I'm sitting in tears trying to pray - trying to untangle my thoughts which are, as usual, twisted and knotted and unruly. Like the disciples, I don't know how to pray - it seems I always end up here, not even knowing how to begin. The metaphor of tangled threads shapes my request - I am tired of confusion and lack of direction - I want things to be clear, simple, straight - untangled. So I ask God to untangle my thoughts, to sort them out, to separate them. But then a nagging thought occurs - perhaps that is not the right way to pray . Perhaps I should ask God to weave them into a beautiful tapestry instead, perhaps that is what He wants to do. . . like that old metaphor popular during my Bible college days. Which is the right way to pray?
And then I reflect that I am thinking, praying in metaphor anyway. My thoughts are not actual threads, are they? Does it matter how I talk about them? And should I pray in figurative language at all? But can I even begin to speak to God or anyone else about my present difficulties without any figures of speech? All this runs through my mind within sixty seconds of my first whispered request. By now my prayers have been completely derailed - another metaphor. Should I just start over and forget the metaphor altogether?
I step back mentally and try to think what I know of God's "speech" as He has accomodated Himself to man. He appears to love figurative language; He repeatedly chose poets to write His message. The canon we have accepted is full of symbolism, metaphor, anthropomorphism. Is there, I wonder, a single literary device discovered by man that cannot be richly illustrated from the Bible? And what about visions? God often "talks" in pictures, even - to Abraham, to Ezekiel, to the minor prophets, to John the Apostle, to Peter. The Scriptures are full of stars and sand and wheels and dry bones, of watered gardens and stony ground, of tarpaulins full of animals and of weird, frightening beasts. He certainly has no hesitation about using metaphor in His own communication to us.
But, returning to my original prayer, my problem is that I don't know how to think about things anyway - what if I choose the wrong metaphor. What if I ask Him to untangle when I should ask Him to weave, or to dissolve, or to secure the knots more tightly - or . . . the possibilities are endless. Now I am really not sure what I want to ask for, anyway. I cast about for anything in the Scripture that might inform or instruct me.
I recall the admonition in Ecclesiastes 5 to "Be not rash with thy mouth.. . .let thy words be few" and wonder if it is a rebuke. But I am also encouraged by the behind-the-scenes glimpse into the mechanics of prayer that the Apostle Paul provides in Romans 8:26, Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Can I trust the Spirit to translate my prayers, however dim or ill-chosen the words, or even the thoughts?
I remember the word picture David used once to describe his posture before the Lord, "Surely I have behaved and quieted myself, as a child that is weaned of his mother: my soul is even as a weaned child." and I think that perhaps what I need to do this morning is just to sit quietly and wait for the Lord to make sense of what I cannot make sense of - to be like Hagar who found herself in the desert, found by "Him who sees me." Maybe the right words don't matter so much. Maybe they don't matter at all this morning.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Thanksgiving
There are only two eye- witness accounts of the the first Thanksgiving feast in Plymouth, 1621. Both are brief, and both are, appropriately, grateful. Edward Winslow ends his account this wish:
And although it be not always so plentiful, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.
Like the Pilgrims, my small company of sojourners has also just passed a first year in a new land. As I head downstairs to my large, air-conditioned kitchen in order to prepare our frozen turkey for dinner today I am aware of how little I have in common with our New England forbears. . . except, perhaps, the conclusion of a first year in a distant land, and the gratitude in my heart for the way God has led us and sustained us through the last twelve months. By the goodness of God we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.
Happy Thanksgiving.
And although it be not always so plentiful, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.
Like the Pilgrims, my small company of sojourners has also just passed a first year in a new land. As I head downstairs to my large, air-conditioned kitchen in order to prepare our frozen turkey for dinner today I am aware of how little I have in common with our New England forbears. . . except, perhaps, the conclusion of a first year in a distant land, and the gratitude in my heart for the way God has led us and sustained us through the last twelve months. By the goodness of God we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Now thank we all our God,
with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom this world rejoices;
who from our mothers' arms has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.
O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us;
and keep us still in grace,
and guide us when perplexed;
and free us from all ills,
in this world and the next.
All praise and thanks to God
the Father now be given;
the Son, and him who reigns
with them in highest heaven;
the one eternal God,
whom earth and heaven adore;
for thus it was, is now,
and shall be evermore.
Friday, November 16, 2007
Dear Santa
I ve heard it said that no two children ever have the same parents. I know that is true when I have conversations with my adult siblings; sometimes when I discuss my mother with my brother I come away thinking we were talking about two completely different people. He and I are next to each other in age - only 14 months apart - both middle children in a family of four, but we know our mother in completely different ways. This must be true for my own children, as well.
Even more obvious in a large family is the truth that no two children have the same childhood. I look at my six year old now, and remember life in our home when my eldest, or second or third was six, and realize how different my children's experiences are! My fifteen year old is acutely aware of this, remembering far more spankings than he sees administered; I am acutely aware of it when I realize that regular bedtimes, rigorously monitored movie watching, long, messy craft projects at the kitchen table and hours of reading aloud every day are things of the past. My youngest daughter's life is full of teenagers and ipods and almost-adult conversation at the dinner table. She lives in a large, Asian city instead of an old New England farmhouse with a brook and climbing trees; she does not get to listen to Winnie the Pooh audio CDs on long car rides, but endures hours of U2, Bob Marley and Counting Crows.
The shape of her childhood - youngest of seven - is clearly reflected in her carefully written Christmas list which appeared on the refrigerator two days ago. I'll reproduce it here, and let it speak for itself.
1. Floaty Canoe
2. Roller skates
3. A Blanket
4. Slippers
5. Candy
6. Squirt Gun
7. A Surfer Suit
8. Iguana
9. Violin Lessons
10. Hair Spray - the DVD
11. Henna
12. Sling Shot
13. Surf Board
14. Cell Phone
15. Stationery
16. Laptop
17. Rabbit
18. Littlest Pet Shops
19. Littlest Pet Shop House
20. Baseball Hat
21. Dress Ups
22. Night Light
23. Frisby
24. Incense
25. Wallet
26. Marbles
27. Sleeping bag
28. Hot Weels cars
Even more obvious in a large family is the truth that no two children have the same childhood. I look at my six year old now, and remember life in our home when my eldest, or second or third was six, and realize how different my children's experiences are! My fifteen year old is acutely aware of this, remembering far more spankings than he sees administered; I am acutely aware of it when I realize that regular bedtimes, rigorously monitored movie watching, long, messy craft projects at the kitchen table and hours of reading aloud every day are things of the past. My youngest daughter's life is full of teenagers and ipods and almost-adult conversation at the dinner table. She lives in a large, Asian city instead of an old New England farmhouse with a brook and climbing trees; she does not get to listen to Winnie the Pooh audio CDs on long car rides, but endures hours of U2, Bob Marley and Counting Crows.
The shape of her childhood - youngest of seven - is clearly reflected in her carefully written Christmas list which appeared on the refrigerator two days ago. I'll reproduce it here, and let it speak for itself.
1. Floaty Canoe
2. Roller skates
3. A Blanket
4. Slippers
5. Candy
6. Squirt Gun
7. A Surfer Suit
8. Iguana
9. Violin Lessons
10. Hair Spray - the DVD
11. Henna
12. Sling Shot
13. Surf Board
14. Cell Phone
15. Stationery
16. Laptop
17. Rabbit
18. Littlest Pet Shops
19. Littlest Pet Shop House
20. Baseball Hat
21. Dress Ups
22. Night Light
23. Frisby
24. Incense
25. Wallet
26. Marbles
27. Sleeping bag
28. Hot Weels cars
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Different ways of seeing the world
I found myself talking to my dad last Father's Day from Batu Ferringhi, a beach on Penang Island. I called him about 7:30 in the morning my time; it was 8:30 PM the previous evening for him. He was home alone, as he is most of the time. I was only alone for the moment - my children were still asleep and my husband was having coffeee at the only cafe on the beach that was open at such an early hour.
I walk up and down the beach as I talk with my father, imagining him in his tiny bedroom off the small, cluttered kitchen in the house on the hill overlooking Port Mouton Bay. We cover the usual subjects first - where I am, how he is. I am on vacation for a long weekend with my husband and children, he is getting around OK but has a doctor's appointment later in the week to check into some recurring symptoms that have been bothering him again. Neither one of us knows that he will never return home from that appointment, will spend months in the hospital, nearly die and then wait long weeks for a nursing home placement. Although I may return to Penang Island some day, he will never return to his bedroom, but we do not know that on Father's Day.
So I think as I watch the brown water, murky from a weekend storm, that he is on the coast, too - the rugged coast of Nova Scotia with its icy water that forbids swimming. His house is less than a kilometer walk to a white crescent beach and we talk about the beach, but I realize he has probably not been there for months - perhaps more than a year. He's been too unsteady on his feet and tires too easily to attempt the rocky descent to the beach. He can see the ocean from his backyard, but has not felt it or stepped in it for years.
Our conversation moves beyond my location and his health, and I am conscious as I always am these days, that he is still clear, articulate. I struggle for the occasional word, he never does. I mention Burma and he begins quoting Kipling, "O the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin'-fishes play, An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!" He tells me that he has always thought the best example of onomatopoeia in the English language is the line, "Elephants a-piling teak In the sludgy, squdgy creek."
We talk about Penang, and he tells me about early missionary work here. I have read the Lonely Planet and Rough Guides to Malaysia, and recently a child's biography of Hudson Taylor to my girls, but he knows details about the history of the gospel in Penang that I've never encountered. Frankly, I'd never heard of Penang until we moved to Malaysia last year, but he is conversant with the history of the Malay Peninsula as well as the island. Rangoon, Mandalay, Georgetown, Malacca are all familiar names to him.
Our conversation leaves Southeast Asia and moves to Europe. He tells me that my cousin's son has recently been to Dieppe with his middle school French immersion class, and that he actually looked up my Grandfather's cousin's grave. My dad tells me about Dieppe, and how many Canadians were killed there. He reminisces about Cousin Harry's visits to his home in Windsor, Ontario, when my dad was 7 and Harry about 14, how Harry played catch with him in the back yard. Harry was only 22 when he died. His young widow remarried and had more children with her second husband. Harry's one son, the only Horner in his family, looked up my Aunt many, many years later in Toronto. My dad remembers it all clearly.
Our conversation shifts again and he tells me he's heard about political demonstrations in Bangkok and wonders if my two eldest children- his grandchildren- who are traveling in Thailand are safe. We talk about where they are staying, where the political unrest is located, how long they will be there and what they are doing. He prays for them daily.
Finally we speak of his recently composed plans for a memorial serivce after his death. He tells me the three hymns he wants: When All My Labors and Trials are O'er, another one so old and unfamiliar I am not sure I know it, and his all-time favorite, The Sands of Time are Sinking. That one I could have predicted. He tells me the names of the people he would like to speak at the service; I am one of them. We do not mention his son who may not be out of prison before he dies. If he is, he will not be able to attend the service since it will be in Canada and he will be on parole in the US.
We talk for nearly an hour, then say goodbye - he to prepare for bed in his cramped bedroom, easing his old frame into his small bed which has been moved to the first floor to avoid the stairs, I to wake my children, have breakfast at the cafe on the beach and pack for the trip back to Kuala Lumpur. My mind is cluttered with things like wet bathing suits, room keys, checkout times and traffic. But I imagine his ranging wide as he waits for sleep - across the globe, through time, over the faces of long dead cousins and traveling grandchildren, through Burma, Penang, Rangoon, Dieppe, Mandalay, Siam, Heaven.
I walk up and down the beach as I talk with my father, imagining him in his tiny bedroom off the small, cluttered kitchen in the house on the hill overlooking Port Mouton Bay. We cover the usual subjects first - where I am, how he is. I am on vacation for a long weekend with my husband and children, he is getting around OK but has a doctor's appointment later in the week to check into some recurring symptoms that have been bothering him again. Neither one of us knows that he will never return home from that appointment, will spend months in the hospital, nearly die and then wait long weeks for a nursing home placement. Although I may return to Penang Island some day, he will never return to his bedroom, but we do not know that on Father's Day.
So I think as I watch the brown water, murky from a weekend storm, that he is on the coast, too - the rugged coast of Nova Scotia with its icy water that forbids swimming. His house is less than a kilometer walk to a white crescent beach and we talk about the beach, but I realize he has probably not been there for months - perhaps more than a year. He's been too unsteady on his feet and tires too easily to attempt the rocky descent to the beach. He can see the ocean from his backyard, but has not felt it or stepped in it for years.
Our conversation moves beyond my location and his health, and I am conscious as I always am these days, that he is still clear, articulate. I struggle for the occasional word, he never does. I mention Burma and he begins quoting Kipling, "O the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin'-fishes play, An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!" He tells me that he has always thought the best example of onomatopoeia in the English language is the line, "Elephants a-piling teak In the sludgy, squdgy creek."
We talk about Penang, and he tells me about early missionary work here. I have read the Lonely Planet and Rough Guides to Malaysia, and recently a child's biography of Hudson Taylor to my girls, but he knows details about the history of the gospel in Penang that I've never encountered. Frankly, I'd never heard of Penang until we moved to Malaysia last year, but he is conversant with the history of the Malay Peninsula as well as the island. Rangoon, Mandalay, Georgetown, Malacca are all familiar names to him.
Our conversation leaves Southeast Asia and moves to Europe. He tells me that my cousin's son has recently been to Dieppe with his middle school French immersion class, and that he actually looked up my Grandfather's cousin's grave. My dad tells me about Dieppe, and how many Canadians were killed there. He reminisces about Cousin Harry's visits to his home in Windsor, Ontario, when my dad was 7 and Harry about 14, how Harry played catch with him in the back yard. Harry was only 22 when he died. His young widow remarried and had more children with her second husband. Harry's one son, the only Horner in his family, looked up my Aunt many, many years later in Toronto. My dad remembers it all clearly.
Our conversation shifts again and he tells me he's heard about political demonstrations in Bangkok and wonders if my two eldest children- his grandchildren- who are traveling in Thailand are safe. We talk about where they are staying, where the political unrest is located, how long they will be there and what they are doing. He prays for them daily.
Finally we speak of his recently composed plans for a memorial serivce after his death. He tells me the three hymns he wants: When All My Labors and Trials are O'er, another one so old and unfamiliar I am not sure I know it, and his all-time favorite, The Sands of Time are Sinking. That one I could have predicted. He tells me the names of the people he would like to speak at the service; I am one of them. We do not mention his son who may not be out of prison before he dies. If he is, he will not be able to attend the service since it will be in Canada and he will be on parole in the US.
We talk for nearly an hour, then say goodbye - he to prepare for bed in his cramped bedroom, easing his old frame into his small bed which has been moved to the first floor to avoid the stairs, I to wake my children, have breakfast at the cafe on the beach and pack for the trip back to Kuala Lumpur. My mind is cluttered with things like wet bathing suits, room keys, checkout times and traffic. But I imagine his ranging wide as he waits for sleep - across the globe, through time, over the faces of long dead cousins and traveling grandchildren, through Burma, Penang, Rangoon, Dieppe, Mandalay, Siam, Heaven.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
daily bread
I was talking with my daughter in Chicago the other night as she was trying to make it to the library before it closed at midnight; it was nearly lunchtime here in KL. She was telling me about things she had been hearing, reading, thinking lately, and she said, "I just love it when everything really starts to come together in my mind, you know?" I do know - that moment when the connections begin to emerge, when thoughts which had seemed disparate and unconnected begin to arrange themselves into a pattern and a bigger picture - maybe still just a sketch - begins to appear. I had one of those moments this morning as I was kneading bread dough.
I was debating whether to double the recipe - it seems to make sense to use the same amount of time and end up with four loaves of freshly baked bread instead of two. It takes no longer to measure ten cups of flour than five, the kneading, rising and baking times are the same, and I have four pans. Besides, my family usually devours two loaves of homemade bread in one sitting so a little backup would be nice. But I decided not to make extra. Homemade bread is so wonderful because it is fresh, because you can eat it while it's still warm and the butter melts while you spread it. Extra loaves are only as good as good bakery bread.
As I kneaded I thought of the Bible story I read my little girls a few nights ago - how the manna from heaven was only good for one day, how it lost its sweetness and freshness if it was hoarded against the morrow, how it must be eaten with faith to be fully appreciated. Then I thought of a note I had just written a friend about how the future looked like a blank screen to me - that I have no idea where I will be a year or two from now after our time in Malaysia is finished. As I turned over the warm dough and forced it down with the heel of my hand I saw how the three threads were woven together - the dough, the manna, my future.
The bread could be made ahead, but I knew it would not be as good, as satisfying, as daily bread would be. The manna was sent not only to provide for the Israelites, but also to teach them their dependence upon God and His absolute faithfulness to them. My unknowable future is not only acceptable, it is actively good for me, it is part of God's love and faithfulness to me. I not only do not need to worry about the next day or week or year, I can trust that what God sends will be better than what I might plan and provide for, had I the opportunity or means or supposed wisdom to do so.
The bread is ready to go in the pans. There will be another waiting time before it is baked, and then we can enjoy it fresh from the oven. I like to think I may enjoy the future fresh from the hand of God, revealed to me at just the right time. It will be worth the wait - I'm sure of it.
I was debating whether to double the recipe - it seems to make sense to use the same amount of time and end up with four loaves of freshly baked bread instead of two. It takes no longer to measure ten cups of flour than five, the kneading, rising and baking times are the same, and I have four pans. Besides, my family usually devours two loaves of homemade bread in one sitting so a little backup would be nice. But I decided not to make extra. Homemade bread is so wonderful because it is fresh, because you can eat it while it's still warm and the butter melts while you spread it. Extra loaves are only as good as good bakery bread.
As I kneaded I thought of the Bible story I read my little girls a few nights ago - how the manna from heaven was only good for one day, how it lost its sweetness and freshness if it was hoarded against the morrow, how it must be eaten with faith to be fully appreciated. Then I thought of a note I had just written a friend about how the future looked like a blank screen to me - that I have no idea where I will be a year or two from now after our time in Malaysia is finished. As I turned over the warm dough and forced it down with the heel of my hand I saw how the three threads were woven together - the dough, the manna, my future.
The bread could be made ahead, but I knew it would not be as good, as satisfying, as daily bread would be. The manna was sent not only to provide for the Israelites, but also to teach them their dependence upon God and His absolute faithfulness to them. My unknowable future is not only acceptable, it is actively good for me, it is part of God's love and faithfulness to me. I not only do not need to worry about the next day or week or year, I can trust that what God sends will be better than what I might plan and provide for, had I the opportunity or means or supposed wisdom to do so.
The bread is ready to go in the pans. There will be another waiting time before it is baked, and then we can enjoy it fresh from the oven. I like to think I may enjoy the future fresh from the hand of God, revealed to me at just the right time. It will be worth the wait - I'm sure of it.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
23 things I love about my husband
My husband and I passed our 23rd anniversary this year. We've been married long enough that people coming to our home for the first time look at our wedding picture and ask, "Who is that?" We've been married long enough to have seven children, two high school graduates, one surgery, more than a dozen emergency room visits and several very memorable family vacations. Long enough to often read each others thoughts, though also long enough to know which thoughts are best left unspoken. Probably long enough to have a few secrets as well.
I wanted to write this post for our anniversary, June 30, but it was a day like many others we've shared - we were preparing for a houseful of company arriving the next day! The company stayed for a month, I left hurriedly for a family emergency and we all spent a month traveling, so I am just now writing 23 things I love about my husband, nearly 3 months later!
Here they are, in no particular order.
1. He drinks coffee in bed with me late at night, and sleeps soundly anyway.
2. He believes I could write a book.
3. He can fix anything from cars to washing machines to bikes to plumbing disasters.
4. He has the best moustache since Joshua Chamberlain in the movie Gettysburg.
5. He's not afraid of blood so he can handle all the stitches, loose teeth, bloody noses, injured pets and worse that occur in our family.
6. He encourages me to be much braver than I feel. If it were not for him I would never have parasailed, gone rock climbing, taken a three week bike trip, or had a baby!
7. He never complains about my family.
8. He loves my children as much as I do.
9. He doesn't let me get away with stuff. Sometimes I wish he would just stick up for me, but he loves me enough to call me on things if he thinks I am wrong. He wants me to be holy, not just happy.
10. He cares about my hair. He would be really disappointed if I cut it.
11. He likes my vegetarian cooking.
12. He makes flattering comparisons. Often he'll lean over and whisper, "Your bottom is much smaller than hers," or some such comforting comment. These days I especially like, "You were the youngest-looking woman in that room."
13. He buys and maintains our awesome fleet of bikes.
14. He still has all his thick, curly blond hair.
15. He likes it when I read books outloud.
16. He is a musical snob.
17. He is wise and fair and never jumps to conclusions.
18. He has the best work ethic of anyone I know. I don't always love this at the moment when it is interfering with my plans, but I really admire his integrity.
19. He does not begrudge me the Sunday New York Times.
20. He is completely trustworthy.
21. He lets me buy (almost) all the books I want, and provides me with (nearly) endless bookshelves to store them.
22. He is a really faithful friend to all his friends.
23. He knows me better than anyone and still loves me.
I wanted to write this post for our anniversary, June 30, but it was a day like many others we've shared - we were preparing for a houseful of company arriving the next day! The company stayed for a month, I left hurriedly for a family emergency and we all spent a month traveling, so I am just now writing 23 things I love about my husband, nearly 3 months later!
Here they are, in no particular order.
1. He drinks coffee in bed with me late at night, and sleeps soundly anyway.
2. He believes I could write a book.
3. He can fix anything from cars to washing machines to bikes to plumbing disasters.
4. He has the best moustache since Joshua Chamberlain in the movie Gettysburg.
5. He's not afraid of blood so he can handle all the stitches, loose teeth, bloody noses, injured pets and worse that occur in our family.
6. He encourages me to be much braver than I feel. If it were not for him I would never have parasailed, gone rock climbing, taken a three week bike trip, or had a baby!
7. He never complains about my family.
8. He loves my children as much as I do.
9. He doesn't let me get away with stuff. Sometimes I wish he would just stick up for me, but he loves me enough to call me on things if he thinks I am wrong. He wants me to be holy, not just happy.
10. He cares about my hair. He would be really disappointed if I cut it.
11. He likes my vegetarian cooking.
12. He makes flattering comparisons. Often he'll lean over and whisper, "Your bottom is much smaller than hers," or some such comforting comment. These days I especially like, "You were the youngest-looking woman in that room."
13. He buys and maintains our awesome fleet of bikes.
14. He still has all his thick, curly blond hair.
15. He likes it when I read books outloud.
16. He is a musical snob.
17. He is wise and fair and never jumps to conclusions.
18. He has the best work ethic of anyone I know. I don't always love this at the moment when it is interfering with my plans, but I really admire his integrity.
19. He does not begrudge me the Sunday New York Times.
20. He is completely trustworthy.
21. He lets me buy (almost) all the books I want, and provides me with (nearly) endless bookshelves to store them.
22. He is a really faithful friend to all his friends.
23. He knows me better than anyone and still loves me.
Monday, September 10, 2007
supersize
I am back in Asia, trying to compress my large American life into the confines of Malaysian society. The challenges are both physical and psychological.
On a purely physical level, we loom large in our surroundings. I am of average height for an American woman and seem to be about the same size as most of my middle-aged friends - not as thin as I used to be, but well within the healthy range. My husband is tall, though not inordinately so, my children are fairly normal sized American teenagers. But here in Asia we are massive. We do not easily fit into Malaysian clothes, cars or restaurant booths. We block the view when we sit in front of people at movies or in church. We spread widely on the seats of trains and buses, feeling as if we take up more than our fair share, unable to compact ourselves small enough to fit into Asian personal space.
It doesn't help matters any that we drive an enormous van in a country where most of the cars are subcompact or smaller. The minivan is relatively rare here, and even then it is an abridged version of the American one - narrow and tight. Parking spaces here are sized for Toyotas, Hondas and their miniature sized cousins - tiny little cars that look like they might have come out of Christmas stockings. People double and triple park along streets which already have parking spaces along both sides, leaving narrow passageways for drivers who are expected to be driving narrow cars. Turns are tight, hurricane gutters are wide and deep, upping the ante for the careless driver or the rare one with a wider wheel base.
We are large in other less tangible ways, too. We laugh a lot, we are familiar, we do not know when to show proper respect (though we try) and we are excessively casual. We sprawl too much, we lounge and slouch, we extend ourselves beyond our neat, electric gates too freely. We fool around at the swimming pool while most other families swim laps or take swimming lessons. We do cannonballs and have chicken fights, we lie down on the poolside benches and stare up at the sky while other people sit properly in the chairs.
I have long been familiar with the theories that suggest Americans are like they are because of their peculiar geography and history - that we spread ourselves wide because we live in a big land, that we are still looking for elbow room centuries after Daniel Boone moved West. I paid scant attention to such musings when I encountered them, mostly in academic journals or the occasional Atlantic Monthly type magazine. I figured they were primarily final projects for American Studies majors who later parlayed them into money making opportunities. But my year in Asia and brief visit back to the US has made me a true believer. We are a large people because we are from a large and spacious land. We have no idea how the rest of the world lives, and we can hardly imagine it.
While back in the US we took my daughter to college in the MidWest. We drove for 18 hours across the northeastern states, the width of New York, across northern Ohio, Indiana and into Illinois. The weather was perfect and the landscape was lovely beyond belief, even along the interstate. Most of the time the roads seemed nearly empty to me, used, as I had become, to driving in Kuala Lumpur. Even the 18 wheelers, unknown in Malaysia, did not seem too large for the road. the sky stretched out vast and blue; clouds floated high, even the airspace seemed huge and spacious.
If the St Lawrence Valley was grand, the MidWest was endless. Farms houses and silos looked miles away, with nothing but fields and empty space between them and the highway. Entrance and exit ramps were long and sweeping, profligate in their use of space since there was seemingly no end of land to be used up. Humble rest stops along the highway were vast, roomy caverns; the Ohio Welcome Center looked like a ballroom. Even the fullest parking lots had plenty of wide spaces to choose from. One could nearly always swing wide.
I have always nurtured what I believed was a healthy cynicism about the United States; I have never been a "my country right or wrong" kind of person; I have always tried to see things from a broader perspective than my own cultural lenses, and I welcomed the opportunity to live elsewhere for a year, to leave at least some of my cultural trappings behind and try in some small way to see my own world from the outside. I see that a year in Asia has changed my perspective the tiniest bit, but it has also made me realize that my culture is woven in and through every molecule of my being. I love being back here where everything seems larger than lifesize.
And yet, driving through the heartland my husband and I shook our heads over the amount of money, energy and resources required to sustain even the most frugal American lifestyle. Choosing to live where we used to, for example, requires us to spend more on gasoline in one month than many people live on for an entire year. And having seen another kind of life, we realize that is, indeed, a choice, not a fact of life. But at the same time I found myself longing to be home to stay, vowing I would never take anything for granted again, almost in the spirit of a foxhole conversion. "God, just let me move back to the US and I will send all the money I can spare to the Third World and never forget how blessed I am."
For now I am back in Asia - a expat version of Asia to be sure, with a big house, big car, plenty of money to dine out and travel - but close enough to rub shoulders daily with real people who know a very different life, and I find myself wondering if it is possible to have too much freedom, too many choices, too much space, too much money, too many rights, too much land. I don't really know, though I am certain it is possible to be much too attached to that kind of life.
I have before me a year to think about it, a tidy, compact, polite, manageable Asian year. I hope to think some big thoughts.
On a purely physical level, we loom large in our surroundings. I am of average height for an American woman and seem to be about the same size as most of my middle-aged friends - not as thin as I used to be, but well within the healthy range. My husband is tall, though not inordinately so, my children are fairly normal sized American teenagers. But here in Asia we are massive. We do not easily fit into Malaysian clothes, cars or restaurant booths. We block the view when we sit in front of people at movies or in church. We spread widely on the seats of trains and buses, feeling as if we take up more than our fair share, unable to compact ourselves small enough to fit into Asian personal space.
It doesn't help matters any that we drive an enormous van in a country where most of the cars are subcompact or smaller. The minivan is relatively rare here, and even then it is an abridged version of the American one - narrow and tight. Parking spaces here are sized for Toyotas, Hondas and their miniature sized cousins - tiny little cars that look like they might have come out of Christmas stockings. People double and triple park along streets which already have parking spaces along both sides, leaving narrow passageways for drivers who are expected to be driving narrow cars. Turns are tight, hurricane gutters are wide and deep, upping the ante for the careless driver or the rare one with a wider wheel base.
We are large in other less tangible ways, too. We laugh a lot, we are familiar, we do not know when to show proper respect (though we try) and we are excessively casual. We sprawl too much, we lounge and slouch, we extend ourselves beyond our neat, electric gates too freely. We fool around at the swimming pool while most other families swim laps or take swimming lessons. We do cannonballs and have chicken fights, we lie down on the poolside benches and stare up at the sky while other people sit properly in the chairs.
I have long been familiar with the theories that suggest Americans are like they are because of their peculiar geography and history - that we spread ourselves wide because we live in a big land, that we are still looking for elbow room centuries after Daniel Boone moved West. I paid scant attention to such musings when I encountered them, mostly in academic journals or the occasional Atlantic Monthly type magazine. I figured they were primarily final projects for American Studies majors who later parlayed them into money making opportunities. But my year in Asia and brief visit back to the US has made me a true believer. We are a large people because we are from a large and spacious land. We have no idea how the rest of the world lives, and we can hardly imagine it.
While back in the US we took my daughter to college in the MidWest. We drove for 18 hours across the northeastern states, the width of New York, across northern Ohio, Indiana and into Illinois. The weather was perfect and the landscape was lovely beyond belief, even along the interstate. Most of the time the roads seemed nearly empty to me, used, as I had become, to driving in Kuala Lumpur. Even the 18 wheelers, unknown in Malaysia, did not seem too large for the road. the sky stretched out vast and blue; clouds floated high, even the airspace seemed huge and spacious.
If the St Lawrence Valley was grand, the MidWest was endless. Farms houses and silos looked miles away, with nothing but fields and empty space between them and the highway. Entrance and exit ramps were long and sweeping, profligate in their use of space since there was seemingly no end of land to be used up. Humble rest stops along the highway were vast, roomy caverns; the Ohio Welcome Center looked like a ballroom. Even the fullest parking lots had plenty of wide spaces to choose from. One could nearly always swing wide.
I have always nurtured what I believed was a healthy cynicism about the United States; I have never been a "my country right or wrong" kind of person; I have always tried to see things from a broader perspective than my own cultural lenses, and I welcomed the opportunity to live elsewhere for a year, to leave at least some of my cultural trappings behind and try in some small way to see my own world from the outside. I see that a year in Asia has changed my perspective the tiniest bit, but it has also made me realize that my culture is woven in and through every molecule of my being. I love being back here where everything seems larger than lifesize.
And yet, driving through the heartland my husband and I shook our heads over the amount of money, energy and resources required to sustain even the most frugal American lifestyle. Choosing to live where we used to, for example, requires us to spend more on gasoline in one month than many people live on for an entire year. And having seen another kind of life, we realize that is, indeed, a choice, not a fact of life. But at the same time I found myself longing to be home to stay, vowing I would never take anything for granted again, almost in the spirit of a foxhole conversion. "God, just let me move back to the US and I will send all the money I can spare to the Third World and never forget how blessed I am."
For now I am back in Asia - a expat version of Asia to be sure, with a big house, big car, plenty of money to dine out and travel - but close enough to rub shoulders daily with real people who know a very different life, and I find myself wondering if it is possible to have too much freedom, too many choices, too much space, too much money, too many rights, too much land. I don't really know, though I am certain it is possible to be much too attached to that kind of life.
I have before me a year to think about it, a tidy, compact, polite, manageable Asian year. I hope to think some big thoughts.
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Jet lag
Madam is back and jet-lagged with a vengeance. She has decided that jet-lag is a lot like PMS: it doesn't actually make anything bad happen, it just makes it seem like everything that happens is bad. And that is not good.
She was only in the Western hemisphere for five weeks, but that was apparently long enough to throw off her groove - her recently acquired, rather shaky Asian groove, that is. So when she stepped off the plane in Singapore after a 36 hour trip she was not really prepared for the incident in the cafe. She ordered drinks and Chelsea buns for her family - a latte for herself, which she left at the table her older children occupied while she quickly checked to make sure she had received plenty of junk in her email box while she was cruising at 900 mph. She was not disappointed.
When she returned to the table her children had just left (presumably to check their own email), a zealous cafe worker was already clearing off the table - coffee and all. Fortunately her husband at the next table was perceptive and realized her coffee was in danger. Knowing what would happen to madam if she were denied her coffee, he snagged the cup before the busboy- girl did.
So, Madam gratefully took the now lukewarm latte, along with her two small daughters, and sat back down at the shiny, clean table. Several Chinese businessmen were getting settled at the next table. Just as Madam sat down with her back to them, a hand reached over her shoulder and grabbed her latte, still with the lid on. Striving for the "I'm-sorry-there-must-be-some-mistake-here" tone of voice, Madam smiled thinly through her headache and said, "But that's my coffee" and took it back, expecting perhaps a mumbled, emabarrassed apology for the rudely executed mistake. She forgot, of course, where she was. The man, who evidently did not speak English, made some comment to his fellows, and reached again for her coffee, putting it back on his table with not so much as a glance at Madam, who was, after all, only a female.
As luck or Providence would have it - or perhaps owing purely to genetics - her husband, who happened to be at least a foot taller than the coffee-snatcher, intervened and retrieved the coffee in dispute a second time. Madam foolishly thought that at this point everyone would have begun apologizing in their native tongues, claiming to be at fault, offering to buy fresh coffee for all concerned, but in this case only muttering and grumbling ensued next door. Her husband's efforts to be magnanimous were not appreciated. Madam did get to keep her latte, but she found she could not enjoy it. Welcome to Singapore.
The rest of the trip was mercifully uneventful, though the airport van driver was unhappy that he could not see out the rearview mirror since Madam's large family had so much luggage. After her month's absence Madam discovered her house had been reclaimed by giant cockroaches, that her cat had somehow acquired a blood parasite while boarding at the vet's and cost 50% more to retrieve than the price she had expected, that her mail was wet and soggy and mildewed after four weeks in a leaky box. Madam forgot about the remote parking meters when she ran into the vet's office to pick up the expensive cat, and came out to find a parking ticket flapping on her windshield while the cat tore at her linen shirt. Welcome to Malaysia.
Madam still had grocery shopping to do since the cupboard was bare except for cockroaches. She wandered through the grocery store in a haze, pushing the cart with a sticky wheel. She wondered, as she always does, what is being said on the loud, monotone recording that always plays in the meat department, chanting the same phrase over and over again. She avoided the aisle with the Durian fruit which smelt like old garbage. She looked in vain for several products which the market often carried, and learned they were out-of-stock, or "finished" as they say here. She was grateful to find a checkout queue with only three people in it and paid for her groceries with pink and blue and peach colored notes.
Madam drove cautiously home, being careful to stay on the left side of the road. She felt unready to resume her parallel life here on the other side of the globe, but she knew that things would look much better in a few days time. All she needed was time, and sleep -lots of sleep.
She was only in the Western hemisphere for five weeks, but that was apparently long enough to throw off her groove - her recently acquired, rather shaky Asian groove, that is. So when she stepped off the plane in Singapore after a 36 hour trip she was not really prepared for the incident in the cafe. She ordered drinks and Chelsea buns for her family - a latte for herself, which she left at the table her older children occupied while she quickly checked to make sure she had received plenty of junk in her email box while she was cruising at 900 mph. She was not disappointed.
When she returned to the table her children had just left (presumably to check their own email), a zealous cafe worker was already clearing off the table - coffee and all. Fortunately her husband at the next table was perceptive and realized her coffee was in danger. Knowing what would happen to madam if she were denied her coffee, he snagged the cup before the busboy- girl did.
So, Madam gratefully took the now lukewarm latte, along with her two small daughters, and sat back down at the shiny, clean table. Several Chinese businessmen were getting settled at the next table. Just as Madam sat down with her back to them, a hand reached over her shoulder and grabbed her latte, still with the lid on. Striving for the "I'm-sorry-there-must-be-some-mistake-here" tone of voice, Madam smiled thinly through her headache and said, "But that's my coffee" and took it back, expecting perhaps a mumbled, emabarrassed apology for the rudely executed mistake. She forgot, of course, where she was. The man, who evidently did not speak English, made some comment to his fellows, and reached again for her coffee, putting it back on his table with not so much as a glance at Madam, who was, after all, only a female.
As luck or Providence would have it - or perhaps owing purely to genetics - her husband, who happened to be at least a foot taller than the coffee-snatcher, intervened and retrieved the coffee in dispute a second time. Madam foolishly thought that at this point everyone would have begun apologizing in their native tongues, claiming to be at fault, offering to buy fresh coffee for all concerned, but in this case only muttering and grumbling ensued next door. Her husband's efforts to be magnanimous were not appreciated. Madam did get to keep her latte, but she found she could not enjoy it. Welcome to Singapore.
The rest of the trip was mercifully uneventful, though the airport van driver was unhappy that he could not see out the rearview mirror since Madam's large family had so much luggage. After her month's absence Madam discovered her house had been reclaimed by giant cockroaches, that her cat had somehow acquired a blood parasite while boarding at the vet's and cost 50% more to retrieve than the price she had expected, that her mail was wet and soggy and mildewed after four weeks in a leaky box. Madam forgot about the remote parking meters when she ran into the vet's office to pick up the expensive cat, and came out to find a parking ticket flapping on her windshield while the cat tore at her linen shirt. Welcome to Malaysia.
Madam still had grocery shopping to do since the cupboard was bare except for cockroaches. She wandered through the grocery store in a haze, pushing the cart with a sticky wheel. She wondered, as she always does, what is being said on the loud, monotone recording that always plays in the meat department, chanting the same phrase over and over again. She avoided the aisle with the Durian fruit which smelt like old garbage. She looked in vain for several products which the market often carried, and learned they were out-of-stock, or "finished" as they say here. She was grateful to find a checkout queue with only three people in it and paid for her groceries with pink and blue and peach colored notes.
Madam drove cautiously home, being careful to stay on the left side of the road. She felt unready to resume her parallel life here on the other side of the globe, but she knew that things would look much better in a few days time. All she needed was time, and sleep -lots of sleep.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Road trip to Chicago, part one
For the last 20 years our family has chosen to live in places that are hard to get out of. We have ended up far from the interstate, accessible only by circuitous routes over secondary, rural, winding roads. While we didn't do it on purpose, I think that says something about our preferences, our habits of life.
When we lived in Lancaster, PA we could go south easily, but our destination was most often northeast, and that required two hours of small town main streets, tobacco fields and roadside vegetable stands before we reached the interstate. We made that trip dozens of times - seldom traversing the exact same route. We always, it seems, spent half the trip wondering if we were on the right road, looking for vaguely remembered landmarks, trying to decide if things looked familiar. In those pre-Mapquest days we studied oddly unhelpful maps that gave us a rough idea of which towns we needed to hit, but always seemed to leave off route numbers, or mark the same thin, black line with two different numbers. It was impossible to estimate how long the trip would take since the first, or last 80 miles never looked the same and some small town was always doing road maintenance.
Northern New Hampshire is the same story. Straight north or south is no problem, but traveling west (usually our destination of choice) requires 2-3 hours meandering through small- town VT, over mountains, past ski resorts, through tiny college towns with their landmark pizza joints ("I remember we ate there once. Which trip was that? Well, this must be right. . . .") war memorials and tourist shops. Once we cross into NY we are guided by the trail of Stewart's convenience stores which we have also frequented on many late night trips. My sister's family from Iowa, flatlanders that they are, claim they have never made the trip to our house without someone throwing up on the snaky roads in VT.
So, today's trip to Chicago to deliver our first daughter to college began with a wandering three hour tour through the lovely Green Mountains of Vermont, just now at the height of their greenery. In a week or two things will begin to wither, drop-off, change to a new palette of reds and oranges. But today the hills are lush and green.
The names here are as rich as the views - we could have taken any number of roads less traveled -Hells Peak Road, Burnt Meadow Road, Muddy Lane and Bank Run Road. Within a single mile we passed businesses named Equinox, Ekwanok and Akwanok. We did not take Squashville Road or Nine Mill Tree Road, but we crossed over Meander Reservoir and felt drawn by the mystery of signs to Lake Desolation.
We stopped twice to study faded state maps posted on Tourist Information boards, hard to decipher under cloudy plexiglass. We passed Stonehedge (a misspelled allusion or a play on words???) and signs for Missy's American Fried Chicken which saucily proclaimed, "This chick has all the pieces." We stopped at Bills' Bait Shop for directions, and were guided to a road under construction through a heavily wooded area. But eventually we found Interstate 90 and began the serious work of driving cross-country, which would lead to the serious work of saying goodbye.
It seemed strange to make a long road trip with only one passenger in the back seat. Nearly every other time we have taken to the Interstate for long trips we have had anywhere from three to seven kids packed in the back of the van, ususally coexisting with mounds of luggage and snacks and books and travel games. Today there was only A reading and dozing in the back seat she had all to herself. Even though she was taking everything she expected to need for a year in the dorm, there was plenty of room for extra luggage in the back, nothing fell out when we opened the doors at rest stops. It felt lonely and very, very quiet.
After a day and a half on the road we arrived at the college during a storm of Biblical proportions. The last three miles we could barely see the road in front of us. The last 10 minutes we pulled over repeatedly for emergency vehicles, their lights flashing dimly through the driving rain. Several roads near the college were closed for fallen trees while houses and businesses stood dark in the late afternoon gloom, their power out for the first of three days. We later learned that a tornado had skipped through the town minutes before we arrived - was this an inauspicious day for the class of 2011 to begin their career? Could it be used as an excuse to take my eldest back home - to keep her a little longer?
But there is no home to take her back to these days, at least not in the contiguous states. She had packed two of her three enormous suitcases in Malaysia before heading to Thailand for three weeks. We had all stopped briefly in New England, staying with friends before this trip across the incomparable US landscape; we, with our diminished family, would be boarding a plane for the other side of the world in six days, and she didn't have a ticket for that flight. She had to stay here, natural disasters nothwithstanding.
When we lived in Lancaster, PA we could go south easily, but our destination was most often northeast, and that required two hours of small town main streets, tobacco fields and roadside vegetable stands before we reached the interstate. We made that trip dozens of times - seldom traversing the exact same route. We always, it seems, spent half the trip wondering if we were on the right road, looking for vaguely remembered landmarks, trying to decide if things looked familiar. In those pre-Mapquest days we studied oddly unhelpful maps that gave us a rough idea of which towns we needed to hit, but always seemed to leave off route numbers, or mark the same thin, black line with two different numbers. It was impossible to estimate how long the trip would take since the first, or last 80 miles never looked the same and some small town was always doing road maintenance.
Northern New Hampshire is the same story. Straight north or south is no problem, but traveling west (usually our destination of choice) requires 2-3 hours meandering through small- town VT, over mountains, past ski resorts, through tiny college towns with their landmark pizza joints ("I remember we ate there once. Which trip was that? Well, this must be right. . . .") war memorials and tourist shops. Once we cross into NY we are guided by the trail of Stewart's convenience stores which we have also frequented on many late night trips. My sister's family from Iowa, flatlanders that they are, claim they have never made the trip to our house without someone throwing up on the snaky roads in VT.
So, today's trip to Chicago to deliver our first daughter to college began with a wandering three hour tour through the lovely Green Mountains of Vermont, just now at the height of their greenery. In a week or two things will begin to wither, drop-off, change to a new palette of reds and oranges. But today the hills are lush and green.
The names here are as rich as the views - we could have taken any number of roads less traveled -Hells Peak Road, Burnt Meadow Road, Muddy Lane and Bank Run Road. Within a single mile we passed businesses named Equinox, Ekwanok and Akwanok. We did not take Squashville Road or Nine Mill Tree Road, but we crossed over Meander Reservoir and felt drawn by the mystery of signs to Lake Desolation.
We stopped twice to study faded state maps posted on Tourist Information boards, hard to decipher under cloudy plexiglass. We passed Stonehedge (a misspelled allusion or a play on words???) and signs for Missy's American Fried Chicken which saucily proclaimed, "This chick has all the pieces." We stopped at Bills' Bait Shop for directions, and were guided to a road under construction through a heavily wooded area. But eventually we found Interstate 90 and began the serious work of driving cross-country, which would lead to the serious work of saying goodbye.
It seemed strange to make a long road trip with only one passenger in the back seat. Nearly every other time we have taken to the Interstate for long trips we have had anywhere from three to seven kids packed in the back of the van, ususally coexisting with mounds of luggage and snacks and books and travel games. Today there was only A reading and dozing in the back seat she had all to herself. Even though she was taking everything she expected to need for a year in the dorm, there was plenty of room for extra luggage in the back, nothing fell out when we opened the doors at rest stops. It felt lonely and very, very quiet.
After a day and a half on the road we arrived at the college during a storm of Biblical proportions. The last three miles we could barely see the road in front of us. The last 10 minutes we pulled over repeatedly for emergency vehicles, their lights flashing dimly through the driving rain. Several roads near the college were closed for fallen trees while houses and businesses stood dark in the late afternoon gloom, their power out for the first of three days. We later learned that a tornado had skipped through the town minutes before we arrived - was this an inauspicious day for the class of 2011 to begin their career? Could it be used as an excuse to take my eldest back home - to keep her a little longer?
But there is no home to take her back to these days, at least not in the contiguous states. She had packed two of her three enormous suitcases in Malaysia before heading to Thailand for three weeks. We had all stopped briefly in New England, staying with friends before this trip across the incomparable US landscape; we, with our diminished family, would be boarding a plane for the other side of the world in six days, and she didn't have a ticket for that flight. She had to stay here, natural disasters nothwithstanding.
Monday, August 20, 2007
Forgotten things
We've been "home" for two weeks now - at least I think we have. We're back in New Hampshire/Vermont - the Upper Valley of the Connecticut River where we own a 1796 post and beam moderately dilapidated house, but it is occupied by tenants at the moment, so we are not staying there. Just visiting for several weeks after a year in Malaysia, we have been, like Goldilocks, trying out one bed after another in the homes of our dear, long-suffering friends. I am frankly amazed at how many people we know who have offered to have the nine of us with our eighteen international-size sutcases invade their tidy homes and consume their foodstores like so many locusts. It is humbling and incredibly comforting.
Last night as we climbed into our rented vehicle after a campfire in friends' backyard/meadow our ten year old sighed happily and said, "I'd forgotten how nice it is to have friends." I had, too.
I had also almost forgotten how lovely it is to walk through northern forests, past small horse farms, under bright blue skies with just a hint of autumn in the cool air. I had nearly forgotten how it feels to drive almost unconsciously, traveling roads whose every curve and pothole I instinctively know. I had forgotten how soothing a good mug of coffee can be with just the right amount of cream, how relaxing it is to read the Sunday New York Times, how pleasantly exasperating it is to work the crossword with my friend who always knows all the answers but occasionally leaves an easy one for me.
I had also almost forgotten the feel of cold, wet sand underfoot on a North Atlantic beach, the chill of the wet fog, the speed and the silence with which it seeps in to envelop the beach. I'd forgotten how small the circle of visibility can become, or how disorienting it can feel to be caught in the mist. I'd forgotten how tiny the rooms under the eaves in an old, maritime house are, how soft and worn are the ancient pine floors in my parents' house.
I had nearly forgotten how it felt to have to close a window in the night because the night air is too chilly for the light summer blanket on the bed. I had almost forgotten globe thistle and black-eyed susans, pansies and hollyhocks, and how lovely it is to sit in the sun when the air is a comfortable temperature. I had forgotten the need to check the weather report when making plans and the smell of wet grass.
I had also forgotten how overweight many of us are, or how much stuff there is to acquire and how hard it is to keep it out of your shopping cart. I had forgotten how many clothes you need to own for the changing seasons, and how heavy and clunky fall and winter shoes look compared to flirty sandals and flip flops. I had actually forgotten how much gas costs, and how many cars even small families have in their driveways, how rare and expensive public transportation is and how few places of business are accessible without a car. I had forgotten how wide parking spaces are, and how large yards are, even in town.
I'd forgotten how many red heads live in New England, and how charming tanned, freckled faces can be. I had never noticed how wrinkled and leathery aging Caucasian skin looks, or how many women wear work boots or clogs. I had forgotten how comfortable it is not to feel like an oddity, but I never realized how dull it is never to see a face of a different color or shape - to see my own ethnic reflection in nearly every face that passes. I had forgotten how fast the internet is here, or how large a load the washing machines can handle.
I had forgotten that my dreams of home were just that, that you can never really come home again, at least not to the same home you left. I had forgotten that while so many things would be warm and inexpressibly comforting in their sameness, that I would never see them again through the same eyes I had last year. I had not realized that although my friends and I could pick up our conversation like we had never parted, there were some things I could never explain to them. I had forgotten that life deosn't work like science fiction - you can't travel for years and come back to the same moment in time that you left.
Last night as we climbed into our rented vehicle after a campfire in friends' backyard/meadow our ten year old sighed happily and said, "I'd forgotten how nice it is to have friends." I had, too.
I had also almost forgotten how lovely it is to walk through northern forests, past small horse farms, under bright blue skies with just a hint of autumn in the cool air. I had nearly forgotten how it feels to drive almost unconsciously, traveling roads whose every curve and pothole I instinctively know. I had forgotten how soothing a good mug of coffee can be with just the right amount of cream, how relaxing it is to read the Sunday New York Times, how pleasantly exasperating it is to work the crossword with my friend who always knows all the answers but occasionally leaves an easy one for me.
I had also almost forgotten the feel of cold, wet sand underfoot on a North Atlantic beach, the chill of the wet fog, the speed and the silence with which it seeps in to envelop the beach. I'd forgotten how small the circle of visibility can become, or how disorienting it can feel to be caught in the mist. I'd forgotten how tiny the rooms under the eaves in an old, maritime house are, how soft and worn are the ancient pine floors in my parents' house.
I had nearly forgotten how it felt to have to close a window in the night because the night air is too chilly for the light summer blanket on the bed. I had almost forgotten globe thistle and black-eyed susans, pansies and hollyhocks, and how lovely it is to sit in the sun when the air is a comfortable temperature. I had forgotten the need to check the weather report when making plans and the smell of wet grass.
I had also forgotten how overweight many of us are, or how much stuff there is to acquire and how hard it is to keep it out of your shopping cart. I had forgotten how many clothes you need to own for the changing seasons, and how heavy and clunky fall and winter shoes look compared to flirty sandals and flip flops. I had actually forgotten how much gas costs, and how many cars even small families have in their driveways, how rare and expensive public transportation is and how few places of business are accessible without a car. I had forgotten how wide parking spaces are, and how large yards are, even in town.
I'd forgotten how many red heads live in New England, and how charming tanned, freckled faces can be. I had never noticed how wrinkled and leathery aging Caucasian skin looks, or how many women wear work boots or clogs. I had forgotten how comfortable it is not to feel like an oddity, but I never realized how dull it is never to see a face of a different color or shape - to see my own ethnic reflection in nearly every face that passes. I had forgotten how fast the internet is here, or how large a load the washing machines can handle.
I had forgotten that my dreams of home were just that, that you can never really come home again, at least not to the same home you left. I had forgotten that while so many things would be warm and inexpressibly comforting in their sameness, that I would never see them again through the same eyes I had last year. I had not realized that although my friends and I could pick up our conversation like we had never parted, there were some things I could never explain to them. I had forgotten that life deosn't work like science fiction - you can't travel for years and come back to the same moment in time that you left.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Sister Act
My life and my only sister's have converged for a few weeks on the Southshore of rural Nova Scotia. Over the past thirty years we have only been toegether perhaps a dozen times, maybe less. Her marriage took her to Iowa, my life has been lived primarily on the East Coast. We have both been busy raising children - 13 between us - and cutting the financial corners familiar to large, single-income families. We've had little time or money for travel.
But my Dad's cancer has brought us here at the same time, at a similar point in our lives. We both brought our youngest, pre-school aged daughters with us, but we both have to return home soon to take older children to college.
As I drove to the hospital this morning for my daily visit with my dad, I was struck not by the similarities between us, but our differences. I am the elder, and definitely have the wrinkles to show for it, but I have felt young and uncertain of myself often this week. Here's how we stack up:
I am older, but she has been married longer.
I've had more babies, but she's endured a c-section.
She's far more computer-literate, but I have traveled more.
We both struggle with our weight.
She's exacting about doctrine and theology; I have forgotten most of the finer points I learned in Bible college - anyone who says "Jesus is Lord" feels like a brother to me.
We both read voraciously, though not, I think, the same books.
She is organized, capable; I am random and sometimes, I think, annoyingly passive.
She seems to know the right thing to do; I am seldom completely certain.
We both like politics, but don't always fit in the same camp.
She has her own bank accounts and manages them online: I call my husband late at night on the other side of the world to ask (again) which account I'm supposed to choose at the ATM when I'm using the Green card. He stifles a sigh when he answers.
I lie awake at night worrying about my dad's existential angst as he confronts his own death; she realizes he probably could get around better if he had a different pair of slippers and goes out to buy him some.
She chats companionably with the neighbors who stop by; I disappear for long walks on the beach.
She willingly assumes Power of Attorney for my Dad to help with his finances; I am secretly glad I live in Asia so I cannot offer.
She is undeniably my mother's favorite daughter; I think I have always been my Dad's. . .
She just left for the hospital to discuss bank accounts and statements with my dad; I am writing this blog.
But my Dad's cancer has brought us here at the same time, at a similar point in our lives. We both brought our youngest, pre-school aged daughters with us, but we both have to return home soon to take older children to college.
As I drove to the hospital this morning for my daily visit with my dad, I was struck not by the similarities between us, but our differences. I am the elder, and definitely have the wrinkles to show for it, but I have felt young and uncertain of myself often this week. Here's how we stack up:
I am older, but she has been married longer.
I've had more babies, but she's endured a c-section.
She's far more computer-literate, but I have traveled more.
We both struggle with our weight.
She's exacting about doctrine and theology; I have forgotten most of the finer points I learned in Bible college - anyone who says "Jesus is Lord" feels like a brother to me.
We both read voraciously, though not, I think, the same books.
She is organized, capable; I am random and sometimes, I think, annoyingly passive.
She seems to know the right thing to do; I am seldom completely certain.
We both like politics, but don't always fit in the same camp.
She has her own bank accounts and manages them online: I call my husband late at night on the other side of the world to ask (again) which account I'm supposed to choose at the ATM when I'm using the Green card. He stifles a sigh when he answers.
I lie awake at night worrying about my dad's existential angst as he confronts his own death; she realizes he probably could get around better if he had a different pair of slippers and goes out to buy him some.
She chats companionably with the neighbors who stop by; I disappear for long walks on the beach.
She willingly assumes Power of Attorney for my Dad to help with his finances; I am secretly glad I live in Asia so I cannot offer.
She is undeniably my mother's favorite daughter; I think I have always been my Dad's. . .
She just left for the hospital to discuss bank accounts and statements with my dad; I am writing this blog.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Rainy afternoon in Penang
The rain is loud on the tin roofs. The floor of the balcony of the Baba Guesthouse is painted a deep, glossy burgundy. Faded blue roll-up blinds lined with fraying, floral silk scarves keep out the gusts of wind, but not the sound of the rain or the roar of the surf across the narrow street. The brown plastic stacking chairs around the laminated plywood table have their legs sheathed in segments of black bicycle inner tubes meant to muffle the sound of scraping on the floor during late night card games. The bead board inner walls are painted a cool aqua, the color one imagines the sea should be but seldom is.
The cement courtyard of the house next door - Shalina's Guesthouse, "A Home Like Home" -looks like every Malaysian courtyard: the ubiquitous rubber hoses, plastic buckets and tubs - some hanging from nails, others sitting about upright or upside down. Wire coathangers dangle from the chain link fence next to gray, cotton mopheads and twining vines. Besides the ever- present laundry hung hopefully out to dry, the space contains a stack of pock-marked styrofoam coolers and some rusty corrugated metal panels and pipes leaning up against the side of the concrete house.
Between the two guesthouses winds a tiny lane, filled with several inches of water despite the metal roof which shields it from the rain. The roof is red with rust. Everything in sight except for this cheerful balcony, is rusted, dented, faded or torn.
Despite the rain, people constantly pass in and out of the narrow lane - a man on an ancient bike holding a woman's blue geometric print umbrella in one hand weaves unsteadily along the alleyway. A darkskinned, Ghandi-like man with skinny, bow legs and a green plaid traditional skirt and mud-colored polo shirt picks his way carefully across the wet, pitted pavement in black rubber slippers, taking his time under a red and white striped, feminine umbrella. A thin, dusky man in flip-flops, his blue workpants rolled halfway up his calves, passes slowly on the road, clutching a black garbage bag closely under his chin, wearing it like a cape over his shoulders and back.
On the other side of the crowded, one- lane road, across from the ancient metal sign, Baba Guesthouse, Nice, Clean, Simple - See to Believe, scrubby grass lines the beach. The ocean, the same muddy gray color as the sky, though a slightly darker hue, heaves and rolls with swells that start far out and break in opaque, tan foam high on the deserted beach. All the beachfront cafes have pulled down their metal doors against the steady rain, the tables on the cement courtyards and on the sand under the huge, dense foliage of ancient trees are empty. Their wooden chairs with peeling paint or mildew-stained plastic seats look dreary and cheap in the dull afternoon light. Lat night they were charming under the strings of lights and neon signs, but their enchantment has dissolved in the rain.
On the balcony we read, doze or play games idly, waiting out the rain. It's not a bad way to spend an afternoon on vacation, and rain in Malaysia seldom lasts more than a few hours. The cool wetness of the air is a pleasant reprieve from the usual steamy atmosphere. We're in no hurry. We can wait.
The cement courtyard of the house next door - Shalina's Guesthouse, "A Home Like Home" -looks like every Malaysian courtyard: the ubiquitous rubber hoses, plastic buckets and tubs - some hanging from nails, others sitting about upright or upside down. Wire coathangers dangle from the chain link fence next to gray, cotton mopheads and twining vines. Besides the ever- present laundry hung hopefully out to dry, the space contains a stack of pock-marked styrofoam coolers and some rusty corrugated metal panels and pipes leaning up against the side of the concrete house.
Between the two guesthouses winds a tiny lane, filled with several inches of water despite the metal roof which shields it from the rain. The roof is red with rust. Everything in sight except for this cheerful balcony, is rusted, dented, faded or torn.
Despite the rain, people constantly pass in and out of the narrow lane - a man on an ancient bike holding a woman's blue geometric print umbrella in one hand weaves unsteadily along the alleyway. A darkskinned, Ghandi-like man with skinny, bow legs and a green plaid traditional skirt and mud-colored polo shirt picks his way carefully across the wet, pitted pavement in black rubber slippers, taking his time under a red and white striped, feminine umbrella. A thin, dusky man in flip-flops, his blue workpants rolled halfway up his calves, passes slowly on the road, clutching a black garbage bag closely under his chin, wearing it like a cape over his shoulders and back.
On the other side of the crowded, one- lane road, across from the ancient metal sign, Baba Guesthouse, Nice, Clean, Simple - See to Believe, scrubby grass lines the beach. The ocean, the same muddy gray color as the sky, though a slightly darker hue, heaves and rolls with swells that start far out and break in opaque, tan foam high on the deserted beach. All the beachfront cafes have pulled down their metal doors against the steady rain, the tables on the cement courtyards and on the sand under the huge, dense foliage of ancient trees are empty. Their wooden chairs with peeling paint or mildew-stained plastic seats look dreary and cheap in the dull afternoon light. Lat night they were charming under the strings of lights and neon signs, but their enchantment has dissolved in the rain.
On the balcony we read, doze or play games idly, waiting out the rain. It's not a bad way to spend an afternoon on vacation, and rain in Malaysia seldom lasts more than a few hours. The cool wetness of the air is a pleasant reprieve from the usual steamy atmosphere. We're in no hurry. We can wait.
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
You know you've been in Malaysia too long when . . .
Several months ago my son joined a group on Facebook called, You know you've been in Malaysia too long when. . . . . At the time he was hating Malaysia, and it was a good way to vent his feelings! Misery loves company and all that. He has come to terms with his new home, and has even told me the first thing he wants to do when we land in Boston is visit a Malysian restaurant he's heard of. Sounds to me like he's been here too long.
A few days ago as I was navigating the narrow corridor that passes for a street in our neighborhood of shops I realized that I, too, may have been in Malaysia too long. I still find driving here frustrating, but no longer surprising. I never remind any of my children not to splash water on the bathroom floors, in fact, I encourage it. I can't remember what fresh milk tastes like, and I don't like ice in my drinking water anymore.
It seems that so much of adjusting to a new culture involves adjusting one's expectations. When people or places or events are far from what we expect, we easily become disillusioned, discouraged, offended or even hostile. Somedays it feels like nothing is right - and that's a pretty fair assessment if we are using the wrong yardstick. Once we know what to expect, life becomes easier, but that does take time. You have to encounter a situation or an attitude or a food enough times to know what it is, and to avoid being disappointed because it is not what you expected it to be.
During this time of adjusting our expectations, we have been reading a lot of Bill Bryson's essays. We have found him to be the perfect companion, since so much of his writing involves his impressions of cultures foreign to him - a mixture of appreciation and mockery into which we find ouselves often slipping. Plus, he hails from Hanover, NH, just down the road a piece from our home town. When he mentions the Four Aces Diner, we know just what he talking about. One of my favorite observations of his is that every culture has things they do very well, perhaps better than anyone else, and then things they just don't get, and probably never will. Just accepting that simple truth goes a long way toward making peace with a foreign culture.
A few days ago as I was navigating the narrow corridor that passes for a street in our neighborhood of shops I realized that I, too, may have been in Malaysia too long. I still find driving here frustrating, but no longer surprising. I never remind any of my children not to splash water on the bathroom floors, in fact, I encourage it. I can't remember what fresh milk tastes like, and I don't like ice in my drinking water anymore.
It seems that so much of adjusting to a new culture involves adjusting one's expectations. When people or places or events are far from what we expect, we easily become disillusioned, discouraged, offended or even hostile. Somedays it feels like nothing is right - and that's a pretty fair assessment if we are using the wrong yardstick. Once we know what to expect, life becomes easier, but that does take time. You have to encounter a situation or an attitude or a food enough times to know what it is, and to avoid being disappointed because it is not what you expected it to be.
During this time of adjusting our expectations, we have been reading a lot of Bill Bryson's essays. We have found him to be the perfect companion, since so much of his writing involves his impressions of cultures foreign to him - a mixture of appreciation and mockery into which we find ouselves often slipping. Plus, he hails from Hanover, NH, just down the road a piece from our home town. When he mentions the Four Aces Diner, we know just what he talking about. One of my favorite observations of his is that every culture has things they do very well, perhaps better than anyone else, and then things they just don't get, and probably never will. Just accepting that simple truth goes a long way toward making peace with a foreign culture.
With that in mind, I've compiled my own list of indicators that You may have been in Malaysia too long. . .
- you no longer expect drivers to stop at the stop sign
- you can remember which side of the road you belong on even when there are cars coming toward you in both lanes
- you know that one way streets don't really mean one way, and you drive in whatever direction you need to
- you think of smog as a viable alternative to sunscreen
- you know there are two ways to write the date, but you can't remember which way is used in the US and which in Malaysia
- you are not shocked to look down at your food and see it looking back at you
- you refer to ringitt as dollars
- you can navigate a squatty potty with impunity
- you can't imagine how people drive when the steering wheel is on the left
- you remember to pick up the toilet paper before you enter the stall
- you can't figure out why Americans think all Chinese look alike
- you don't necessarily expect a shower stall - a shower head sticking out of the wall somewhere between the sink and toilet works just fine
- you are tempted to say "la" at the end of certain words
- mamak (local Malay/Indian fusion cuisine) food feels like comfort food
- 100 Plus is your soft drink of choice
- you can't remember why pirated movies are bad because they are obviously so good
- you actually consider double-parking when you have a short errand to run
- you not only understand the signs that ask you not to stand on the toilet seats, you appreciate them and hope people heed them
Monday, June 04, 2007
where morning dawns and evening fades
I am sitting on a beach in Malaysia looking out over the ocean. I am not facing the open sea, but the Straits of Malacca. Between me and "home" are Sumatra, the Indian Ocean, the Indian subcontinent, more Indian Ocean, Africa, and the Atlantic Ocean. If I were on the east coast of peninsular Malaysia I could imagine North America far off beyond the horizon, but I am on the west Coast, looking in the wrong direction.
Behind me huge trees with broad, low-hanging branches make deep pockets of shade along the beach. From them, and from the dense, tangled foliage of a steep hillside comes the high-pitched, irregular static of insects, sometimes vibrating in a hum, sometimes escalating into a screech. Low thunder rumbles behind me, interrupting the steady sound of the washing of small waves on the sand.
On my left a thickly forested point juts out, a deserted crescent beach in its center. To the right is the skyline of the city of Port Dickson, littered with tall vacation apartment buildings and communication towers. All along the beach old concrete and stone stairways curve down to the sand, some ending in stone walls, some in crumbling concrete platforms. Their origins are uncertain, overgrown as they are with vines and creeping plants. It would be easy to imagine a castle at the top, though there is more likely an aging bungalow or camp.
There is no familiar ocean smell here. The crisp, pungent, marshy flavor I am so used to on the North Atlantic coast is replaced by the tang of damp foliage and the fragrance of flowers, heavy and cloying. The water is warm, not refreshing, but still somehow soothing. It feels thick with salt.
The straits are a pale, murky green instead of the bright blue of the open sea. I can count at least sixteen ships on the horizon, trading places with each other as they move up and down the busiest shipping corridor in the world. Freighters with cranes and smoke stacks pass enormous barges looking like huge bricks. Some, obviously empty, ride high in the water.
The shallow waters near the shore are filled with bathers - Muslim girls in long sleeved shirts and track pants, their colorful head scarves bobbing about in the water, children in shorts and t-shirts or white underpants, men and boys in anything from long pants to speedos. There is not a woman in a bathing suit on the beach. Everyone is swimming in street clothes.
Between the bathers and the cargo ships speedboats weave, pulling "banana boats" - long, orange torpedo shaped inflatables, with yellow and blue striped pontoons on either side. One is ridden by seven Muslim girls in orange life jackets, straddling the torpedo and hanging onto the pommel-like handles provided. The climax of the ride is always when the driver slows the boat suddenly and flips the banana, toppling all the riders into the water. They scream appreciatively at the proper moment.
The roar of the speedboats and the laughter and cries of the bathers are broken occasionally by the bicycle bell of the Good Humor man who rides up and down the beach on his motorbike equipped with a small freezer cube on the back. He carries sleeves of ice cream cones behind him. Like all proper Malaysian bikers he wears a helmet in the scorching sun, even on the trafficless beach. He does not appear to have much business, though he is just now stopped by two girls in long sleeved shirts and track pants, one with a head scarf and one bareheaded, who choose ice cream bars out of his freezer, pay him 2 ringitt each from a small zippered purse, and retire to the shade under the trees.
The sky is hazy at the horizon, becoming brighter blue as it stretches farther from the ocean. A single, three-dimensional bank of cumulus clouds rises like a genie from the sea, surrounded by wispy, smoky cirrus clouds. The sky looks hot. I feel anonymous and very far from home.
I think of the verses from the Psalms I read this morning, "You answer us with awesome deeds of righteousness, O God our Saviour, the hope of all the ends of the earth and of the farthest seas. . . Those living far away fear your wonders, where morning dawns and evening fades, you call forth songs of joy." I don't feel exactly joyful, but I am content to be here for now, sitting on the edge of the farthest seas.
Behind me huge trees with broad, low-hanging branches make deep pockets of shade along the beach. From them, and from the dense, tangled foliage of a steep hillside comes the high-pitched, irregular static of insects, sometimes vibrating in a hum, sometimes escalating into a screech. Low thunder rumbles behind me, interrupting the steady sound of the washing of small waves on the sand.
On my left a thickly forested point juts out, a deserted crescent beach in its center. To the right is the skyline of the city of Port Dickson, littered with tall vacation apartment buildings and communication towers. All along the beach old concrete and stone stairways curve down to the sand, some ending in stone walls, some in crumbling concrete platforms. Their origins are uncertain, overgrown as they are with vines and creeping plants. It would be easy to imagine a castle at the top, though there is more likely an aging bungalow or camp.
There is no familiar ocean smell here. The crisp, pungent, marshy flavor I am so used to on the North Atlantic coast is replaced by the tang of damp foliage and the fragrance of flowers, heavy and cloying. The water is warm, not refreshing, but still somehow soothing. It feels thick with salt.
The straits are a pale, murky green instead of the bright blue of the open sea. I can count at least sixteen ships on the horizon, trading places with each other as they move up and down the busiest shipping corridor in the world. Freighters with cranes and smoke stacks pass enormous barges looking like huge bricks. Some, obviously empty, ride high in the water.
The shallow waters near the shore are filled with bathers - Muslim girls in long sleeved shirts and track pants, their colorful head scarves bobbing about in the water, children in shorts and t-shirts or white underpants, men and boys in anything from long pants to speedos. There is not a woman in a bathing suit on the beach. Everyone is swimming in street clothes.
Between the bathers and the cargo ships speedboats weave, pulling "banana boats" - long, orange torpedo shaped inflatables, with yellow and blue striped pontoons on either side. One is ridden by seven Muslim girls in orange life jackets, straddling the torpedo and hanging onto the pommel-like handles provided. The climax of the ride is always when the driver slows the boat suddenly and flips the banana, toppling all the riders into the water. They scream appreciatively at the proper moment.
The roar of the speedboats and the laughter and cries of the bathers are broken occasionally by the bicycle bell of the Good Humor man who rides up and down the beach on his motorbike equipped with a small freezer cube on the back. He carries sleeves of ice cream cones behind him. Like all proper Malaysian bikers he wears a helmet in the scorching sun, even on the trafficless beach. He does not appear to have much business, though he is just now stopped by two girls in long sleeved shirts and track pants, one with a head scarf and one bareheaded, who choose ice cream bars out of his freezer, pay him 2 ringitt each from a small zippered purse, and retire to the shade under the trees.
The sky is hazy at the horizon, becoming brighter blue as it stretches farther from the ocean. A single, three-dimensional bank of cumulus clouds rises like a genie from the sea, surrounded by wispy, smoky cirrus clouds. The sky looks hot. I feel anonymous and very far from home.
I think of the verses from the Psalms I read this morning, "You answer us with awesome deeds of righteousness, O God our Saviour, the hope of all the ends of the earth and of the farthest seas. . . Those living far away fear your wonders, where morning dawns and evening fades, you call forth songs of joy." I don't feel exactly joyful, but I am content to be here for now, sitting on the edge of the farthest seas.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Good grief! It's Mothers Day! -Charlie Brown
Charlie Brown has pretty much summed up my Mothers Day sentiments! That's about all I have to say about the day. Though I appreciate John Erskine's take on the day as well :
Woman in the home has not yet lost her dignity, in spite of Mother's Day, with its offensive implication that our love needs an annual nudging, like our enthusiasm for the battle of Bunker Hill.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
My first son just turned 18. He is not my eldest child, but he's my first potentially draftable one. His sister preceded him by 18 months, so this birthday was not a "first" for us as parents, but he is the first young man we've raised. The day felt important to me.
We celebrated in a way none of us would have anticipated 12 months ago - at a Lebanese restaurant in Bukit Bintang, the Times Square of Kuala Lumpur, eating hummus and shish kebab while enduring the undisguised stares of the heavily disguised young woman in a burkha sitting across the room from us. We do make an imposing party, I guess, when all nine of us occupy the same space on the planet. Which happens all too infrequently now for my taste. My son and his slightly older sister are leaving for six weeks of backpacking in SouthEast Asia tomorrow, after which time they will be home for a week or two here or there until college, until life. We'll all have the same address for college bills, but not for much else.
So I wrote him a letter. I wrote it quickly, and did not even have a chance to proofread it, since by the time I was finishing it someone else was clamoring for breakfast, and someone else needed a ride to ballet, and I was afraid if I read it again I might decide parts of it were not just right and I would save it for a rewrite which I knew would never happen. So I sealed it in blue airmail envelope - the only kind I could find at the moment - and tucked it in a drawer where it sat till cake and presents time. I gave it to him along with his gifts of ear pods, hemp bracelets handmade by his sisters, a travel-size sketch book and pencils, his smallest sister's sacrificial cache of Legos, a CD called something about the Wretched Exiles recorded in someone's family room, and some DVDs from the neighborhood pirated movie store.
I wanted to say something to him as he walked out my door, figuratively as well as literally. The literal part is not so hard; it's the figurative part that's killing me. I don't say wise things well, and I don't have really personal talks with my kids often, like Bill Cosby and Meredith Baxter-Birney do on the old TV shows we've been watching lately. Sometimes I even find myself hoping my kids are listening when the wise parents on the show say something significant - parenting by sit-com, I guess. But my son has spent the last seven months on the road already, seeing movies we'd never watch in our living room, and rubbing shoulders with people who won't give such wholesome advice, so I wanted to seize the moment and say something that he might remember sometime when he had a choice to make.
What I wanted to say first of all was be brave rather than safe. That's not an original thought, I read an address a few months ago with this idea as its central theme. But it seemed like the best piece of advice to give a young man on the verge of everything. Be wise, be circumspect, be careful about which countries you hitchhike in, register your presence with the US Embassy, but in the big life choices, choose brave over safe. Dare to do what is good and noble even if it feels risky and it scares you and everyone else you know is making the safe choice.
Take care of the poor and needy; speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, share your bread with the hungry and your clothes with the naked. Don't turn your back on or just forget about the many, many people in the world who do not have the blessings you do. Remember Micah 6:8 - do justice and love mercy. Make it your life's work.
Understand that life is short and that you have only one chance to spend the time you have been given. Time is not like money - if you squander it you cannot repent of your foolishness, pay off your debts, work hard and replenish your bank account. There is no way to get more time once you have spent what you have. So spend it wisely, even now when it seems like you have forever at your disposal. Remember that is an illusion.
Fianlly, remember your true citizenship is in Heaven. No earthly loyalty, ideology, political alliance or cause should ever cause you to forget that you are a stranger and pilgrim here, an ambassador for a kingdom that will never build an embassy in any of the world's capital cities. Don't confuse your loyalties or lose sight of your true allegiance.
And although I didn't say this, I hope he can read between the lines: Don't forget to call your mother every now and then.
We celebrated in a way none of us would have anticipated 12 months ago - at a Lebanese restaurant in Bukit Bintang, the Times Square of Kuala Lumpur, eating hummus and shish kebab while enduring the undisguised stares of the heavily disguised young woman in a burkha sitting across the room from us. We do make an imposing party, I guess, when all nine of us occupy the same space on the planet. Which happens all too infrequently now for my taste. My son and his slightly older sister are leaving for six weeks of backpacking in SouthEast Asia tomorrow, after which time they will be home for a week or two here or there until college, until life. We'll all have the same address for college bills, but not for much else.
So I wrote him a letter. I wrote it quickly, and did not even have a chance to proofread it, since by the time I was finishing it someone else was clamoring for breakfast, and someone else needed a ride to ballet, and I was afraid if I read it again I might decide parts of it were not just right and I would save it for a rewrite which I knew would never happen. So I sealed it in blue airmail envelope - the only kind I could find at the moment - and tucked it in a drawer where it sat till cake and presents time. I gave it to him along with his gifts of ear pods, hemp bracelets handmade by his sisters, a travel-size sketch book and pencils, his smallest sister's sacrificial cache of Legos, a CD called something about the Wretched Exiles recorded in someone's family room, and some DVDs from the neighborhood pirated movie store.
I wanted to say something to him as he walked out my door, figuratively as well as literally. The literal part is not so hard; it's the figurative part that's killing me. I don't say wise things well, and I don't have really personal talks with my kids often, like Bill Cosby and Meredith Baxter-Birney do on the old TV shows we've been watching lately. Sometimes I even find myself hoping my kids are listening when the wise parents on the show say something significant - parenting by sit-com, I guess. But my son has spent the last seven months on the road already, seeing movies we'd never watch in our living room, and rubbing shoulders with people who won't give such wholesome advice, so I wanted to seize the moment and say something that he might remember sometime when he had a choice to make.
What I wanted to say first of all was be brave rather than safe. That's not an original thought, I read an address a few months ago with this idea as its central theme. But it seemed like the best piece of advice to give a young man on the verge of everything. Be wise, be circumspect, be careful about which countries you hitchhike in, register your presence with the US Embassy, but in the big life choices, choose brave over safe. Dare to do what is good and noble even if it feels risky and it scares you and everyone else you know is making the safe choice.
Take care of the poor and needy; speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, share your bread with the hungry and your clothes with the naked. Don't turn your back on or just forget about the many, many people in the world who do not have the blessings you do. Remember Micah 6:8 - do justice and love mercy. Make it your life's work.
Understand that life is short and that you have only one chance to spend the time you have been given. Time is not like money - if you squander it you cannot repent of your foolishness, pay off your debts, work hard and replenish your bank account. There is no way to get more time once you have spent what you have. So spend it wisely, even now when it seems like you have forever at your disposal. Remember that is an illusion.
Fianlly, remember your true citizenship is in Heaven. No earthly loyalty, ideology, political alliance or cause should ever cause you to forget that you are a stranger and pilgrim here, an ambassador for a kingdom that will never build an embassy in any of the world's capital cities. Don't confuse your loyalties or lose sight of your true allegiance.
And although I didn't say this, I hope he can read between the lines: Don't forget to call your mother every now and then.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
She did what she could
Lately I've been thinking a lot about a familiar Bible story from Mark chapter 14. It's an "old one" . . . I've known it since I was a child in Sunday School in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where I used to wonder why grown-ups still read the Bible, since I was only 7 and I pretty much knew all the stories that were in there already. Preacher's child that I was, I wondered what there could possibly be left to learn after 8 or 10 years of Sunday School and a dozen years of Hurlburt's Bible Stories every night at bedtime.
Now past the midpoint of my life I wonder at how little I have learned of what the Scriptures contain, and if I will ever do more than scratch the surface. I understand a little better what the Apostle meant when He described the Word of God as living and active - that the words of God, like His mercies, are new every morning. So I often find myself shaking my head over some familiar verse or account, wondering, "Why did I never see that before?" I catch my breath when I glimpse some lovely gem that has apparently been there all the time, but I never really saw it. This passage in the gospel of Mark struck me that way when I read it several weeks ago.
Speaking of Jesus, Mark writes:
While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head.
Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another, "Why this waste of perfume? It could have been sold for more than a year's wages and the money given to the poor." And they rebuked her harshly.
"Leave her alone," said Jesus. "Why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me.
And then Jesus says the words which have been haunting me for several weeks:
She did what she could.
An introvert by nature, blessed or cursed with an interior monologue that just won't quit, I have spent my life second guessing my choices, comparing my life to any and everyone else's and always coming up short. I have wished and wished I could just lighten up, that I could be happy with who I am and where I am and what I've been given, but I find at the end of the day it is never enough. I have spent a lifetime shivering in the winter of my discontent. . . all the while feeling guilty because I have been snowed under with blessings that I struggle to enjoy. I am my own worst critic and my own harshest judge. So that is why Jesus' words to the woman whom every one condemned sounded so sweet in my ears: Leave her alone. She did what she could.
No, I have not held down a fascinating job while simultaneously raising lovely, talented, smart kids like some women I know; being a full-time Mom was about all I could handle. I have never served on the rescue squad or coached a team, or run the women's program at the local mission or even led a successful, well-attended Bible study. I've felt happy many days to just get dinner on the table and a load of laundry half-done. I have never run a marathon or been the state power-lifting champion like some real women I actually know; I feel like I've won a great victory if I manage to get in a walk most days of the week. I'm not a musician, not a philosopher, not an author, not a beauty, but Jesus appeared to be happy with the woman who "did what she could." She didn't resue the poor or realize huge profits on her investment; she did what she could. She didn't do what Jesus' other disciples would have done with the resources she had, but Jesus told them to leave her alone - she did what she could.
What sweet praise for someone who was trying so hard to do good, but was criticized all round for her choices. For a woman who may have had limited resources, and perhaps limited imagination, who could not see beyond the moment, but really loved Jesus. For the woman who may have felt she had only one thing in her hands, only one thing to offer. For the woman who did not fund the homeless shelter or volunteer in the hospital, or do anything that seemed to have lasting significance. Jesus recognized that she did what she could, and it was enough for Him.
Now past the midpoint of my life I wonder at how little I have learned of what the Scriptures contain, and if I will ever do more than scratch the surface. I understand a little better what the Apostle meant when He described the Word of God as living and active - that the words of God, like His mercies, are new every morning. So I often find myself shaking my head over some familiar verse or account, wondering, "Why did I never see that before?" I catch my breath when I glimpse some lovely gem that has apparently been there all the time, but I never really saw it. This passage in the gospel of Mark struck me that way when I read it several weeks ago.
Speaking of Jesus, Mark writes:
While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head.
Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another, "Why this waste of perfume? It could have been sold for more than a year's wages and the money given to the poor." And they rebuked her harshly.
"Leave her alone," said Jesus. "Why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me.
And then Jesus says the words which have been haunting me for several weeks:
She did what she could.
An introvert by nature, blessed or cursed with an interior monologue that just won't quit, I have spent my life second guessing my choices, comparing my life to any and everyone else's and always coming up short. I have wished and wished I could just lighten up, that I could be happy with who I am and where I am and what I've been given, but I find at the end of the day it is never enough. I have spent a lifetime shivering in the winter of my discontent. . . all the while feeling guilty because I have been snowed under with blessings that I struggle to enjoy. I am my own worst critic and my own harshest judge. So that is why Jesus' words to the woman whom every one condemned sounded so sweet in my ears: Leave her alone. She did what she could.
No, I have not held down a fascinating job while simultaneously raising lovely, talented, smart kids like some women I know; being a full-time Mom was about all I could handle. I have never served on the rescue squad or coached a team, or run the women's program at the local mission or even led a successful, well-attended Bible study. I've felt happy many days to just get dinner on the table and a load of laundry half-done. I have never run a marathon or been the state power-lifting champion like some real women I actually know; I feel like I've won a great victory if I manage to get in a walk most days of the week. I'm not a musician, not a philosopher, not an author, not a beauty, but Jesus appeared to be happy with the woman who "did what she could." She didn't resue the poor or realize huge profits on her investment; she did what she could. She didn't do what Jesus' other disciples would have done with the resources she had, but Jesus told them to leave her alone - she did what she could.
What sweet praise for someone who was trying so hard to do good, but was criticized all round for her choices. For a woman who may have had limited resources, and perhaps limited imagination, who could not see beyond the moment, but really loved Jesus. For the woman who may have felt she had only one thing in her hands, only one thing to offer. For the woman who did not fund the homeless shelter or volunteer in the hospital, or do anything that seemed to have lasting significance. Jesus recognized that she did what she could, and it was enough for Him.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
what's so great about six
The End
When I was One,
I had just begun.
When I was Two,
I was nearly new.
When I was Three
I was hardly me.
When I was Four,
I was not much more.
When I was Five,
I was just alive.
But now I am Six,
I'm as clever as clever,
So I think I'll be six now for ever and ever.
There are a lot of things in my life that make me smile. I live in Malaysia, down the streeet from a business with a large banner reading, "foot sense hot dip"- your guess is as good as mine. I deal with people like the lawncare man who arrives in his beat-up old car with golden idols on the dashboard, and smilingly asks my daughter, "Is Mother home?" I still get a charge out of being adressed as Auntie by children I have never even met. I absolutely LOVE ending up in a traffic jam behind a police car bearing the official bumper sticker. "Don't Bribe Me."
But what makes me smile most often these days is having a daughter who is six. I love six. I love six year old teeth, with their huge gaps and crazy angles - the quintessential "homeless person" mouth. I love the lisping and the constant wiggling of teeth with the tongue. I love helping write notes to the tooth fairy asking her to please leave the tooth AND the money.
I love answering six year old questions, and contemplating the really important issues of life that they so often raise. In the last two days I have been asked: "Aren't you ever sad, Mommy? Because I never see you cry." "Does God know I am afraid to die?" "Why is drawing so much fun?" "Why are geese afraid of foxes?" "Then are animals afraid to die?" "Where is the Garden of Eden?""When did people start talking in different languages?" "Do you think I am spoiled because I live in Malaysia?" "What does being spoiled mean?"
I love six year old books. I love getting to read Little House on the Prairie again, and Just So Stories and A Little Princess. I love Beatrix Potter and fairy tales and Bible stories that are still exciting and new. I love six-year old songs - the original ones which she croons while she plays and the old standards like The Fox Went Out on a Stormy Night which everyone in my house is singing these days.
I love watching a six year old discover the mysteries of reading. I love having to wait in the grocery store while she puzzles out a word on the back of a cereal box. I love finding phonetically spelled messages all over the house.
I love living with a person who gets excited about playing in the huge mud puddle left in our yard after a thunderstorm and tells me stories with homemade sock puppets. I love getting invited to secret places like the jungle behind the living room curtains with a waterfall made from a sparkly blue scarf, a stuffed monkey swinging from a scarf-vine, a crayoned dragon fly suspended with masking tape between a chair and the window. I love making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and going to the zoo and listening to earnest bedtime prayers.
I wish six could last for more than just twelve months!
I Do, I Will, I Have
How wise I am to have instructed the butler
to instruct the first footman to instruct the second
footman to instruct the doorman to order my carriage;
I am about to volunteer a definition of marriage.
Just as I know that there are two Hagens, Walter and Copen,
I know that marriage is a legal and religious alliance entered
into by a man who can't sleep with the window shut and a
woman who can't sleep with the window open.
Moreover, just as I am unsure of the difference between
flora and fauna and flotsam and jetsam,
I am quite sure that marriage is the alliance of two people
one of whom never remembers birthdays and the other
who never forgets them,
And he refuses to believe there is a leak in the water pipe or
the gas pipe and she is convinced she is about to asphyxiate
or drown,
And she says Quick get up and get my hairbrushes off the
windowsill, it's raining in, and he replies Oh they're all right,
it's only raining straight down.
That is why marriage is so much more interesting than divorce,
Because it's the only known example of the happy meeting of
the immovable object and the irresistible force.
So I hope husbands and wives will continue to debate and
combat over everything debatable and combatable,
Because I believe a little incompatibility is the spice of life,
particularly if he has income and she is pattable.
-Ogden Nash
What happens when an engineer marries a liberal arts major? Somewhere down the road somebody writes a memoir entitled, “Engineers are from the US; Liberal Arts Majors Might Feel More at Home in Malaysia.” It will never be a best seller; it has little movie potential, but I suspect there may be a niche market out there.
I’ve been considering possible plot outlines for just such a thriller since I caught a glimpse of our marriage in a microcosm. A while ago our entire family, at least what was left of it, was roaming around the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, trying to get our second daughter on a flight to Boston. For several reasons incidental to this account, we still did not have a ticket in hand when we arrived at the airport, though we had, we believed, a confirmed reservation. At the last moment - 40 minutes before her flight was scheduled to leave - we decided some things about her itinerary were too uncertain and we bagged the flight. Which left us in the position of needing to find another available flight with acceptable connections for a 16 year old flying alone, preferably within the next several hours.
We discovered the single available public computer terminal and both of us, engineer and spouse, sat down to hunt for the elusive ticket. It was a recipe for disaster: me at the keyboard and him looking over my shoulder. I don’t need to script this part; you can imagine how things went as Mr. Systematic and Ms Random attacked the problem from within their respective frames of reference. The drama inherent in this clash of worldviews was heightened by the shortness of time and multiplied exponentially by the number of children waiting for us to take them home.
Two hours later over lunch, having eventually purchased a ticket and checked our daughter’s heavy suitcases, we attempted to debrief. However, as happens in so many diplomatic encounters, the tension refused to evaporate. We each, as it turns out, not only had different ideas about how the ticket search should have proceeded, we also had vastly different interpretations of “what happened back there.”
Me: “You know, I would really have preferred it if you had just taken over instead of coaching me from behind.”
Him: “But I didn’t want to take over! I just wanted to help you. I wanted to do this with you.”
Me: “Well I think we approach problem solving so differently that we should NOT try to work on something pressured and last-minute together. One or the other of us should do it alone.”
Him: “It’s true; we do approach problem solving differently. I approach it like an engineer and you.. . . “ something inaudible ending with the word “housewife.” (He was not trying to be patronizing; he was just, once again, at a loss for words to adequately describe me.)
Me: (outwardly calm, but with the last word reverberating in my head), “I do have a Master’s degree in Rhetoric. I know how to think.”
I think that was the end of the conversation; at least it should have been!
Before I take this any farther, there are a few things you should know. First, the real question here is not “Can this marriage be saved?” (The marriage is fine; the conversation, however, had to be scuttled.) ; The real question, it seems to me, is why don’t we do this a little more smoothly after 25 years of practice?! Sometimes, not often, I try to think past the immediate interaction and look for some underlying dynamic.
And, as I reflect on our marriage I have to say that the bane of both of our lives has been the lack of proper “systems” in our house. The engineer feels like whenever he comes in the door each evening he enters Chaos in its truest modern day incarnation, and he may be right, considering that mythical Chaos has three main characteristics: it is a bottomless gulf where anything falls endlessly; it is a place without any possible orientation, where anything falls in every direction; it is a space that separates, that divides: after the Earth and the Sky parted, Chaos remains between both of them That’s not a bad description of the home in which I have been homeschooling 7 children, 24 hours a day for nearly 15 years.
I, however, never feel the lack of systems except when I read it in his eyes. To his everlasting credit he has spent 23 years biting his tongue, but I do still know. . . . You see, I am the kind of person who has never had a place for everything, so that everything could stay in its place, though I can usually find a utensil when I need one, or improvise with the next best thing. You’d think an engineer could appreciate that kind of resourcefulness and creative thinking, but no. Lately he has even told me (and our children) about a Japanese management tool they are implementing at work to keep things in their places, a simple five step process with an accompanying mnemonic mantra to be repeated as you do the task. I can't remember what the system is called, or even what the five letters are, never mind what they stand for. I'd rather just grab that spatula and use it instead of the tool I was originally looking for. You see what I mean.
He, however, has not been promoted to be Director of Global Engineering for no reason. He is an extremely talented man, and a systematic one, at that. He knows in his heart of hearts that there is nothing wrong in our lives that could not be fixed with a better system, and the only thing standing in the way of a better system is. . . . you guessed it, me. I know that his expertise in making things run smoothly is exactly why we find ourselves here in Malaysia, where nothing is systematic, systematized, streamlined, methodical, orderly, efficient, logical or regular. The entire reason my husband was called in was to make the company’s Malaysian operations work smoothly and profitably. And he’s doing a wonderful job! The factory personnel here appear to be considerably more tractable than his wife, which is a good thing for us all. And while I find a lot of things about Malaysia frustrating, I have to admit that I understand how a country could have ended up like this. .. . all I have to do is look at my kitchen!
Is there a moral here? Not really, unless it's that the real key to a successful marriage must be the ability to laugh at oneself more often and more heartily than one laughs at one's spouse! Or that the real oil that keeps the machinery running is not the right system, so much as the right attitude - esteeming one another better than ourselves. Fortunately, my husband is an expert at that, as well. When we exchanged rings at our wedding we read the words from Ecclesiastes 4:9, "Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor." Which is, I guess, the inspired version of, "It takes two to tango." I think I'm going to go put on some dance music right now.
How wise I am to have instructed the butler
to instruct the first footman to instruct the second
footman to instruct the doorman to order my carriage;
I am about to volunteer a definition of marriage.
Just as I know that there are two Hagens, Walter and Copen,
I know that marriage is a legal and religious alliance entered
into by a man who can't sleep with the window shut and a
woman who can't sleep with the window open.
Moreover, just as I am unsure of the difference between
flora and fauna and flotsam and jetsam,
I am quite sure that marriage is the alliance of two people
one of whom never remembers birthdays and the other
who never forgets them,
And he refuses to believe there is a leak in the water pipe or
the gas pipe and she is convinced she is about to asphyxiate
or drown,
And she says Quick get up and get my hairbrushes off the
windowsill, it's raining in, and he replies Oh they're all right,
it's only raining straight down.
That is why marriage is so much more interesting than divorce,
Because it's the only known example of the happy meeting of
the immovable object and the irresistible force.
So I hope husbands and wives will continue to debate and
combat over everything debatable and combatable,
Because I believe a little incompatibility is the spice of life,
particularly if he has income and she is pattable.
-Ogden Nash
What happens when an engineer marries a liberal arts major? Somewhere down the road somebody writes a memoir entitled, “Engineers are from the US; Liberal Arts Majors Might Feel More at Home in Malaysia.” It will never be a best seller; it has little movie potential, but I suspect there may be a niche market out there.
I’ve been considering possible plot outlines for just such a thriller since I caught a glimpse of our marriage in a microcosm. A while ago our entire family, at least what was left of it, was roaming around the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, trying to get our second daughter on a flight to Boston. For several reasons incidental to this account, we still did not have a ticket in hand when we arrived at the airport, though we had, we believed, a confirmed reservation. At the last moment - 40 minutes before her flight was scheduled to leave - we decided some things about her itinerary were too uncertain and we bagged the flight. Which left us in the position of needing to find another available flight with acceptable connections for a 16 year old flying alone, preferably within the next several hours.
We discovered the single available public computer terminal and both of us, engineer and spouse, sat down to hunt for the elusive ticket. It was a recipe for disaster: me at the keyboard and him looking over my shoulder. I don’t need to script this part; you can imagine how things went as Mr. Systematic and Ms Random attacked the problem from within their respective frames of reference. The drama inherent in this clash of worldviews was heightened by the shortness of time and multiplied exponentially by the number of children waiting for us to take them home.
Two hours later over lunch, having eventually purchased a ticket and checked our daughter’s heavy suitcases, we attempted to debrief. However, as happens in so many diplomatic encounters, the tension refused to evaporate. We each, as it turns out, not only had different ideas about how the ticket search should have proceeded, we also had vastly different interpretations of “what happened back there.”
Me: “You know, I would really have preferred it if you had just taken over instead of coaching me from behind.”
Him: “But I didn’t want to take over! I just wanted to help you. I wanted to do this with you.”
Me: “Well I think we approach problem solving so differently that we should NOT try to work on something pressured and last-minute together. One or the other of us should do it alone.”
Him: “It’s true; we do approach problem solving differently. I approach it like an engineer and you.. . . “ something inaudible ending with the word “housewife.” (He was not trying to be patronizing; he was just, once again, at a loss for words to adequately describe me.)
Me: (outwardly calm, but with the last word reverberating in my head), “I do have a Master’s degree in Rhetoric. I know how to think.”
I think that was the end of the conversation; at least it should have been!
Before I take this any farther, there are a few things you should know. First, the real question here is not “Can this marriage be saved?” (The marriage is fine; the conversation, however, had to be scuttled.) ; The real question, it seems to me, is why don’t we do this a little more smoothly after 25 years of practice?! Sometimes, not often, I try to think past the immediate interaction and look for some underlying dynamic.
And, as I reflect on our marriage I have to say that the bane of both of our lives has been the lack of proper “systems” in our house. The engineer feels like whenever he comes in the door each evening he enters Chaos in its truest modern day incarnation, and he may be right, considering that mythical Chaos has three main characteristics: it is a bottomless gulf where anything falls endlessly; it is a place without any possible orientation, where anything falls in every direction; it is a space that separates, that divides: after the Earth and the Sky parted, Chaos remains between both of them That’s not a bad description of the home in which I have been homeschooling 7 children, 24 hours a day for nearly 15 years.
I, however, never feel the lack of systems except when I read it in his eyes. To his everlasting credit he has spent 23 years biting his tongue, but I do still know. . . . You see, I am the kind of person who has never had a place for everything, so that everything could stay in its place, though I can usually find a utensil when I need one, or improvise with the next best thing. You’d think an engineer could appreciate that kind of resourcefulness and creative thinking, but no. Lately he has even told me (and our children) about a Japanese management tool they are implementing at work to keep things in their places, a simple five step process with an accompanying mnemonic mantra to be repeated as you do the task. I can't remember what the system is called, or even what the five letters are, never mind what they stand for. I'd rather just grab that spatula and use it instead of the tool I was originally looking for. You see what I mean.
He, however, has not been promoted to be Director of Global Engineering for no reason. He is an extremely talented man, and a systematic one, at that. He knows in his heart of hearts that there is nothing wrong in our lives that could not be fixed with a better system, and the only thing standing in the way of a better system is. . . . you guessed it, me. I know that his expertise in making things run smoothly is exactly why we find ourselves here in Malaysia, where nothing is systematic, systematized, streamlined, methodical, orderly, efficient, logical or regular. The entire reason my husband was called in was to make the company’s Malaysian operations work smoothly and profitably. And he’s doing a wonderful job! The factory personnel here appear to be considerably more tractable than his wife, which is a good thing for us all. And while I find a lot of things about Malaysia frustrating, I have to admit that I understand how a country could have ended up like this. .. . all I have to do is look at my kitchen!
Is there a moral here? Not really, unless it's that the real key to a successful marriage must be the ability to laugh at oneself more often and more heartily than one laughs at one's spouse! Or that the real oil that keeps the machinery running is not the right system, so much as the right attitude - esteeming one another better than ourselves. Fortunately, my husband is an expert at that, as well. When we exchanged rings at our wedding we read the words from Ecclesiastes 4:9, "Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor." Which is, I guess, the inspired version of, "It takes two to tango." I think I'm going to go put on some dance music right now.
Monday, April 09, 2007
After Prayers, Lie Cold
After Prayers, Lie Cold
Arise my body, my small body, we have striven
Enough, and He is merciful; we are forgiven.
Arise small body, puppet-like and pale, and go,
White as the bed-clothes into bed, and cold as snow,
Undress with small, cold fingers and put out the light,
And be alone, hush'd mortal, in the sacred night,
-A meadow whipt flat with the rain, a cup
Emptied and clean, a garment washed and folded up,
Faded in colour, thinned almost to raggedness
By dirt and by the washing of that dirtiness.
Be not too quickly warm again.
Lie cold; consent
To weariness' and pardon's watery element.
Drink up the bitter water, breathe the chilly death;
Soon enough comes the riot of our blood and breath.
C S Lewis
Arise my body, my small body, we have striven
Enough, and He is merciful; we are forgiven.
Arise small body, puppet-like and pale, and go,
White as the bed-clothes into bed, and cold as snow,
Undress with small, cold fingers and put out the light,
And be alone, hush'd mortal, in the sacred night,
-A meadow whipt flat with the rain, a cup
Emptied and clean, a garment washed and folded up,
Faded in colour, thinned almost to raggedness
By dirt and by the washing of that dirtiness.
Be not too quickly warm again.
Lie cold; consent
To weariness' and pardon's watery element.
Drink up the bitter water, breathe the chilly death;
Soon enough comes the riot of our blood and breath.
C S Lewis
Sunday, April 08, 2007
Home Thoughts, From Abroad
Home Thoughts, From Abroad
Robert Browning
Oh, to be in England
Now that April’s there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England—now!
And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray’s edge—
That’s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children’s dower
—Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!
Robert Browning
Oh, to be in England
Now that April’s there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England—now!
And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray’s edge—
That’s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children’s dower
—Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!
Thursday, April 05, 2007
I'm Nobody Without Facebook
What would Emily Dickinson do with facebook? I wondered that yesterday when reading yet another staus update from a "friend." Once you join a social network you feel almost compelled to offer blow-by-blow descriptions of your everyday life - what music you are "currently listening to," your "status", your photos, your favorite this and that. If you never update you risk looking like the biggest bore in the blogosphere; if you once begin you can never stop.
I thought of Dickinson' while reading updates on what all my "friends" are currently doing, and feeling like I had better change my "status" soon lest people think I have spent the last seven days "waiting for someone to make me a cup of coffee", (which I sort of have, but that's the story of my life).
From my persepctive, grounded as I am in the last century, social utility networks are wonderful for seeing pictures of what distant friends and family members are doing, for dropping a quick note to a loved one far away, for instant encouragement and fun repartee, but they can easily turn people into frogs who tell their names, and the details of their everyday lives, and their most mundane thoughts the live-long June to the entire bog (which sounds curiously like "blog.") That's just what I think. I'll let Emily speak for herself.
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
by Emily Dickinson
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Are you—Nobody—Too?
Then there's a pair of us!
Don't tell! they'd advertise—you know!
How dreary—to be—Somebody!
How public—like a Frog—
To tell one's name—the livelong June—
To an admiring Bog!
I thought of Dickinson' while reading updates on what all my "friends" are currently doing, and feeling like I had better change my "status" soon lest people think I have spent the last seven days "waiting for someone to make me a cup of coffee", (which I sort of have, but that's the story of my life).
From my persepctive, grounded as I am in the last century, social utility networks are wonderful for seeing pictures of what distant friends and family members are doing, for dropping a quick note to a loved one far away, for instant encouragement and fun repartee, but they can easily turn people into frogs who tell their names, and the details of their everyday lives, and their most mundane thoughts the live-long June to the entire bog (which sounds curiously like "blog.") That's just what I think. I'll let Emily speak for herself.
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
by Emily Dickinson
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Are you—Nobody—Too?
Then there's a pair of us!
Don't tell! they'd advertise—you know!
How dreary—to be—Somebody!
How public—like a Frog—
To tell one's name—the livelong June—
To an admiring Bog!
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Good intentions
I have been following, albeit from a distance, a long distance, the progress of a South Carolina bill which passed the House last month by a huge margin. The bill requires women requesting an abortion in South Carolina to view an ultrasound image of their child before they agree to the abortion. I am about as pro-life as you can get - a real litmus-test voter on this issue, but I have to confess I just don't get this bill.
I have watched over the years the restictions which pro-lifers have tried to enact into laws in order to by any means save some babies - requiring "informed consent", waiting periods, parental consent for minors, etc. And I have hoped, along with all others who deplore the taking of innocent life in the womb, that the provisions will, indeed, keep some women from making that fatal mistake of terminating a pregnancy and a life. I have sometimes been embarrassed by the rhetoric which surrounds these issues; don't we all, pro-life and pro-abortion, know that making abortion more rare is what they are really all about, not just helping women be better informed or simply giving them time to think about an important decision. The availablility of over the counter abortifacients has, I am sure, seriously limited the impact of such restrictive laws, but they may still save the occasional baby who has made it past the first six weeks, and so I applaud them.
This South Carolina bill, however, seems wrong-headed in the extreme, even to me. First of all, the very presumption that anyone can make someone else look at something they don't wish to see is ridiculous. It reminds me of those gory Driver's Ed films they used to show in high school in the 70's. I remember sitting through an entire class period with my eyes closed while everyone around me groaned and gagged at the images on the screen. No one was allowed to skip the class period when they were shown, but even in my South Carolina high school no one pretended they could make us watch. And I never did. Who is to keep a woman who has already agonized over the decision to seek an abortion from simply looking away or closing her eyes? And don't we all know it is possible to look without really seeing?
The supporters of the bill also, I believe, attribute more power to the grainy ultrasound image than it really possesses. Representatives talk about letting a woman see the face of her baby. Now granted, the last ultrasound I had was about 14 years ago, and I know from images on friends' refrigerators the technology has advanced somewhat, but I would never have been able to make out the face, or the heart, or the tell-tale gender markings of any of my children without a very patient ultrasound technician pointing everything out to me, often more than once. And I really wanted to see what was there! Assuming that most abortions take place in the first trimester, there is not much easily seen on the ultrasound screen, though a beating heart is usually hard to miss. I would sooner vote for a bill that required the mother to hear the heartbeat magnified by a Doppler than to look at a blurry picture. It's harder to close your ears than your eyes, too.
But the biggest problem I have with this bill is the question of how it can be enforced. Short of having an armed officer in each clinic examining room, I can not possibly imagine how this regulation could be enforced. Neither, apparently, can its sponsors, who have said they will figure out at a later date how to enforce it if/when it becomes law. Just imagine the scenario. A clinic worker who has no incentive to dissuade the patient from having the abortion, a patient who has most likely nerved herself for what is to come and just wants to get it over with - and the two of them are expected to cooperate in this joint venture of taking the time and effort to obtain a clear picture of the baby and then examine and appreciate it together. It boggles the mind. It seems to me the state can require a signed piece of paper saying the client has seen the ultrasound, but there is no way they can guarantee the truthfulness of the claim.
I deplore abortion. I weep for every baby who is sacrificed on the altar of convenience, poverty, fear or desperation. I have sheltered unwanted little ones in my home, and I would take a dozen more if I were allowed to (I have too many children to be considered for adoption or foster care in my state.) But I can't see how this bill could possible have any effect on the number of abortions performed in South Carolina, though it can certainly add fuel to the fires of abortion proponents across the country who already believe pro-lifers are not living in the real world. Let's not confirm their suspicions.
I have watched over the years the restictions which pro-lifers have tried to enact into laws in order to by any means save some babies - requiring "informed consent", waiting periods, parental consent for minors, etc. And I have hoped, along with all others who deplore the taking of innocent life in the womb, that the provisions will, indeed, keep some women from making that fatal mistake of terminating a pregnancy and a life. I have sometimes been embarrassed by the rhetoric which surrounds these issues; don't we all, pro-life and pro-abortion, know that making abortion more rare is what they are really all about, not just helping women be better informed or simply giving them time to think about an important decision. The availablility of over the counter abortifacients has, I am sure, seriously limited the impact of such restrictive laws, but they may still save the occasional baby who has made it past the first six weeks, and so I applaud them.
This South Carolina bill, however, seems wrong-headed in the extreme, even to me. First of all, the very presumption that anyone can make someone else look at something they don't wish to see is ridiculous. It reminds me of those gory Driver's Ed films they used to show in high school in the 70's. I remember sitting through an entire class period with my eyes closed while everyone around me groaned and gagged at the images on the screen. No one was allowed to skip the class period when they were shown, but even in my South Carolina high school no one pretended they could make us watch. And I never did. Who is to keep a woman who has already agonized over the decision to seek an abortion from simply looking away or closing her eyes? And don't we all know it is possible to look without really seeing?
The supporters of the bill also, I believe, attribute more power to the grainy ultrasound image than it really possesses. Representatives talk about letting a woman see the face of her baby. Now granted, the last ultrasound I had was about 14 years ago, and I know from images on friends' refrigerators the technology has advanced somewhat, but I would never have been able to make out the face, or the heart, or the tell-tale gender markings of any of my children without a very patient ultrasound technician pointing everything out to me, often more than once. And I really wanted to see what was there! Assuming that most abortions take place in the first trimester, there is not much easily seen on the ultrasound screen, though a beating heart is usually hard to miss. I would sooner vote for a bill that required the mother to hear the heartbeat magnified by a Doppler than to look at a blurry picture. It's harder to close your ears than your eyes, too.
But the biggest problem I have with this bill is the question of how it can be enforced. Short of having an armed officer in each clinic examining room, I can not possibly imagine how this regulation could be enforced. Neither, apparently, can its sponsors, who have said they will figure out at a later date how to enforce it if/when it becomes law. Just imagine the scenario. A clinic worker who has no incentive to dissuade the patient from having the abortion, a patient who has most likely nerved herself for what is to come and just wants to get it over with - and the two of them are expected to cooperate in this joint venture of taking the time and effort to obtain a clear picture of the baby and then examine and appreciate it together. It boggles the mind. It seems to me the state can require a signed piece of paper saying the client has seen the ultrasound, but there is no way they can guarantee the truthfulness of the claim.
I deplore abortion. I weep for every baby who is sacrificed on the altar of convenience, poverty, fear or desperation. I have sheltered unwanted little ones in my home, and I would take a dozen more if I were allowed to (I have too many children to be considered for adoption or foster care in my state.) But I can't see how this bill could possible have any effect on the number of abortions performed in South Carolina, though it can certainly add fuel to the fires of abortion proponents across the country who already believe pro-lifers are not living in the real world. Let's not confirm their suspicions.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Prove It
Kids say it often - "Prove it!" Or they ask scornfully, "What have you got to prove? " In my case the answer is everything.
Scripture talks about the proof of our faith, being more precious than gold, even though tried by fire. Most trials come unbidden like tragic accidents, physical illness, the horrors of war, the rapes of Burmese women and girls, the attacks on Somali believers, the beating of Indian believers , the imprisonment of Chinese pastors. No one asks for them, though they may receive the grace to welcome them as friends like the Apostle Paul did.
What about we soft Americans? How do I prove that I don't just love God for what He has given me - which is staggering - as Satan accused Job of doing. I know that death is the final proving ground for the Christian unless he's taken suddenly, but short of my dying moments, how do I know if I really believe the words I've spoken so often, both inside my heart and through my lips. How do I know that don't love father and mother (or sons and daughters and husband) more than Christ, and so become unworthy of Him? Jesus Himself made the test of true repentance and belief, for the rich young ruler at least, selling all one has and giving it to the poor. He said the ones whom His father would ultimately recognize as His own were the ones who had given food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, shelter to the homeless, clothing to the naked, comfort to those in prison.
Wasn't He in essence saying, "Prove it"??
Am I going to go to my grave remembered as a nice woman who raised a happy, healthy family - no small accomplishment in this day and age - but still wondering if I have done "no more than sinners do" - loved those who love me.
We denigrate or question the wisdom of people who take outlandish, radical actions "just to prove something," but is that necessarily foolish? How else can you know? You can spend your life waiting for the extraordinary moment to arise - the child asleep in the burning building you happen to be passing, or the person falling through thin ice - or you can become an Army Ranger or a rescue swimmer, or sell all you have and give it to the poor, or choose to share the sufferings of the poor and oppressed of the earth, or take up your cross which is heavy and hurts to carry and may actually cause you to fall under its weight like our Lord's did.
These days I keep seeing in my head the classic bully scene from a clicheed movie where the tough guy asks, "Hey kid, you got something to prove?"
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.
Scripture talks about the proof of our faith, being more precious than gold, even though tried by fire. Most trials come unbidden like tragic accidents, physical illness, the horrors of war, the rapes of Burmese women and girls, the attacks on Somali believers, the beating of Indian believers , the imprisonment of Chinese pastors. No one asks for them, though they may receive the grace to welcome them as friends like the Apostle Paul did.
What about we soft Americans? How do I prove that I don't just love God for what He has given me - which is staggering - as Satan accused Job of doing. I know that death is the final proving ground for the Christian unless he's taken suddenly, but short of my dying moments, how do I know if I really believe the words I've spoken so often, both inside my heart and through my lips. How do I know that don't love father and mother (or sons and daughters and husband) more than Christ, and so become unworthy of Him? Jesus Himself made the test of true repentance and belief, for the rich young ruler at least, selling all one has and giving it to the poor. He said the ones whom His father would ultimately recognize as His own were the ones who had given food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, shelter to the homeless, clothing to the naked, comfort to those in prison.
Wasn't He in essence saying, "Prove it"??
Am I going to go to my grave remembered as a nice woman who raised a happy, healthy family - no small accomplishment in this day and age - but still wondering if I have done "no more than sinners do" - loved those who love me.
We denigrate or question the wisdom of people who take outlandish, radical actions "just to prove something," but is that necessarily foolish? How else can you know? You can spend your life waiting for the extraordinary moment to arise - the child asleep in the burning building you happen to be passing, or the person falling through thin ice - or you can become an Army Ranger or a rescue swimmer, or sell all you have and give it to the poor, or choose to share the sufferings of the poor and oppressed of the earth, or take up your cross which is heavy and hurts to carry and may actually cause you to fall under its weight like our Lord's did.
These days I keep seeing in my head the classic bully scene from a clicheed movie where the tough guy asks, "Hey kid, you got something to prove?"
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.
Friday, March 16, 2007
states of residence, states of mind
I have felt largely unable to write since I moved to Malaysia. I'm not sure why. I have a few theories, but no way to judge the worth of any of them. I realized this week that most of my pre-Malaysia thinking was done on my daily walks, that I would often sit down at the keyboard as soon as I arrived home from a walk to record ideas which had come, seemingly unbidden while I walked. I don't walk here: it's too hot, for one thing, and too urban for my taste. I try to keep my heart in shape by walking on the treadmill at the community exercise room, but it does nothing for my thought life.
I miss my daily 45 minutes in the fresh air, charmed by the subltleties of the seasonal changes which made the same route through the woods a different walk every day. A favorite pastime of mine was to take a mental snapshot of some stretch of the path and ask myself if I would be able to guess what month of the year it was from this photograph alone. I loved searching for the minute cues of color, angle of light, bough-dressing and ground cover that I had over the years come to intuitively associate with each page of the calendar on my kitchen wall. Here such a game would be pointless and unwinnable. Each day looks like the last looks like the next. I have been told in the market that certain fruits are seasonal, but I believe they are fruits imported from China, not ones grown here.
A weekend trip to northern Thailand suggested another hypothosis to me. My daughter and I sat beside a charming street musican on the flight from Kuala Lumpur to Chiang Mai. Richie had shoulder length, thick wavy black hair closely shaved about the temples, dark eyes framed with thick black lashes, the whitest teeth I have ever seen and a soft but animated voice. He and Anna and I talked non-stop the 2 hour flight and hour long wait in the immigration line. A Colorado native of Cuban descent, he'd spent the last ten years or so travelling, playing music and busking to support himself through Barcelona, Croatia, Mexico, Germany, the UK, Thailand and Malaysia.
He clearly loved his music, and as we chatted he asked what I loved - what I did for pleasure. I said I wrote. . . or used to, and mentioned how I had stopped writing the last few months. He assured me that I was going to the right place. He told me how many painters came to Chiang Mai to create the works they sold elsewhere, how many people wrote there, how Chiang Mai had released the songwriter in him. I didn't know how much credence I put in the powers of place to foster creativity, but I did remember those walks in the woods.
We absolutely loved the three days we spent in Chiang Mai; I was reluctant to come back to Kuala Lumpur at the end, though I wonder how much of my hesitance was just not wanting to face my responsibilities again after three days chilling and drinking great coffee! I've thought a lot this week about place and atmosphere and and how they tend to support or squelch creativity. I've even remembered my first mid-wife walking through our 200 year old log house and affirming that yes, this felt like a good place to have a baby - as opposed to the sterile hospital room I gave birth in on another occasion (both babies were fine.) I've pondered Kuala Lumpur and Chiang Mai ad nauseum, and weighed them against each other, and decided maybe Richie was on to something.
I think Kuala Lumpur is hard. Not difficult, but unyielding. Not rigorous so much as rigid. While the houses in Chiang Mai were made of soft, dark weathered wood, homes here are constructed of concrete, marble and tile. Chiang Mai was full of deep shade and quiet temple gardens, colorful, rustic benches under drooping trees, and dusty by- ways bordered by walls just high enough to obscure the sight of what mysteries lay within. KL is characterized by gardens which are beautiful but sterile - full of clipped, controlled plants, carefully situated around golf-course neat lawns which dare you step off the manufactured stone pathways. Every house has a concrete wall with steel gates around it, gates which are either locked elctronically or with a large padlock.
Chiang Mai was full of street bazaars and shops selling goods created by local artisans - hand-woven cloth, hand-carved wood, locally made garments and hammocks and jewlery. Granted, Chiang Mai had its share of copied goods - Birkenstock sandals complete with tages printed in German which had actually been manufactured somewhere down the road, cheap toys from China that broke the first time a child played with them - but the majority of items in the stalls were locally made, as opposed to the famous Kl markets which are overflowing with manufactured goods, often imported ones, which are largely cheap copies of Western brands.
Chiang Mai was a clean city, but not ritualistically clean like KL, where you cannot walk through one of the many mega-malls without encountering dozens of immigrant floor moppers. Chiang Mai actually smelled of flowers, not disinfectant. The roads were full of motorbikes and tuk-tuks, the tiny open-air taxis that look a bit like a Jeep Landrover mounted on a motorbike. In the heat of the day their drivers nap in the back seats while waiting for a customer.
People walked in Chiang Mai and rode bicycles. You could rent a bike to get around town and hope to make it back to your guesthouse that evening. KL is so jammed with cars that bicycles are practically unheard of and legendary traffic jams are a fact of life. Cars here are shiny and new; a status symbol and a point of pride. They also seem to be a way for Malaysians to vent the frustrations inherent in life in a big, crowded, noisy place. Going anywhere is a wearying, irksome ordeal involving a lot of rudeness and risk-taking. There's so such thing as the Sunday afternoon drive in KL.
A more subltle difference, but one which was probably fairly significant, was the religious climate. Northern Thailand is primarily Buddhist, while Malaysia is officially Muslim. Disregarding the truth claims of competing religious systems, you can classify some as friendlier, softer, nicer than others. I found the monks intheir orange robes and babyish bald heads friendly-looking. They hung out in nice temples with big, shady courtyards that were open to anyone for a nap or a rest. They appeared humble and poor, whether or not they were, walking the streets in their sandals and loose garments. Malaysia, however, is a land of religious enforcement officers, of religious courts and judges, of official religious ID cards and of strict laws . The enforcement officers don't bother me, in the sense of harass me, since I am clearly a hopeless infidel, but they do bother me in the sense of irritate or annoy me. I don't like knowing they are there.
Last, but far, from from least, I noted the prevalence of books and coffee. As far as I am concerned these are the staples of the creative life - the life worth living - and Chiang Mai was full of them. Used book stores are everywhere and most are next door to cafes with real, Western style coffee which invite you to sit for hours reading, chatting, discussing the meaning of life. Malaysians are known for their disinterest in books; they freely admit it and always talk about how they should read more, but they don't like to read. Bookstores here are perfunctory; they exist chiefly to sell school texts, and just include some other books for effect. Chiang Mai is full of shops lined with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves divided into satisfying categories for easy browsing. I spent three times as much on books as I did on lodging the three days we were there, and I left so many books I really wanted on the shelves for another day (yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.)
Just when I am tempted to excuse my lack of creativity on my environment, I remember how many of the most beautiful works ever penned came out of prison, poverty, war and deprivation. I think of the British WWI poets, of Pilgrim's Progress, of Solzenitsyn and my own brother, and know that one's inner life can be beautiful and rich and productive, no matter what circumstances one finds oneself in. So, I don't get a pass on writing just because I live in KL. But I know where I'm headed on my next vacation!
I miss my daily 45 minutes in the fresh air, charmed by the subltleties of the seasonal changes which made the same route through the woods a different walk every day. A favorite pastime of mine was to take a mental snapshot of some stretch of the path and ask myself if I would be able to guess what month of the year it was from this photograph alone. I loved searching for the minute cues of color, angle of light, bough-dressing and ground cover that I had over the years come to intuitively associate with each page of the calendar on my kitchen wall. Here such a game would be pointless and unwinnable. Each day looks like the last looks like the next. I have been told in the market that certain fruits are seasonal, but I believe they are fruits imported from China, not ones grown here.
A weekend trip to northern Thailand suggested another hypothosis to me. My daughter and I sat beside a charming street musican on the flight from Kuala Lumpur to Chiang Mai. Richie had shoulder length, thick wavy black hair closely shaved about the temples, dark eyes framed with thick black lashes, the whitest teeth I have ever seen and a soft but animated voice. He and Anna and I talked non-stop the 2 hour flight and hour long wait in the immigration line. A Colorado native of Cuban descent, he'd spent the last ten years or so travelling, playing music and busking to support himself through Barcelona, Croatia, Mexico, Germany, the UK, Thailand and Malaysia.
He clearly loved his music, and as we chatted he asked what I loved - what I did for pleasure. I said I wrote. . . or used to, and mentioned how I had stopped writing the last few months. He assured me that I was going to the right place. He told me how many painters came to Chiang Mai to create the works they sold elsewhere, how many people wrote there, how Chiang Mai had released the songwriter in him. I didn't know how much credence I put in the powers of place to foster creativity, but I did remember those walks in the woods.
We absolutely loved the three days we spent in Chiang Mai; I was reluctant to come back to Kuala Lumpur at the end, though I wonder how much of my hesitance was just not wanting to face my responsibilities again after three days chilling and drinking great coffee! I've thought a lot this week about place and atmosphere and and how they tend to support or squelch creativity. I've even remembered my first mid-wife walking through our 200 year old log house and affirming that yes, this felt like a good place to have a baby - as opposed to the sterile hospital room I gave birth in on another occasion (both babies were fine.) I've pondered Kuala Lumpur and Chiang Mai ad nauseum, and weighed them against each other, and decided maybe Richie was on to something.
I think Kuala Lumpur is hard. Not difficult, but unyielding. Not rigorous so much as rigid. While the houses in Chiang Mai were made of soft, dark weathered wood, homes here are constructed of concrete, marble and tile. Chiang Mai was full of deep shade and quiet temple gardens, colorful, rustic benches under drooping trees, and dusty by- ways bordered by walls just high enough to obscure the sight of what mysteries lay within. KL is characterized by gardens which are beautiful but sterile - full of clipped, controlled plants, carefully situated around golf-course neat lawns which dare you step off the manufactured stone pathways. Every house has a concrete wall with steel gates around it, gates which are either locked elctronically or with a large padlock.
Chiang Mai was full of street bazaars and shops selling goods created by local artisans - hand-woven cloth, hand-carved wood, locally made garments and hammocks and jewlery. Granted, Chiang Mai had its share of copied goods - Birkenstock sandals complete with tages printed in German which had actually been manufactured somewhere down the road, cheap toys from China that broke the first time a child played with them - but the majority of items in the stalls were locally made, as opposed to the famous Kl markets which are overflowing with manufactured goods, often imported ones, which are largely cheap copies of Western brands.
Chiang Mai was a clean city, but not ritualistically clean like KL, where you cannot walk through one of the many mega-malls without encountering dozens of immigrant floor moppers. Chiang Mai actually smelled of flowers, not disinfectant. The roads were full of motorbikes and tuk-tuks, the tiny open-air taxis that look a bit like a Jeep Landrover mounted on a motorbike. In the heat of the day their drivers nap in the back seats while waiting for a customer.
People walked in Chiang Mai and rode bicycles. You could rent a bike to get around town and hope to make it back to your guesthouse that evening. KL is so jammed with cars that bicycles are practically unheard of and legendary traffic jams are a fact of life. Cars here are shiny and new; a status symbol and a point of pride. They also seem to be a way for Malaysians to vent the frustrations inherent in life in a big, crowded, noisy place. Going anywhere is a wearying, irksome ordeal involving a lot of rudeness and risk-taking. There's so such thing as the Sunday afternoon drive in KL.
A more subltle difference, but one which was probably fairly significant, was the religious climate. Northern Thailand is primarily Buddhist, while Malaysia is officially Muslim. Disregarding the truth claims of competing religious systems, you can classify some as friendlier, softer, nicer than others. I found the monks intheir orange robes and babyish bald heads friendly-looking. They hung out in nice temples with big, shady courtyards that were open to anyone for a nap or a rest. They appeared humble and poor, whether or not they were, walking the streets in their sandals and loose garments. Malaysia, however, is a land of religious enforcement officers, of religious courts and judges, of official religious ID cards and of strict laws . The enforcement officers don't bother me, in the sense of harass me, since I am clearly a hopeless infidel, but they do bother me in the sense of irritate or annoy me. I don't like knowing they are there.
Last, but far, from from least, I noted the prevalence of books and coffee. As far as I am concerned these are the staples of the creative life - the life worth living - and Chiang Mai was full of them. Used book stores are everywhere and most are next door to cafes with real, Western style coffee which invite you to sit for hours reading, chatting, discussing the meaning of life. Malaysians are known for their disinterest in books; they freely admit it and always talk about how they should read more, but they don't like to read. Bookstores here are perfunctory; they exist chiefly to sell school texts, and just include some other books for effect. Chiang Mai is full of shops lined with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves divided into satisfying categories for easy browsing. I spent three times as much on books as I did on lodging the three days we were there, and I left so many books I really wanted on the shelves for another day (yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.)
Just when I am tempted to excuse my lack of creativity on my environment, I remember how many of the most beautiful works ever penned came out of prison, poverty, war and deprivation. I think of the British WWI poets, of Pilgrim's Progress, of Solzenitsyn and my own brother, and know that one's inner life can be beautiful and rich and productive, no matter what circumstances one finds oneself in. So, I don't get a pass on writing just because I live in KL. But I know where I'm headed on my next vacation!
Monday, March 12, 2007
losing weight
I've been thinking lately about losing weight. And not in the usual way. As the calendar reads Spring, I've discovered that one of the benefits of living in a climate without seasons is that you don't have to endure all the get- ready- for -your- bikini articles. But I have more weight-loss issues than the ones my scale and mirror create.
This morning I experienced again the relief I always feel at the airport when, after struggling with luggage whose wheels never run smoothly, whose handles never fit my hands just right, whose weight and bulk trip me up over and over again, I hoist it onto the conveyor belt and watch it disappear into a dark tunnel, knowing I will not see it again till it magically reappears at the end of my journey. As I leave the check in counter I always fumble around for a moment, feeling as if I have forgotten something, feeling too light, too unencumbered for the trip I'm taking. Then I remember that I am no longer responsible for that weight. I can take the escalator, go to the restroom solo, squeeze into a tiny booth at the coffee shop, browse in the bookstore; it's not my responsibility any more. Someone is taking care of it for me.
The weight of all the things I could not leave home without. . .things which seemed so essential as I crammed them into my suitcase; Now I find I can scarcely remember what is in the bag I just checked. If I had to make an inventory I might forget half of it. Even if it never shows up again, I'll probably be just fine. I'm so happy to surrender it to the man behind the counter; I just don't want to fight with it anymore.
Why is is so hard for me to travel light? Why do I never remember when it's time to set off again what I learned last time. . . that, in the words of Jesus, "only a few things are necessary". Why can I not remember the relief of being relieved of my baggage, both literal and figurative?
As I was shaking my head over my reluctance to shed those pounds, I remembered a picture which has been in my mind for several years now. . . a scene I witnessed once at the small Vermont lake where my children used to swim. I sat on the beach and watched as an elderly woman with a walker slowly approached the water. She made her way across the gritty sand in an old, faded bathing suit, moving her walker forward step by step right into the cold water. She leaned hard on the walker for stability until the water reached her hips or so, and then she slipped into the dark coolness and was free, the ugly walker left standing in three feet of water looking utterly out of place in the glow of the late afternoon sun reflecting off the deep green surface.
For a time she was free - weightless and graceful as a girl again, no longer hobbled by the walker, by the aching joints and the feeble bones, buoyed up by the water which carried her as easily as it carried the children splashing nearby.
I could not shake the image of rebirth, of rejunvenation I had witnessed. For nights I actually lay awake wondering at it. I imagined how she must have hated to come back; to give up the liberty of the water for the weight of her aging body on the shore. I wondered if she would ever decide not to return - to just stay in the water and let someone else retrieve the symbol of her weakness and frailty, to just let it rust. I wondered how she could ever bear it again.
I felt as if I had watched something very profound, something almost like a revelation. I felt as if I were watching a preview of her death, and my own, a final laying aside of every weight and infirmity and slipping into the comforting depths, feeling the years slip away and the weight of mortal flesh which has become increasingly hard to carry dissolve, becoming bouyant once again.
So I've been considering these two stories about weight which seem to have little in common, but are really just a few more earthly images of heavenly Realities - opportunities to stop and remember yet again that the things which are seen are not the only things that Are. It is good to be reminded of the need to lay aside the weight that so easily besets us as we journey through this life- the things we can't seem to bring ourselves to leave home without. Life maybe a series of lessons about the weight of all those things we can't seem to leave behind, leading up to that day when we may ,through Christ, finally achieve a lovely weightlessness - free from the weight of our sinful flesh that has dogged our steps for all our lives.
All That You Can't Leave Behind
U2
And love is not the easy thing
The only baggage you can bring...
And love is not the easy thing...
The only baggage you can bring
Is all that you can't leave behind
And if the darkness is to keep us apart
And if the daylight feels like it's a long way off
And if your glass heart should crack
And for a second you turn back
Oh no, be strong
Walk on, walk on
What you got they can’t steal it
No they can’t even feel it
Walk on, walk on...
Stay safe tonight
You're packing a suitcase for a place none of us has been
A place that has to be believed to be seen
You could have flown away
A singing bird in an open cage
Who will only fly, only fly for freedom
Walk on, walk on
What you've got they can't deny it
Can’t sell it, can’t buy it
Walk on, walk on
Stay safe tonight
And I know it aches
And your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on
Home… hard to know what it is if you’ve never had one
Home… I can’t say where it is but I know I'm going home
That's where the hurt is
I know it aches
How your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on
Leave it behind
You've got to leave it behind
All that you fashion
All that you make
All that you build
All that you break
All that you measure
All that you steal
All this you can leave behind
All that you reason
All that you sense
All that you speak
All you dress up
All that you scheme...
This morning I experienced again the relief I always feel at the airport when, after struggling with luggage whose wheels never run smoothly, whose handles never fit my hands just right, whose weight and bulk trip me up over and over again, I hoist it onto the conveyor belt and watch it disappear into a dark tunnel, knowing I will not see it again till it magically reappears at the end of my journey. As I leave the check in counter I always fumble around for a moment, feeling as if I have forgotten something, feeling too light, too unencumbered for the trip I'm taking. Then I remember that I am no longer responsible for that weight. I can take the escalator, go to the restroom solo, squeeze into a tiny booth at the coffee shop, browse in the bookstore; it's not my responsibility any more. Someone is taking care of it for me.
The weight of all the things I could not leave home without. . .things which seemed so essential as I crammed them into my suitcase; Now I find I can scarcely remember what is in the bag I just checked. If I had to make an inventory I might forget half of it. Even if it never shows up again, I'll probably be just fine. I'm so happy to surrender it to the man behind the counter; I just don't want to fight with it anymore.
Why is is so hard for me to travel light? Why do I never remember when it's time to set off again what I learned last time. . . that, in the words of Jesus, "only a few things are necessary". Why can I not remember the relief of being relieved of my baggage, both literal and figurative?
As I was shaking my head over my reluctance to shed those pounds, I remembered a picture which has been in my mind for several years now. . . a scene I witnessed once at the small Vermont lake where my children used to swim. I sat on the beach and watched as an elderly woman with a walker slowly approached the water. She made her way across the gritty sand in an old, faded bathing suit, moving her walker forward step by step right into the cold water. She leaned hard on the walker for stability until the water reached her hips or so, and then she slipped into the dark coolness and was free, the ugly walker left standing in three feet of water looking utterly out of place in the glow of the late afternoon sun reflecting off the deep green surface.
For a time she was free - weightless and graceful as a girl again, no longer hobbled by the walker, by the aching joints and the feeble bones, buoyed up by the water which carried her as easily as it carried the children splashing nearby.
I could not shake the image of rebirth, of rejunvenation I had witnessed. For nights I actually lay awake wondering at it. I imagined how she must have hated to come back; to give up the liberty of the water for the weight of her aging body on the shore. I wondered if she would ever decide not to return - to just stay in the water and let someone else retrieve the symbol of her weakness and frailty, to just let it rust. I wondered how she could ever bear it again.
I felt as if I had watched something very profound, something almost like a revelation. I felt as if I were watching a preview of her death, and my own, a final laying aside of every weight and infirmity and slipping into the comforting depths, feeling the years slip away and the weight of mortal flesh which has become increasingly hard to carry dissolve, becoming bouyant once again.
So I've been considering these two stories about weight which seem to have little in common, but are really just a few more earthly images of heavenly Realities - opportunities to stop and remember yet again that the things which are seen are not the only things that Are. It is good to be reminded of the need to lay aside the weight that so easily besets us as we journey through this life- the things we can't seem to bring ourselves to leave home without. Life maybe a series of lessons about the weight of all those things we can't seem to leave behind, leading up to that day when we may ,through Christ, finally achieve a lovely weightlessness - free from the weight of our sinful flesh that has dogged our steps for all our lives.
All That You Can't Leave Behind
U2
And love is not the easy thing
The only baggage you can bring...
And love is not the easy thing...
The only baggage you can bring
Is all that you can't leave behind
And if the darkness is to keep us apart
And if the daylight feels like it's a long way off
And if your glass heart should crack
And for a second you turn back
Oh no, be strong
Walk on, walk on
What you got they can’t steal it
No they can’t even feel it
Walk on, walk on...
Stay safe tonight
You're packing a suitcase for a place none of us has been
A place that has to be believed to be seen
You could have flown away
A singing bird in an open cage
Who will only fly, only fly for freedom
Walk on, walk on
What you've got they can't deny it
Can’t sell it, can’t buy it
Walk on, walk on
Stay safe tonight
And I know it aches
And your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on
Home… hard to know what it is if you’ve never had one
Home… I can’t say where it is but I know I'm going home
That's where the hurt is
I know it aches
How your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on
Leave it behind
You've got to leave it behind
All that you fashion
All that you make
All that you build
All that you break
All that you measure
All that you steal
All this you can leave behind
All that you reason
All that you sense
All that you speak
All you dress up
All that you scheme...
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