with pregnant women. Burying my head in whatever magazines I could find (generally Parents and Mother and Baby), I plowed through holiday recipes and child-friendly vacation tips. When my name was finally called, I escaped to an examination room, grateful not to be reminded of my barrenness.

During this period, I remember the encouragement and advice from others: Don’t give up hope–you’ll get pregnant when you least expect it! Just relax–take a vacation! Go on a cruise! For them, it seemed the door to motherhood would open benevolently in its own time. But for me, the door felt hopelessly and permanently locked. Yet, even as this door closed–or seemed to close–I felt the stirrings of another door opening: the adoption of our first child, Megan.

In three days, we’ll celebrate Megan’s birth. Out of the despair of infertility and miscarriage, her birth ushered in a period of great consolation, a joy I’d previously not known. In the years to come, this joy grew exponentially with the births of my daughters, Collyn and Marinne, and the adoption of my son, Quinn. When one door closed, four doors swung wondrously open.

For centuries, we’ve portrayed Christ’s birth in a lowly manger. I’ve often wondered what it might’ve been like if the innkeeper had happily ushered Mary and Joseph into a room where Jesus could be born in a cleaner, more appropriate environment. But God had a better plan. The closed door, the crude stable and simple manger testify to a divine paradox: the Son of God, the King of Kings, born humbly as a baby to bring consolation to a desolate world.

As humans, we may be tempted to view our condition as a series of closed doors that prevent us from pursuing our hearts’ desires and fulfilling our best-laid plans. We may view our world as a dark and dangerous wilderness through which we must make our way, hoping for refuge at every door we encounter. One of Advent’s greatest consolations is that Christ lived 33 years as a man, so that He might know our human condition, so that He might feel its joys and sorrows. As we wander through our own wildernesses, He is with us. And when doors close before us–as they inevitably will–He waits to greet us, swinging His door open with merciful abandon.

painting by Giovanni Battista Salvi da Sassoferrato

And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her. Luke 1:38

A few weeks ago, I attended my annual silent retreat at the Cloisters on the Platte near Gretna, Nebraska. Seven years ago, I was fortunate enough to be moved quickly off the waiting list into a spot which I’ve held ever since. During my first retreat at the Cloisters, I was wholly unprepared for the beauty of the facility and grounds and for the power of three days of silence, prayer, and meditation. Since then, I’ve returned each November–blesssed.

During my last retreat, Fr. Paul Hoesig led us in a study of St. Ignatius’ Rules for the Discernment of Spirit. Ignatius contends that we all move between periods of spiritual consolation and spiritual desolation. He defines spiritual consolation as “when some interior movement in the soul is caused, through which  the soul comes to be inflamed with love of its Creator and Lord; and when it can, in consequence, love no created thing on the face of the earth in itself, but in the Creator of them all.” When we experience an increase in hope, faith, and charity as well as an “interior joy” from the Lord, this is spiritual consolation. And this, Ignatius explains, is much more than a feeling; it’s a state of being.

On the other hand, spiritual desolation is “the contrary of [spiritual consolation], such as darkness of soul, disturbance in it, movement to things low and earthly, the unquiet of different agitations and temptations, moving to want of confidence, without hope, without love, when one finds oneself all lazy, tepid, sad, and as if separated from his Creator and Lord.”

For most, the world at the time of Christ’s birth (between 6 and 4 B.C.) was oppressive. The Romans had ruled the world for half a century, and their republic had turned into a tyranny, with the emperor, Caesar Augustus, in charge of the empire. In most agrarian societies, 90% of the population worked the land as peasants, while 10% were born into nobility and, therefore, into power and wealth. It goes without saying that the world was a dark place for many who struggled to survive. And it doesn’t take much effort to imagine the spiritual desolation of the oppressed. Into this world, an angel of the Lord appeared to a teenage girl in a backwater town. We know the story well. Perhaps we know it too well, often joyfully skipping to the good part: the birth of a healthy, pink-cheeked baby boy destined to be the Savior of the world.

We may unthinkingly skip the almost certain fear, confusion, and inevitable shame that would accompany an apparently illegitmate pregnancy. And we shouldn’t. For into this desolate world, into these dark circumstances, Mary consented to bear God’s Son, opening her soul fully as she declared: Let it me unto me according to your word.

Although we know that spiritual consolation–our souls inflamed with love of our Creator and Lord–is grounded in this kind of open-hearted submission, sadly, we often turn to ourselves, resolved to create a kind of consolation of our own making and effort. We get about the business of doing–rather than being. We make plans and resolutions. We get to work on ourselves. I don’t know how many times in the past year I’ve heard, or read, about people “doing the work” on themselves. It’s not that we don’t bear some responsibility for our own wellbeing–or that we should ignore how God works through pastors, counselors, mentors, friends, and family members. It is, however, that too often we ignore the source of all consolation which Mary understood well.

Thirty-two years ago at this time, we were preparing to adopt our son, Quinn. I confess that there have only been a handful of times in my life when I was fully aware that I had no real control over my circumstances and stood, as Mary did, before God as a supplicant. On the day that we traveled to the Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis to meet our new son and take him home, we couldn’t have known that we’d be there for hours–first at the church and later in a congregant’s home–as we waited for confirmation from the State of Iowa that his official paperwork had arrived in Des Moines, granting us the legal right to bring him home. These were hours fraught with worry, frustration, and confusion as our caseworker repeatedly called to check whether the paperwork (on a FedEx truck during peak Christmas delivery hours) had arrived. At one point, perspiration running from her temples, she turned to us and asked–hopefully, desperately–if we knew anyone of political prominence in Iowa who might intervene on our behalf, so we could leave Minnesota and legally enter Iowa.

Of course, we didn’t, and the minutes that ticked by were fraught with tension. There was much hand wringing–for almost everyone but me. The Iowa official communicating with our caseworker had informed her that their offices would close promptly at 4:30 for Christmas that afternoon, and if they hadn’t received the official paperwork by then, she’d have to fly Quinn back to Georgia and try again after the holidays. Throughout all this, an uncharacteristic and miraculous sense of peace pervaded me. As I held my infant son, I sensed the concern and frenzied actions around me, but I felt warmed with the assurance that all would be well. And it was. With minutes to spare, we finally received word that we could take Quinn home.

Although I didn’t speak Mary’s words of submission, I can look back on this day and know, with certainty, that I felt them. Let it be unto me according to your word. I felt the peace that passes all understanding. I know the spiritual consolation that illuminates the darkness. And I know, with certainty, that this was not of my own making, not a result of my own effort nor any human effort.

A 16th century Carmelite monk, St. John of the Cross, understood the darkness of spiritual desolation. In his poem, Noche obscura del alma (translated “The Dark Night of the Soul” ), he writes of the worldly struggle to know and feel an “interior joy” from the Lord. Like St. Ignatius, he knew that we would move into and out of periods of spiritual consolation and desolation. One of the pillars of our Christian faith, Mother Teresa, experienced decades of this “dark night of the soul.” And yet, she continued to seek God, to do His will on earth, and to live with the hope that her soul would be once again ignited with this “interior joy.” Throughout her desolation, she kept her soul fixed on the consolation she’d once experienced and prayed to experience again.

Regardless of our circumstances and in spite of the desolation we often experience in this broken world, there is consolation. And this is the good news of Advent: The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1:5) Mary understood this, both as a young mother and later as she knelt at the foot of her son’s cross. Before I celebrate the birth of Christ this year, I plan to spend some time with Mary. As I give thanks for my own son, I plan to remember how on that long, snowy day in Minneapolis, I, too, opened my soul before God in humble submission. And I plan to live fully and joyfully with this consolation, even as I prepare myself for the inevitable times when I struggle to feel God’s presence and peace.

Photo by Ante Hamersmit

[Lowry] Pressly’s book is a probing critique of a modern public sphere that overwhelms the private realm, but it goes further than that. He argues for privacy, or what he more accurately terms “oblivion,” as not just freedom from surveillance but a positive, albeit essentially unknowable value—a place where true human depth and personality reside. –John Kaag, “The Virtue of Being Forgotten,” The Atlantic, Oct. 29, 2024

In Lowry Pressly’s new book, The Right to Oblivion, he explores the notion of privacy. Although it’s common now to define privacy in digital terms, Kaag writes that Pressly advises caution and consideration:

Today, when people think of privacy, they are likely to think of the protection of one’s personal data and information. But according to Pressly, that definition makes a dangerous assumption, namely that humans could be wholly reduced to a set of descriptions or records. As he explains, this notion is an outgrowth of the “ideology of information,” a worldview that holds that who a person is can be fully articulated, comprehended, and stored in data or other representations of them—whether in images, texts, or other accounts. This error has encouraged people to neglect aspects of their subjective interior lives that could never be captured by such data points. As a result, it has made our private lives shallower, and our public lives, in turn, less meaningful and trusting.

Carefully curating our public lives, attempting to be seen and remembered through posts, photos, and videos, has become a familiar practice in the age of social media. Pressly makes an interesting–and perhaps damning–remark that, in doing so, we neglect our interior lives and make our private lives shallower. To promote our public selves, we often focus on the exterior at the expense of the interior.

And this promotion may also come at the expense of our safety. Hence, we’ve become fearful of how our public identity is managed–or mismanaged. In our desire to promote our public selves, we may open ourselves up to comments that shame and frighten us. We may also open ourselves up to hackers and extortionists. An online presence comes with risks, some more dangerous than others.

In his book, Pressly offers a remedy to this fear by “inviting readers to slip into oblivion: to recognize the freedom of being temporarily forgotten, and resist the forces that reduce them to what can be gleaned on the internet.” To slip into oblivion? To gain freedom by being temporarily forgotten? Really? In the age of social media, this advice seems countercultural. Yet, Pressly argues it’s sound advice and notes that prescriptions of online abstinence aren’t new. Nearly 20 years ago, I recall reading an article that featured individuals who actually paid to attend technology-free weekend retreats. They lauded the benefits of leaving their computers, tablets, and phones behind and spending a few days free from the compulsion to check emails or text messages. As I was reading this article, I remember thinking how silly it seemed that some would actually pay for a technology-free weekend. What might have seemed foolish 20 years ago, however, might not seem so foolish today. We’ve all heard the warnings about how dependence on digital technologies re-wires our brains. We’ve read research regarding the addictive nature of our digital devices, and we’ve witnessed the anxiety that separation from these devices often provokes. Today, online abstinence may be just what the doctor ordered.

And what the philosopher ordered. Pressly contends that the call to oblivion isn’t new and cites several 19th-century philosophers who extolled the virtues of interior life. Philosopher Friedrich Schelling called this the Abgrund or the “groundless ground,” an experience of the Romantic “sublime” that can’t rationally be explained. Likewise, Søren Kierkegaard advocated “inwardness,” a state of personal and absolute belief that can’t be directly explained. Pressly also cites Edwardian feminists such as Ella Lyman Cabot who referred to the “reserve, those psychic regions of individuality—both private thoughts and partially conscious dreams—that refuse to ever go public.”

We may not be able to live in our current age without leaving some sort of public, digital footprint, but Pressly argues that, at the very least, we should consider protecting and nurturing our “most personal feelings and experiences.” To support his argument, he offers these words from French philosopher and historian Michel Foucault:

The game of life depends on remembering that each person lives partially in shadow. That it is necessary, at times, to access, and embrace, our deepest parts, the ones that can’t be plumbed by anyone—or anything—else.

Again, all this seems to fly in the face of current trends which encourage individuals to be seen, to live in light and not in shadow. We’re supposed to be our own agents, promoting our best selves in hopes of gaining “likes” and “followers.” As we plumb our deepest parts, we’re encouraged (expected?) to make our journeys public. If you don’t believe me, just watch reality TV where participants are urged to “be vulnerable,” so viewing audiences may have full access to their interior lives. Or browse through an assortment of social media posts that publicize individuals’ lives with everything from photos of their evening meals to political, philosophical, and social treatises. Plumbing our deepest parts is now celebrated as a group activity.

A few years ago, I read several books by Henri Nouwen, ordained priest, professor, and public speaker. At the height of his professional career as educator and public speaker, he left academia to reside in a L’Arche community in Trosly-Brueil, France and then in L’Arche Daybreak in Richmond Hill, Ontario. Both of these communities are for people with intellectual disabilities. I recall reading The Road to Daybreak, Nouwen’s diary of a year he spent in Trosly. In his article for Christianity Today, “What Henri Nouwen Found at Daybreak,” Arthur Boers writes that Nouwen confessed he left his Harvard teaching position and popularity as a public speaker because “[s]omething inside was telling me that my success was putting my own soul in danger.” He abandoned a very public life to lead a private one among disabled adults. In doing so, he risked being forgotten as the celebrated priest, professor, and speaker the world had known. At L’Arche, however, not only was Nouwen able to live a richer interior life–intellectually and spiritually–but he was able to minister intimately to the “least of these.” For Nouwen, there was freedom and blessing in slipping into oblivion. In the presence of a handicapped resident, his former public self mattered little; he was seen and known simply for the kind hands and heart he happily offered.

Since retirement, I’ve thought a lot about the tension between wanting to be seen and known and recognizing the freedom in being temporarily forgotten and in slipping into oblivion. Although I am an introvert by nature, for decades I lived a very public life in classrooms all over the Midwest. And I admit that when things were going well, it was a heady feeling to stand before a classroom of young adults, a work of classic literature in hand. For most of my life, I positioned my public self behind a podium and taught as though my life depended upon it. And then after 41 years, it was over. I moved quicky from the public realm into the private one. I had a closet of professional clothes I took to Goodwill. When once I would have been teaching 1st period American Lit, I now sipped coffee from my complimentary retirement mug in the quiet of my home. Thrust into what Lowry Pressly calls oblivion, I stood, trembling, at the door of that place where true human depth and personality reside.

What if I opened the door to a private realm where no one was home? What if I’d been so busy cultivating my public self that my private self had become shallow from years of neglect? What if I didn’t know how to plumb my inwardness or to call upon my reserve? As Pressly points out, I’m certainly not the first nor the last person to ask such questions. But now, perhaps we should be asking what we’re doing to prepare ourselves for occasions when we lose our public selves? Perhaps we should be asking how to cultivate richer interior lives that can never be never be measured by data points. In an age of influencers, what are we doing to prepare a sanctuary for those whose fickle followers change teams, casting them into involuntary oblivion? What are we doing to prepare a interior space for those whose public selves collapse in the void when the internet fails, when cell phones are lost, broken, or confiscated? As we fill our children’s lives with activities and entertain them with technology, what are we doing to grow their interior lives? And do we even give their interior lives a second thought?

Pressly and others believe that we should. I was fortunate that my parents and many of my teachers believed that we should. They modeled the riches of cultivating interior lives in which, as Foucault maintains, we might access, and embrace, our deepest parts, the ones that can’t be plumbed by anyone—or anything—else. In the years since my retirement, I’ve come to see how their examples helped prepare me for a more contemplative life, a life beyond the busyness of my former public one.

Granted, we all have public lives, and these public lives matter deeply. And undoubtedly, we all use digital technologies that offer benefits ranging from access to family photos to breaking news. Pressly’s argument is that we balance our public lives which are increasingly promoted through digital technologies with a sincere interest in our interior lives which are cultivated through privacy and reflection.

As I’m typing these final words, a red-headed woodpecker and a host of nuthatches are ravaging the bird feeders outside my window. For a time, I’ll sit alone, watching them and moving gratefully into oblivion.

photo by Collyn Ware

Dear God, I cannot love Thee the way I want to. You are the slim crescent of a moon that I see and myself is the earth’s shadow that keeps me from seeing all the moon. The crescent is very beautiful and perhaps that is all one like I am should or could see; but what I am afraid of, dear God, is that my self shadow will grow so large that it blocks the whole moon, and that I will judge myself by the shadow that is nothing. –Flannery O’Connor, A Prayer Journal (2013)

Written in 1946 during her time at the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, 21-year-old Flannery O’Connor penned these words to God in a standard composition notebook. Years later, Farrar, Straus and Giroux published her 24 prayers for the world. O’Connor, a Christian writer, is one of my favorites, and I thought of her words last week as I walked at the nature preserve in the half-hour before dawn. The Supermoon was blindingly bright and so fully present that it consumed the world, filling each moment with incandescent glory. And I gave thanks that my self shadow couldn’t block it, that nothing could block it. I gratefully walked my miles in moonlight.

Again and again, O’Connor prays that she might accept what she perceives to be her spiritual and artistic mediocrity. She laments, If only I could hold God in my mind. If I could only always think of Him.The final prayer in her journal reveals this struggle:

My thoughts are so far away from God. He might as well not have made me. And the feeling I egg up writing here lasts approximately a half hour and seems a shame. I don’t want any of this artificial feeling stimulated by the choir Today I have proved myself a glutton–for Scotch oatmeal cookes and erotic thought. There is nothing left to say of me.

Upon reading this prayer for the first time, I thought: Yes, this is it exactly. I was moved by her struggle with worldly appetites that separated her from God. Here, O’Connor reveals her self shadow as it blocks the whole moon. She concedes that God has given her everything, all the tools, instructions for their use, even a good brain to use them with, a creative brain to make them immediate for others. Yet, she grieves that even as God is feeding her, she lacks a healthy appetite.

O’Connor presents us with fictional characters whose self shadows have no appetite for God. Instead, they insist on feeding themselves, on being their own light, and on trusting human intelligence and understanding. For a time, some believe they’re enlightened; ultimately, however, they find themselves consumed by darkness. They fail to see the price of their own arrogance until it confronts them, often violently. That O’Connor empathized with such characters, seeing her own spiritual struggles in theirs, is evident in her prayer journal where she reveals a raw and ravenous humility. She sees that her self shadow is nothing, and she prays fervently to get out of God’s way.

Through words, art, and music, some succeed–at least for a time–in subduing their self shadows, so that they might stand–stripped of all pretense–before God. They bring us under the Supermoon of His majesty, offering us such gifts as the Psalms, the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, and the Messiah. They make it possible for us to experience much more than a slim crescent of glory.

As I walked in moonlight last week, I recalled the photo my daughter took several years ago in which my granddaughter appears to hold the moon in her hands. An illusion, certainly, but the effect is powerful. Walking beneath the moon, I could imagine lifting it high into the sky, so my self shadow could never steal its light. I could imagine holding God where my shadow would never cast a sliver of darkness upon Him. Like O’Connor, I lament the many ways in which I get in God’s way. Too often, I find myself repeating the Apostle Paul’s words from Romans 7:15: I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.

There are many writers with whom I’d like to sit down over a cup of coffee. Flannery O’Connor is at the top of this list. But perhaps our time might be better spent without coffee. Perhaps we might walk together in moonlight. And perhaps, rather than converse, we might spend the time in prayer, asking God’s light to increase as our self shadows decrease.

_{“Lucy Barton, the stories you told me, for all that I could tell–had very little point to them. Okay, okay, maybe they had subtle points to them. I don’t know what the point is to this story!”
“People,” Lucy said quietly, leaning back, “People and the lives they lead. That’s the point.’
“Exactly,” Olive nodded.} —Elizabeth Strout, Tell Me Everything

In Elizabeth Strout’s latest novel, Tell Me Everything, writer Lucy Barton makes weekly visits to 92-year-old Olive Kittredge who lives in a care facility. They meet to share stories. Wasting no time with small talk, one or the other begins with “So, here’s the story.” Both occupy that rare space of being heard. They tolerate each other’s interruptions, for they understand the stories they spin often need clarification and elaboration to make them come fully alive.

When Olive becomes frustrated during one of Lucy’s stories and demands that she reveal the point, Lucy answers: “People and the lives they lead. That’s the point.” These are stories of ordinary people living their lives, lives that both women narrate with uncommon care. Throughout this novel, I was struck with the same sentiment that a younger Olive Kittredge once shared: “All these lives,” she said. “All the stories we never know.” (Strout, Olive Kittredge) And I kept thinking how wonderful it would be if everyone’s stories could be told, their lives becoming known in the telling, their stories heard.

For decades when I taught the narrative essay, I was met with collective groans from my students who insisted that nothing important had ever happened to them, that they had no stories to tell. I knew what they were thinking: Hollywood producers would never visit their homes to hear the stories that would become feature films or Netflix mini-series. They were thinking there was no point to the stories they might tell. And yet, like all of us, they did have stories to tell, and their stories were poignant, funny, terrifying, and sad. They were people living their uncommonly common lives.

In this novel, Strout also develops the friendship between Lucy Barton and Bob Burgess, friends who walk frequently, so Bob can smoke his one secret cigarette away from the watchful eyes of his wife, the Unitarian minister. Their friendship is founded on the assurance that each will be heard by the other. Lucy often looks expectantly at Bob and says, “Tell me everything, Bob.” As they pour out their experiences in the intimacy of this friendship, they rest in the assurance they won’t be rushed or judged; they’re confident they’ll be heard. There’s something remarkable about how Lucy and Bob not only invest in each other but in so many others. Throughout their small community, people and their stories are being heard every day.

American author Barry Lopez’s novel, Crow and Weasel, is mythic fable of self-discovery. In it, Lopez contends that sharing stories is a powerful way to care for people:

The stories people tell have a way of taking care of them. If stories come to you, care for them. And learn to give them away where they are needed. Sometimes a person needs a story more than food to stay alive. That is why we put these stories in each other’s memory. This is how people care for themselves.

It seems serendipitous that everything I’ve read in the past few months has revealed this truth. In Chris Whitaker’s New York Times best-selling novel, All the Colors of the Dark, the protagonist, Patch, is abducted and held captive with Grace, who’s also been abducted and abused by their captor. Both seek to survive their captivity by telling each other stories so that, though blinded by the abject darkness of their basement cell, they can see these settings and events vividly, as if they’re living lives far from the despair of their imprisonment. After Patch is ultimately freed, he’s obsessed with the girl whose stories sustained him. The words of these stories echo through his memory, compelling him to search for her in hopes that she, too, somehow escaped. For weeks, Grace kept Patch alive, her stories feeding his imagination and fueling his desire to live. These stories, as Lopez says, “have a way of taking care” of people.

In an interview with Book Browse, Elizabeth Strout spoke openly about what she hoped to give her readers:

I would also hope that readers receive a larger understanding, or a different understanding, of what it means to be human, than they might have had before. . . . I would hope that my readers feel a sense of awe at the quality of human endurance, at the endurance of love in the face of a variety of difficulties; that the quotidian life is not always easy, and is something worthy of respect.

The stories of our lives–of most people’s lives–are generally quotidian. That is, they are stories of ordinary people living their lives. And these lives, as Strout maintains, are often difficult and always worthy of respect. Yet, too often we discount the value and impact of these stories. Too often, we’re not the tell me everything kind of folk, neglecting to take the time and make the space for stories that deserve to be heard. In the sanctuary of such stories, however, we can learn much more about what it means to be human. This is holy ground where the lives of those we love and meet become the stories we remember and revere. Here, we discover heroes and heroines who endure the trials of our shared human condition and fallen world.

And this, as Lucy Barton insists, is the point of every story: though the settings and circumstances are unique (and oh so fascinating!), all people live, love, and endure all sorts of things. This theme is universally human. Although I try not to be discouraged, my years of teaching has given me cause for concern. Generally speaking, my students struggled to actively listen. Fed on a flashy diet of sound bites, Instagram posts, and TikTok videos, they weren’t in shape to listen to anything that took more than a couple minutes to deliver. Truth be told, they didn’t want me to tell them everything; they wanted me to tell them little and tell it quickly, to offer them a Reader’s Digest condensed version on a platter. A story, real or fictional, deserves the time and space to be told well. Most of my students didn’t have the will or skill to hear and read such stories. Regrettably, neither do many adults who often mentally will storytellers to “just get on with it.”

I’m not certain what it would take to ensure that more of us are in shape enough to enter the sanctuary of a good story. The training program, I fear, would be rigorous and time-consuming. Can you imagine meeting with 92-year-old Olive Kittredge or walking with Bob Burgess and setting aside time for them to tell you everything? Can you imagine listening with the same intensity and interest as you give an Audible book, living vicariously through each scene, holding your breath as the action rises, climaxes, and falls, and leaning into what it means to share this human condition? Can you imagine caring for people by hearing and sharing their stories?

Certainly there are those who have recorded and continue to record the life stories of ordinary people. These are the writers, the documentary producers, the journalists, and family members who make these stories available for interested readers and viewers. Through their efforts, I’ve learned about the lives of those who homesteaded the Sandhills of Nebraska, who endured the ghettos and concentration camps of WWII, and who’ve navigated the poverty of Appalachia, India, and so many other places. I’m grateful for these stories which transport me into lives that deserve my attention and respect.

What I’m proposing, however, is something for those of us ordinary people quietly living our lives. I’m hoping that more of us might be like Lucy Barton and Bob Burgess, intentionally making space and time for others’ stories. I’m suggesting that we might be better listeners who help others to feel “heard.” I’m envisioning a world in which more common people recognize the uncommon worth of their life stories. And I’m praying I’ll be patient enough not to grumble about the length of another’s story or its apparent lack of a point, patient and wise enough to remember, “People and the lives they lead. That’s the point.”

photo by Collyn Ware, Griffin age 2

How do you like to go up in a swing,
   Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
   Ever a child can do!  --Robert Louis Stevenson, "The Swing"

These were the first lines of poetry I ever memorized. Poem #33 from Stevenson’s A Child’s Garden of Verses was my favorite. From the time I opened my book–a birthday or Christmas gift, I forget which–I loved everything about “The Swing”: the illustration, the rhythm and glorious rhyme, the way it lifted me from the page into the reverie of flying through the air. There is real magic in a swing. When the world drags me to the mat, give me a good swing where I can pump my legs until I’m “Up in the air and over the wall,/ Till I can see so wide/ Rivers and trees and cattle and all/Over the countryside–” Everything is better from the seat of a swing.

In poet Robert Frost’s “Birches,” he writes of a boy who rides birch trees. He laments “when life is too much like a pathless wood” that he’d “like to get away from earth awhile”:

I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.

He concedes, however, that “earth is the right place for love” and cautions that he doesn’t want some fate to misunderstand him, whisking him away forever. As child, I understood this as I swung for sky on the swingset in my backyard. I liked to go “toward heaven” but was happy to return to earth again. While some children had imaginary friends, I had Ginny and Susie, my red swings. I told them secrets and sung them made-up songs. I loved them, and earth was the right place for this love.

There are no more swings at my house. My husband recently removed the swingset we’d erected for my grandchildren who’ve outgrown the small yellow rubber seats that hung a few child-safe inches from the ground. And the two bigger swings that hung from the glorious oak in their yard are gone, too. A summer storm took the old oak and left a sunny spot where, for years, we’d taken refuge to swing in the shade. The absence of these swings haunts me. I can still see my grandchildren, heads thrown back, legs kicking out, shoes flung off. I can feel the rush of wind, hear the creak of the chains as we work them hard. And I remember their cries, “Do it again, Grandma!” as I push with all my might to give them an under-doggy.

Children grow up, and the heaven of childhood may live in memories on a swingless earth. This is the way of things. And though “earth is the right place for love,” some of us may find ourselves saying, “But not this earth. Not this place where the sweet days of swinging and singing and opening new boxes of Crayola crayons have left us. Not these days when we sit alone in a house once littered with toys and smeared with the remnants of sticky fingers. Not this life of repurposing ourselves as ones who look on from the sidelines. Certainly, not this.”

And yet, it is this. Swinging takes us up and away, only to return us to where we began. The absolute rush of reaching the peak of a swing’s arc is shortlived. We gasp, we feel the bottom of our stomachs drop, and then it’s over. We can make it happen again, as we pump our legs to keep up the momentum. But we can’t make this one incredible moment last for more than a second or two. This moment is a brief but wonderful gift.

Gifts such as these give us glimpses of heaven on earth. Whether we’re transported by swings, by experiences or memories, we escape momentarily from the world. And, thankfully, from ourselves–that is, from selves that are too often burdened with fear, insecurity, anger, and despair. These moments may open our eyes and hearts in surprising ways. And when they do, we pray the words from the Lord’s Prayer, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” and really mean them. For we begin to understand how heaven visits earth in childhood, in hillsides of autumn colors, in final visits with loved ones, and in all those moments that delight and bless us. We begin to understand that even as these moments transform us, we, in turn, have the power to transform the earth in small, yet heavenly ways.

Of course, from time to time, we can expect to be grounded. Herein lies the magic in a swing, though. In the midst of the world’s brokenness, we’ve only to pump our legs again, pushing up towards that sweet spot at the end of the chain, and believing as Robert Frost claimed: “one could do worse than be a swinger of birches.”