I’ve been quiet….Stringing words together in this liminal space feels clumsy. When the girls were little, we used to read a picture book together about a reptile named Verdi. When he was young he was bright yellow with sporty stripes. When he shed his skin, he turned green and it took some getting used to. I feel kind of like Verdi, shedding an itchy and uncomfortable iteration of myself and growing into something the same and different.

During this sacred silence, I spent a year dredging up layers of reasons and motivations and explanations for why I do and think and say and feel what I do. I feel like I excavated right down to my bowels during a yearlong Clinical Pastoral Education training. 302 single spaced pages of introspective writing, 400 hours of group processing and education and 1200 hours of clinical practicum hospital visits later, I became credentialed to serve as a medical care chaplain, a ministry God invited me to partner in to, as best as I am able, reflect Divine love and presence in the flesh.

This Hope, I’m still getting acquainted with her. 

Here are her musings, random thoughts from today while driving, on autopilot, between a coffee date with a friend and workout at the gym.

47 degrees and sunny. January in Michigan. How is this even possible? No need for any of those artificial mood enhancing lights today. Vitamin D on demand. I hear it in my head, the 70’s rock classic song—Blinded by the Light. Today’s fresh mercies.

About light…. And darkness…..

When I grew up the daily offices of lowering and raising the window shades were our family’s non-liturgical practices equivalent to morning and evening prayers. I never heard my mom put words to it, but if she had, I imagine they might have been something like this.  “Hello God, you’ve protected us in the darkness. It’s a new day now and I’m anticipating your mercies in the light.” That’s what I’m thinking anyway, as I replicate the sacred practice decades later.

Everybody knows that people just feel better in the light. And it’s not just our mood. The Bible uses these two images to delineate good from bad, desirable from undesirable.  So….why do churches intentionally build sanctuaries that have no windows and then turn the lights out to worship God? I don’t get it! Never have. I tolerated it for a long time, like I tolerated a lot of things that I wish I hadn’t, but I don’t want to do that anymore. “May the light of your glory shine in through the windows of whatever sanctuary I gather with your people in, to worship You, God. Amen ”

Aldi is like the light. It brings out the best in people. A little old lady, frail but determined, stared me down as I approached the sliding front door, kindly holding a quarter out in front of me. 

“Take this for a cart.”  “Awww, thank you,” I replied. “I don’t actually think I need one today.”  “Well pass it on then,” she said as she thrust it into the palm of my hand.

Where else do you find the carts lined up like dominoes at the entrance to a grocery store? And there’s almost always a quarter tucked into the slot of the one ready to pull out. At Aldi’s cart corral, rugged individualism gives way to communal charity and it’s like sunshine.

I might have to park myself at Aldi for the next four years to bask in the light of collective goodwill and generosity of spirit after the executive order on “Protecting The American People Against Invasion”. While we’re at it, maybe we should just drape a body bag over the Statue of Liberty to cover the New Colossus which reads, ”Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

Yesterday, in the daylight, I participated in a safety inservice at work where the commercial airline industry was elevated as a model of effective, systemic organizational protocols put into practice, demonstrated by a track record of 16 years without any major crashes. Then, last night, I watched a video of fireworks over the DC skyline, an air traffic collision resulting in the human light of 67 lives snuffed out— swallowed up in the darkness of the murky waters of the Potomac. I imagined what it might be like to be an airport chaplain, to sit with those loved ones dazed with fear at Reagan International and witness the cumulative grief.

Truth is, I fear flying. Xanax style. It started on 9/11 when I had three littles in tow. Recognizing that not even a  mama bear can protect their babies from a plane crash, my sympathetic nervous system started responding on overdrive. Every time. So, I developed a meditation that I still practice 24 years later. It goes like this. When the plane starts to taxi toward the runway, I open my palm and imagine God sitting next to me, even if it’s actually a snoring dude who smells like marijuana. God takes my hand and I say silently, “Well God, I’m either going to (name my destination) or heaven today and either way, it’s all good.”  Sometimes I’ve been traveling to Scotland or California or Tennessee. Sometimes its been Dallas, which, if I’m honest, I begrudgingly express gratitude for. Other times I’m coming home to Grand Rapids. 

Two weeks ago, it was Utah. The snow was blowing a gale as I boarded a plane at dusk, landing under a clear starry night in the desert with one of my little women. We spent three days walking together, just like my mom and I used to. Well, sort of… She and I never hiked up mountains or through deserts—at least not in real time, but we took some pretty sacred journeys nonetheless. And so it goes— from one generation to the next. A mom loves her kids, when they’re itty bitty and when they aren’t. And she hopes that when they grow up, they’ll continue to walk together, but separately too. That’s called individuation in the world of Psychology and there’s a learning curve to mastering that relational dance. It can be horrible hard sometimes, but it’s also beautiful and holy to try. Eventually, we realize that we’re all just God’s kids, beloved, one a few minutes older than the others. And in that sacred space we can cheer one another on as we grow and change and wonder and consider and delight and grieve and celebrate all of the mysteries of this broken beautiful life.

When I consider life’s brevity, and I consider it even more frequently now that I’m a chaplain, these realities come to mind and serve as trail markers for my life.

What is true about the cycle of life?

“A person’s life is like grass. Like a flower in the field it flourishes, but when the hot wind blows by, it disappears and can no longer even spot the place where it once grew.” Psalm 103:15-16

How can I steward the life I’ve been gifted?

“So teach us to consider our mortality, so that we might live wisely.” Psalm 90:12 

and “Eat your food with joy and drink with a happy heart… Enjoy life with the people you love…Whatever your hands find to do, do it with all your might.” Ecclesiastes 9

What is my abiding hope?

“Nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.” Romans 8:38

And as I crawl into my warm bed to rest, reflecting on the tapestry of human experience woven into this day, I recite this blessing from Psalm  4. “In peace and with a tranquil heart I will lie down and sleep. For You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety and confident trust.”

Goodnight.