Popcorn before bed...my kind of supper

One of the problems of being isolated is that your thoughts whirl around and around, and occasionally spiral into a no-man's-land of bleakness, or pessimism, or whateverism… So I apologise if the Blog has been a bit of a Blurt lately.

I have been thinking, reading, and ‘being’ in isolation. I have some friends here, but, context makes such a difference, hey? So, although I chat, and talk, it is somehow different than being rooted. And rootedness is so important. My tentacles have reached out, and the tap-root went into the Word and Table service – mostly through the connection of the Eucharist, the body given for me, the blood shed for me, BUT as you sup, you sup with others… So, the locus of my life in Longsight is also woven into the locus of my experience in Kansas. The mystery of faith, the Holy Spirit amongst us, uniting us, seems/is real.

Also, my Andrew asked me if my ‘not missing this list’ was really transformed [do I have more imagination? Humour? Grace? Am I more interesting? Less boring? {thanks darling!}] by being away? And the reality of course is that the absence of Methane, litter, weed [not that people here don’t smoke it, but I’ve not encountered any at headquarters!] and so on is truly great… But “the first thing you unpack is your head” and the dragging sense of lowness hasn’t gone anywhere. But – having ONE THING TO DO is a good feeling – and having a RHYTHM of life [albeit early…] is wonderful. Having time to meet people for coffee, is lovely… Sitting in cafés and thinking is a beautiful thing. The question of ‘what happens when I get back lingers of course. But, there are daffodils coming out, cardinals hopping around, and the grass is growing, so the world and her seasons continue… The magnolias are in bloom, and it is warm and sunny. So I read this and thought it was wonderful:

“We withhold from them [non-Christians] the possibility of being our teachers. Without an attitude of learning, we have not entered a sacred “I/Thou” relationship. ... We want to provide for them what they lack, care for their needs, and teach them what they need to know. This position of a giver affords us a sense of control. But true love means knowing how to take. You love your grandma when you take her recipe; you love strangers when you need their company; you love your parents when you need their advice, you love your children when you need their forgiveness; you love your friends when you hear their stories. We don’t truly love someone until we take what they need to give us. Although we often think of God as self-satisfied, needing nothing, God does honour us by needing us. This need of God for us is symbolized in the Sabbath commandment that has no other purpose than creating a space in time when God can enjoy our full attention, when a lover can simply be with his beloved. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel explained once how the greatest human need is to become a need. God needs us to participate with him in healing the world.”

Pagitt and Jones, An emergent manifesto of hope, 197

I was wondering as I was driving, lost [somehow the I-70 confuses me, I ended up downtown and had to wend my way back – past 18th street [home of the Jazz museum], down The Paseo, an old, beautiful, broad, tree-lined, run-down street.]: could I live here? It’s an interesting concept to play with - my forehead was bruised from listening to NPR [national Public Radio, thank you Geordan] and hearing Bush deny the right for his advisors to be subpoenaed, or have their statements taken under oath, or have transcripts of their statements made ‘because the houses/senates concern was partisan.’ And then, I heard John Bolton’s most recent proclamations that Iran was a ‘potential military target’ because ‘military action would be better then having Nuclear Weapons in the hands of Iran’ and that the best way for things to change would be ‘regime change’ in Iran, Sudan, [North Korea was mentioned too: the report… ]. Bang, Bang, Bang, my forehead on the wall… The question I asked myself was - would I just become numb to this? Complacent? Worn-out? Concussed? Mind-boggling. Well done to the many, many people I’ve met here who question, think, and live differently.

And, of course, what about home? As per our vigorous, earlier conversations - the UK most definitely has her share of problems. Lack of imagination, lack of optimism, fragmentation abounds. The ageing, sagging, embarrassed, post-colonial, post-Christian, post-everything atmosphere has its own ways of wearing you down.

So, onto the Church, the body of Christ, the alternative story-telling community that we share in, be in. The hope-bringing, light-shining, upside-down-believing, longing for a different story to be our story, the Eucharist taking, life-of-Christ-pulsing through our veins, that church. What way do we go so that we regain our Spirit? Longsight, as a particular community, shaped, shaping in so many ways, rooted in community… how do we live obedient to that kind of vision? Postcolonial, liberating, free?

Anyway, picking up from the chapter of one of the books I’m reading, I really think I’m probably a Nazbomergent… That bears some thinking about… (as well as deeply involved in paradoxology).

“Go to the people. Live among them, learn from them, love them, start with what they know, build on what they have.” Chinese proverb

and then, this made me laugh [it was said in the context of babysitting]:
“sometimes you just have to get pooh on your hands” ~Andrew Brower Latz