Little things...

     Some of the things that haunt me are little things. An example is Joanne's request for our next car. All she wanted was that our next car would have two things; a compass and a thermometer. She didn't live to get either of them. Perhaps we should have bought a new car so that her wish could have been fulfilled though I don't think really wanted or expected that. Knowing that she never got them bothers me. Maybe it's just the tip of the iceberg of the latent grief in the land of grief. But why didn't I see that she got everything she wanted when there was time?  She certainly was not very demanding, she was easily pleased and abundantly grateful.
    Ah, such are the realities of living in the presence of absence.

Takk for alt.

Al

1. Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost

Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day
Nothing gold can stay.

I broke my silence.

     It is my tendency to say what I think. Sometimes that can be a good thing, but not always. As a form of discipline, since joining Grace, I've avoided congregational meetings to be certain that I don't say something I later regret. A congregational meeting was scheduled for today before the news about our pastor's retirements were announced. The purpose of the meeting was informational with no decisions pending. "Perhaps it's time for me to attend" I though and so I did. That's when I broke my silence.
    The final item on the agenda was information about the process of choosing new pastoral leadership. The discussion was ably led by the chairman of our congregation who is the perfect person to help us through the transition. When I sensed some anxiety that we find new leadership quite quickly, I was moved to speak. This is what I said in effect: "While we're all grieving the departure of Dan and Mary the real grief will strike after they leave 6 or 7 months from now. A congregation that calls new pastoral leadership before it has done it's grief work runs the risk of calling unhelpfully. Let's not hurry the process."
    Much of grieving is about history. When Joanne died I lost the one person with whom I'd shared 54 years of marriage memory. There is no one who can replace that role. When Dan and Mary leave they will take with them 27 years of history that they shared with the congregation plus much they shared individually with each member. No one can replace that role. Such grieving operates on its own time table; longer for some shorter for others.
    This announcement of pastoral change has been a powerful reminder to me of the significance of history, i.e., shared and lost history, in grief. In the land of grief I'm learning to live with that which I cannot know because I can no longer ask. It is still hard.  (Ask your questions, people, while you still can.)

Takk for alt,

Al

Grief touches grief.

Tis a Fearful Thing
by Yehuda HaLevi (1075 – 1141)

"‘Tis a fearful thing
to love what death can touch.
A fearful thing
to love, to hope, to dream, to be –
to be,
And oh, to lose.
A thing for fools, this,
And a holy thing,
a holy thing
to love.
For your life has lived in me,
your laugh once lifted me,
your word was gift to me.
To remember this brings painful joy.
‘Tis a human thing, love,
a holy thing, to love
what death has touched."

     

     The announcement of Pastors Dan's and Mary's retirement awakens the reality, that even as I move on with life, I continue in the land of grief.  There is more than one dimension to this. That the new pastor will not have know Joanne seems hard. Mary and Dan were with us through Joanne's surgeries, hospice stay, death and funeral. In every encounter with either of them Joanne's absence was always present, sometimes spoken but sometimes unspoken.  That will now be lost.

    Grieving in anticipation of their departure falls to me without the opportunity to share, discuss, remember and process with Joanne. We'd talk about Mary bringing Joanne a "Grace rock" to hold as she went into surgery and how many times she did that with various surgeries.  The Easter Service Mary brought to Joanne's hospice bed as Evy volunteered to read the gospel would be remembered.  Joanne often told of Mary's parents bringing the family to sing for Joanne's parents when her father had Parkinson's.  Mary's parents rented an apartment in Joanne's parents home when the Halvorsons were first married. Joanne's father had deep respect for Dan's family in North Dakota.  

    There is so much we would talk about and now it reminds me, that in this regard, I am alone.

Takk for alt,

Al

Rejuvenation

Reluctance
by Robert Frost

'"Out through the fields and the woods
   And over the walls I have wended;
I have climbed the hills of view
   And looked at the world, and descended;
I have come by the highway home,
   And lo, it is ended.

The leaves are all dead on the ground,
   Save those that the oak is keeping
To ravel them one by one
   And let them go scraping and creeping
Out over the crusted snow,
   When others are sleeping.

And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
   No longer blown hither and thither;
The last lone aster is gone;
   The flowers of the witch hazel wither;
The heart is still aching to seek,
   But the feet question ‘Whither?’

Ah, when to the heart of man
   Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
   To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
   Of a love or a season?"
 
     Today I walked in the field on which we did a prescribed burn this spring. First up after the fire were the milkweeds....a good stand. Hopefully they nurtured many Monarch Butterflies this summer.
Then came the warm season big bluestem grass that some call "turkey foot" because of their three pronged heads. Much of the grass tops out at six feet and the stand is significantly more dense than last year, thanks to the fire. The fire also stimulated the growth of alfalfa which was seeded with the prairie grasses. The alfalfa will fix nitrogen in the soil, provide food for pheasant chicks and compete with the cool season, spring, invasive grasses. It is a healthy ecosystem that was greatly enhanced by fire...rejuvenation.
    Hunting was the pretext for the walk and I was rewarded by the sight of a number of pheasants. They enjoy the tree row, corn in the food plot and multiple acres of lush grass. No disappointment at not bringing any home, seeing them was sufficient. The deer have reduced the 50 pound salt block by half since it was placed in June.

Takk for alt,

Al

Beautiful grass.

    .

I'm scared!

     In some regards I know too much. It's hard to just lean into the news and trust. I think it might be easier if I knew less. It's clear that there will a huge change and it's hard to imagine that it will be for the better. Added into the mix of feelings is the unfamiliarity of being on this side of the impending event. Then, too, there is recognition of how much better I could have done some things in the past.
   When Joanne was alive I'd make a start like the paragraph above and then tease by saying "I'll tell you more tomorrow" but then would tell her.  So, I'll tell you more tomorrow. 😉 ....well, OK, here  goes.....
    Dan and Mary, beloved pastors of Grace University Lutheran are retiring. Over their 27 year tenure they have nurtured a wonderful, caring community. No doubt there will be an interim pastor, probably lengthy. A new pastor will be called. The experience looks and feels so different when I'm the one being left and not the one leaving. It's very unsettling.
   One of my first internal reactions was "but the new pastor will not have known Joanne." Then I thought, "Wow, I could have done much more to seek out and listen to the recently bereaved when I began a new call."  It's new grief which lands with me living in the land of grief.  Being an adult is not an easy thing, is it?


Takk for alt,

Al

Roots

  My Ancestral Home
by Louis Jenkins

We came to a beautiful little farm. From photos I'd seen
I knew this was the place. The house and barn were
painted in the traditional Falu red, trimmed with white.
It was nearly midsummer, the trees and grass, lush green.
When we arrived the family was gathered at a table on the
lawn for coffee and fresh strawberries. Introductions were
made all around, Grandpa Sven, Lars-Olaf and Marie, Eric
and Gudren, Cousin Inge and her two children ... It made
me think of a Carl Larsen painting. But, of course, it was
all modern, the Swedes are very up-to-date, Lars-Olaf was
an engineer for Volvo, and they all spoke perfect English,
except for Grandpa, and there was a great deal of laughter
over my attempts at Swedish. We stayed for a long time
laughing and talking, it was late in the day but the sun was
still high. I felt a wonderful kinship. It seemed to me that
I had known these people all my life, they even looked
like family back in the States. But as it turned out we had
come to the wrong farm. Lars-Olaf said, "I think I know
your people, they live about three miles from here. If you
like I could give them a call." I said that no, that it wasn't
necessary, this was close enough.

“My Ancestral Home” by Louis Jenkins, from Where Your House Is Now: New and Selected Poems From today's Writer's Almanac

    Joanne and I made five trips to Norway, I think she made eight total.  In Oppdal, her cousin Ola Erik, showed us where her grandfather's house had stood. On the island of Averoy, we stayed with my cousin, Varda, next to the now abandoned house where my grandfather was born. Significant roots...with all of our ancestors leaving Norway for America. The hospitality we experienced was similar to that in the humorous poem above.

    The sunset tonight was spectacular and it lasted exceptionally long...not just a brief moment. Driving to The Little House gave me the full view. Three or four inches on snow lay on my sidewalk seeming to have fallen without wind, which hardly ever happens here on the prairie. 


Takk for alt,

Al

PS Last night's Mary Oliver poem touched many...thanks for emails/texts and posts.

My experience in poetry.

by Mary Oliver

November 27, 2006

Heavy

That time
I thought I could not
go any closer to grief
without dying

I went closer,
and I did not die.
Surely God
had His hand in this,

as well as friends.
Still, I was bent,
and my laughter,
as the poets said,

was nowhere to be found.
Then said my friend Daniel
(brave even among lions),
“It’s not the weight you carry

but how you carry it—
books, bricks, grief—
it’s all in the way
you embrace it, balance it, carry it

when you cannot, and would not,
put it down.”
So I went practicing.
Have you noticed?

Have you heard
the laughter
that comes, now and again,
out of my startled mouth?

How I linger
to admire, admire, admire
the things of this world
that are kind, and maybe

also troubled—
roses in the wind,
the sea geese on the steep waves,
a love
to which there is no reply

What can I say to this? but Amen!

Takk for Alt,

Al