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They sit in various configurations outside in the blue wonder of an early summer evening. In twos, fours, and sixes. At metal patio tables, flowers spilling nearby, breezes ruffling hair, wine glasses in hand. They hover closer amid traffic noises, accompanying music, others’ conversations. Their heads nearly touch. They dip their crusty bread into olive oil and parmesan cheese.
Today I stretch the contour sheet from our bed between two deck chairs, lay the pillowcases on the others and drape the top sheet on a lounge. The wind blows mightily and the bottom sheet billows and balloons. Sun warms the pillowcases and the flat sheet and barely three hours later I gather them up, fold them carefully and press my nose into their air-dried creases. And I think about how I no longer iron sheets.
I will turn their mourning into gladness and I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow. Jeremiah 31:13
Everywhere I look the world is coming alive. A wall of green nearly obscures the homes at the back of our property. Two days from now those houses will be invisible, the underbrush, celadon, will be in full leaf as if I alone live here. As if our one acre is a never-ending wood.
I live a “feast or famine life”. Nothing new really, but exacerbated by the absence of my best friend. Today I hover under the comforter reading the Scriptures, Anne Lamott’s latest, Hallelujah, Anyway, and try to find the courage to face the world. This is a weekend when I have few plans. Neither have I reached out to make any of my own, to be “social” to pack seeds for Feed my Starving Children at our church. To call a friend, to do something kind for someone I love.
Not long ago I was struggling with a challenging relationship. I had surmised a number of possible (though hypothetical) intentions to the person in this relationship which allowed little room for the fact that I could be wrong. While I was mulling my hypotheses I began to think that I was creating a story, a case if you will without the benefit of having enough information/ background. And I remembered something I had read in scripture: James 2:13. “Mercy triumphs over judgment.”
A number of years ago one of my closest friends died in her 40’s after an eight year battle with breast cancer. Throughout the ups and downs of her sojourn she was open to discuss the struggles, the pain, both emotional and physical and the uncertainties of her future. In spite of that eight year battle she coined the phrase, “mercies in the middle” and went on to elaborate on just what those “mercies” were. For her they could be as simple as a cloudless sky on a near-spring day or as profound as the tender hug of one of her daughters as she returned from her school day.
