the third day
pulling lights from the tree always gets me. on the one hand, i'm anxious to pack it all away and get on to the work of January. yet as i wrap one unlit strand after another around my elbow and put them in the box for another year, it often feels like the light is dimming inside me along with those from my tree, one twinkle at a time.
of course this is ridiculous. there is plenty of light inside me somewhere, but lately, it feels like i am almost choosing not to let it out.
on new year's eve as i left the grocery store, a woman walked through the doors with a smile stretching so wide across her face that i looked around to see what could be so delightful. turns out, nothing — she was simply smiling. i huddled to myself against the wind and aimed for the car, wondering just what could make someone walk around that happy, all the time. i was also well aware that my expression would bring a passerby the exact opposite question to mind: why would someone frown so?
i spent that day as i often do on the last day of the year, taking stock of the things i have done and ought not to have done, understanding that i am not as right or as true as i sometimes think i am. the last few months of 2012 found me using angry words against the very people i love most, distancing my children and friends, and the reality of that leaves me feeling mired in the weight of me.
in all of my thinking, i promised myself i would make the changes in this new year that would make me more loving, less critical, less judgmental. no longer would the glass be half full. and i would tell the truth when i screwed up, not making excuses for my bungling of so many situations. not anymore.
on the first day of this new year, it took me exactly two hours to learn that even in truth telling, i will always be a bit broken. sometimes, like in the past couple of days, it feels like most of me feels broken, shattered into minute shards like the ornaments that fell from my tree this year, and most often from my own doing. on other days, somehow, i'm cracked, but the cracks hold together.
i spent the second day of 2013 second-guessing every decision i have made, pretty much in my life, praying that surely it is not in my DNA to hurt others, over and over again. and if it is, asking how i might go about deleting this fatal flaw.
a good friend who knows my heart and life very well said she sees much light in me. she didn't know that i had wrangled with those very words, that image of myself, as i began this post five days before. she says that none of us is all good or all bad. we are mixed up parts of both, and everyone has days when the light does not show through.
like any strand of Christmas lights, some of the bulbs do burn out. i have spent hours, sometimes, going through a strand to find that one defective piece, removing one bulb after another until i just throw the whole thing out and start over. but i can't throw my whole self out because half the light in me seems at best, dim in these early days of 2013.
on the third day of the new year, i went about my way, walking the dog, checking off the details of my work day. i've said before that when you work at church, God is pretty much in every corner. so there is no escaping the broken pieces of self, nor more than you can escape the light that flickers, even in the shadows of a darkened nave. God is there and watching, waiting i think, for those calls for help.
at the end of the day, i sat with my friend/priest/boss and we talked it all through. i cried a bit. we prayed a good long prayer, me saying right out loud that i wasn't really sure it would work. he said, yes, in his experience, prayer worked in even those most extreme situations, to bring about reconciliation of self, of others torn apart. so we closed our eyes and prayed for light. for love. for healing.
i was late picking the dog up from doggie day care. as i waited for the kennel worker to bring him to me, i overheard a woman on the phone explaining that she would get to work as soon as she could, but she was in a domestic situation and was uncertain of how she would get there.
she had just dropped her dog off at the kennel for the first time, uncertain, too, of when she would be able to get him. she was about my age, a soft face and graying ponytail, and there was something about her that showed great beauty.
sometime in me wavered, but i heard myself say:
do you need a ride somewhere? where do you work?
at a gas station, not far from here, she said.
so a few minutes later, the dog and i invited donna into our car. the dog licked her, and she talked about her own dog, a pug, she had rescued not long ago, and how he was going blind.
he is in good hands, i told her. the best. they will care well for him.
as we drove down the dark highway toward the quick mart, she spoke of being escorted by police from her home earlier that day, the same place where her fiancé had tried to kill her in october. he'd been in jail but had posted bond and showed up. she called the police, left all of her belongings except for the dog and walked out with no place to go.
she had left him before, sleeping in her car in 23 degree weather, so as not to be hurt again. but she did go back. until yesterday. his court date was to be this morning, and she was to testify.
he thinks if i'm dead i can't testify against him, she said, and i felt my throat catch, my own trivial self-inflicted problems fading. this was a woman's life. her life.
i'm intelligent and educated and embarrassed that i have gotten myself into this situation, she said. things like this don't happen to me.
they happen to anybody. this is not your fault, i told her.
as we pulled into the lighted parking lot of her work, i told her about the shelter for women in her situation, a place where she could find food, clothing, shelter and support. the police had told her about it, but she didn't know how to contact them, so i offered to get the number. she wrote the number of the gas station on a sheet of paper, squeezed my hand and disappeared into the busy quick mart to begin her job overnight job.
at home i found the number, reading online that:
• One woman is abused every minute in the United States*
• that it takes seven attempts for a victim to successfully leave her abuser*
i thought of all the women right in my town who died in the last year at the hand of someone who was supposed to love them, one of them in a shopping center i frequent. i have been distanced from this world, i think, but on the third day of this year, a beautiful woman in the midst of this very crisis shared a ride and conversation with me.
of course this is ridiculous. there is plenty of light inside me somewhere, but lately, it feels like i am almost choosing not to let it out.
on new year's eve as i left the grocery store, a woman walked through the doors with a smile stretching so wide across her face that i looked around to see what could be so delightful. turns out, nothing — she was simply smiling. i huddled to myself against the wind and aimed for the car, wondering just what could make someone walk around that happy, all the time. i was also well aware that my expression would bring a passerby the exact opposite question to mind: why would someone frown so?
i spent that day as i often do on the last day of the year, taking stock of the things i have done and ought not to have done, understanding that i am not as right or as true as i sometimes think i am. the last few months of 2012 found me using angry words against the very people i love most, distancing my children and friends, and the reality of that leaves me feeling mired in the weight of me.
in all of my thinking, i promised myself i would make the changes in this new year that would make me more loving, less critical, less judgmental. no longer would the glass be half full. and i would tell the truth when i screwed up, not making excuses for my bungling of so many situations. not anymore.
on the first day of this new year, it took me exactly two hours to learn that even in truth telling, i will always be a bit broken. sometimes, like in the past couple of days, it feels like most of me feels broken, shattered into minute shards like the ornaments that fell from my tree this year, and most often from my own doing. on other days, somehow, i'm cracked, but the cracks hold together.
i spent the second day of 2013 second-guessing every decision i have made, pretty much in my life, praying that surely it is not in my DNA to hurt others, over and over again. and if it is, asking how i might go about deleting this fatal flaw.
a good friend who knows my heart and life very well said she sees much light in me. she didn't know that i had wrangled with those very words, that image of myself, as i began this post five days before. she says that none of us is all good or all bad. we are mixed up parts of both, and everyone has days when the light does not show through.
like any strand of Christmas lights, some of the bulbs do burn out. i have spent hours, sometimes, going through a strand to find that one defective piece, removing one bulb after another until i just throw the whole thing out and start over. but i can't throw my whole self out because half the light in me seems at best, dim in these early days of 2013.
on the third day of the new year, i went about my way, walking the dog, checking off the details of my work day. i've said before that when you work at church, God is pretty much in every corner. so there is no escaping the broken pieces of self, nor more than you can escape the light that flickers, even in the shadows of a darkened nave. God is there and watching, waiting i think, for those calls for help.
at the end of the day, i sat with my friend/priest/boss and we talked it all through. i cried a bit. we prayed a good long prayer, me saying right out loud that i wasn't really sure it would work. he said, yes, in his experience, prayer worked in even those most extreme situations, to bring about reconciliation of self, of others torn apart. so we closed our eyes and prayed for light. for love. for healing.
i was late picking the dog up from doggie day care. as i waited for the kennel worker to bring him to me, i overheard a woman on the phone explaining that she would get to work as soon as she could, but she was in a domestic situation and was uncertain of how she would get there.
she had just dropped her dog off at the kennel for the first time, uncertain, too, of when she would be able to get him. she was about my age, a soft face and graying ponytail, and there was something about her that showed great beauty.
sometime in me wavered, but i heard myself say:
do you need a ride somewhere? where do you work?
at a gas station, not far from here, she said.
so a few minutes later, the dog and i invited donna into our car. the dog licked her, and she talked about her own dog, a pug, she had rescued not long ago, and how he was going blind.
he is in good hands, i told her. the best. they will care well for him.
as we drove down the dark highway toward the quick mart, she spoke of being escorted by police from her home earlier that day, the same place where her fiancé had tried to kill her in october. he'd been in jail but had posted bond and showed up. she called the police, left all of her belongings except for the dog and walked out with no place to go.
she had left him before, sleeping in her car in 23 degree weather, so as not to be hurt again. but she did go back. until yesterday. his court date was to be this morning, and she was to testify.
he thinks if i'm dead i can't testify against him, she said, and i felt my throat catch, my own trivial self-inflicted problems fading. this was a woman's life. her life.
i'm intelligent and educated and embarrassed that i have gotten myself into this situation, she said. things like this don't happen to me.
they happen to anybody. this is not your fault, i told her.
as we pulled into the lighted parking lot of her work, i told her about the shelter for women in her situation, a place where she could find food, clothing, shelter and support. the police had told her about it, but she didn't know how to contact them, so i offered to get the number. she wrote the number of the gas station on a sheet of paper, squeezed my hand and disappeared into the busy quick mart to begin her job overnight job.
at home i found the number, reading online that:
• One woman is abused every minute in the United States*
• that it takes seven attempts for a victim to successfully leave her abuser*
i thought of all the women right in my town who died in the last year at the hand of someone who was supposed to love them, one of them in a shopping center i frequent. i have been distanced from this world, i think, but on the third day of this year, a beautiful woman in the midst of this very crisis shared a ride and conversation with me.
later on, i called donna, giving her the number. she had tried to leave him five times, she said.
it's finally time to do it for good, i told her. don't be a statistic. and she promised she would call right away.
God put you in my life today, she said.
no, i said, He put you in mine.
in the night as i tossed, still selfishly worrying about my own petty problems, i prayed for donna, that she did make that call, and that soon, she would find new light.
*interactofwake.org
writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.
our light has come
ok, so i haven't written daily during december, at least not here at writemuch. but i have been writing a lot in my job and in my head. why just a few days ago, in the wee hours of the morning, i dreamed that i had found the characters and plot to the next harry potter (well, HP wannabe)... literally dreamed up the world and had actors taking parts in the screen version, even setting it up for the sequel.
if only i could remember it. in the middle of the dream i dreamed that i was thinking now this is a great story, so great in fact that it is unforgettable. apparently not so unforgettable that when i woke just minutes later, the whole thing had vanished more quickly than dear ol' harry under his invisible cloak.
and so i have vowed that i will wake myself up from a dream of this sort again and write the whole damn thing down (even if i can't read my own handwriting, which is hard to do in the middle of the day, much less in the wee hours with the lights off.)
sometimes, though, it's not about my writing at all. sometimes the joy of words comes through the people i love writing and reading their own stories — stories i admittedly helped pull out of them — but their words, their dreams, beautifully rendered on the page.
today was that kind of day.
each sunday during Advent, i've had the privilege to mentor a group of writers who share the pews with me at my church. we've been gathering for years, off and on, during sunday school, to put ourselves into the stories of the Bible and write our way out. i think we are in our 8th year, though we've departed the text and written about Lent from time to time.
it's been a remarkable journey. and i have grown to love and respect all the people who sit at the table with me, churning out their personal stories with great enthusiasm and humility. some of them have been with me for years, others new to the table, but all are searching for the role God plays in their daily life, in their struggles to be good people and parents, to work through their grief, to accept life when plans go awry. you can't know how much i admire how they put it right there on the table, when too often their instructor is not yet ready to do the same. they have written about their marriages, children and siblings they have lost, riffs in families and the struggles and joys that come with this busy season. they've written with humor and with grace, and we have made good use of the box of Kleenex that sits in the middle of our table.
and today, this group of writers shared their stories with the larger congregation. i felt like a mother watching her child perform, take her first steps or riding away from me with her back to me as she peddles away on her bike. in the words these dear friends read, i saw growth, too, as writers and as Christians who have come to understand that God is there, even in the middle of sadness.
it's funny. we set out each season with a set of readings and no idea what we will write about or if our stories will connect in any way to each other, as any good collection should. and every single year, as i begin placing the stories in our collection, it's a goosebump feeling, because stories set apart by circumstance, gender and generation are woven together as if from the same cloth.
this year's collection is all about light, the aha! kind of light that comes when we finally understand we are on the right road.
advent: noun. "coming into being or use."
i'd say that's what this year's collection is all about. but why don't you see for yourself? our light has come, and you can read all about it here.
but that's not all. this afternoon i sat in the audience to hear my mentor, poet Sally Buckner, read from her collection, Nineteen Visions of Christmas. i was sally's student almost 40 years ago at peace college, and one of the joys of the season throughout the years has been to receive a Christmas poem from her as her card. she has collected some familiar to me, and many not, and listening to the cadence and clarity of her words today reminded me of why i want to be a writer, and how much she has taught me about the craft. i can only hope i have taught my own students half as much.
what a joy, in the midst of this season, to be both teacher and student in one single day. but come to think of it, shouldn't every day be just like that?
writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.
if only i could remember it. in the middle of the dream i dreamed that i was thinking now this is a great story, so great in fact that it is unforgettable. apparently not so unforgettable that when i woke just minutes later, the whole thing had vanished more quickly than dear ol' harry under his invisible cloak.
and so i have vowed that i will wake myself up from a dream of this sort again and write the whole damn thing down (even if i can't read my own handwriting, which is hard to do in the middle of the day, much less in the wee hours with the lights off.)
sometimes, though, it's not about my writing at all. sometimes the joy of words comes through the people i love writing and reading their own stories — stories i admittedly helped pull out of them — but their words, their dreams, beautifully rendered on the page.
today was that kind of day.
each sunday during Advent, i've had the privilege to mentor a group of writers who share the pews with me at my church. we've been gathering for years, off and on, during sunday school, to put ourselves into the stories of the Bible and write our way out. i think we are in our 8th year, though we've departed the text and written about Lent from time to time.
it's been a remarkable journey. and i have grown to love and respect all the people who sit at the table with me, churning out their personal stories with great enthusiasm and humility. some of them have been with me for years, others new to the table, but all are searching for the role God plays in their daily life, in their struggles to be good people and parents, to work through their grief, to accept life when plans go awry. you can't know how much i admire how they put it right there on the table, when too often their instructor is not yet ready to do the same. they have written about their marriages, children and siblings they have lost, riffs in families and the struggles and joys that come with this busy season. they've written with humor and with grace, and we have made good use of the box of Kleenex that sits in the middle of our table.
and today, this group of writers shared their stories with the larger congregation. i felt like a mother watching her child perform, take her first steps or riding away from me with her back to me as she peddles away on her bike. in the words these dear friends read, i saw growth, too, as writers and as Christians who have come to understand that God is there, even in the middle of sadness.
it's funny. we set out each season with a set of readings and no idea what we will write about or if our stories will connect in any way to each other, as any good collection should. and every single year, as i begin placing the stories in our collection, it's a goosebump feeling, because stories set apart by circumstance, gender and generation are woven together as if from the same cloth.
this year's collection is all about light, the aha! kind of light that comes when we finally understand we are on the right road.
advent: noun. "coming into being or use."
i'd say that's what this year's collection is all about. but why don't you see for yourself? our light has come, and you can read all about it here.
what a joy, in the midst of this season, to be both teacher and student in one single day. but come to think of it, shouldn't every day be just like that?
writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.
Put On Your (Pity) Party Pants (I promise, I did write this yesterday)
Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans.
Ok, so I've read some of the Reverb10 posts and realize I am supposed to BREAK THE RULES with these questions, and not write them uncomfortably straight, like yesterday's post. But uncomfortably truthful.
I would be a little late on the uptake. Like I am with just about everything this year, especially Christmas. No tree, no decorations, hardly any gifts. (Who has time with all this writing I'm doing? I just can't multitask like I could in my 30s and 40s, I'm just saying.)
Though the weddings I attended were FAB, Anna and Ardeth, that's not what I will remember here.
It happened just last night. It was lovely. I went to my first ever book club meeting at a friend’s house. As I write these words, I think how can it be that I have, at 53, been invited to join my first book club? All my friends are in book clubs, some of them in more than one. I've been invited to read at book clubs, but never to join. (Ok, might this be pity party # 2?) A wise friend told me recently that I might intimidate people because I'm a "writer," well, do they know that this writer reads her fair share of trash, has actually bought a copy of the National Inquirer (once), that the high brow books I read I often don't understand? Not to mention that it is embarrassing the number of books I haven't read on that list of BBC books that most people have only read six of floating around on FB. (For the record, I have read WAY more than six. But Madame Bovary? My mother would never have allowed me to read that. I had to get special permission to see Romeo and Juliet at the Dixie Theatre because Leonard Whiting was bare bottomed. Not to mention Olivia Hussey's bosom, but I had seen at least two of those by then.)
Anyway, back to the Party. I love my friend. We've been friends for 20 years, and I have admired her all those years. She's a great mother. She is intentional in her actions.
She is beautiful, has a beautiful house and everything looks like pottery barn and her husband is a cabinet maker (as a hobby), he built some of the cabinets in their living room. He is also a husband who can fix anything at all, and one thing he fixed (that I covet) are these beautiful cabinets over her kitchen computer station that are back light (not with florescent lights, mind you) but soft lights that reflect on the artisan pitchers and plates she has on display. They have a mountain house (that I have been invited to twice) and they cut their Christmas tree down from the mountains and it is 10 feet tall), and she made us Christmas cookies and everything was CLEAN, even with a dog in the house and the lights are all perfectly low and the children's Christmas handprint wreath pictures are all framed and over the fireplace, (somewhere in my boxes yet to unpack, my children's handprint wreaths are curled on dowels.) And she had carefully preserved other special Christmas artwork — the adorable burlap pillow cross-stitched with a Christmas tree comes to mind —I have the same one somewhere, if the dog didn't chew it up a couple of Christmases ago. And she had ordered special huggers for our wine glasses with the name of the book club on them, and there were lights everywhere and she has stenciled the wall with a special Christmas saying about singing loudly that she created, that apparently just scrapes off without leaving a scar on the wall when Christmas is over, (if I did it, it would indeed scar), and, well, can you tell that when I die I want to come back as her?
As I moved around her house, admiring every corner of it, I couldn't help but wonder, what do I have to offer my friends, really?
I came home to kitchen counters filled with lists and bills and nary a twinkling light glowing, save my husband's computer screen, and the florescent one over the kitchen sink, and I guess if I tried real hard I could imagine its light emanating from the Star of Wonder all those years ago in Bethlehem. And I had two missed messages from my husband saying he couldn't, then could, figure out the DVR so I wouldn't miss Sing-off while I was gone. And I just looked around at all the dust and scratched up floors where the dog has played catch me if you can and I had myself a good ol' fashioned pity party, with nobody but myself in attendance, remembering a time when you could practically eat off my floors my house was that clean. What happened to that girl?
And while I pitied, I watched Sing-off (aren't those guys from Committed amazing?) marveling in fact God gives some people the ability to sing better than a bird, and though I have always wanted to, He didn't give that to me, and in the midst of the pity, I realized what I did get, right in front of my eyes in this beautiful home but I had failed to see.
My friend Pam. I have known her, too, for 20 years, and being a Yank, she is a stitch. She has made me laugh ever since we coached our daughters' OM team together, way back when they were in fifth grade. And she told me how she went to the airport to greet the WWII veterans who took the Flight of Honor a couple of weeks ago. Her father, a WWII vet is no longer around to take that flight. One of the giants in my church did though.
And Martha was there. I have known her since Miss Lottie Smith Welch's kindergarten. I have been waiting to see her for a couple of weeks, to talk about her son Ryan, in Afghanistan, and to share news that I have connected with one of our long-lost classmates, whom she will want to see. We hugged, (twice) knowing there is no friend like the ones who have known you when you were just you, and have loved you anyway.
And Grace was there. We walk our dogs every day at 6:30, a.m., have for I don't know how many years. Two dogs ago for me I think. It's been so cold this week we have stayed snuggled under the covers instead, and I have missed her company. When we went around the room to share our favorite Christmas traditions, she said church on Christmas Eve. It's the same for me. We have the same dishes, the same colors in our houses.We joke sometimes that when we get old, we'll move around the corner to the retirement home and combine our things. They would easily coordinate. We were suite-mates in college. I have known her that long.
Two of my neighbors who have children getting married next year were there. I don't see them often at all, even though they live just through the trees. Both are funny, characters in their own right, and I love seeing them, listening to Karen talk about her favorite residents in the retirement home she runs, and Margaret about her extended family, all of whom live in the neighborhood, or nearby.
And there were a couple of women I don't know well, but whom I know will, over discussions about books, will give me great food for thought.
Why do I do this to myself, needle until I find the ways I fall short, instead of celebrating the fact that my friend opened her home and invited me in? That she drew together a group of women who are important to me, and gave me the chance to reconnect?
And so, just a bit ago, I pulled out the candles to put in the windows, and since it is me, a few of the bulbs were burned out, and when I went to the store to get them, I forgot to get them. So there you go. But when I drove back in the driveway, the candles lit the windows like stars.
Christmas is coming. And even if I can't get the scratches off my floor, the presents bought, the greenery hung by the time it arrives, there will be much to celebrate.
sbr