Carmen’s Chatter

From the Foreword to A Book of Psalms by Stephen Mitchell:

The Hebrew word for psalm is mizmór, which means a hymn sung to the accompaniment of a lyre. But when the ancient rabbis named the anthology that we know as the Book of Psalms, they called it séfer tehillím, the Book of Praises. That is the dominant theme of the greatest of the Psalms: a rapturous praise, a deep, exuberant gratitude for being here.

The mind in harmony with the way things are sees that this is a good world, that life is good and death is good. It feels the joy that all creatures express by their very being, and finds its own music in accompanying the universal rapture.

Let the heavens and the earth rejoice,
let the waves of the ocean roar,
let the rivers clap their hands,
let the mountains rumble with joy,
let the meadows sing out together,
let the trees of the forest exult.

Thus the Psalmists, in the ardor of their praise, enter the sabbath mind and stand at the center of creation, saying, “Behold, it is very good.” This is the poet’s essential role, as [Rainer Maria] Rilke wrote in a late poem; when the public wonders, “But all the violence and horror in the world — how can you accept it?” Rilke’s poet says simply, “I praise.” . . .

“Sing to the Lord a new song.” . . . The Psalms speak as both poetry and prayer. Some of them are very great poems. But as prayer, even the greatest poems are inadequate. Pure prayer begins at the threshold of silence. It says nothing, asks for nothing. It is a kind of listening. The deeper the listening, the less we listen for, until silence itself becomes the voice of God.

I am going for a walk. It’s a glorious spring morning, but first I wanted to thank Dr. Robert Buck Goyer of Huntsville, Alabama, for writing me this encouraging e-mail:

Thank you for your modern English translation of THE CLOUD OF UNKNOWING. While I have many translations of THE CLOUD, I believe your translation will become the standard and favorite translation of this important work (it is now my favorite). I only wish your publisher had offered it in a hardcover edition.

I seriously don’t know what I’d do without the kindness of readers. Here’s what I wrote Dr. Goyer back:

Your kind words mean more than perhaps words can say, which is always an interesting predicament for one who writes books for a living. Thank you for taking the time to let me know how you feel. Often I am up writing books at midnight, with only the train whistle for company (it is so quiet then), and to know that a book landed well in someone’s soul, as I hoped and prayed it would, is joy indeed.

And now for the walk, filled with joy—it is hard to explain how the kindness of readers buoys up a writer’s heart. God bless, Carmen

White, yellow, purple,
red fragrances and cool drops
of dew, this dawning

Yesterday I took our daughter to Olive Garden for supper, for some mom-daughter time, much needed especially now that she’s a teenager and I’m a 48-year-old. It was also a celebration for her hard work in school, for her high grades and perfect scores on the CRCT. On the way there, I teased her, asking did she have some conversations in mind that would interest me throughout supper, so she could be an entertaining dinner date.

She laughed, “Oh, Mom.”

But we did have great conversations. That’s why I love to get either of my children alone in a restaurant because they talk to me then. They feel so grownup and things spill out that I do want to hear, little things and big things and things in-between. We talked about the number zero and how it works in math (she’s an expert now, having not missed anything on the math CRCT, which, to this English major’s mind, is astonishing). We talked about much.

We ate that fresh salad, warm bread, five-cheese ziti, and finished up with Zeppoli, those hot Italian donuts, dipping them in chocolate sauce. That’s when I noticed the two people who sat down beside us; they must have been a mom and her teenage son. Kate and I were laughing and talking and eating and having a great time when I noticed the mother and son were silent. I wondered were they okay.

I turned to see they both had their phones out, texting. It looked so odd.

I did the eyebrow thing to tell Kate to look left. She did. She asked, “So?”

I whispered, “Cell phones are not allowed at the supper table.”

Her raised eyebrows telegraphed to me, “Oh, Mom.”

Pretty soon, people will be marrying their cell phones.

[I was reading the New York Times after writing this blog entry, when I found this article, "Play with Your Food, Just Don't Text!" by Sara Rimer.]

Yesterday I took my son, John, to Las Palmas on a “date.” We were also celebrating his hard work in school this year. He always did his homework, even when he didn’t feel like it, which, he will add if he is within earshot of my telling this story: “Was every day!” And he “SUCCeeded” on all three of his CRCT’s, by which he meant “exceeded.”

John is eight. He loves Las Palmas for the chips and salsa. He always orders, otherwise, the kids’ menu chicken tenders and fries. John thinks that the meal of chicken tenders and fries is the ambrosia of the world.

We had a great date. I love having lunch with my son because I learn so much. He tells me things about his friends and about school and about his likes and dislikes that I would otherwise not know. Plus, he’ll tell me things about Star Wars then that I might not find out elsewhere.

As the chips disappeared in the basket, I was like, “Woah, John, you and I have decimated that basket of chips.”

John took a look, quipped, “Yep.”

So cut to last night. I’m putting John to bed and then get in and snuggle with him. I’m like, “John, you are crazy for chips and dip.”

I noticed I misspoke and corrected, “I mean salsa.”

“Well, salsa is dip, Mom.”

“Right. They are synonyms.”

There was a long pun-creating pause. I continued, “What if you were driving down the road, and noticed up ahead something like a small valley in the road, like a depression in the road, you might say—”

And here, my son, having a long acquaintance with my terrible pun-making, chortled (I tip my hat to Lewis Carroll). Yes, John chortled. He chortled the way you sneeze. It burst out.

I continued, “Yes, you might say as you approached that small valley in the road, ‘Look, there’s a salsa in the road.’”

More laughter from the boy beside me.

I kept on, “But I don’t think you could dip your chip in that salsa.”

John couldn’t stop laughing, and I told him that that was all that is required from a good friend—that they laugh at your bad jokes.

Yesterday my son, John, and I went to the Memorial Day Ceremony at Myrtle Hill cemetery in Rome. We climbed to the very top, had wonderful views, saw Alfred and Martha Shorter’s graves, watched the flyovers, saw the cannon loaded and fired, went below and listened to the Georgia 8th Regiment band warm up (taps over and over, so sad), and then enjoyed the entire ceremony; then so hot, we had chocolate milkshakes from McDonald’s, beside the river.

That’s the short of it, something pasted on Facebook. Here is the long of it.

My son is a rising third-grader, and he’d been to Myrtle Hill on a 2nd-grade field trip and was proud that he knew where the Shorter’s graves were and could lead us to them.

Also, it felt as if we were on top of the world. It was beautiful weather, all sun and blue sky. When we lived in Charlottesville, Virginia, I grew fond of walking through the cemetery near our one-bedroom apartment, especially once I was pregnant; it was so calm in that cemetery, and it calmed me and reminded me of the end sum, that none of us gets out of here alive. Yesterday, so alive beside my young son, walking through perfect May weather up Myrtle Hill to the top through countless graves, I felt the same serenity. It’s odd how serene a graveyard can make a person feel.

Also, we were sitting at the top of Myrtle Hill in a small shady spot, waiting for the 3:00 p.m. flyovers, when a large white truck drove up, pulling a cannon behind it. Then we had the bonus surprise of watching them set up that cannon and then fire it, way cool.

Then the memorial ceremony at the bottom of the hill was moving in a way I had not expected. An 88-year-old World War II veteran spoke and said all the right things. We all stumbled through a singing of “The Mansions of the Lord.”

There were many people of all ages in every kind of uniform imaginable, and they did look hot. They also looked authentic, and I felt as if John got a good history lesson looking at all of those different uniforms. There was also a man dressed up like George Washington, reviewing the troops.

And just watching those young men and women in their crisp, brightly colored uniforms standing at attention with their hands behind their backs, unmoving, was moving. John and I marveled at their unmoving stances.

Also, sitting there with my Korean-born son, across from a man wearing a baseball cap with “Korean Vet” on it, I whispered to John, “Isn’t it neat that that man fought in the Korean war and so did your granddad, and here you sit, a Korean-American?” “Yeh,” he answered. John is a 28-year-old in an 8-year-old body; he gets everything.

It was a true memorial ceremony. We remembered those who have fought and been wounded. We remembered those who have fought and lived. We remembered those who have fought and died. We got there early and heard the Georgia 8th Regiment band practising, and they played taps over and over and over, which was even more touching than the actual performance, in a way, because it was done with only a smattering of an audience around and was quiet and hushed and reverent.

I do have one question. Why do people talk through taps? I mean adults. I can understand that their children talk through taps; they talk through taps because their parents talk through taps. But, again, taps is solemn and a time for reflection, and any time someone is performing anything, even if it’s not taps, a person should be quiet in honor of the fact that a performance is going on. But no, the level of people’s talking during performances is rising. But talking during taps? That is astonishing and sad. The quality of listening in the world needs raising.

But the talking-through-taps notwithstanding, it was an awesome ceremony, and I was happy that John and I could share it together. Later, back at home, I was recapping the day’s events and all we’d seen and done, when John added, “AND . . . we saw George Washington!”

Lately, I have been thinking about getting unstuck in some parts of my life. Anyone knows that is not easily done, ever. It might even seem silly to try, except that I am so fed up with certain paralyzing grooves I have.

But I have a plan. (I sound like Baldrick in the brilliant Black Adder comedy series my British husband Sean introduced me to when we were living in London. Now, you are laughing at this point, if you know Baldrick. I hasten to add that most of my plans work out as well as Baldrick’s do, though I most uncategorically would never have burned Samuel Johnson’s dictionary!)

But, yes, I have a plan. I want to be God’s aroma. I want to be the invisible (because egoless) fragrance of God that catches in people’s clothes and all. This hope reminds me of our son’s bedtime routine. Sean usually reads to John at night, and then he lies beside John awhile. When Sean leaves, I go in. John loves nothing more than to snuggle in bed under the covers, and when I kiss our son then, he smells like Sean’s cologne.

I want my soul to be so Christ-like kind that it sticks to others’ souls as gently and as fragrant as a daddy’s cologne sticks to his son’s forehead after many loving goodnight kisses. I want to be the kindness that lingers in another person’s imagination.

It’s a worthy goal. You might even say it’s an impossible goal. In a way it seems like the pie-in-the-sky spiritual equivalent to winning the multi-million-dollar Reader’s Digest Sweepstakes, except of course we are talking about grace here as the efficacy of the prize and not chance. So, sure, this is a truly impossible goal, but then nothing is as worthy as the divine-requiring good change.

A wise nun with a Ph.D. once told me that long after people forget what you said to them or did for them, they will remember how you made them feel.

My request to God is that I enjoy, more and more, focusing on Christ’s wisdom, on studying and eating the Bible, on praying, and on worshipping, until I grow in love, until I desire this joyful obedience to Christ and fun service to others more than anything else. I believe I can, in God’s grace, learn to enjoy being kind more.

The verses of 2 Corinthians 2:14-17 contain this beautiful old metaphor:

But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? Unlike so many, we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, like men sent from God. (New International Version

And C. S. Lewis wrote in “The Weight of Glory”:

If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and to earnestly hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I suggest that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. . . . [I]nfinite joy is offered us, [and] like an ignorant child[,] [we want] to go on making mud pies in a slum because [we] cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea.

I love gardening. I gardened most of yesterday, though I did take our daughter to Claire’s in the mall to get very necessary earrings. I think we are up to pair 1 jillion.

Anyway, I moved plants around yesterday, putting some in sunnier spots, where they will grow better. I planted the soapwart my son gave me for Mother’s Day—grown from seeds into a full-blown plant! Awesome!

I dug a lot. I moved rocks. I made more room for a flower a friend gave me; this hydrangea is going to be beautiful. I just know it.

Yes, I also pulled weeds and vines all yesterday morning, and I love to do this because every vine reminds me of a way I do not trust God (I mean to trust him but do not, so often); and as I pulled out each vine, I prayed, “I trust you, Lord.” Some of us have to go back to the basics, over and over and over again.

Have you ever noticed how those clinging, invasive vines choke flower-bearing plants, and these are not fruit-bearing vines. They block out the sun. They stymie growth. They keep those plants stuck where they are, so to speak, and if the vines win, then too bad for the plants. They will wither and die.

So that’s why as I pulled out each vine, I prayed, “I trust you, Lord.” It’s kind of like praying-gardening.

First, because if he sees this column, he will be mortified. He’s got no ego but much self-esteem.

Second, because he loves me unconditionally.

Third, because I would rather talk with him than anyone I know.

Fourth, because he is the kindest person I know and the most Christ-like (which is actually a tautologous statement, isn’t it—I guess it is also synonymous with #2 above).

Fifth, because he does things out-of-the-blue for me that I hadn’t even known I needed or wanted, and yet he always seems to be thinking about ways to improve my life. Why? Well, I thank God because I can’t figure out why. I certainly don’t deserve it or anything.

Case in point. Yesterday afternoon, I got home from work to make an important phone call and had that all on my mind, when I come upstairs and see my husband sitting at his computer. He says, “I’m revising your books page on your website.”

“Really? Why?” Then I pause to consider. This is the man to whom I’ve been married for almost 19 years now. Isn’t he tired of me yet? Thankfully, I think the answer is no.

Then I add, “Gee, thanks. That’s awfully nice of you.” All the rest of the day I consider how wonderful this kindness is to my soul.

Sean spent several hours updating my website. Of course, he created it the first place, and man of patience that he is—he has also taught me how to maintain it and work with html code and add to it and renovate it in minor ways. He does the heavy lifting.

So check out the changes sometime when you have a sec. I see them not so much as changes as unasked-for-love-for-which-my-heart-is-bursting-to-the-brim-grateful.

The tenth-century gentle, brave Benedictine monk, abbot, and splendid British writer Ælfric of Eynsham is featured online in a Christianity Today article, “A Monk, Bloody Vikings, and a God of Mercy.” InterVarsity also recently published an article I wrote for their Emerging Scholars Network, “Why Get a PhD in the Humanities?”

“Less bombs—more art supplies” arrested my attention. It was February a decade ago. I was driving our little Honda Civic down California’s Central Expressway through the heart of Silicon Valley—home of computers, chips, and savvy Internet start-ups. Against this backdrop of technological innovation, it thrilled me to see the new-grass-green median lined with organic trees bursting with plum-colored flowers. Spring comes early in northern California.

Long ago I decided reading cereal boxes at breakfast was good training for life. So, in that same spirit of giving attention to that which lies nearest at hand, I continued reading the bumper stickers on the car in front of me. One said, “They’re NOT HOT FLASHES. They’re POWER SURGES.” Followed by, “Enjoy life—it’s NO dress rehearsal.” Then, “Have an Attitude of Gratitude.” When the light changed, I eased left around this car, to study the last sticker, fixed beside the gas hole. It asked: “Why be normal?”

I had to know what the driver looked like. My guess was she was a graduate student, though I doubted that in the absence of a university sticker. She had messy, shoulder-length brown hair streaked with gray. Her square mouth was bookishly grim. I didn’t dare guess her age.

This Chaucerian stranger was driving a Dodge Colt E. Now, a Colt E is small. Hers was powder blue. Its hood had faded to white in the Palo-Alto sun. Colt E’s probably never get speeding tickets. Zoom is not in their vocabulary. Pootle is.

As this bite-size car scuttled down the road in front of me, under the weight of its several opinions, I fell in love with the way you could fit two of it side-by-side on one lane of the road. Most of all, I loved its bumper-sticker humor. I liked thinking some human wanted to be reminded each time she filled up her surely mini-tank with gas (to go I-can’t-guess-where, to see I-can’t-guess-who): “Why be normal,” as a positive statement, a foregone conclusion. I liked that it wore its lack of a car wash shoulders back, head held high. It had character, while all those shiny Porsche’s zipping past had a sleek and boring sameness.

I had just delivered a warm spaghetti dinner, complete with dessert and bread, to a new friend. My excited daughter, almost three, was responsible for skipping the unbroken loaf of bread up the sidewalk and to the door. She rang the bell. My new friend wasn’t at home, but her mother-in-law from Michigan was and her five-year-old once-foster, now-adopted son.

We all stood for a moment under the fragile beauty of a cherry tree’s paper-thin white blooms and made small talk. Looking up, I was glad the cherry tree’s branches held the bright blue hope of sky, but I could not avoid stepping on the impermanent carpet of its torn and browning petals. That bothered me.

When there was no more to say, the door shut. Not understanding, my little girl dashed over to the next house shouting, “Mommy, who can we deliver food to next?” Like God would, I imagined. But I had made only one spaghetti supper that night, so I just drove home. A world of three-year-old softness squirmed in my back seat. And I considered the lessons that that tiny Colt E had taught me en route to deliver that spaghetti supper.

When we got back home to Mountain View, my daughter and I passed Castro Street, the main street downtown, and I saw an older couple with wrinkled brown faces and white hair, both slightly stooped. They were utterly unremarkable, even unattractive, except that each held a plastic grocery bag in one of their outer hands, while in their shared space, European-wise, they each held, between them, one handle of the heaviest plastic bag. This way they could carry three bags fairly easily. This old man and woman were absolutely lovely in their shared strength that some would call dependence, and others, independence.

“Mommy,” came that ever-questioning voice in the backseat. Its blond owner was entering only her third spring: “Why is Nicolas’s mom sick?”

“She had a boo-boo, and the doctors cut it out for her. She’ll be better soon.”

“Oh. Okay.” I heard a small sigh of relief.

Meanwhile, I embraced my own platitude and my toddler’s positive acceptance of my lie about breast cancer, as well as her naïve (which I hoped would turn out to be something I could call “childlike”) faith in healing.

I just kept on driving. Looking for mystery. Reading every clue.

Last Sunday, our pastor told us about a mother whose son had been sick his entire short life, thirteen years. My daughter is thirteen, so I was listening. Our pastor said that this woman was in a dire financial situation and that she did not have the money to bury her son. Through her working relationship with some members of our church, her need had been brought to the attention of our pastor, and he brought it to the congregation. He said that he told her boss to bury this woman’s son and that he would write a check and that he would ask the congregation to help cover the $1,000 in funeral costs, retroactively. The money flowed into the brown baskets at the doors. This love offering was after the regular offering, too. This Sunday, our pastor told us that $3,000 was raised, that he hadn’t known if he’d even meet this woman but that he had and had ministered to her, and that we could thank the Lord that he had worked through our congregation. On the way home, my husband said, “That’s what church is supposed to be about.”

Summer’s half days at Shorter College have begun. That means when I had an interview today with Frank Morock about The Cloud of Unknowing that not even my good friend Dr. Jill Borchert was on the Hill. You know that’s saying something. It was just me and the chirping birds and the splashing of the fountains when the phone rang at 4:30 p.m., and it was Frank Morock of Catholic Bookmarks. The thirty-minute interview seemed like five minutes. Frank is a joy to work with. He makes an interview seem easy. I had such fun. When we finished, Frank said I filled the entire show and that it will air in a week or two. Frank asked me back in a month to do another interview, this time on my earlier Hildegard of Bingen: A Spiritual Reader book. He also told me that he re-broadcasted our 2006 interview on my Man of Blessing: A Life of St. Benedict book on June 23, 2008 (#826). If interested, you can find it podcasted here for easy listening.

[One of the great pleasures of my life is that I serve as a Georgia Public Broadcasting (GPB) commentator, and tonight my most recent GPB commentary aired on 97.7 FM on Georgia Gazette with Rickey Bevington at about 6:20 p.m. It is podcasted at "May 14, 2009" under Georgia Gazette on the Georgia Public Broadcasting website. The script for my commentary is below. The most thrilling aspect to me is that it features a quotation from my awesome editor and friend Dave O'Neal and also my good buddy Gary Davis! Many thanks go to the Edward-R.-Murrow-award-winning journalist John Sepulvado, who has taught me much about the art of broadcast-voicing and who is a terrific editor also. Here it is.]

Perhaps one day I will be, but right now I am not and never have been a social activist. I wonder sometimes if that means there is something seriously wrong with me. After all, I am a Christian, by which I mean that I want very much to follow Christ. You may recall he overturned tables, threw merchants from the temple, flung out the chairs of people selling doves (Matthew 21:12). He’d done it before, but they didn’t listen, being human (John 2:14ff). That time he shouted, “Take these things away; stop making My Father’s house a place of business.”

Well, that’s not me. I have friends who are social activists, and God bless them. I don’t begrudge anyone their social activism. It does much good. I can see that. I have also admired mystics who told off emperors (Hildegard, for example, called one an “idiot,” what nerve!) and have studied mystics who have helped lepers. I think of Mother Teresa. And here I sit, on the edge of my non-social-activist seat.

So I start to justify, as people do. I mean—as I do. I used to be the kind of person who wanted to change the world until I realized I couldn’t even or hadn’t even yet tried to change myself. Then I realized that perhaps social activism should start at home, in me. I remember thinking this one day when I was studying abroad in Germany, West Germany, in 1982, living like a cash-strapped college student, above the garage of Boppard nuns.

The nuns said to me, “Walk in our garden and heal.” I was like, “Huh?” I’m from Macedonia Community in Canton, Georgia. If someone there had told me to walk in the garden and heal, I would’ve said they must’ve stood in a cornfield too long under a June sun. But the black and white habits were strangely reassuring, as if these women knew what they were talking about.

So I went out in their garden in that European-cold fall weather and found a trail and raspberry bushes with leftover berries as red as jewels and walked around in a sort of circle. I saw that inside the nunnery through the huge kitchen window were yellow and brown apple peels curled in a blue pottery bowl. I’ve never forgotten those walks, the raspberries left on the bushes, the apple peels through a window. It was quiet there, with spells of psalms sung by the nuns. I began to heal.

Now, I look at my husband and children when I want to charge off and save the world (those feelings resurface often when I’m tired). What do they need? How can I love them better? I look at the postmaster at Shorter College and wonder if I’ve really seen him. What is his world like? His name is Gary Davis, and he is unfailingly kind to students. The way that Jesus handled wood, Gary Davis handles mail. But do I love this friend well? And what about my students? What are their worlds like? What do they need from a teacher? How can I show Christ’s love to them? And the list goes on. There are my parents, my brother and sisters, my friends, strangers, doctors, nurses, and shop clerks.

I think of Teresa of Avila, who said we can’t all do great things but we can do small things with great love. I think of what My friend Dave O’Neal wrote somewhere on his Facebook page—how it would change the world if everyone just sat quietly for fifteen minutes a day.

Maybe he’s right.

Maybe the greatest activism of all comes in quiet, passive, self-reflective moments.

Buckminster Fuller, the twentieth-century inventor of the geodesic dome, among other accomplishments, is also famous for his quotation on trim tabs, which he saw as a metaphor for leadership. In 1972, Fuller said:

Something hit me very hard once, thinking about what one little man could do. Think of the Queen Mary—the whole ship goes by and then comes the rudder. And there’s a tiny thing at the edge of the rudder called a trim tab.

It’s a miniature rudder. Just moving the little trim tab builds a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. Takes almost no effort at all. So I said that the little individual can be a trim tab. Society thinks it’s going right by you, that it’s left you altogether. But if you’re doing dynamic things mentally, the fact is that you can just put your foot out like that and the whole big ship of state is going to go.

So I said, call me Trim Tab.

For more information and to see helpful pictures, click on this link, as well as on the link for the Buckminster Fuller Institute’s Newsletter.

I have always loved the Psalms because David is turning to God with his emotions. I come to the Psalms with the same goal. We always think of David as a great king, but I always think of him as a shepherd boy and soaring poet with the clay feet of murderer and adulterer. I know that David was real and that he turned to God with his issues. That encourages me.

Psalm 27

Triumphant Song of Confidence of David.

1 The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life;
of whom shall I be afraid?

2 When evildoers assail me
to devour my flesh—
my adversaries and foes—
they shall stumble and fall.

3 Though an army encamp against me,
my heart shall not fear;
though war rise up against me,
yet I will be confident.

4 One thing I asked of the Lord,
that will I seek after:
to live in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
to behold the beauty of the Lord,
and to inquire in his temple.

5 For he will hide me in his shelter
in the day of trouble;
he will conceal me under the cover of his tent;
he will set me high on a rock.

6 Now my head is lifted up
above my enemies all around me,
and I will offer in his tent
sacrifices with shouts of joy;
I will sing and make melody to the Lord.

7 Hear, O Lord, when I cry aloud,
be gracious to me and answer me!
8 ‘Come,’ my heart says, ‘seek his face!’
Your face, Lord, do I seek.
9 Do not hide your face from me.
Do not turn your servant away in anger,
you who have been my help.
Do not cast me off, do not forsake me,
O God of my salvation!
10 If my father and mother forsake me,
the Lord will take me up.

11 Teach me your way, O Lord,
and lead me on a level path
because of my enemies.
12 Do not give me up to the will of my adversaries,
for false witnesses have risen against me,
and they are breathing out violence.

13 I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living.
14 Wait for the Lord;
be strong, and let your heart take courage;
wait for the Lord!

One of the reasons I love Shorter College is for its beauty. It’s that simple. The sun comes up and reflects cotton-candy pink off the Appalachian foothills and their green pines, and your heart (my heart) goes pitterpat.

This morning I was standing at the top of the Hill clutching my books and briefcase when I saw the Chorale boarding a long white bus for a tour of high schools, starting with Cherokee High, the alma mater of Dr. Martha Shaw and me.

All black curls and vibrant energy, Martha stepped off the bus to make sure all was loaded and ready to go. I told her something discouraging that I’d heard, and in true Martha fashion, she said, “I want you to read last night’s entry from that book that’s white with the multi-colored spools on the front.”

I laughed. She meant my book A Little Daily Wisdom. “You mean you want me to take some of my own medicine?!” I said.

Here is the entry from Mechthild of Magdeburg’s The Flowing Light of the Godhead:

Kind soul, rejoice!
You become God
when you drink with divine patience
many bitter mouthfuls,
though you are entirely free of guilt.
So—no matter what,
rejoice!

Why is it that to be a Christian often means learning to rejoice in hard times and through unfairness? But I am determined not to be a bitter Christian, a phrase that surely sounds like an oxymoron, not unlike “government efficiency” and “toxic assets.”

Okay. Today we had the spring semester graduation at Shorter. It was especially hard for me this year, for some reason. I kept seeing face after friendly, intelligent, hard-working face walk across that stage. Stories after stories surfaced in my mind as I watched each student pause for the photo, diploma in hand. Essays were remembered. Hardships overcome were once again silently applauded in my brain.

Clap clap clap. And then they are gone. They resurface in requests for letters of recommendation, thankfully, or show up at your office door with stories, but the daily interaction is gone. Still, my . . . our prayers go with them. We are so proud, but the commencement itself is bittersweet. Thank goodness, too, for Facebook!

So now the summer begins. I have a few writing deadlines to finish, but I also want to replenish my soul. I am exhausted after a year spent working on and finishing five books, several refereed articles, lots of talks, and the ever-true joy of teaching and connecting with terrific students.

Does anyone have any suggestions for books that I could read to restore my soul? I’m open to any and all. Please e-mail me at cbutcher(at)shorter.edu or put your astute comment below. Thanks much!

I am an English teacher. I think I can define words. After all, Webster’s, the Oxford English Dictionary, and all kinds of online lexicographical tools are my best friends. But I have been thinking lately that maybe love, trust, humility, joy, long-suffering, forgiveness, diligence, good humor, and kindness are all just synonyms.

On the other hand, good words exist in this world, and last night I got several of them given to me by my best friend from college days, Beth. She is wise and kind, and we all know that a wise, kind person gives the best advice. She said to me, “Carmen, perhaps you’re supposed to repose on God in this situation and let him handle it. Perhaps you’re not supposed to fix it but are meant to let him fix it in his own time.” Ouch. Well, not really “Ouch!” but “Right!” So I am trying to do that. It has become the central focus of my life—to learn how to rest in God, as Psalm 46:10 recommends.

I cannot pretend that I know how or that I will ever know how to rest in God, but I can say that it’s the single most worthwhile goal I’ve ever challenged myself with.