THE DAYS ARE ABLAZE

How can it be November?  But that's what I say each month.  How can it be October, or September, or August?  Don't you?  

For us and our neighbors, October means leaves.  And early November, still a red and golden world outdoors here in the North Carolina Piedmont.  Not so in Western North Carolina.  Our beautiful mountain communities were hit hard this year, tragic flooding, landslides and tornadoes.  Lives were lost.  Every place our family has ever visited in the Blue Ridge Mountains is under reconstruction. So all over our state, joys are tempered.  

But somehow, there is still pleasure in the changing season. What we feel first is an atmospheric change.  The somnolence of summer is over; where heat enervated, crisp air energizes.  Without the glare of the months just past, colors flare more vibrant.  Green in the warmth of August, with colder mornings the leaves' chlorophyll retreats, leaving carotenoid pigments in charge, boasting orange, yellow and gold, like the pumpkins and squashes covering patches and gardens. But only briefly.  Soon the ground will be covered with brown, not yellow leaves. The flamboyant decay will become stealthier. 

At the same time, sunrise and sunset reach their peak luminescence. With less water vapor in the air, we see more clearly.  Colors appear more vivid.  I never understood why before, but this year did some simple research on the science of autumn. It's so interesting.  As the earth turns on its axis away from the sun, light has to travel further to reach our eyes. Blue light scatters out long before it reaches us.  Only red and orange can make the 150 million kilometers to reach our eyes in a blazing sunrise or sunset.

So enjoy this beautiful sight, if you are lucky enough to share it with me. With thanks for whatever is before us.     Nina Naomi

IT'S NOVEMBER. CAN WE GIVE THANKS?

The month of horror movies is over and it's November, when we give thanks.  Not yet time for the angels to sing, but time to gather for another year of reckoning over turkey and gravy. For what are you thankful?  

This morning, even before rising from bed, gratitude for what entered your sleepy mind first?  The sounds of your children?  The smell of coffee?  That you have lunch planned with a friend?  Or mom is doing better?  Or you are?  For me, daily, it is my husband's arm around me, a last warm embrace before I begin to carefully navigate my unreliable morning back.  

Some, like me, may be thankful that the pain is not today as it was yesterday, when a mere sneeze brought a yelp.  Instead, you may have a new challenge to inspire you. Or be grateful for a friend who did something brave.  Or that Election Day is over.  You may feel appreciated.  That's worth a prayer of thanksgiving.  At the day's close, you might sit outside by the fire pit, as we have been doing, watching the sparks fly and the stars come out, the nights earlier just now.  So many things to be thankful for.  

But what if you have to dig within to give thanks?  What if you're remembering someone lost to you and have only their blessed brief or not-so-brief life to be thankful for?  Worse, what if they just left you, even yesterday or so it seems?  What if the time to be the one you need to be now has not yet passed and you fear it never will and also fear you might forget, and which is worse?  Or what if you're just plain lonely, or sick, and have to dig deeper? 

Sometimes blessings do seem buried, hidden.  Sometimes it is easy to give thanks but sometimes, maybe more often than not, we have to find a way through pain or grief or worry or fear.  We have to scale boulders so high they block our way.  I can't imagine how we do this except through the grace of God.  How else do we survive our tragedies and traumas and losses and illnesses and things that, truly, have no upside?  

Together, of course.  We are never alone.  Lonely, yes, people are.  But not alone.  We have friends.  We have family.  We seek help.  We have those who share our faith.  We have God.  

The most fearful things--not the horror movies we watched over Halloween--but mental, emotional and even physical sufferings, never belong to us alone.  There are times I have wanted more than spiritual blessings.  When an illness strikes, I have prayed for healing, not acceptance.  Or "Dear God, make this not be true."  But God Himself has transformed the prayer into something else.  I have not yet been unable to accept life, and death, as it is.  And you too, is it not so?  

We don't give thanks for losses, or suffering, or meanness.  Sometimes we can't give thanks for anything.  But God takes even just a thought, or tear, takes it all.  God takes our lives and inchoate prayers and makes something of them, something to which He responds giving us strength and grace, endurance and love.  We are children who are known and treasured and beyond all understanding given not what we ask for (perhaps) but what we need.  I don't understand this.  But of all that is difficult to accept, this is not.  

This must be a prayer.  AMEN

"THE STILLER YOU KEEP, THE MORE YOUR SURROUNDINGS EXPAND."

"The stiller you keep, the more your surroundings expand."  This is a quote by Rosey Priestman, who lives by the sea in Scotland.  I ran across it in a magazine I subscribe to, The Simple Things, @Iceberg press.  

I certainly feel like that when we're at the ocean.  All I need do is stand on the shore and everything happens without me doing a thing.  The tide comes in, the tide goes out.  It leaves piles of the smallest shells crushed by their life in the sea. At my feet the shore birds skitter, curved beaks parting the smallest of bivalves as air bubbles recede in the sand. Overhead the gulls screech and just at the waterline pelicans glide or rise and dive.  The stiller I keep, yes, the more life at water's edge expands. 

Have you noticed?  When you're in the right place, you don't feel the urge to go anywhere.  At home we live in a wood and it's the same.  You can look outdoors at any time of day and see the miracle of creation:  towering pines, rugged shaggy bark Hickory trees, squat dogwoods, oaks and red maples.  Branches bare in winter, over-heated in summer and glowing in Fall.  Today leaves floating down, settling about in red and gold. Raking them is a rhythmic delight, the sound, the smell; letting them be, too.

Priestman says, you can drift along doing your thing and nothing particular happens except the sea.  Or, here in the Piedmont, the forests.  North Carolina is a green state.  Our friends from Santa Barbara, California, kept marveling the way we are sheltered by trees everywhere. Overhanging the roadways, nestling the houses, spreading branches in parks and woods and gardens.  And with them, cardinals, finches and woodpeckers; gray and red foxes (we have one each); entertaining squirrels (too many to count); deer and geese and hawks and turkey vultures and ravens.  It feels quite a privilege to pause for the geese in our path or watch the deer bound off gracefully.  

Can't we nurture this feeling wherever we live?  Don't you feel privileged to be where you are, where you choose to be or stay?  I almost don't need to go anywhere else.  I don't have a bucket list.  Granted, I am older, but I have never had a bucket list.  Wait for the sun to rise.  Study the stars.  Watch the night grow longer and the moon head higher each night.  What we do is enough.  What we do is a privilege.  Our lives are a privilege.  

And if times are chaotic for some of the many reasons we can't help, take a break from the worry and stress and keep still for a moment.  The sky hasn't moved.  It won't go away. Breathe and look up.

Let's make everything simpler.  Let's try not to let stuff crowd in on us.  Let's keep our lives as empty as possible.  And in that way, paradoxically, they expand and are full.  

What do you think?                              Nina Naomi

WHAT'S BEST ABOUT FALL

This morning, I looked out the kitchen window and the holly berries had turned pink.  By December they will be a bright red weight on the boughs. The robins are awaiting their winter feast, the way we wait for the Thanksgiving turkey to brown. Yesterday, honestly, they were hard green and nearly invisible amongst the prickly leaves. It happened overnight.

What's best about Fall is that every day it changes.  Take the dogwoods for example.  In Spring they bloom with small yellow flowers encircled by pink or white bracts that look like petals.  Then in summer nothing much happens.  The dogwood stays green and survives the heat.  But now, every day the leaves reach a deeper shade of red.  Soon, the branches will be bare and reveal their deeply grooved bark. 

The nandina too have been turning persimmon with undertones of honeydew. They keep their feathery leaves all year if we escape a freeze, but are pruned by our hungry deer as grasses brown out for winter.  Right now, they are bent with heavy clusters of pale red berries on their cane-like stems. Some need propping up.  They will keep these berries all winter, probably because of the small amounts of cyanide in each orb.  

Last week we couldn't spot the white tails unless they were grazing in the meadow.  But this morning, with less foliage, they were visible meandering from meadow to deep woods past our windows.  Two were nuzzling while they ate the verbena next to the house.  They're growing their dark winter coats.  

And of course, the leaves. We're not making a fall trip.  There's enough going on right here.  And my husband still on crutches, down to one.

The other day I saw the most amazing sight. Not specifically related to the season, I guess, but a box turtle was on its back near my drive as I pulled in.  Nudged up against its side was another box turtle, wedged as it were, trying to help its buddy turn over. We've all seen water turtles piled on a rock together for warmth, but this I hadn't seen--two friends, alone in our meadow, struggling to right the one in trouble.  I got out and turned it over and off they plodded. 

What a season, what a world.  Having passed my big birthday, that I wrote about, I am enjoying everything. Keats called it a "season of mists and mellow fruitfulness."  Shorter days and longer nights. Let's love it all.           With love, Nina Naomi  

THE BLESSING OF A BIRTHDAY

October is my birthday month.  This year it is a very big birthday, and I planned a week of events.  A kind of self-care thing while my husband hits the last marks of his recovery from surgery.  

So we went out with another couple. Old friends traveled for a visit. A special group met for lunch instead of knitting.  Women friends from church gathered for brunch.  My oldest grandson came for the weekend.  My granddaughter too. We had breakfast with our niece and her boys who were in town from New Jersey.  And we hosted an evening party for the rest of the family and some close couples' friends. Wonderful friends and family gave me flowers, soaps and other fragrant things.  I blew out candles.  It felt marvelous.   

I have never shopped and organized and straightened and planned so much for myself. It is a super fun thing to do; I recommend it.  Plus, with this approach there's no way to be disappointed because someone forgets your birthday.  You've taken care of that.    

I also recommend the pleasure of growing older.  I know the choice isn't ours, but the welcome we give it is.  What could be luckier than being the age we remember our parents being and finding out that it's not so old after all? What could be better than discovering that growing older is not a misnomer--that we actually do keep growing?  That we grow into all the important aspects of life--resilience, bravery, caring, joy, perspective.  We never stop learning.  Not all of our lessons are wanted, but most are helpful.  I have learned from tragedy what mortality is. No lesson is harder.  I have learned why caring for self is prerequisite to almost any other good thing. 

We learn not to squander anything, not time, or love, or friendship.  We learn what needs protecting and what needs jettisoning. We learn how to accept graciously and how to give freely.   

We learn where our safe places are.  We help others find their safe places.  We learn how to be by ourselves and to value that.  We're not so picky.  We learn how easy it is to wound someone and try not to feel wounded ourselves.  We give and accept second chances. 

We were born to age.  Growing older should never bring sadness.  We mourn for those who don't.  Every birthday brings us closer to eternity.  I am curious about that.  But I am far from the only one. 

The Christian rock band MercyMe wrote and first performed this hit in 1999, and it has been the most played song on Christian radio. The lyrics could not be better.  You might want to listen to it.  Here are the words:

I can only imagine 

What it will be like

When I walk by Your side

I can only imagine

What my eyes would see

When Your face is before me

I can only imagine

Surrounded by Your glory

What will my heart feel?

Will I dance for You Jesus

Or in awe of You be still?

Will I stand in your presence  

Or to my knees will I fall?

Will I sing hallelujah?

Will I be able to speak at all?

I can only imagine

I can only imagine

When that day comes

And I find myself

Standing in the Son

I can only imagine

When all I will do

Is forever, forever worship You

I can only imagine

                          With thankfulness for a long life, Nina Naomi

 

AGAIN, MARY OLIVER

 

Wild Blue Iris
Chena River, Fairbanks, Alaska

How, Lord, should we pray?  The Lord might answer, prostrate yourself, fall on your knees, let the cathedrals fill with Gregorian chants, let out the stops, shake the walls and let the world hear your praise!  This is good.  

But the Lord could also answer that: 

"It doesn't have to be

the blue iris, it could be

weeds in a vacant lot, or a few

small stones; just

pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don't try

to make them elaborate, this isn't

a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which

another voice may speak."

This too is good.  And so we have this message through the gift of voice God gave to the poet Mary Oliver, for us to read in her poem "Praying."  A poem that reminds us that we are not often in the pews beneath the great Flenthrop organ and the stained-glass windows.  Sometimes all that is near is the flower or branch and our own small words of gratitude.  Words that God hears as surely as the practiced cathedral choirs.  

However we pray, we are heard.  Thank you, Lord.  

 

WHY SADNESS? MARY OLIVER KNOWS.

I mentioned the other evening that I thought that sadness has its benefits.  Someone who heard me may have looked doubtful, if not put off.  I phrased it badly. I didn't mean to minimize our tragedies.  Sad, worried, concerned, even afraid.  Times we aren't happy.  When we are something else, something that tightens us and pushes us down.  Not the hurt that accompanies fresh grief--that far more physical response to loss.  But sadness.  

Sadness is so common, so part of the fabric of everyday, that it becomes part of the old question, "Why do bad things happen to good people?"  But since they do, I wonder if perhaps God gives us sadness so that we can respond.   We can comfort ourselves by a feeling that draws in and lets go, a feeling that often, maybe even always, brings us closer to God.  

Some of the saddest (and most romantic) music touches our hearts. Somehow the directors of the movies Platoon and The Elephant Man knew that Barber's (1910-1981) "Adagio for Strings" would anchor their movies in heartbreak. Play this for yourself, if you will, and test your response.  

We are meant to catch our breath on those anniversaries that are embedded in mystery.  Those anniversaries where someone is given to God's care for all eternity.  

Mary Oliver writes,

To live in this world

you must be able

to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it

against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and, when the time comes to let it go,

to let it go.

Of course.  Everything is mortal.  My flowers die, my avocados rot, my hair turns gray, my old cat wanders off and our bones grow brittle.  Worse, the young are as mortal as we. Our species death rate is 100%; our survival rate, zero.   

Mary Oliver also writes, 

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.  

Meanwhile the world goes on.

. . . 

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

I think that sadness may be a bridge.  It may catch our attention to life as it is, then once caught, we note what lives beyond our sadness.  We ready for the next round.  The round where new flowers bloom, romantics listen to music and babies are conceived.  

Sadness is never the end.  There is always something after, high in the clean blue air as we living beings are heading home again.  

The psalmist writes, "He heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds."  Psalm 147:3  This we believe. 

Thanks be to God.  AMEN