Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

being still

Doing

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“So are we actually going to do something on spring break?” he asks, as we sit on sun-warmed concrete.

“What do you mean, ‘Are we going to do something?’ We aredoing something; this is something,” I reply as I dislodge a pebble with my foot and watch it roll down the embankment into the culvert stream below.

“No, I mean do something exciting, like go somewhere,” Noah persists. ‘We’re not really doing anything fun.”

“Yeah,” Rowan chimes in. “We’re not doing anything fun!”

I admit, my kids are more than a little entitled. They are used to adventure, to being on the go. They fly to destinations like the Florida Keys; they spend weeks on the North Shore of Lake Superior. They swim in my sister’s pool and build sand castles on the beach of Long Island Sound. They aren’t accustomed to a vacation at home, in Nebraska, in March.

We sit on the concrete culvert on a warmer-than-usual March afternoon. It’s a favorite spot, below the bike path and just before the stream widens, trickling beneath the A Street bridge. Earlier this winter I had to drag them away from this very spot, so content were they in their “job” of breaking up ice chunks in the frigid water.
But now they are restless and agitated.

“Come here,” I call to Rowan, “I want to tell you guys something,” and he climbs the hill to stand next to me, squinting in the bright sun.

“We don’t always have to do big, exciting things, you know,” I begin to explain. “Sometimes it’s fun to find joy in the small things, too.”

“Is this some kind of prayer or something?” Rowan interrupts.

“No, it’s not a prayer, I’m just saying,” I laugh. “I’m just saying that it’s a beautiful day, and we’re at your favorite spot, and the sun’s out and there are rocks to roll into the stream, so why don’t we just enjoy the moment for what it is, instead of wishing for something else.”

The kids don’t say much in response. Rowan looks at me skeptically, still leery that this might be a prayer masquerading as a speech.

I lean back on the steeply angled pavement, the crook of my elbow over my eyes. I hear Noah get up, and a few minutes later, the boys’ voices echo off the concrete over the din of the traffic. Opening one eye, I turn my head and look down at the stream. They are piling rocks next to the water, deep in conversation. It looks like they are building a dam.
Do you find you have this same restlessness, too – the need to always be doing something big or important, exciting or productive? I admit, I do.

Stand Still to See

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I stand stock-still at the window, and it’s hard, because I am a woman in motion, always wiping, scrubbing, neatening, organizing, folding, pacing. But I turn the faucet off, lean low against the sink with the sponge in my hand and wait, eyes fixed on the suspended globe outside.

I wait and I watch. And even though there are backpacks to stuff and lunch boxes to fill and crumbs to sweep into cupped palm, and even though the morning clock ticks toward departure and I haven’t even put on mascara yet, I stand at the window and watch.

I hear her first even before I see her, because I’ve glanced down just a second at the sink full of juice glasses and coffee cups and half-eaten crusts of cinnamon raisin English muffins. It’s the sound of wings I hear first through the open window. A gentle whir of wings beating furious, 90 times in a single second, they say.

And then the quiet pip-pipping, a delicate chirp as she drinks, needle-beak sipping orange sweet as wings whirl. Her back glimmers green, the color of polished malachite.

She’s so close, I can almost touch that tiny, humming body, were it not for the window screen that separates us.

She doesn’t linger. I blink and she’s gone, hovering over the magenta zinnia and then zipping blurred toward cover of elm leaves. If I squint and lean close toward the window, I can just make her out, sitting regal on a branch, a Lilliputian queen.

It requires a bit of restraint, this motionless waiting. But oh, isn’t it worth all the wait in the world to catch sight of such grandeur? God does great things before my eyes indeed. I simply need to stand still to see.

“Now then, stand still and see this great thing the Lord is about to do before your eyes.”
1 Samuel 12:16

Over at Ann’s place we’re exploring how we practice faith in the day-to-day. Standing still to see is one such way for me…what about you? How do you practice faith in the day-to-day?

And linking with Emily, too, for Imperfect Prose:

Art Schmart

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Take yourself on an artist date.

I read that snippet of advice a few months ago in Julia Cameron’s book The Creative Life, and I read it again last night in the opening chapter of another of her books: The Sound of Paper: Starting from Scratch. I stopped by the library yesterday and picked up that one and another of Cameron’s books called The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity. When I dropped them onto the kitchen counter Brad glanced at the titles. “Having a little creativity problem?” he asked.

Why yes, in fact, I am.

So Cameron suggests that once a week I take myself on an artist date, that I set time aside to “nurture my creative consciousness.”

“In order to make art, we must first make an artful life,” advises Cameron, “a life rich enough and diverse enough to give us fuel.”

Art schmart.

I admit, I often roll my eyes when I hear talk about “art” and “artists.” I’ve always pooh-poohed the idea about making space for the creative spirit to grow. What a bunch of hogwash. It all sounds so self-absorbed and new-agey, like I should wear a long floral skirt and braid daisies into my [grey] hair. Like I should take up meditation and burn incense, too. Nothing against meditation or incense or daisies and long skirts … but they’re just not me. I don’t have time to refuel my creative spirit, or “take my artist on a date.” That’s for “other” creative types, not me. I’m more the “get ‘er done” type.

So from 6 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. that’s what I do. I run from one activity and obligation to the next: get the boys up and ready for school, churn out fundraising materials at work, pick up the boys from school, swing by the post office and Walgreens, throw in a load of laundry, help Rowan with his reading homework, do dinner dishes, fold laundry, wrap up the bedtime routine, tidy the house. And then I settle into my desk chair, fingers poised on the keyboard.

So do you want to know how that’s working out for me? I’ll simply say that “get ‘er done” works fabulously…until you fizzle out like a Fourth of July sparkler and are left feeling like a smoking, blackened metal stick.

The thing is, no one can run ragged and then sit down after a 14-hour day and expect lyrical prose to bloom. That frenetic method may work for a while, but it can’t be sustained indefinitely. At least not by me.

So I’m beginning to think perhaps Julia Cameron is on to something with her “artist date” malarkey. The fact is, don’t we all need to create a little margin, a bit of white space in our harried lives? Isn’t that what God means by “be still?”

Time to breathe in the fresh scent of apple blossoms.

Time to stare out the window at the cardinal pecking sunflower seeds from the grass.

Time to relish a bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream with chocolate sauce and really taste it.

Time to stroll, yes stroll, through an art gallery and fantasize about which painting you’d buy if you had the money.

I suspect these “artist dates” (or whatever you want to call them…perhaps “white space” is a more comfortable phrase for me) water the cracked and withered soul. I suspect that a small space carved between the mad dash to the post office and proofing the marketing brochure serves to replenish the spirit. And I suspect Julia Cameron has learned this through first-hand experience.

So what’s your idea of the perfect artist date (or white space, if you prefer)?

** Note: You might notice that I installed a new comment format called Disqus. It enables me to reply to comments right here on the blog. Not that I won’t continue to visit you at your place…but this method does allow for some conversation and connection without me running around like a crazed chicken. Because, you know, too much of that and I’ll need to take myself on a daily artist date! Or, egads, a whole retreat!

Hear It on Sunday, Use It on Monday: The Birds and the Butterfly

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I read them time and time again: personal stories by people who hear God’s voice loud and clear. Sometimes it’s a person who hears a distinct calling from God. Other times it’s a person who clearly discerns God’s voice. No matter what the circumstances, though, I always come away from those stories with the same questions: Why don’t I hear God speaking so clearly? Why can’t I discern his voice in my life? Why doesn’t he talk to me that way?

Yesterday we began our study of the “I am” verses with John 10:1-10, in which Jesus declares, “I am the gate for the sheep.” I’ve read that passage before – I even wrote a devotion about it – but yesterday as the verses were read from the podium, I heard something new. I heard the word voice repeated three times in ten verses and the word listen repeated twice.

I wondered about this emphasis on voice and listening. I figured it must mean something, right? After all, God doesn’t repeat himself unless he wants to make an important point, so I was curious: what might God be trying to telling me?

“The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.” (John 10:3-4)

It occurred to me, as I heard these lines and the repetition of the words voice and listen that perhaps I don’t hear God’s voice because I don’t take the time to listen for it. Maybe I don’t know God’s voice because I’m unable to recognize it through the cacophony of distraction that pervades me life.

Maybe I don’t even allow him the space in which to speak.

Last Thursday, just one day into my Lenten multitask fast, I ate lunch outside on the front step, plate on my lap, back pressed against the sun-warmed siding. Usually I eat at the kitchen counter, laptop positioned next to napkin and plate, but the fast wouldn’t allow that. So peanut butter sandwich and apple slices in hand, I stepped outside, away from the lure of the laptop.

I tilted my face toward the warm sun. March chill seeped through concrete and into the seat of my jeans. Eyes closed, I munched granny smith slices and listened to a symphony of spring songbirds. I identified only a handful: trill of robin and cardinal, screech of blue jay, woodpecker jackhammer tap on oak, chickadee staccato.

The longer I listened the more I heard. Two chickadees whistled, volleying calls back and forth, one from atop the honey locust, the other nestled deep within pine boughs. A pair of mourning doves cooed contently as they pecked sunflower seeds beneath the feeder. The screeching jay changed his tune to a melodious chortle.

How have I lived forty years, half my life, and never heard this exuberant symphony before?

How have I never noticed such sonorous beauty in my own backyard?

Why have I never stopped for even five minutes to listen?

I opened my eyes. Across the street I caught something white, fluttering. Squinting against March glare, I spotted spring’s first butterfly weaving and tumbling amidst barren grey. Empty plate on my lap, I sat still and watched it circle and spin across winter-brown lawn.

The butterfly summersaulted past bare budded shrubs, above sand-gritty street, around trash barrels pushed against mud-spattered fence. It crossed the road, flitted near the neighbor’s lamppost and then flew on, bobbing and cartwheeling, plunging and soaring.

I leaned forward on the stoop, craning to catch every last bit of the butterfly’s exuberant dance before it vanished, white blur behind chain-link fence.

When was the last time you carved out the time and space to listen for God? How do you make that time in your day-to-day?

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If you’re here for the first time, welcome to the Hear It on Sunday, Use It on Monday community. Feel free to click here for details and instructions on how to link up. Or, if you’re easy-breezy, copy the code for the “Hear It, Use It” button in the sidebar to the right, and simply paste it into your post.

And remember, you don’t need to write exactly about Sunday’s reading or sermon; you can simply write about a verse or even a hymn that you’ve been pondering anytime recently. Also, you can come by anytime during the week to link up — it stays open until Friday.

Thanks for coming around today!

Beautiful Broken Us

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They sit on beach chairs, on beach towels rumpled and striped, legs splayed, faces to the sun. They sit while their kids splash and mold kingdoms out of cool damp sand. They sit amidst florescent pink and yellow pails and shovels, amidst half-eaten bags of Cheetos and uncapped bottles of Dr. Pepper. They sit with flesh wrinkled, saggy, taut, bronzed, fish-belly white. They sit and gesture and talk in French and English. And is that Portuguese perhaps?

I don’t often get the opportunity to observe the human masses. The airport is a good place for that, but more often I’m riding the moving walkways with exuberant kids or standing in line for McNuggets and fries. The mall is a fine place, too – settled onto a bench to watch shufflers and shoppers – but usually I’m leaning on the metal rail, gazing dizzy at the carousel as my kids spin beneath colored lights or sweeping frenzied past kiosks in search of the perfect birthday gift an hour before the party.

The beach is the perfect people-watching spot, and two months or so ago I did just that. I sat on a fabric chair low to the sand, book propped on my lap, sunhat pulled low on my brow, legs stretched across infinitesimal bits of coral, and I watched.

And as I watched an overwhelming sense of oneness, an inexplicable feeling of communion and connection spanning race, age, culture and background settled on my chest. 

We are separate-connected, distant-close, many-one.

Moms call to kids, beckoning in words I can’t understand but in tone all too familiar. Children play side-by-side, content in ephemeral friendship if only for an hour. Teenagers giggle behind screens of blond, flat-ironed hair. Couples sit reading in quiet.

Our broken-beautiful oneness spools like a satin ribbon from sea to crystalline sea.

“Individually, we are one drop. Together, we are an ocean.”
Ryunosuke Satoro, Japanese poet

Sharing sisterhood stories over at Jen’s place today: