The Christmas Rose

There is a lovely Christmas song....  that anyone who ever sang in a school or church choir probably had the great privilege to learn.  The notes float out and around you and if you are lucky enough, you sing in some wonderful venue where the notes resonate around the room and back, singing, ringing, floating in a kind of Christmas music magic.  The last time I sang this, it was with my precious children for a Christmas Eve service.

My memories are many - and sweet - of singing with my children.  From the first days of their lives, holding them gently in front of me, looking into those eyes that were so recently bound to me physically... inside of me, and now were a separate, breathing, heart-beating entity magically and lovingly created.  I sang 'Ash Grove' and 'Summertime' and 'It Had to Be You'....... and continued to sing them every night putting them to bed after lights were out.

There were long car trips home to see grandmothers - 'journeys of misery' as my drama-queen daughter dubbed them - where we played the 'Matching Game' and sang at the top of our lungs along with the songs, repeated time after time until we were ready to move on, starting with all things Raffi and Hans Christian Andersen - 'Down By the Bay' and 'The Ugly Duckling' will always be songs with a story in our house - and eventually on to the Broadway musicals that inspired my talented babies eventually to recreate on the stage (Godspell and Les Mis to name a few).

I remember the first Christmas Eve service that my children stood with me in a darkened sanctuary and sang 'The Friendly Beasts'.  That first Christmas Eve was the beginning of many family performances, eventually leading up to us singing together as a complete family - Tom included.  Tom will say that these are among his favorite memories.

And there were the nights sitting in a darkened theater waiting to hear those grown babies singing from the stage while I sat, breath held, in the audience. And, yes, crying.  For joy.  For the memories.  For love.

Babies.  There is such magic and such power and such overwhelming and profound love that goes with that word.  So much so that just trying to write this, the tears are streaming down my face.

And this time of year, I think of the baby that this whole season was created to celebrate.  The Christmas Rose.  My relationship to this baby is simple.  I call myself a "Christmas Christian" because it is the life that this baby went on to lead that thrills and inspires me.  I don't need or care whether he was the result of a miracle any greater than the pure miracle of conceiving and bearing a child into this world.  I don't need a 'virgin birth'.... but I love the story and the tradition and the life that was the reason the story was ever told to begin with.

And I think of the mother, young and frightened, huge with a child that I know she wondered about.  I'm referring to true 'wonder'... filled with awe at the absolute miracle of being able to help create and grow inside of her a human life until it was able to take its first breath independent of her body.

All mothers feel this way, don't they?

And then the miracle of delivering that child into the world and getting him through his first year, alive and well and walking.  And then helping him learn to 'be' in this world on his own, year after year, kissing boo-boos and rocking to peaceful sleep and cheering him on as he continued to grow and separate more and more from where he first started.... deep inside of her, connected and part of.

And I remember standing in front of The Pieta in St. John's Basilica in Rome with my husband and the father of my babies, and weeping with him, at the sheer power and beauty of a mother's agony and love, holding her precious child in her arms.  I was looking at a marble sculpture, but could literally feel the searing pain of that mother, holding her grown baby in her arms after his life had been extinguished.

At that moment I wanted to rattle the rafters of every public/political building in the world and throughout history that had ever entertained the discussion of war and death.  I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs that babies were never made to slaughter.  Only to love.  We make our babies to live and thrive and love and continue on in the world, not to march into war and die.  Mothers would never declare war.

Would they?

Tom and I had been to Florence and saw so many of the Christian paintings of pain and torment and death.  We wondered how anyone who had not been steeped in the stories of Christmas and a loving Christ wouldn't be frightened away by these images of sorrow and fear.

But this one sculpture, this Pieta..... this one silent declaration of love and loss and love eternal..... this could change the heart of anyone.

No, I don't need a virgin birth.  And I don't require someone else dying for my sins.  I believe we were all made in the image of God and will - all of us - return to that light and love, regardless of choices made or beliefs or lack thereof.  I do pray for peace and compassion and enlightenment and awakening.  And I pray that everyone who wants to hold a baby in their arms - and to sing to - would have that chance.  And to see it grow strong, healthy and happy into a world of peace and purpose. 

Because that, to me, is the Christmas miracle.  That we can experience a Christmas Rose of our own.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyuOIYCERc4

Merry Christmas.  Blessings and love.

Trees

Trees captivate me.

Some of my earliest memories are of trees.  I remember lying in the grass and watching the sunlight playing through leaves and just....wondering... about being alive and breathing and being in love with that perfect moment of stillness and beauty. (We are so wise as children and then, for some reason, we lose it.)

My brother Paul and I used to scout through the woods looking for treasure and adventure and one day discovered a magnificent beech tree.  This particular tree was like a ladder to the clouds and we knew we had discovered something incredible.

The first thing we did was climb that behemoth!  The branches were close enough to the ground that small people could easily reach and swing skinny legs up and over and then it was just a hand-over-hand climb up, up, up.  The trick was to keep climbing and always concentrate on the next hand and foot hold... and never, ever look down.  I know this because the once that I did look down, I was frozen in place.  My precious brother and best friend had to help me down, one branch at a time, until I was close enough to earth that I felt safe.  Lesson learned?  Keep looking up.

We immediately ran home and reported our find to our mother who promptly agreed to be shown this monster tree.  She put aside the work she was doing and followed her excited and happy children back into the woods to check out their discovery.  Mama had exactly the same reaction to that tree as we did.  She started climbing.  It is a wonderful thing to discover for a child that you have a mother willing to drop her work, follow you into the woods and then climb an enormous tree!

When mom moved into her current home, she wasn't satisfied until she had a beech tree sapling planted squarely in the middle of her enormous back yard.  She planted it for Paul and me.  That's love.

Over the years I have continued to be drawn to trees to the extent that my husband refers to me as a Druid, an apt moniker.  He has had to stop the car in order for me to take pictures of particularly striking trees.  I have an album dedicated to the pictures taken over the years and a dream to publish my work or display it somewhere.  Tom has seen me throw my arms around particularly impressive trees as well as witness me mourning the mutilation or death of trees.

The only thing sadder than the untimely death of a beautiful tree (through storm or fire or ill-planned construction) is the scalping of a tree in the name of tree husbandry called topping - as if something akin to tree torture could be considered beneficial to the life and growth of a tree.  I know that those responsible for this kind of abuse believe that they are doing the tree a service but they wouldn't dream of cutting off fingers and toes of a child to help them grow better.  I see no difference.

But enough of my personal rant and back to what I love.....

There is something profoundly beautiful about a tree in winter.  Partly because without all the dressing of green or outrageous fall colors, a winter tree stands proudly naked for all the world to see without regard to age or infirmity assuming, of course, that it hasn't been trimmed and topped and pruned into submission or some other definition of beauty.  A winter tree shows us what it is truly made of.  We can see that each species of tree has a specific shape and quality making it uniquely an oak or a maple or a sycamore or a walnut.  It doesn't hide its weathering or wear.  The breaks and falls it has taken over the years can be seen, but one can also see the self-healing the tree has accomplished given enough time.

Ruthie B is in love with trees for all these reasons.  I especially love the metaphor they represent to a life well lived -  their strength and individuality and character, their ability to provide shelter and protection,  their invitation to climb and explore and reach for the stars.... and their willingness to expose their hearts for all to see.

Thanks

It is the last day of November as I sit here capturing this thought.  The Christmas lights have been officially lit on 'The Plaza' and the Mayor's Tree is aglow.  The seasonal songs have long been playing on radio stations and in stores.  How we do love to rush our holidays in this country!

Oh, I love the nativity and the carols and the coming snow and the twinkling lights and presents under the tree, too.  But it is this holiday of food and family and parades and footballs games and gathering together that I am most thankful for.

Because?  Because of the promise that Thanksgiving makes to all of us.

It is the one day that, all family strains and cares aside, we really do understand we are expected to stop and reflect and be thankful for everything in our life.  Every wee thing.  Every major thing.  Everything.

And I am.  Boy howdy, I am!

At a recent writing workshop we participants were given a list of journaling tools to help our writing juices flow.  One of these tools is to keep a 'Gratitude Journal' in which we would write every day three things we are thankful for then answer why these good things happened to us.  What did we do to bring these good things about?  Then, once we understand what led to these, keep writing what else we are grateful for.

So, I wrote.

I am thankful for my family:  For my mother, who prayed me into existence and who lived selflessly all her life for her children.  For my husband who knows me better than (almost) any other human being on this planet.  Who understands my passions and moods and need to GO!  Who has loved me through the ups and downs of an often-tumultuous marriage and has stood by me when I needed encouragement and behind me (pushing or kicking) when I needed a little more.  And for my children without whom I do not honestly know how I lived before.  They are the reason I was born. 

What did I do to deserve these precious people?  This is a hard question to answer.

I lived and loved.

I am thankful for my healthy, strong body.  I am incredibly aware that I am fit and strong despite my years.  This isn't an accident.  I spent plenty of years being not so fit and healthy, just getting by, getting on airplanes, going from one hotel and one company event and meal to another and not really paying much attention to the toll it was taking on my body.

Then one memorable day I was in Colorado traveling with my young children and husband and looking at the sign at the head of a mountain trail deciding if I 'had it in me' to make it up what had been warned was a 'strenuous' trail.  I was saddened and dismayed that at the tender age of 40-something I was really questioning whether this trail was something I was capable of doing.

So, what did I do to bring this thing about?

I listened to my heart's desire and started walking.

At first I used my poor dog as an excuse to get me going.  He walked with me until he just couldn't anymore and would lie down in the shade getting his second wind, looking at me pitifully to just, please, stop already!  And I kept walking. Eventually I walked 60 miles in 3 days as part of a cancer awareness walk.  Then I walked 27 miles in one day just to know I could.  Now I am hoping to walk across my state of Missouri next year with a delicious band of Wild Women who will be walking across the U.S.A.

I am thankful for my mentors and teachers and friends.  They have instilled in me my wish - my prayer - to speak and live my truth with courage and wisdom and love.  They have encouraged me to use my outside, out-loud voice and not be afraid of what will come out.  I thank you Diane and Orlando, David and Charlie and Jim.  Thank you Kim and Jenny and Diane, Susan and Sheri and Helen.  Oh, the list is so long and I pray that I have told you who you are!

What did I do to bring this 'good thing' about?

I listened and I loved and listened some more.  

What other things can I think to be grateful for?  Oh, is there ever enough room to record it all?!  For wine and music and dancing.  For beautiful food and romantic movies and books.  For glowing sunsets and crisp sheets and snow.  For thunder storms, birthdays and soft April afternoons.  For trees on fire with fall colors and reflections in the water.  For last first kisses and whispered dreams.  For love and laughter and baby-powdered baby-bottoms.  For the ability and forum and freedom to write these words.

For enough days to say 'Thank You'.

It's really a great exercise.  I recommend it to everyone.

Shadows

Last week was one of those exquisitely beautiful autumn weeks.  The air was simultaneously warm with a light chill, the leaves were dancing circles on the breeze to the ground and the sun was coming at the most interesting angle through the remaining leaves on the trees creating a golden glow.

Everything seemed just a little magical and other-worldly.

I happened to be in Indiana, my home-state and where my mother and many of my friends can still be found and somewhere I go as often as possible to escape my now and step back, in many ways, to who I was a lot of yesterdays ago.  And as is my custom when I am home and have spent too many hours in the warmth and stillness of my mother's kitchen, I walk the country roads that are laid out in such grid-like precision that miles are easily stepped off and exact measurements of time can be given to worrying mothers so they won't, well, worry so much.

And I had my camera.

It was late enough that the sun was starting to sink in the west and the shadows were getting long.  I love that time of evening especially for the light and shadows, regardless of the season, but especially in the fall for the additional colors that are showing up on tree-tops and in field furrows.

As I walked this particular stretch of CR 800, I came upon a tree still standing but shattered by time and weather.  I am intrigued by trees.  One might say I am passionate about trees, especially when they have been defrocked by the seasons and are standing proud and strong, showing their species by their bare-boned limbs.  This one, though, had been standing naked for a long time.

I stopped to take in this tree, watching the play of light and color from the setting sun behind me and tried to find the best spot to capture the tree's remaining essence.  I also liked the idea of capturing me taking the picture via my shadow.

The picture was snapped, and I continued on my walk finding many other lovely Indiana fall images that would make it into my camera and, eventually, my photographic journal of this particular trip home.

Back home again in the heartland, I reviewed all my pictures and was particularly pleased with this one.  The colors were lovely, though the tree wasn't quite as singular in the picture as it had been the moment it was taken.  I am always amazed at what the human eye sees in the moment that somehow the camera never can capture.  Still, I liked this picture.  And it haunted me.

 I was reminded of the spiritual lesson of the continuous shadows in our life - the lesson to be conscious of the shadow, ever-present, that is really working for the accolades of 'job well done, good and faithful servant'.   When we work at the soup kitchen in order to show compassion for others who don't have the luxuries of plentiful food and dependable shelter, is the compassion shaded with the relief of 'thank God that isn't me' or the hope that this small kindness is building another step on our stairway to heaven?  When we write a check to the homeless shelter or the soup kitchen or the church, is it considering the need at the other end, or the tax deduction on ours?  When we ask for prayers for another, is it truly lifting that person up or is it a more acceptable, elegant form of gossip?

And my personal shadow game is that of jumping to judgment or conclusions about another only to honestly have to admit that what I am not liking in their actions is something I recognize and dislike in my own.  My lovely teacher and mentor reminds me again and again that we cannot see in another what we don't recognize in ourselves.

That lesson applies to the beauty and talent and specialness we 'recognize' in another as well as the ability to see and label bad behavior.  A friend of mine routinely flies into fits of road rage when fellow travelers aren't driving in a way to suit him/her, but is one of the worst drivers I know.  Another friend is  the first to love the gentleness of a human spirit, but fails to recognize their own gentleness.  Another announces they 'hate liars' but doesn't seem concerned about the small deceits that pepper their own reality.

If I am wounded by a lack of compassion or understanding, have I given any thought to my inability to empathize with the one who is the seeming perpetrator?

I have caught myself jumping to conclusions and judgments recently and thankfully am recognizing the sameness of those judgments and lingering guilt inside of me.  Not only is it time to release my opinions of others, it is time to finally let go of the corresponding sadness inside of me.

Shadows are everywhere in nature - outdoors and internal.  Sometimes they are nearly invisible, when the shining light of personal recognition is directly upon us, and at other times they stretch long into our horizon.  Shadows aren't bad or good.... they just are.  Just like that weathered tree.

So I labeled the picture - A mere shadow of her former self.

Searching for a Voice

Lying in bed listening to the birds begin to sing as the day dawned here in the heartland of America I thought about this new project/assignment to be an Empowerment World Mentor.  What a wonderful opportunity and what an amazing challenge to help another woman find her voice and to encourage her to speak her truth and change her world forever.

And what a tremendous responsibility.

It made me think, again, of the prayer I have been saying - the mantra I have been repeating - for several years.  'May I speak my truth with courage, wisdom and love.'  This prayer originated, really, with the second-guessing I continually put myself through either on my job or with my family and friends, or in my life in general.  It seemed that at the end of the day I would find myself questioning the things I had said and their impact on the people around me............  Did I speak wisely?  Was what I said fair and truthful?  Did I make a fool of myself or, worse..... someone else?

So much of what is written or said is through the emotional lenses of anger and fear manifesting often as sarcasm and contempt - which only seems to inspire the same in others.  My personal initial reaction to the expression of anger is to put up a wall and attempt to remove myself.  Not healthy, I know, but as they say in some parts of the country.....'just sayin'.

It appears courageous to share anger and fear when that seems to be what is really going on.  Whether it be the political situation or personal.  Maybe it is discussing religion or relationships.  The environment or education.  But is it really the truth?  And is it really effective?

I believe we have to look for the impulse behind the words that we speak - either out loud or in writing - to determine their impact.  When we speak from anger, righteous or not, we speak from fear and a position of weakness.  And people usually respond accordingly.

But, when we continue digging through the layers of anger and fear and keep looking for the kernel of truth we should eventually find it in love.....  there is something, eventually, based in love that motivates us.  Think about it - when we are angry or scared... isn't there always love threatened at the emotional center?

When we find the love based truth, then the words we speak can have the most lasting impact.  When we speak our truth with courage wisdom and love then we can never question or second-guess what we say.

I think the secret of being heard always is and will ever be in using the language of love.

Just sayin'.....

Handprints

I am just home from a weekend in the woods with a growing group of friends that have known each other, some of us, since kindergarten.  All of us from high school because we graduated together.  This is not some notorious group of friends that were inseparable then and have maintained the 'clique' all these years. No, this is a group of strikingly different individuals who have come together after 30 years and fallen in love with just being together talking and laughing, sitting around a campfire or a dinner table (or the occasional bar) sharing memories and stories. 

Sharing life.

When I came home, I felt a definite loss of air in my 'joy balloon'.  Coming home meant my sweet husband and warm bed and much healthier eating, to be sure.  It also meant several hundred miles between those wonderful people and months before I would be able to laugh and love with them again.  And I started thinking about the song from the musical "Wicked" that has always touched me deeply.  One of my favorite lines goes like this:

So much of me 

Is made of what I've learned from you 

You'll be with me 

Like a handprint on my heart

Handprints on my heart.  What an incredibly beautiful concept!  What a lovely way of thinking about all the people that have touched our life in some way.  And how completely true.  

So I started thinking about the handprints on my heart that have been left there throughout my lifetime.  This really correlates to the "Listen to My Life" class in which a group of women have gathered to listen to the telling of our stories and to help each other figure out how God/the Universe is working in our life through our experiences. I struggled last week with how to share my story, and now I know it will be telling the story by those very handprints.

Our hearts are covered with handprints.  Parents, siblings, friends, teachers, lovers have all left their marks.  Some are more gentle than others.  Some are more like bruises.  Each and every one of them has made an impression.  The trick, really, is in learning how to appreciate each of them for what they were.... for what they are. 

And now whatever way our stories end
I know you have re-written mine
By being my friend...

The people that come in and out of our lives are responsible for helping us rewrite the way our stories are to be told, if we only will take the time to understand the impact they make.  The parents who, though imperfect, were doing the best they knew how.  The friends who were wrestling with the same fears and insecurities.  The colleagues who had the same things to accomplish and prove.  The lovers that appear and then leave, but from whom we have discovered one more aspect of ourselves.  The spouses who appear and stay through thick and thin teaching us that commitment is a working gift.  The children who are born to us with their own lives to lead - joys to experience and sorrows to bare - and from whom we can learn much, if we just take the time to watch and listen.

 Thousands and thousands of handprints.  

And some of the 'prints' are not from hands, but from events.  Imprints maybe?  Some are from a whole list of the 'firsts' - first day of school, first time we learn our parents are fallible, first time a bat or a ball or a club connects with a ball so perfectly, first time we look into the face of our child, our first wish for a 'do-over' in life.

And some are historic events.... the assassination of a president, a war that leaves the world shaken and grieving, a car accident that leaves classmates dead or permanently scarred, a wall and a country that crumbles after a lifetime of being 'the enemy'.  September 11th, 2001.

I am learning to be thankful for all the prints that have been left on my heart - even those that felt more like a pinch - and hope to keep making room for more, because.... 

   

Who can say if I've been changed for the better?  

But because I knew you 

I have been changed for good.

I just want to make sure that all of these handprints are changing me for the better because I am recognizing them for what they are and learning from them.

And I pray that the handprints I am leaving are ones that translate to love.

I'm Listening

A couple of weeks ago I started a class entitled 'Listen to My Life' that has been run several times in the past by one of my dearest friends.  Penny is a pastor at one of those monster churches - we fondly refer to it as 'Six Flags Over Jesus' - that is attracting people by the thousands.  She has more work to do than any 3 people normally can manage AND she worked with this group of women who were gathering to tell the story of their lives and listen to the tellings. 

Penny, knowing me as well as she does, knew that this class would be something I would be drawn to and fall in love with.  What's not to love, really?  Women?  Gathering together to talk about the things that matter most to them?  Talking about their life stories?  Talking about how God has worked through and played in their lives?  Learning to listen exquisitely and ask questions - not for clarification, but to help others better understand their story?

Eating brownies, for God sakes?!

Yeah, that sounds like me, alright.  Penny knows me well.

So, last night was the beginning of the reflection of lives, not just the 'meet and greet' that has been happening the last two weeks (in which this WOO thrives, by the way...)  I knew it could be awkward.  I knew it would be hard.  I knew there would be tears.  And laughter.  I knew some people would be uncomfortable.  I knew my heart would open and break at some of what was going to be shared.  I knew that we risk much telling these stories.  (We have all sworn to confidentiality, so there won't be any sharing here, unless it is my story.)

What I didn't realize and am now processing is how much the stories of others would unlock places inside my heart and my mind and my memory.  I had a journal there with me and was quickly writing as others spoke, remembering things that needed to also go into my story.  I didn't want to miss a word of what was being said and didn't want to work on me as others were sharing to the depths of their souls.  But, I was surprised that I could forget some really important events that made such a difference in my life.

So I scribbled furiously, listening as attentively as possible and wondered at the forgetting.  Why would I forget the jobs?  College?  Talking about my father?  My mother and brothers?  Odd things, really, to leave out of a life's story.  And then the pit of my stomach started churning.... really hurting in a fear-like kind of way.

I took a picture once that reminds me of this familiar feeling.  We had been hiking in New Zealand with a tour and were told that early one morning our guides would be going to the river and feeding the eels.

Really.

So early the next morning I hiked down to the river and watched as the chicken scraps were thrown onto the river bank.  Within moments, the water was churning and writhing with these eels, all black and sinewy and slithering over each other. 

It looked like my definition of Hell.  And it reminded me of the way I feel, sometimes.  

I recognized the feeling I was having during this Tuesday night class as a stage fright kind of feeling, but didn't know why I should be suffering from anything like that.  I didn't have to say anything that night, I wasn't going to be 'on' with a less than complete life story... I had another week or two to be able to fill it out more completely.  And, besides, no one in that class would know whether I had really done my homework or not.  I had nothing to be afraid of.

If that was what it was.

What was I feeling?

Ah, yes.  The sadly too-familiar feeling of not being authentic - not really being 'true' to myself.  This prayer for authenticity I have said for years continues to be answered in opportunities to 'be' my prayer and here it was.  Again.

I have spent so many years being 'the strong one' - in my family, in my church, with my friends.  Goodness, even as a little girl I felt like I needed to be 'strong' for my mom.   She had gone through so much heartache in her life that I decided at a very young age never to do anything intentionally that might hurt her. 

And here I was, again, presenting the 'strong side' of Ruth.  Although the story I had mapped out was one that had ups and downs, I recognized that I had left out anything that might show me as fragile or flawed or weak.  I was mapping out vulnerabilities... but I was leaving out the stories that might really show some of the inner rooms of my heart that had never been truly explored.

There is a reoccurring dream I have that puts me in a house - a familiar house in my waking - that, in the dream,  I live in.  The house changes occasionally, but thematically it is the same.  I am walking through a house I know intimately, but keep opening doors to new rooms or finding stairways to new levels that I had never explored or discovered before.  Mostly, the dream house rooms are crowded with the trappings of life - furniture and clothing, dishes and pictures.  And cobwebs!  But occasionally, those rooms are painted white and pristine and echo-y empty.

Always I wonder, in my dream, how I could live somewhere and not know all that is there to know about the house and the rooms and the things in them?!  How could I occupy something as important as a home and not know everything in it like the back of my hand, not explore it and open all the doors and the closets and the drawers?

And clean it up, for pity sake?

And how is it possible for me to occupy my own life and not be opening all the doors and climbing all the stairs?  And yes, even cleaning out the cobwebs if need be.

So, life.... I am listening.  Truly, lovingly listening.

And I know what you have to teach me will be profound.