Oh, Happy Day!
Monday was an unexpected day off for me. I read Seth Godin’s The Icarus Deception, talked on the phone with dear friends, meditated over my ongoing jigsaw puzzle, and decided to use flowers for my blog post today.
Apr 30
A Puzzling Time
Boston is still reeling from a week ago Monday’s bombing at the marathon. Most everyone I know is exhausted … with an emotional hangover, really. It feels to me a lot like how New York City felt right after 9/11 even though pundit after pundit has sworn that it’s nothing like 9/11. Except … I was there.
The death of one and the capture of another teenage terrorist are over, but that really doesn’t help. Nor does it help that it “only” took five days. I’ve discovered that about all I can do is work the jigsaw puzzles which I have used to meditate for years.
I got to thinking about the puzzling messages of the media over this experience. Did anyone else notice the shift in their language? From “vicious, evil attacks” to “teenage terrorist?”
Lost? Yes.
Misguided? Yes.
Wrong? Yes.
Sad? Yes.
Devastating? Yes. Especially to those directly affected by their actions, not just at the marathon but, for some, for the rest of their lives.
I’ve now lived through two of the major terrorist attacks in our country, less than a mile from both. Why? No idea. Not really.
I have no choice but to repair to the principles by which I live my life:
because it’s in my consciousness.
It’s got to be. Terrorism lives in me. Or, really, terror lives in me. Otherwise I wouldn’t have the receptors to perceive it.
I’m very weepy, sad about all sorts of things. Few subjects keep my attention. I slip from one thing to another aimlessly in my house. I try to nap and fail. Packing lunch for this week, wondering about those who are in rehab, or in hospitals still recovering, praying for the remaining, living perpetrator of this dreadful event. I can’t really read, or focus on writing. Someone just slammed a door in the building where I live, and I jumped clear out of my skin.
It’s a puzzling time.
I know that after 9/11 we all worked very hard to go back to “normal” (whatever that is) as quickly as we could. Bostonians are doing the same, but our city isn’t normal right now. Neither is our world. It’s scary and disorienting as a result. I know I’m not the only one.
The only guarantee of solace I have is prayer which I find myself doing more and more.
Prayer: for good out of evil, for blessing for us all, for healing, for the restoration of peace, for gentleness, for kindness for all.
I know our way of life was attacked. I know too that more evil doesn’t change what happened. Only goodness does that. Prayer is goodness at its root. That’s why I pray.
If you’re a praying sort, please join me.
The Slow Lane
I know I claim this all the time but it’s really true. I am the only person who drives the speed limit on the Mass Pike—including cops and state troopers and sheriffs!
That’s why I liked this aphorism, “Healing happens in the slow lane.”
I usually drive in the middle lane on the Pike so that the speed demons and state troopers can whip past me and so can the on-ramp folks who aren’t up to speed just yet. Still, it’s so true about healing. It’s a process, first and foremost, and a slow one at that.
In fact, hurry and healing are antithetical really. It’s not that they don’t go together, it’s that they can’t go together. It amazes me sometimes, working with medical doctors, how their patients demand instant curing. Docs search for years for language to express this small but vital truth.
Beloved, be patient. Healing happens in the slow lane.
The thing is: if you will be patient, and let healing really occur, it’s often for keeps, and that’s what makes the patience worth it.
Seeds XV, 16
