Girl on the Metro

Another story ... This time from my first fiction class ...

Girl on the Metro

1.

Hello ... A whole month and I’m still walking around on glass. But people wouldn’t believe me if they knew, even though they see me every freakin day.

You know, I’ve always hated the phrase, “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Those words give way too much credit to humanity methinks. Seeing to believe? How much do we really, really see? Shouldn’t people really say, "I’ll believe it when somebody can show me rock solid evidence, when it actually matters to me?" Leave a message at the tone … beep …

People see every moment. Yet no one can surely, truly believe what they see. No one recognizes people for what they are, or the experiences they wear on their skin like a tattoo. No one seems to ask for a name today because no one can see right in front of them, much less remember a few moments later. Why bother with formalities when there isn’t even time to look at someone. Anything can start with a hello, can’t it?

There is not-a-one, yet we all continue to see and place people in the tidiest of boxes, the emptiest of labels, in the simplest way. Fat Guys, Hot Girl, Baldy, Wino, Ugly, Gangster, Skinny Chick, Mother of Seven, Dude, Lesbo, Baldwin, Dead, Zombie. The list goes on and on and on, some names more interesting than other ones. Some seem more intimidating.

I have the honor and privilege to be one again for you today good, kind-eyed Sir.

Pleased to meet you, I’m just the “Girl on the Metro.” (But I would feel much more interesting if I were The Zombie.)

2.

I see you every day, week after week, but have not spoken to you. You’ve seen me every day, week after week, but have never spoken to me. I haven’t said more than two words to anyone on this train for a while now. It doesn’t matter to you how this damsel ended up here in Metropolis, boarding the “E” every day of the week at seven in the morning. It doesn’t matter why I prefer to stand instead of sit, even though my orange JanSport pack weighs over twenty pounds. Heaven forbid I have to sit down by someone. Sheesh!

You never wonder how I can afford that mauve leather bag I clutch to my chest, or the handmade canvas protected by two sheets of cardboard I snatched from outside by the dumpster. It seems to bother you that I don’t wash my hands, like I’m some kind of Street Waif. But I do wash! Two, sometimes three or more times a day, under scalding hot water until I turn cherry red.

Don’t worry good sir, its only pure pigment from mixing tempera on my fingers. Egg yolks are good for the skin you know, though I probably can’t say the same for the pigment. Now, if you could get past the stains, you would realize how enjoyably soft they really are. You can only guess I’m one of those Crazy Bohemian Chicks, minus the dreadlocks. You think you know the ones; they don’t eat meat and brazenly dance naked in the rain shamelessly. WooHoo! Rain exists to dance off the ground don’t ya know. There you go seeing again. Knock it off! Sheesh! Why do I have to be so discombobulated … so wary … so quiet when I find a guy interesting …

For a spell, maybe you just chalked it up to my wearing headphones. Possibly that’s why the girl is so silent. Oh no! Don’t worry. It’s not an attempt to ignore anyone (well, yes it is), it’s just my way of performing the unapproachable ‘Girl on the Metro’ you’ve got locked inside your head.  Sir, Maybe I didn’t have the cash to plug them in to anything, so I just make up the songs in my head. Take it as my Mad Bohemian Poet nature and not anything too important. I wouldn’t want to ruin your image, you know. The phones keep out unwanted questions – no one wants to bother with someone who shows as much interest in them as they do in me.

I see you Metro Boy between Glitter Girl and the Man with the Magazine. I can’t help but feel tense from your chance casual looks my way. You have a smile that could brighten my day, making it about the only thing I see as natural and untainted in my stained world. My heart is going b-dump, and begins to gallop. Still you continue with your discreet glances. Still I catch myself beginning to blush with every look you take. Does he think I’m pretty? Does this count as an admirer I wonder … Or perhaps I just look weird? Trying to act natural, not daring to take in your profile, well not too much. A peculiar and wonderful muddle of fear, hope and happiness churn within. You know, I really must find that necklace my guardian angel left behind! My fingers clutch tighter on the shiny hand rail as I turned to focus out a window towards the rear of the bus. The Bald Guy two seats back seemed unaware that my eyes were stealing his window outlook.

Everything looks grey out there ... The sidewalks, the windows, the roads, the sky. It’s wet too, the kind of damp that makes your Converse do the slight squeaking sound on the pavement thing. The grey pavements mind you. Then suddenly something’s there; colors that stand out against the grey! Spray paint, Art! Coming in from the outside and then knocks on the heart. Not sure what it says or means, but there is a history nonetheless. Maybe a Girl wrote that, or a Boy. Maybe Dropouts, maybe they’re Aspiring Writers. Possibly they’re Potheads, Photographers, or Freaks. Who knows? Who needs to know?  With art, everyone’s the same, and still not the same. I recognize the value of how I can ignore parts, yet let it pour out slices of me alike. Could it be a Lawyer maybe or a Lover? It may possibly be a Surreptitious Judge or ‘just’ an Offender? Hmmm …. Maybe it does matter. But hey, art is hard to interpret. Like people … Like the Metro Girls and Boys …

… Like me. I’m happy, quirky, kindhearted and caring. I’m also sad, lonely, depressing and barely here. I say every line is yet another note in my symphony of colors. I’m all sorts of broken pieces, insecurities, and half-finished characteristics fleetingly blended together, here to give a little shading to the surroundings. I’m in the bargain bin, the finished product will be sent out next Thursday if you please. In the end which is more real? The little ole me that everyone sees every single day, or the one that only I know? What is seen, what you all think you see, is not what’s in front of you. You see what I want you to see, what I want you to see. And that girl is not me. I hate her! If seeing is believing and I only appear when the lights are out or the doors are all closed, why doesn’t someone start banging on the door! Come on; get a crowbar … something … anything! Yeah, maybe it does matter.

I wish that you’d get the nerve to ask me why you rarely see me smile, to investigate me. I’ve always had this fantasy, a sweet dream really, of someone being so kind as to inquire. They’d take me away from this routine “E” train ride, to somewhere quiet and ask me if I was okay, ask me anything. Ask me over coffee perhaps at the cute little French Café on the corner. Yes, that’s the ticket, that’s how it would happen.

“I see you every day and I never see you smile. Are you okay?”

I’d slowly shake my head. No words yet. Can’t look anxious. I’d stare at the swirls in my coffee. It feels hot on my fingers, fighting the temperature of my vintage country mug. I puff on the steam rising in spirals.  “It reminds me that I want to shower again.”

There. Now I’m interesting.

“How come?” And then it would happen, “Tell me …”

But you won’t …

Best for me to build an uninviting fence I tell ya. No one would care to climb over or crawl under it when they think they know what is on the other side of it. Like a nasty Rottweiler snarling, licking its chops or something. No one will know I have a story. And if no one knows, I don’t have to tell it. So I’ll reserve myself until my time comes. I was stupid to think you could see Sir. I don’t blame you. You’ll just go on knowing nothing about me and its best it probably stays that way. What was I thinking? Hell, I don’t even like coffee!

I don’t want anyone to see anyways, unless they are willing to look. It would only be then that it would be worth the risk of seeing a face without seeing someone’s back again. Suppose what you will, I’ll always be ‘that’ girl to you Sir. Kind, reluctant and forgettable. You don’t have to listen, oh no you don’t. In fact I know that you won’t. I’m just that Bohemian Girl on the “E”. You know all there is about the Girl on the Metro, don’t cha now.

But you know nothing about these: The Survivor girl, The Abused, The Sick, The Beaten, The Hurting, and The Muse. Therefore, my good Sir, you know so little about me. You don’t have a clue about the nights I spent under my bed and under those men in whom I should have been able to trust. Do you understand what it feels like to be bent in half or snapped in two? Wham, bam, thank you mam. Do you Sir, have a clue what it feels like to not feel truly human. I open my mouth as if to say, “You’re still beautiful.” But we both know that’s not true. And the thought makes me want to cry, just a little, but I hide it so very well.

It really is wrong of me to think that because you see me every day that you are responsible to dig at me, and find the better parts of me. I shouldn’t think that of anyone. Everyone has secrets that they long to hide, hoping that they will not be exposed by anyone. Burying them in the backyard, veiled behind umbrella drinks in festive colors, and keeping them behind meaningless conversation, hidden by flowers and barbeques. I am the secret and I want to be free. I want to be known! I want to get rid that that girl who pretends to be me, sweet, gentle, smiling and ever so kind. The one you forget about when you are in the same room as them, and on the same goddamned train every day.

Goodbye Sniper. Do not think I owe you anything, and you’ll forget all about me and the words I’ve never said. I’m ready to break the rules of the ‘Girl on the Metro’. I wish you would make an effort, I’m so tired of being ‘hard to get’. I’ve tried to call out for so long but can never find my voice. No one is listening again today anyway; they only believe what they see. Well you know they all see me, why aren’t they looking?

The “E” slows to a gentle stop in front of the Café Toi et Moi. It’s her stop. Beneath the Tuesday morning traffic, the laughter of the teens in the back, and the flurry of activity of the fellow Metro-ites clambering to get on and off the train, there was a voice. It was a cautious masculine voice reaching towards the Bohemian picking up a handmade canvas, protected by two sheets of cardboard.

“See you tomorrow.”

3.

I gather my ‘art’, dangling my bag over my shoulder. I didn’t look back as I stepped of the train into the milieu. Nor did I look back as the train drove off down its tracks, leaving the busy sidewalk as my companion. I dare not see what look his face might show, apprehensive at what emotions his eyes would betray. Does he find me interesting? Or would his face reflect disgust? Or worse yet, it would be nothing at all. Better to live in uncertainty, than face what his face might display. Now I can save my hopes, fears and anticipations, for perhaps the next train ride.

The “Girl on the Metro” walks a few paces, peeks in the toy store window and then abruptly stops. Suddenly apprehending, and nearly getting rear ended by another bumbling pedestrian with an unpleasant word or two to say in the process.

Was that “See you tomorrow???” Hello …






Cafe Toi et Moi = Cafe Me and You

The Violinist's Wife

Here is a story I written for a Fiction class at school I would like to share .... Enjoy! .... Let me know what you think!

The Violinist’s Wife

     Theodore is holding her intimately again, gently and warmly, as he has held her every single day for several weeks now. Without a doubt she is his one true love. From the doorway of his studio I stand back and watch him embrace her. I covet the way he lays her body against him, the way they seem to seamlessly fit together, the way they seem to be made for one another. Eavesdrop on her scream and whisper in crescendos, singing high, low, and every note in between. Teddy told me before we were married that he couldn’t possibly love another more than me, but I’m afraid I just can’t see it. He absolutely adores her. And truth be told, how can I deny him the pureness and beauty of his love? When he glides his bow over her strings, the singing of the vibration, the burning of the notes, there is nothing else like it. Theodore’s violin is the woman he pines for, the one he desires. Late at night after we make love, I know her harmony fills his dreams.

     

Theodore is playing in legato enhanced by vibrato, the notes flow like streams, one over another. As I lean against the entryway to watch, I see he is unwilling to part from her. As I turn to leave, he sees me from the corner of his eye, and looks up abruptly. He is still sliding the bow across her strings, his fingers hovering over the delicate curve of her neck. He pauses …

      

“What is it Carly?”

      

“Oh … Nothing.”  I recognize my reply is fragile.

     

He narrows his eyes. “Sugar? You seem …” Whatever it was that he thought I seem he doesn’t finish. He exhales and turns back to the sheet music in front of him. “I should practice a while longer. Why don’t you get dinner started?”

     

Oh sheesh! I nod. Dinner. It’s what the violin cannot provide. I turn reluctantly to go to the kitchen. The music resumes to breath over me. The sound is so clear it fills my chest. I long to be Theo’s violin, I ache to be a part of it all. I never have had the head for the wonders he and his violin can create. Although I love it, when I tried my hand at music, I could not throw myself fully into it with passion. Writing was more my thing. Now I wish that I could, to save myself from the loneliness. When Theodore is not creating music with her for himself, he is performing for the Philharmonic.

     

His love for her has taken him farther than his love for me ever could. Far, far from me. The music he makes is so beautiful; I can sense his romance with her with every single note. The slow concertos are like a fairytale love story, in which you anticipate the prince to find his princess. When Theo plays a daring suite, I can see the dancers in shimmering dresses throw sparkles across the spotless polished wood dance floor, the stuff of storybooks. That is the potency of their love.

     

I know that it is silly, always very silly, to be resentful of an inanimate instrument. Who could I tell? Who would listen? But she seems to be alive under Theodore’s touch, and he is unwilling to part from her. From the studio, I can hear the mood of the piece he is playing flawlessly change. The notes rise and become sharp and quick. This new melody is upbeat, almost has a bounce to it. The bow slides quickly, the violin moans from pressured strings, notes tremble in the air, breaking silence into sparkling shards.

     

Ambling into the kitchen, opening the refrigerator, I realize how low we are on anything that can remotely call healthy. We, well mainly he, make good money. However, he is so preoccupied with her, he hasn’t bothered to grocery shop, and I have been swamped for the past month. Today, really, has been the first day I haven’t had pages to mark up, change, and re-edit for all of January. Releasing a weary sigh, I walk towards the front door of our flat.

     

“Theo,” I shout.

     

The music continues to spill out of the studio.

    

“I’m going to the grocery store,” I continued perfunctorily, knowing that my words were drowning under the melody. His performing is ceaseless. I turn and gather my coat from the nearby rack and grey scarf. I open the door and stare. The hallway is nippy. *sigh* I have zero desire to shop. I quickly realize. I have no desire for anything. I step back and close the door. I do have a desire. I want my husband back. Theo has been seduced by the magic and mystery carried in his music. Biting my lip, I turn away from the door and toss my scarf and coat on the floor. I proceed towards his studio. He has paused momentarily, and is leaning over the gorgeous mahogany violin to scribble a few notes to himself. He looks up and sees me in the hallway.

       

“I thought you were going shopping?” He sweeps a strand of hair that has fallen loose from his ponytail behind his ear.

     

“I’d rather you came with me.” The words fell out quietly. “It’s freezing outside, and the city is so…” my voice trailing off when I see the look on his face. “Forget I said anything,” I say stupidly. What the hell else can you say to a musician?

     

But the look he gives me is not what I expect. His eyes hold me captive. It brings to mind the first time he caught my look from the stage long before we were married. He was playing a Paganini Violin Concerto.  And I remember the way he played her, as if just playing for me, just me alone. The auditorium dimmed, the symphony orchestra became soft, and it was only he and I and the music. The sound ... of the violin ... so brittle and innocent ... with a touch of bittersweet and longing ... made my heart ache and remember ... many things. She was not a figure at all, but an instrument for our love. I believed we glowed that night. The intensity of the gaze he is giving me, in silence, is the same but, I cannot read its intention. I am anxious about what he will say to me.

     

“I’ll order out and go shopping tomorrow, ok?” My voice is pleading, I’m not sure what for …

     

Theo breaks his look and nods, “That’s fine.” As I turn to go, he begins to play differently now. He is playing her spiccato, hitting her strings with his bow, notes being bounced off. The song he is playing sounds downcast, yielding eerie memories. My mind conjures up the impressions of storm clouds, amassing to form a funnel over some distant plain.

     

I leave the room and wander down the dimmed hallway. Our flat is considerable, painted in warm tones of deep red, and muted orange.  We’re the sort that decorates with fresh cut flowers and candles, and with paintings blended so beautifully with colors, and no lines to tell me who I should be or where I have to end. But despite all of our best efforts, there is a chill in the place that apparently cannot be lifted. Even Theo’s love for his violin can’t exorcise the concealed threads of ice. I pick up the phone and speed-dial the number for the pizza parlor a block and a half away. I order a large half- California Club and half-Hawaiian. Sometimes compromising is the easiest. And besides, I don’t want to interrupt the music any more than I can help it. But damn …

     

I decide to head for the bathroom right across the hall from me. It has a large, spacious bathtub, the kind with the soothing jets. I scarcely ever use them, but their comfort is not lost on me. I usually shower, so I don’t waste valuable time I could be spending on changing tenses, and amending ‘there’ to ‘their’ on a sloppy manuscript. Besides, this bathtub seems to be full of memories.  I turn the handle and soon steam rises off silken water, with bubbles floating through the air. Sitting on the side of the tub I take my slippers off and dip my feet in the water.

     

It was just about a year ago from this very place that I had rushed to show Theo the plus sign on my pregnancy test. He had loved me then, and he had loved the new life inside of me. Two and a half months later I felt something was terribly wrong, so I crept to the bathroom. Soon enough I had discovered it; blood, lots of it. I knew I was losing it. You can’t lose this much blood and expect it to still be alive, still be breathing … of course not … it is impossible. The pain, the cramps, they were unbearable, the vomiting, the dizziness, all of it ... too much to take. I took some medicine, lay in the bed, and eventually slept the rest of the day and night out.

     

The next day I spent the entire afternoon in this tub, contemplating how my body had become a tomb. I was devastated and inconsolable. Theo had sat on the toilet next to the bathtub, leaning over me, rubbing my hand. There was nothing for it, nothing was said. He left the room and silently came back with his violin, and sat there and played. Quietly weeping, the violin moans from pressured strings. He played for me then, but I think he was playing for himself as well. The notes fill my chest as my tears would not stop. His music has always been where he has thrown himself, and the way he played her that day, we shared the lamentation. Before long, tear drops stain the mahogany one by one …

     

I would not return to that day for anything, but he used that violin to love me. Now he only loves her. I suppose I cannot blame him. After that day, several months later, I had another. Children cannot grow inside of me. It’s like I was poison to them! And it was Theo who became inconsolable. He had never verbalized he wanted children, not aloud, anyway. But he way his face lit up when I told him, and the way he played when they passed from me … I knew how very much he aspired to be a father. Perhaps that is why he prefers her to me. With his violin he can create. She is superior where I have failed. Sometimes fate is so cruel.

   

I turn off the jets and kick my feet softly in the warm water, Theo’s playing has stopped. I hear the front door shut.  There is silence for a moment. Then I hear footsteps coming closer to the bathroom.

    

“I guess you didn’t hear the door Hun. It’s on the counter if you want any.” He pokes his head in the doorway then pauses before speaking. “Carly, is something wrong?”

     

I look down at my feet making small ripples in the water and finally shake my head.

     

“Have you … Have you been crying?”

    

I keep looking at my knees above the bubbles and don’t answer. I want him to take me in his arms and hold me, but I know very well that he won’t. I wait a few seconds which feel like minutes. At long last he grips he door face, tightly, before turning away. “Don’t let it get cold,” he says half-heartedly as he begins to amble down the hall.

    

He never eats in the studio so I know that he is sitting at the table, or at the very least hovering over the counter. I get up to rinse my hair then drain the bathtub. Dinner together, even in this state is more appealing than the alternative, dinner alone. I step out onto the floor. “Crap! There are no towels.” While puddles form around my feet, I slip on my robe that was still hanging from the door, and proceed to make little footprints on the hardwood floor as I walk to the kitchen and dining area.

     

As I supposed, Theo is leaning over the kitchen counter, munching on a piece of Hawaiian while looking out the window at the wall across the alleyway. He has a plate set out for me beside the pizza box. I open and take out a piece of the California Club. Trying to smile at him, and then giving up, I pick off a slice of avocado and pop it in my mouth, taking the plate and the pizza to the table.

    

“Carly?” he says after a while.

     

I look up at him. He walks up to the table and sits across from me, a vase of tired Peonies between us. He’s got the look on his face of a man grasping for words. He seems to mentally shrug and continues, “The new piece is difficult. I keep getting distracted, slipping into older pieces. More natural I suppose …”

     

I nod slowly. “It sounds nice from what I can hear.”

     

“It’ll be better when I can play it smoothly, of course”

     

I stare at my plate, picking at the peppers and chicken distractedly. Then I stand up. “Do you want anything to drink?

     

“Yeah … Sure … Is there any orange juice?”

    

Opening the refrigerator, I am again instantly reminded about how low our supplies are. “I guess I really should have gone shopping. There isn’t any.” I pour two glasses of water and bring them back to the table. We both sit. We both eat. Neither of us speaks.

    

“How is the manuscript going?” Theo asks after wiping his face on a napkin.

     

I shrug. “There’s nothing to write home about.”

    

“Well maybe you should!”

     

“What???”

     

Why don’t you actually take up writing instead of just tearing other people’s to pieces? You always can find just the right words!”

    

The suggestion strikes me. I’ve thought about it many times, but the excuses then begin, real and imagined, and those in between, to avoid actually doing it. “Oh please,” I say, trying to sound casual and amused. “One artist is quite enough in the house.”

    

“I’m sure you would be good at it!”

    

I shake my head. “No … No … I’m … I’m content.”

     

“But are you really happy?”

     

I force a smile as I look up at him. “When I am not, I know that this too shall pass. You should just be concerned with getting that piece prepared in time for the Spring Concert.”

     

He rises and picks up his plate and carries it to the dishwasher with a sigh. After standing for a moment he turns and says softly, “It’s not a piece for the Spring Concert.”

     

I cannot hide my confusion. “Are you not playing? You are almost always first chair. You are expected to be there. You can’t possibly be thinking of sitting this one out!”

   

“I can be!” he declares, rubbing his bottom lip with his long thin musician’s fingers. “Come here.”

     

Theo takes my hand and leads me back to his studio and sets me down on the window seat, the one with the decidedly better view. With extreme care he opens the violin’s case, and lifts her by the neck-gently. Caressing the smooth varnish upon the carved surface, he lifts her to his shoulder, and the tension heats. Horse hair placed at rest upon strings. All thoughts leave my head. With a silent sigh of anticipation, and an inward breath and preparation, with a flicker of light in the dark of clover eyes, he begins to play. I have heard him play all day, but this time he has made it clear that he wants me to listen. And so I do.

     

Describing the composition without poetry would be hard not to do. The violin plays my soul as my heart glides across the strings. The beat of my existence represents a sad tale, of loss, pain, and suffering that can only be freed through the expression of string and bow pressure momentously singing notes. There is a passion, an immense terrible passion that overcomes me, it crescendos throughout my being. I can see it in the shift of his expression, in the concentrated frown of his mouth and in the sincerity of his half-closed eyes. I could almost hear the words in every touch. The song trails off into a sweet, deep melody, and then jumps up into lightness with sudden staccato.

    

I’m sure that this piece is not one I’ve heard before, but there is something intimate and familiar to it. It wraps around me, filling me with is deep vibration. I feel the song binding me up, but softly, carefully. What makes Theo’s playing different I realize, is that he is not playing it to hear the sounds she makes. He seems to be waiting for something in the playing, and when he is finished, he looks up at me. The decrescendo lingers in the air.

    

“That was … That was …” I begin standing up.

     

“For you.” He said quietly. “Carly, are you going to leave?”

    

“Wh-what?” my voice stumbles.

     

“I’ve seen the way you … Like he rooms you are in no longer matters. Like you are planning to get out, to get away … Of all of this.”

    

I am taken aback. I look down toward my toes and shake my head. Looking up I reveal, “I don’t know Theo. I’m going around and around in circles.”

     

He puts his violin back in her case and closes it as she has completed playing her part in this. Then he takes my hand and pulls me close. We embrace, and the warmth of it that rushes through me is far greater than any music, or perhaps borne of it. Holding on to him, and bury my head in his chest. My heart is beating fast, allegro. I could swear I am hearing symphonies …

September 11, 2011

As we look forward to our week of remembering 9/11, I offer the following hymn of peace for your consideration today.

“…and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war anymore;
but they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree,
and no one shall make them afraid,
for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken.” (Micah 4:3-4, ESV)

I can’t believe its coming on 10 years since that day. I think the real message in September 11 is that there is a lot of pain and anger in the world. This world really needs hope and love. This morning I finished reading Philip Yancey’s “Where is God When It Hurts?” and he had something in there that startled me. In India only 3% of the country is Christian, yet Christians in India are responsible for 18% of the health care. In India when you ask someone what they think of when they think of a Christian, they think of love, compassion and graceful health care to the poor. Wouldn’t it be great if it were like that in the United States?

God of peace, bring your peace to our violent world: peace in the hearts of all men and women and peace among the nations of the earth. Turn to your way of love those whose hearts and minds are consumed with hatred. Amen.

... Never throw out anyone!

http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&section=&q=Audrey+Hepburn#/d16vjnm

A really great quote I came across today ...

“People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone.”

~Audrey Hepburn

Amen!

the Good, the Bad, the Ugly: The Grace thing revisited ....

Just an observation … I think can be demonstrated again and again, especially what one sees on the news, that what many are comfortable saying to an unbeliever, we aren’t comfortable saying to a Christian. But the bottom line is … The Gospel is for Christians, too! We all love the story of the Prodigal son. Have you thought about what goes on the day after the party? What if the son messed up again in a week? Or even in a couple of days. What if he doesn’t live the life of a grateful son much at all? Or to be more lifelike, what if he sometimes does and sometimes doesn’t act all that grateful? Does that change the Father? Does the older brother get to come back into the story and say “Aha!! I told you so; I was right all along!”

The thing is that our brothers and sisters can be a combination of the good, the bad, and the ugly. And Christ died for the sins of Christians too. And we need to hear that over and over again! We all need that grace to continue on the path of ‘glory to glory’! Grace is a word that describes how you feel before you kiss someone. I think it's like when a bird decides that it can fly. Lets dispense that grace to our brothers and sister so they can realize they are about to take flight!

I will be there for you ...

A quote I just had to share ...

"No one enjoys walking people through dark valleys or through painful reactions, but love says, I will be there for you. I may not know what to do or what to say. But I just cannot let you go through this alone!"

~Wayne Jacobsen

Love & Wild Irises

With Valentines Day coming up I would like to place this, one of my most favorite of poems, out there. Ideally, love should be spontaneous and unexpected but the reality can be very different. The daily dreary routine of family life destroys the spontaneous give and take of true love. It gets completely choked and suppressed by the dull monotonous and boring duties of daily household life like cooking a meal for the family, feeding the baby or taking the clothes to the cleaners, becoming a chauffeur ... Susan Griffin captures, in a very moving way, the feelings of many people who yearn for true love which is as spontaneous and reinvigorating as the sudden and unexpected blooming of the wild iris after a thunder storm. However, it is not meant to be that love should die down, but blossom into something greater!

Love Should Grow Up Like a Wild Iris in the Fields

Love should grow up like a wild iris in the fields,
unexpected, after a terrible storm, opening a purple
mouth to the rain, with not a thought to the future,
ignorant of the grass and the graveyard of leaves
around, forgetting its own beginning.
Love should grow like a wild iris
but does not.

Love more often is to be found in kitchens at the dinner hour,
tired out and hungry, lingers over tables in houses where
the walls record movements, while the cook is probably angry,
and the ingredients of the meal are budgeted, while
a child cries feed me now and her mother not quite
hysterical says over and over, wait just a bit, just a bit,
love should grow up in the fields like a wild iris
but never does
really startle anyone, was to be expected, was to be
predicted, is almost absurd, goes on from day to day, not quite
blindly, gets taken to the cleaners every fall, sings old
songs over and over, and falls on the same piece of rug that
never gets tacked down, gives up, wants to hide, is not
brave, knows too much, is not like an
iris growing wild but more like
staring into space
in the street
not quite sure
which door it was, annoyed about the sidewalk being
slippery, trying all the doors, thinking
if love wished the world to be well, it would be well.

Love should
grow up like a wild iris, but doesn't, it comes from
the midst of everything else, sees like the iris
of an eye, when the light is right,
feels in blindness and when there is nothing else is
tender, blinks, and opens
face up to the skies.

~ Susan Griffin ~

(Like the Iris of an Eye)

YOU Are Accepted

A quote to remember this evening ... and always! Have a blessed evening everyone!

"Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life. It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for perfection does not appear, when the old compulsions reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage. Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a great voice were saying: "You are accepted. You are accepted, by that which is greater than you..."
~Paul Tillich



“Grace must find expression in life, otherwise it is not grace.” Karl Barth

A God Who Can Kick Tush

Just some thoughts ...

I cruise around a lot of Christian sites from time to time and this observation has struck me of late ... God in general seems to be pictured as, for lack of a better word at the moment, "nice." There seems to be a want for a God that provides but not one really who meddles in our lives. A God who protects but never demands, never judges, keeps His distance ... This nice God doesn't seem to say much but greeting card slogans. Sheesh! A God who is basically a wimp!

But the fact of the matter is God is not just nice. God is a consuming fire! Although He cares for the sparrow, the fragile, the hurt, He just isn't all that pampering. God's main business isn't getting us the best parking spaces at the mall or otherwise make us nice and comfy. His main business is making us holy which requires the niceness .... And sternness of our God.

Let me share this verse from Exodus 20:20, "Do not be afraid, God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning." Do not be afraid ... Only a God we fear, and yet not be afraid of can make our hearts burn with a passion. The God who truly is, who seeks after you and me is far more loving and comforting than the "nice" God depicted seemingly everywhere. He is also more fierce and fearsome than this "scorekeeper" God of those who threaten us with damnation with every misstep and misthought. His anger is not just irritability ... Its the distillation of His justice, His hatred of evil.

This is what we want, even demand from a good God. A God who can kick tush and maybe even spank our own when necessary... A nice, kindly old man type of god could never drive us to our knees in desperate prayer. He could never set us up on our feet in fierce determination ready to roll. A nice god could never inspire fervent worship, awe or sacrifice. The nice god is someone easy to dismiss unless we want or need something. How can we possibly explain a God that has His Son die a cruel, bloody death for us with a picture like that? God demands all ... In Hebrews it says its a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Yet the thing more dangerous than that is to NOT fall into His hands! God may not be all sweetness and fluff ... But He is good!

Just wanted to throw this out there ...

Yours Are The Hands

St. Teresa of Avila as a foundation for ministry:

‘Christ has no body now on earth but yours/No hands but yours/No feet but yours/Yours are the eyes through which God’s compassion will look upon the world/Yours are the feet with which God will go about doing good/Yours are the hands with which God will bless others now.’

Tim …. Pondering this ….

Be Ye Perfect!

Jesus says "Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48). What is that supposed to mean? Like, that's impossible, right?

In fact there are a number of contradictions in this section of the Bible, part of the Sermon on the Mount ... until you look further. For instance, Jesus speaks of loving your enemies. I've always thought that to be contradiction because if you love someone they are no longer your enemy, but of course, He is saying that although you may love them, they still don't love you. The enemy bit is pretty much in their court not ours.

Further along He says that when we love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, we do it "in order that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven". So does that mean that if I don't love my enemies, I can't be a child of God anymore? No, I don't think that's what He's trying to get across. What He is saying is that God loved me when I was His enemy, and so if I am a true child of God, then I'll behave in the same way. I am to be my Father's Son. I am to see things the way God sees things. When I do that I am doing all that God calls me to do.

But then Jesus goes on to say something absolutely off the wall to me. Or at least at first glance it is ... Lord, you go on to say "Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect". That's going too far! I'M NOT PERFECT, Lord. You know that I fall short of this. So what are you trying to say? Your standard is way too high for me!

But then when you think about it, God couldn't have very well said to me, "Just do your best, and I'll accept that." A perfect God doesn't give me an imperfect standard to live by. God wouldn't lower His standards to accommodate us would He?

I guess when I love my enemies, then I participate in something that is part of God's perfect character. I do something perfect in His strength, but I still don't get to that kind of standard in the everyday part of my life. I still get it wrong at times.

Its time to look at how Matthew uses the word "perfect" in this passage. "perfection" in the original Greek has the idea of "complete." In other words"capable of doing everything that God calls us to do"

Colossians 2:10 (NLT) says "So you also are complete (or "perfect") through your union with Christ, who is the head over every ruler and authority."

"Perfect" (teleios from télos = goal, purpose) means "one who has accomplished the intended goal (telos)." If something accomplishes what it is designed to do, it is said to be perfect (teleios). A child is imperfect in the sense that they have not yet grown to full maturity. So telios is often translated as "mature". When something is fully developed then it is said to be perfect. So Telios has the idea of "being complete."

2 Corinthians 5:21 (NLT) says, "For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.:"

When I trust in what Jesus did for me on the Cross, then I am complete. God sees me as righteous, ie in right relationship with Him, as perfect and complete, as forgiven of all my sins. Instead of seeing me, He sees what Jesus did for me, and so I stand before Him AS PERFECT.

That doesn't mean I'm going to be perfect in my everyday relationships. I'm never going to be perfect in that way. I get it wrong all the time. But as the Lord works through me, I live out the kind of life He wants me to live. I am complete. I am doing all that God has called me to do, and in that sense it is PERFECT and I live in a way that is holy and acceptable to God. It is a journey of perfection that we are taking.

Philippians 3:12-16 (NLT) explains it further,

"I don't mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us. Let all who are spiritually mature agree on these things. If you disagree on some point, I believe God will make it plain to you. But we must hold on to the progress we have already made."

Jesus is our perfect standard for life and faith, and as I live it out then I display glimpses of the perfection of God in my life. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 (NLT) says, "All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work." The Kings James Version says "That the man of God may be PERFECT, thoroughly furnished unto all good works."

"YOU THINK YOU'RE SO PERFECT!" Well, as a matter of fact, we are ... In Christ.

We need to forgive one another for not being God!

I found this quote interesting and wondered what you thought. Tim

Forgiveness, the Cement of Community Life

“Community is not possible without the willingness to forgive one another “seventy-seven times” (see Matthew 18:22). Forgiveness is the cement of community life. Forgiveness holds us together through good and bad times, and it allows us to grow in mutual love.

But what is there to forgive or to ask forgiveness for? As people who have hearts that long for perfect love, we have to forgive one another for not being able to give or receive that perfect love in our everyday lives. Our many needs constantly interfere with our desire to be there for the other unconditionally. Our love is always limited by spoken or unspoken conditions. What needs to be forgiven? We need to forgive one another for not being God!

Visit HenriNouwen.org

A Plethora of Quotes on Love

What is love to you?

I found this on another blog ... Love: a temporary insanity, curable by marriage.

Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings.


Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking together in the same direction.

Love is a choice you make from moment to moment.

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking.
It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.


Love, like truth and beauty, is concrete. Love is not fundamentally a sweet feeling; not, at heart, a matter of sentiment, attachment, or being "drawn toward." Love is active, effective, a matter of making reciprocal and mutually beneficial relation with one's friends and enemies. Love creates righteousness, or justice, here on earth. To make love is to make justice. As advocates and activists for justice know, loving involves struggle, resistance, risk. People working today on behalf of women, blacks, lesbians and gay men, the aging, the poor in this country and elsewhere know that making justice is not a warm, fuzzy experience. I think also that sexual lovers and good friends know that the most compelling relationships demand hard work, patience, and a willingness to endure tensions and anxiety in creating mutually empowering bonds.

For this reason loving involves commitment. We are not automatic lovers of self, others, world, or God. Love does not just happen. We are not love machines, puppets on the strings of a deity called "love." Love is a choice -not simply, or necessarily, a rational choice, but rather a willingness to be present to others without pretense or guile. Love is a conversion to humanity - a willingness to participate with others in the healing of a broken world and broken lives. Love is the choice to experience life as a member of the human family, a partner in the dance of life, rather than as an alien in the world or as a deity above the world, aloof and apart from human flesh.


Love is anterior to Life
Posterior to Death
Initial of Creation, and
The Exponent of Earth


Love doesn't make the world go 'round; love is what makes the ride worthwhile.

Love is only half the illusion; the lover, but not his love, is deceived.

Love does not die easily. It is a living thing. It thrives in the face of all of life's hazards, save one -- neglect.

Love is the strange bewilderment which overtakes one person on account of another person.

Love is a promise, love is a souvenir, once given never forgotten, never let it disappear.


Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very important. (Something I'm trying to remember in math class!)

In reality, in love there is a permanent suffering which joy neutralizes, renders virtual, delays, but which can at any moment become what it would have become long earlier if one had not obtained what one wanted, atrocious.

Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century.

Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into friend.


Love vanquishes time. To lovers, a moment can be eternity, eternity can be the tick of a clock.


Love is the only bow on life's dark cloud.
It is the Morning and the Evening Star.
It shines upon the cradle of the babe,
and sheds its radiance upon the quiet tomb.
It is the mother of Art,
inspirer of poet, patriot, and philosopher.
It is the air and light of every heart, builder of every home,
kindler of every fire on every hearth.
It was the first to dream of immortality.
It fills the world with melody,
for Music is the voice of Love.
Love is the magician, the enchanter,
that changes worthless things to joy,
and makes right royal kings and queens of common clay.
It is the perfume of the wondrous flower -- the heart
and without that sacred passion, that divine swoon,
we are less than beasts;
but with it, earth is heaven
and we are gods.


Love is a condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.

Love does not alter the beloved, it alters itself.


Love is blind, but friendship closes its eyes.

Love doesn't just sit there like a stone; it has to be made, like bread, remade all the time, made new.

Love is never lost. If not reciprocated, it will flow back and soften and purify the heart.

Love, I find, is like singing. Everybody can do enough to satisfy themselves, though it may not impress the neighbors as being very much.

~Author Unknown pontificating ...

Kindness

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you every where
like a shadow or a friend.

~ Naomi Shihab Nye

Violet Forgiveness

“Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.”

~ Mark Twain