"Remember that thou art dust and to dust thou will return."OK, so most people wouldn't find that a particularly cheery thought for a Wednesday evening. But last week was Ash Wednesday. And yeah, if I were thinking about death all the time, that might be a problem. But on a random Wednesday, in the middle of a long week of studying, and interviewing for practicum, and trying to remember to keep my fridge full, and 72 other things that feel really urgent if you let them, a little dose of my own mortality in the form of a charcoal cross across my forehead was a good thing, to begin 40 days in which, somehow, I am meant to remember that God is God and I am not. (OK, so I'm supposed to remember that one the other 325 days too, but the intentional discipline of lent helps bring it home).
I gave up the stereo in my car for lent this year. The faceplate is now living in my sock drawer. So let's just say that it was a looooong drive to Palm Springs in Friday afternoon traffic at the end of last week. I figured it would be a good chance to be more present, to God and to my own self, since I'm usually pretty good at distracting myself with email, music, people, bellybutton lint... you name it, I'll get sidetracked by it. In the car, I'm trapped. Hopefully in a good way. But after an hour and a half of being alone with the little spinning hamster wheel of my own thoughts, it was not a good feeling. Praying wasn't getting me very far, and besides, I was managing to distract myself from that too. I needed something short and sweet. So I repeated the "dust" line 20 or so times. Really. There is something about remembering, as Ecclesiastes points out, that the sun comes up and the sun goes down, and the rivers flow and are never full, and that all of this stuff runs whether or not I get out of bed on any given day. Yeah, the stuff I was thinking about is important, and somewhere within my theology I assent to the idea that God cares about things that are important to me, because I am important to God. But pondering my eventual demise takes a lot of the pressure off and definitely puts a few things in perspective.
Anne Lamott has a great passage in Operating Instructions about how revolutionary it is to show up for your life and not be ashamed that you don't really have your shit together. So this week, I'll drink to "dust," because mortality therapy helps me keep showing up.
2 comments:
You're always coming up with good ideas for your lenten sacrifice. Last year was excuses, and this year is noise. I spent a total of of 15 or so hours on my road bike in Moab this weekend. Of those 15 hours, I think I may have spent all of 15 minutes attempting to listen to God and really be present. How is it that we are so bad at that? God must be so exasperated. :)
I think that's why God made Montana. There's alot of space here. Both space in terms of land and the space one needs to oneself. Culture on the whole is less aggressive, rushed and ambitious. But don't get me wrong, globalization effects the whole globe. People are moving in daily from more huried parts of the world. We all gotta fight for the space we need.
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