Sunbath

A few days ago I sat with a dear friend on the corner of 9th and College.  We hadn't planned to meet.  It's summer, and LJ's grinds some good beans.  What other reason do you need?  So with mugs in hand we talked, surfed, and read to each other.  She and I have been good friends for a few years, so it didn't take very long before we opened our bags of dirt, both spoken and written.  Included was a journal of sorts she's been writing over the summer.  It was crass and it was awkward, but it was real.  Dirt is dirty after all.  She admitted that she was an idiot, that she mistreated her parents, that she had been stupid.  She had hurt people and it hurt her.  She hasn't told the whole truth.  She's afraid of life after Hope community.  She's afraid of what happens when people are people with people.  She's afraid of losing a friend.  The summer's been good and bad to her, just as she's been good and bad to those around her.  I laughed as I read.  I laughed because her dirt is my dirt.

Every once in a while I see a glimpse of how similar we all are.  My friend and I are different, just as everyone is different from everyone else, yet we are both human.  We share the same woes, the same fears, the same joys, the same hopes.  I don't deserve my family.  I disappoint my professors.  I am satisfied with mediocrity.  I keep terrible secrets.  I break the laws of my country and I grieve the Holy Spirit.  With my deeds I spit in the face of my God.  I am a crooked soul.

Yet, there is Grace.

And Mercy.

The mold that would bind us to wickedness was broken by an utterly selfless expression of these two things. Chipped and cracked as we are, Grace and Mercy are making us whole again.  We constantly fall short, but Grace and Mercy span the distance.  The dirt caked on our hands and on our feet and over our eyes threatens to soil everything we touch, yet Grace and Mercy wash us clean, and we can work to mend the brokenness around us.  This is the power of the Gospel.  Take heart, my friend.  Don't let the dirt mar the sight of the good that is being done in and through you.  Remember what we know to be true and make that knowledge your foundation, your bastion of strength.  Take in the beauty of these days with open eyes and open lungs, letting the sun bathe your skin, and let joy rule over your heart.

and down we go

Two days ago I sat at the community table in Lemonjello's coffee, sipping fresh Mind, Body and Soul from their trademark yellow mug.  My open macbook displayed the usual emails, facebook postings, and comic updates as my headphones played the tunes of Bon Iver, Bon Iver, barely out of the shrink wrap.  Eventually I found myself reading something that doesn't grace my screen often enough: a blog.  More specifically, the blog of a writer friend.  To be honest calling her work a blog leaves a funny taste in my mouth.  Her work seems more like a letter, a postcard from a fellow traveler for any and all who would read it.  She writes with sincerity and a big heart, doing so with clarity and grace that you would be hard-pressed to find among many our age.  Her prose is the sort of thing that makes your limbs feel light as a clean breeze on a day soaked with sunshine, or a cup spilling over with cool drink, waking you up to the infinite possibilities that a day brings.  After reading her latest entry I felt that draught stirring in my guts.  I found myself thinking "I really like this.  I want this.  I want this for other people.  I want to do this for people."  Whether or not I'm writing this blog simply as a response or as the awakening of a dormant desire to write for others, I don't know.  I've toyed with the idea of writing a one before, but the papers and projects and practice and concerts and all the other else that holds our attention during the school year shouted it down.  But two days ago was June, today is July, and today is as free as the sky is wide.

And so I give you the red wagon.  Why a wagon?  If you're a Calvin and Hobbes fan, you might get the reference.  More often than not, the longer philosophical discussions had between Calvin and his tiger friend take place in a little red wagon, careening down alarmingly steep hills at breakneck speeds, dodging trees and falling into the occasional gully, creek, or patch of sticker bushes.  As unlikely a place as it is, that little wagon is their platform, their forum, their vehicle for hearing and being heard.  This blog is my wagon.  Where will it take us?  Who knows?  Anything could be waiting behind the next tree, over the next hill, across the next creek.  We have only to step out and trust that whatever happens, it is for good.  So strap on your dungarees and grab your safari hats, 'cause we're going adventuring.