Bright Death
On weapons and weeping and chasing the sun.
This morning I noticed the Walnut tree (my favorite elder) had turned to gold. I swear it happened overnight. It’s among the last to leaf out in Spring, and one of the last to give up its green come Fall. I watch it hold out and then I watch it hold on for dear life. (A mirror.)
October has shocked me once again with her their1 brilliance. Autumn is famously not my favorite season, a particularly hot take for a Midwesterner. For you it might mean sweater season, PSL, fires and hikes and if you’re lucky, a pot of soup. I hear you! You know my dedication to soup and you darn well know I love warm socks. I just have trouble overlooking the fact that it also means putting the garden to bed – yanking the hardiest cosmos out by their roots and tossing them to the curb. It means I’m going to be cold for many months. Soon, darkness will descend before dinner.
I’m always mad at Fall until its beauty breaks me.
The summer George Floyd was murdered, someone I love said they were choosing to “focus on joy.” Days later, someone else I love asked how I was doing and I said something like, “Anyone who is ‘good’ is not paying attention.” I was accused of being ungracious. Maybe I am always looking for trouble. But if we can’t be honest about the perpetual grief of being alive, I’m not sure we’ll make it. Acknowledging it is both the least we can do and absolutely mandatory.
We used to get breathers between bad news. It was always rumbling from nearby streets and distant shores, but it was so much easier to avoid the fault lines. 6:00 pm was Bad News Hour. We digested grainy clips of war with full bellies. Disaster arrived sandwiched between commercial breaks. And then we turned it off until the next day.
It’s different now. The template shattered when we weren’t looking. Now, beauty and grief and wind and sun and delight and sorrow and concern and indifference and peace and war co-exist on a regular Tuesday.
Trauma has worn down our defenses. We’re raw. And then there’s the personal stuff. No one foresaw that illness, that death, that divorce. We didn’t know to brace ourselves for shattering sunny days when the bottom would fall out anyway.
On Tuesday I watched through my cracked bedroom windowpane as a child played soccer with his mom. The cherry tree watched too, blushing amber. The little boy squealed as his mama did her best to keep up. It’s not supposed to be 75 degrees in Indiana’s October. Nothing is supposed to be this way.
All I could think was, we are all that mom, reaching for what matters right where we are, an invisible string tying us to things we do not have the power to control.
On Wednesday I sipped mocha lattes with a friend while drizzle glazed the street. “I miss my kids… It’s too loud to sleep at night… I always give those guys food even though I’m not supposed to… The Judge is over me and I don’t blame her… This time is different… Can I get a ride in the morning?”
All I could think was, we are all that mom, juggling hope and reality, asking for what we need, offering what we can, believing there’s enough for everyone if we throw what we have on the community table.
The neighbor’s Gingko dies bright outside my kitchen window while bombs split the skies in Gaza, in Israel, in Ukraine, in Russia, in South Sudan, in Syria… My lunchtime arugula is dressed in a flawless maple balsamic, draped in sheets of parmesan the size of dollar bills. My friends tide themselves over until tomorrow’s free lunch. Dinner simmers on my stovetop while other wives waste away over missing husbands. Other mothers sit in the dark, breaking crackers into crumbs.
I’m not an expert on international diplomacy, climate change, homelessness, the criminal legal system, or keeping my own house clean.
I only know the world is screaming.
I only know the world is sparkling.
Life thrums with terror and intoxicating light. It is not naïve to hope for peace, justice, or grime-free grout.
How do we carry it all? We open our arms wider. We reach further.
We keep looking through the broken glass, expecting to see beauty.
We sit knee-to-knee with those whose lives are unfairly hard and learn to apply their light to other shadows.
We comb the gardens, stare at the sky, and don’t take it personally when our kids are unruly. We light candles for other people in other lands with our eye fixed on our very own streets.
We let life’s wild too-muchness seal our fates.
What I’m Reaching for Today
Fall break Friday. We had pastries for breakfast and took the kids on a reluctant nature walk. I brought home approximately 80 leaves, which I plan to string into a garland like it’s 2013.
Putting this computer away before 5pm so I can watch Next in Fashion with Ruby River while we eat our cozy dinner on the couch.
Dropping off a bag of poblano peppers to my neighbors.
Reading more than one chapter of Counterfeit2 later tonight in bed.
Ruminating on Sunday’s sermon (and letting myself feel my feelings about that particular complexity)
Grabbing the last of the basil from the garden before October changes their mind and whipping up one more batch of basil aoli.3
Trying something new before it’s too late.
Postscript:
I wrote most of this email two days ago. I was standing in my kitchen later that evening when I heard about the most recent mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine. One room over, my child was laughing at something silly. Since then, I was stung by a bee and ate lemon meringue pie. A friend called me this afternoon with news so good, she was crying. Two hours later, she texted me with news so sad, she was crying. On we go, friends. Near God and each other. Reaching and stretching and leaning for our lives.
I have several non-binary people in my regular life, one at work. We are doing our best and making mistakes along the way. It’s harder for some of us than others. It has me rethinking my urge to gender things for no apparent reason. I love an impromptu personification! I also want to practice they/them. This is me practicing. Someone recently said to me, “But I don’t understand!” My response? “You don’t have to understand. You just have to honor them.” And by the way, I think honoring people for all they are - just as we honor the complexity of everyday lives - has a way of helping us understand.
This book is fun and light so far! But the real reason we’re in the footnotes is to remind you that I use affiliate links for both Amazon and Bookshop. Purchases made with my links toss a small percentage my way, at no additional cost to you.
Guess what? The basil already packed up and headed home. But we’re still having BLTs!
I love that you are trying (i.e. pronouns) - I am, too! Our youngest kid is nonbinary & for whatever reason using they/them, as well as their new name, is more challenging to me than when our oldest came out transgender. Why it was easier to use she/hers & her new name is a mystery. But I am trying because it’s important 🥰
Thank you for this, Shannan. I’m sorry about your basil.
I wrote a couple of short poems about grief in 2020. Life seemed simpler and more complicated then...
Grief and hope play here
with our hearts and with our strength.
There is no winner.
and
Grief lives here, but not
quite alone. There are others.
Good companions.