Like Gilligan's Island

No phones, no lights, no motor-cars

not a single luxury

like Robinson Crusoe

it's primitive as can be

I know, I know. Who watches Gilligan's Island anymore?

Well, I do sometimes.

The gift of my father's television taste, now fortunately freed from the tyranny of commercials by boxed seasons.

I also sometimes watch Hogan's Heroes and I Dream of Jeannie, but that's beside the point.

Gilligan's Island was a comedic sitcom about a tour boat crew and its passengers who got stranded on a tropical island and had to (a) survive with whatever they'd brought along and the natural resources of the island, and (b) forge a small, functioning community out of an odd assortment of people. Admittedly, Gilligan's Island is not a perfect simile to my life at the moment: I certainly have no professor available who can figure out how to make a bomb out of a couple of coconuts to diffuse an imminently erupting volcano, and obviously if I am writing this post I am not lacking electricity or technological options to connect to the outside world. I did leave my car at home, though. And, of more relevance, I am trying to find harmony in the midst of living with an odd conglomeration of personalities, isolated from my normal community, with minimal access to my usual "drugs".

Normally when I'm stressed, I either self-medicate with chocolate (which a good health teacher from Jr. High taught me is filled with chemicals that initiate calm emotional responses) or I do my best to escape by distracting myself with fictional stories that have happy endings. Sometimes I will also listen to loud music in my car that I can sing along with to soothe my soul. However, a couple weeks ago our church Young Adult group challenged all its members to try a fast. Too much of a coward to do a full food fast for a day or two, I opted for a much longer but much less stringent fast from chocolate and fictional book reading. Since Dan opted to fast from coffee, I decided I might as well cut that out, too. We arbitrarily chose a traditional time length for our fast, and away we went.

It just hasn't been as easy as I thought. Oh, I've resisted temptation to the listed items alright. Rather, the challenge has been to allow God to fill those empty spaces, rather than just filling them with other things (ex. lemon squares in lieu of chocolate, and movies in lieu of books). Particularly, now that I've been travelling for nearly two weeks and my alternative drugs aren't easily accessible either (Dan, my little lemon square of sunshine, is still at home), I'm finally starting to feel the strain of the fast I chose. I am really struggling to put into practice the idea of "resting in God," and in God alone. Practically speaking, what does that look like?

I have some guesses. Rest is what you get when you're not anxious about something, regardless of whether or not your body is in motion. The banes of anxiety and helplessness seem to be competence, power, and trust. You don't need to worry about x if you believe that someone has the power, ability, and desire to handle x with care. My former room-mate, Jasmine, seemed to have a pretty good grasp of the concept of resting in God. God always seemed so obvious to her, and she followed Him like a child, curious and content. She'd chat with him about life, and he'd tell her to do things like, "Go for coffee at the Starbucks on 14th now," and she would obey and then find an old friend she hadn't seen in years. (Her summary of said 'coincidence' was: "Yeeees! I'm getting so good at this game, God!"). Graham Cooke also described his relationship with God as one of trust, and a game of giving. Bitterness and hopelessness are not synonymous with rest. These emotional/psychological states appear to carry an underlying belief that others will not take care of x (due to incompetence, unwillingness, or impotence), so I must do x myself, and it's too hard. I've been reading through Job again. I love Job like I love reading treatises on mathematical formulas, or like I like eating broken glass, or listening to screaming babies, or eating my birthday dinner at McDonald's, or having my fingernails pulled out with pliers, or riding a bicycle in a snowstorm, or building a summer home in the middle of a Florida swamp, or going down-hill skiing in Saskatchewan, or keeping a pile of live snakes and tarantulas on the floor in lieu of carpet, or eating household pets for supper, or putting moldy potatoes in my fruit smoothie for breakfast, or rolling naked in piles of festering garbage, or watching reality tv shows on tv, or stubbing my toe on the heat register, or accidentally stabbing myself in the finger with my syringe, or presenting sex ed to a class of grade 7 students, or... I mean, honestly, has anyone ever tried to count how many similes, proverbs, and metaphors are used by each character in that story to make a point that could have been stated in under 10 seconds? Of course not- they would shoot themselves first. Wait, what was I talking about? Oh, right; I think Job is a counterfoil to Jasmine, or he would be if they were in the same story. Job's sin was pride and self-righteousness. He was so sure of his own perfection that he was willing to accuse God of being unjust when the blessings of his life were removed. Everyone gets so angry on his account: how could God allow such a righteous man to suffer so much and then respond to his anguish with a "Shut up and stop questioning me- I'm God, you fool!"? But how do we know Job was actually righteous, except from his own account? (ex. "Everything I did was honest. Righteousness covered me like a robe, and I wore justice like a turban" Job 29:14). How accurate was Job's account? How do you know when someone is righteous? God never argued that Job hadn't done good things with his wealth and influence while he held them. Rather, it seems that God saw something ugly coming that Job, and all Job's friends, family, and acquaintances had not seen; a temptation hidden in Job's heart Job had never recognized because Job had never been in the sort of uncomfortable place where such a thing could be revealed. He had too much chocolate and fictional reading and lemon squares and movies to watch to see that tiny little crack in his soul Satan was panting at, ready to rip in and tear it wide open for disease and death. So after all Job's angry ranting, Elihu, the young one, speaks on God's behalf: "But by means of their suffering, [God] rescues those who suffer. For he gets their attention through adversity. God is leading you away from danger, Job, to a place free from distress. He is setting your table with the best food. But you are obsessed with whether the godless will be judged. Don't worry, judgement and justice will be upheld. But watch out or you may be seduced by wealth. Don't let yourself be bribed into sin. Could all your wealth or all your mighty efforts keep you from distress? Do not long for the cover of night, for that is when people will be destroyed. Be on guard! Turn back from evil, for God has sent this suffering to keep you from a life of evil" (Job 36:15-21). A very little bit of discomfort is already showing me that I lean a lot more on my "easy-going" and "tempered" nature to deal with conflict around me than I do on God, and when my little stress relievers of chocolate and happy distraction and people who are always nice back to me aren't available, I'm not quite as easy-going and tempered as I like to believe. I have some of the appearance of a Jasmine, but underneath is mostly the pride-cracked heart of Job with a secret doubt that God will not take care of everything the way that it should be. So come Holy Spirit, and transform me. You must increase, and I must decrease (wince). Or, since I'm looking at Job, in Job's words: "I had only heard about you before, but now I have seen you with my own eyes, I take back everything I said, and I sit in dust and ashes to show my repentance" (Job 42:5-6).

Country-song Ode to Daniel

August 28. Day 8 of my trip in Saskatchewan.

Happy Anniversary Daniel,

I miss you a lot.

I miss your enthusiasm for growing things, nurturing plants like your children;

I miss your garlicy culinary creations, thoughtfully packed up for us on Thursday nights;

I miss your endless curiosity about how things work,

your pride in finding one perfect word to sum up a complex situation,

your soothing hugs as you laugh at me for raging about something,

the vexed sound you make when you're feeling trapped,

the texture of your downy-soft hair after it's been washed,

your deep voice rumbling the word, "Hmmm,"

your tight and ticklish abs and buns,

your tiny little drawings or diagrams,

the way you would croone the words, "Tiny little," and twiddle your fingers to demonstrate,

muscled arms that remind me of Popeye the Sailor on spinach,

your wrinkly forehead that makes me giggle when it folds up like a soft-top on a sports car.

I miss being around you:

I miss going for walks with you and swinging our held hands together, and occasionally pushing you into a nearby bush or snowdrift;

I miss listening to loud music in the car with you (actually, I kind of miss music, period);

having stupid fights as we cook delicious recipes together in the sunny kitchen,

snuggling in bed for 2 minutes before I get too hot and have to shove you away so I don't explode,

intentionally going limp and falling over so you have to catch me,

punching you when you make awful puns,

and going to the grocery store together to hunt for exotic cheeses to taste with crunchy crackers before going to bed.

I love you a lot Daniel.

1 more week to go.

Katutura [R]evolution

Katutura is a low-income district in the Namibian city of Windhoek (see "The Katutura Township of Windhoek"). The name literally means, "The place we do not want to settle." Katutura was originally built by the South African Administration around the time of World War I as a sort of crappy rental district where all black residents of the town of Windhoek were forced to move to so Windhoek could be exclusively composed of white German residents. Lighter "coloured" individuals were allowed to live in between. Not surprisingly, the non-white residents of Windhoek didn't want to leave their nicer homes in the Old Location to live in a segregated ghetto where they would be forced to pay rent for 1-room cement houses without running water or electricity, so they termed the new living area Katutura and posed a mass demonstration that ended rather bloodily and badly for them. In 1990, by the turning of God, Namibia gained independence from the South African Administration. Consequently, a lot of effort was put into improving the Katutura area infrastructure, and residents were allowed to either buy their homes at low cost or were simply given their homes. By 2006, Katutura had become a popular point of arrival for rural migrant workers seeking a new urban life of opportunity, with approximately 600 new people arriving every month to an area with a population of 150 000. Katutura was hard pressed to provide even basic housing and sanitation for the newcomers. The Old Location remains the most desirable real-estate of Windhoek, with infrastructure and property value decreasing the further away from it and closer to the outer edge of the Katutura district a person goes. Nevertheless, today, provisioned with more freedom and ownership for the area that now makes up 2/3 of Windhoek, some of the locals have begun calling Katutura Matutura, which means, "The place where we want to stay." I heard a Christian College professor give a sermon on Katutura earlier this year. He stated that Katutura means, "The place where we will never settle," and emphasized the people's desire to move out of Katutura towards the interior of the city once they had found appropriate employment to support them. From this, he admonished Christians to be like that in our faith- never content to just sit where we are, but to push forward, deeper; "Further up and further in!" if you prefer C. S. Lewis' wording (The Last Battle, p. 213). I think that was a worthy lesson. And yet. And yet, the people have renamed Katutura. There is a beauty to be noted from the changed name of the place by the residents themselves, manifesting a change of attitude toward their home borne of the transformation and redemption of their community. So where am I? Am I an ambitious migrant worker in Katutura, or a proud citizen in Matutura? The two places co-exist in Namibia, and perhaps I live in both worlds simultaneously also. I take pride in my work, and I generally feel satisfied in my roles of family connector, friend support, and young adult church leadership. In that sense, I am dwelling in Matutura. And yet. And yet, I feel time as the steady pull of a river moving past me, to unseen places I wish to go. But I don't have a boat to get there, and there's so much to do where I am that somehow I always run out of daylight before the opportunity comes to build my boat. The And Yet tells me I am biding my time in Katutura. What do you say, God? I say that right now you're training, and you need to be patient, but you also need to plan for the future. Keep fishing in the river where you are- you need to eat; yet, spend a little time each week working on your boat. You can't swim to where you're going. Or teleport. Teleporting is out.

Lament for Darcy

Dear Darcy, It's hard to believe you won't be there to greet me at the farm when I come to visit this go around. Mind, I probably wouldn't be visiting my Eastern kin so soon if it weren't for you. I expected to return for a funeral. I didn't expect it to be yours. I was never close to you, Darcy. You were 8 years older than me, and that always appears a big difference when you're a child. Moreover, you were a farm boy, and I was a city girl, and you got to see our grandparents every day, while I met them as if for the first time again every 4 years or so. You always seemed 5 steps ahead of me, but I really liked you. On one of the earliest visits we had that I can remember, you were friends with Nolan. The two of you made a giant pile of hay below the hay shoot in the dairy barn, then bravely jumped through the shoot 2 stories down to the pile of hay. I was a little bit horrified, and perhaps more than a little bit envious. The next time we visited, you were older; a responsible teen. Nolan and I made a pile of hay below the shoot, and you sighed heavily, a sigh of long-suffering, then called to our uncle Ted that, "The kids made a mess in the barn". Our mother taught us to make forts with the bales of hay instead. When we returned next, you had gotten older again; a good-natured youth. Nolan was old enough to work with the men, so it was just me, Melanie, and Chasey making forts in the barn. Chasey fell 4 layers down through a tunnel in the deeply stacked hay and landed on the rickety hatch to the hay shoot. It didn't look like it could support his meager weight very long. We couldn't reach him, and Chasey started crying, "Oh no, oh no, oh no!" You came to the rescue. With one of your long, lanky youth arms you reached down into the hole, said, "It's ok, buddy," and pulled Chasey out. When we returned for Grandma's funeral, you were a young man, broken-hearted. Rare among your contemporaries, you were deeply attached to your grandparents, even sharing the same home with them when you got married and started your own family. Even in your grief, you were genuinely hospitable. I will never forget Chasey's description of your introduction for your first son. Shy, he was nowhere to be found when we arrived. You wandered around the house, cheerfully calling, "Jackson? Jackson?" Until at last you opened a closet and found him cowering in a corner. Not missing a beat, you happily declared, "There you are Jackson!", and hauled the poor child from his hiding place to meet Nolan and Chasey. So proud of your young son. Most recently when we visited, it was for Grandpa's 90th birthday. Now an established adult, you proudly introduced us to Jackson's younger brother, Charlie- named for his great grandfather- showed us the beautiful renovations you had completed on the old farmhouse to make it new, and warmly offered us a place to stay in the house we had always used as home base when visiting, though our grandparents no longer lived there. You found honour in carrying on the family tradition of dairy farming on the original Perrinridge farm, where we had the party to celebrate the grandfather you still loved so deeply. It's hard to believe you won't be there to greet me at the farm when I come to visit this go around. Mind, I probably wouldn't be visiting my Eastern kin so soon if it weren't for you. I expected to return for a funeral. I didn't expect it to be yours. Your family was your whole world, and when it broke down you felt there was nothing left. I heard that you and Kristy were fighting, and that it was after she had left you experienced a mental break-down, and your final overwhelming despair. It's a hard image to envision alongside the snap-shots of you I remember. It hurts to picture you feeling so alone and hurt that you believed there was only one choice left to you. You made a decision you couldn't take back, and no one can change it for you. Wherever you are now, I know you are regretting that decision. Regretting never being able to play hide-and-seek with your sons again, Regretting not waiting to experience reconciliation with your beautiful wife, Regretting leaving your father to work alone on a dairy farm that will haunt him for the rest of his life, Regretting not seeking comfort from the One who made you, loves you, and died for you. I'm going to miss you, Darcy. "I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, and kill, and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full." John 10:9-10. Lord have mercy, Amen.

Grief Gears Turning, Present Images

(A) C.S. Lewis’ The Silver Chair: a long series of botched instructions that lead to a long series of much more difficult tasks and guilt. I had such great intentions of reading a lectio in the morning every day while I was on holiday, to properly focus myself on the actual meaning of Christmas. That is, the celebration of Christ’s arrival on earth and remembrance of all that his visit to Earth as one of us accomplished. On the few lectios I did, I discovered that my attention span for meditation has become significantly diminished. And, with no surprise, my lack of attention to my first priority wreaked havoc with my smaller Christmas goals. I missed my marks repeatedly: I forgot to include my amphibious bible in the Christmas back-pack I dropped off at the Mustard Seed, held too long onto West Jet buddy passes and thus let them go to waste, and neglected to complete my wedding gift thank-you notes and consequently had to suffer the pointed disappointment of one of Daniel’s aunts (the one who gave us the West Jet passes we wasted). Sigh. (B) I did succeed in my goal of going to the local pool for an assortment of low-impact fitness programs nearly every day I’ve been off work. My body feels much better. Moreover, the combination of yoga, deep-water workouts, and aquasize brought out some pseudo-spiritual experiences for me. I discovered that my grief has at last transformed from a snarly, unreasonable dog to the ocean. On our honeymoon, Dan and I stayed at a tropical resort along the Brazilian coast. When the tide was in, large, relatively warm waves would hit the sand and whoosh with inconsistent sucking power up onto the steeply sloped beach. We spent hours of blissful joy jumping in those waves, and getting sucked out into the ocean when we failed to keep our feet in place. It was intensely fun, and felt like we were playing with God himself…that is, that is how it felt until I started having a low blood sugar, at which point it would just seem scary, and annoy me by making my escape difficult. This is how memories of my mother come to me: in character, they are cheerful, fun, and loving, and that is usually how they make me feel; but every now and again they hit me hard like an unexpectedly large wave, leaving my eyes and throat burning, and myself nearly bruised. But it’s just a moment, and I’ll live.

Grief Gears Turning, Fifth Image

My green Car of Grace spinning out on the highway on the top of the Crowchild Trail overpass that crosses over Bow Trail. Miraculously, the lovely sportscar I side-swiped in my impatience only has a dent on its front fender, no one is injured, and I didn’t go over the guard rail or get hit by any of the on-coming traffic that my car is now facing. And the nice police officer who arrived at the scene only gave me a ticket for making an unsafe lane change, when he could have also ticketed me for not having my license on me. However, my brilliant plans of getting out of debt with gazelle-like intensity are way-laid: I’m way too shaky to go to work for a relief shift, so I’ll make no extra money this pay cheque; my car has some ugly new dents in it to broadcast my shame as an unsafe driver; and soon my insurance company will no doubt find it expedient to increase my monthly car insurance payments. Well, there it is: The Sign of Aravis from C. S. Lewis’ A Horse and His Boy. I got a good lashing for my wrong-doing, but at least now I know God still cares and is engaging with whatever I’m doing.

Grief Gears Turning, Fourth Images

(A) A very small, solitary wolf crying alone in a very big wilderness beneath a very white, large, cold moon. I try to worship and find the words stuck in my throat. I start to pray about situations outside of my control, things that I used to just talk to God about habitually. I get ½ way through and then stop when I remember that we’re not talking because I don’t have confidence You’ll do anything. It’s lonely not talking anymore. (B) Mae’s Brink of Disaster song sings me a forewarning: “I'm on the brink of disaster Staring down the consequences To brake hard would be better Tonight I'll do what it takes to fail Going there only faster Jump the gun and throw it into gear But the fact of the matter’s: I'm out of control, asleep at the wheel Asleep at the wheel I'm out of control, asleep at the wheel.” I ignore the caution, bite my thumb at God, and continue crying while driving and fish-tail frequently.

Grief Gears Turning, Third Images

(A) 3…2…1… and the anesthesia wears off. A nearly rabid dog who has just come out of surgery, is in pain, and ready to bite the arm off of anyone who comes near. That dog is me. I listen to angry heavy metal music when I drive, and speed often. Rabbi Harry Kushner wrote a book called When Bad Things Happen to Good People. I have not read that book, and probably should do so before I comment on it; however, today I am going to be lazy and just recite what I remember of Kushner’s summary of his book from a t.v. interview I once watched in a Spiritual Disciplines class taught by Charles Nienkirchen. In that interview, Kushner explained that he wrote his book after his son died prematurely of a very painful and debilitating disease, which caused physical and emotional suffering that seemed entirely out of proportion to any wrong-doing by Kushner’s son or Kushner himself. Kushner noted that after the loss of his son he extensively studied the book of Job. Job is about a righteous man (named Job) who experienced every kind of suffering known to man while being tested by God, but was ultimately restored. Kushner rejected that book. As he put it, “There’s no way to replace loved ones you’ve lost with new ones. God’s gift of a new family to Job did not, and could not, make up for the family God had taken from him.” Kushner’s revelation on the problem of pain was thus that some things God does are inexplicable to the human mind and you just have to choose to forgive God for perceived injustice. I reject that thesis. I can’t believe in a God who is imperfect and makes unholy mistakes that I have to forgive, just as I can’t believe in a God who is so wimpy that he wants to do good but just isn’t powerful enough to do it. I also have way too much solid theological training and too many direct experiences of God’s goodness and power to convince myself that God is evil, unengaged, or non-existent. And so I am stuck in a world where the only true happiness, the only real purpose or meaning to be found is to be a worshiping and obedient creature of my creator, and I don’t particularly want to be such right now. I try to read C. S. Lewis’ Surprised by Joy and The Problem of Pain. I can only read very short pieces before I get too angry, because it says reproachful things to me like, “I have no other good to give you”. I persist because Lewis repeatedly admits that much of what he has to say is simply based on Christian theological teaching and he has as hard a time following his own writing as anyone who is bound to read it. I don’t understand why God would make my sweet, loving mother suffer so much, or take her so early from a world that needs to experience her kind of warm acceptance and love. A Small Voice asks me who I am, that I demand to never know the pain of loss like every other human being ever born on broken Earth. The small voice also condescends to point out the blessings that I received which are not given to all who suffer similar losses: memories of a mother uncomplicated by abuse, anger, or bitterness; a large family that pulled together in their grief; a supportive husband who doesn’t smother me, but gets me to laugh as needed; financial stability and a positive work environment that allows me to take the time I need to myself; the assurance that some day I will get to see my mother again, alive and whole and full of joy. I tell that voice to Fuck Off. Unfortunately, I don’t believe that is a prayer recommended or sanctioned anywhere in the Bible. I instantly regret it. (B) The image of King Saul, surrounded by demons that torment his mind, abandoned by the Spirit of God, comes to mind and leaves me feeling cold.

Grief Gears Turning, Second Images

(A) A storm trooper magnet that reads, “Regret: Those were the droids you were looking for.” I was in the right place at the right time, but not paying attention to the right things. Acts of care for my mother were never enough to ease her suffering. She couldn’t eat, drink, sleep, stand, walk, sit, or stay awake. I wanted desperately to make her laugh, to distract her from her pain for a moment, but I couldn’t think of anything funny to say. There’s nothing funny about cancer, and I couldn’t focus on anything else. I was at my mom’s bedside for her final breath, and I missed my mom’s last smile at me because I was too busy frantically texting, calling, and finding all my other siblings to come immediately even though it was clear they’d never make it in time. (B) A merciful shot of anesthesia to a deer hit by a truck on the highway: I felt only relief at my mother’s escape from pain, and a tranquil sense of purpose as I supported my family, hosted out-of-town guests who had come for my mother’s funeral, and participated in funeral arrangements. I remember the song I Can Only Imagine (by Mercy Me?) coming on the radio moments after my mother’s passing into the arms of Christ.

Grief Gears Turning, First Images

(A) The sadist with a curved blade who likes to do some cruel knife twisting on my insides every time I look at my mother’s painful body. I went to visit my mom’s family a week before my wedding. It was bittersweet chocolate to me. On one hand, it was so beautiful and restful to spend time with my mother’s siblings and father, building my own connections with them so that when she passes away I won’t lose contact with them, or by extension, with my mother. There’s so much of her in them, so much rich memory. My mom has been the Switzerland of her siblings, nieces, and nephews; able to provide unbiased, confidential empathy, opinions, and mediation in a way the others could not, limited by their geographical closeness to each other. On the other hand, it filled me with sorrow that I was able to go visit my grandfather for his 90th birthday party when my mom, who so deeply desired to, was unable to. She didn’t think she could handle both the flight to see him and the strain of my wedding, and she chose to be present at my wedding. (B) Two deer bounding across a field beneath a rainbow in the middle of a very cold and windy rainstorm on the worst day of the biking pilgrimage Dan and I went on two summers ago. People who came to visit my mom, help with chores around the house, provide personal care, pray, or send meals, gifts, cards, or e-mails of support: all these acted as the face of God in a dark place for us. Bits of light, hope in the midst of exhaustion and frustration.