I start chemo today, so of course this is what I'm thinking about:
I'm stringing together some ideas from John O'Donohue and Parker Palmer which are helping me see the heart of fundamentalism, and realize that this sort of stream can take many forms.
In speaking about the richness of language and how it gives voice to a culture and people's rich history, O'Donohue says this: "When strangers intrude and take over what is not their own, everything in the place reminds them that they do not belong there. Their guilt and unease can be assuaged by making the take-over as clean and thorough as possible. They must control everything. This is what a colonizer does. Our Irish language was targeted in this way. “
I think of how much of the history of evangelism reflects the same effects as colonialism.
And, "Given the sense of homelessness in modern life, there is anxiety and fear and a tendency to prescribe a style of belonging that has no self-criticism and wants to corral longing in fixed, empirical frames. This is fundamentalism. Fundamentalism is false longing and forced belonging. Unable to read or decipher the labyrinth of absence, the homeless mind often reverts to nostalgia. It begins to imagine that our present dilemma, rather than being a new threshold of possibility, is in fact a disastrous fall from an ideal past. Fundamentalism laments the absence of the time when everything was as it should be. Family values, perfect morality and a pure faith existed without the chagrin of question, critique, or the horror of such notorious practices as alternative lifestyles or morality. Such perfection of course never existed. (Note: This reminds me of how I used to say our church relished the 1850's and the 1950's. That was the golden age...unless you were a woman or a black person.) Neither experience nor culture has ever been monolithic. Fundamentalism is based on faulty and fear-filled perception. It constructs a fake absence, the absence of something that never in fact existed in the first place. It then uses this fake to demand a future constructed on a false ideal. Fundamentalism pretends to have found an absolute access point to the inner mind of the mystery. Such certainty cannot sustain itself in real conversation that is critical or questioning."
Isn't that something? Nostalgia for a life that never existed? Lamenting the loss of a world that never was? Isn't that like every moral sermon you ever heard?
Christianity doesn't do that. Instead, it is homesick, or homeless now because it is longing for a world that "will be". It isn't missing a time that was and was lost, it is waiting for a promised time (Parousia?), that is now but not yet. One is a sorrow with dismay. The other is a sorrow with hope.
People who live on the borders are gazing toward the future, on the "threshold of possibility". But to the fundamentalist, they are somehow seen as the ones who have brought an end to the past ideal, and they are dangerous.
"Fundamentalism does not converse or explore. It presents truth. It is essentially noncognitive. This false certainty can only endure through the belief that everyone else is wrong. So it is not surprising that such fundamentalism desires power in order to implement its vision and force the others to do as prescribed. Fundamentalism is dangerous and destructive. There is neither acceptance nor generosity in it differences with the world. It presumes it knows the truth that everyone should follow....Blind loyalty replaces critical belonging. Creative and mystical individuals within an institution become caricatured as the enemy; they become marginalised or driven out."
"A community which is driven by power or too great a flurry of activity and talk will never achieve much more than superficial belonging. The attempt to force community usually drives the more creative and independent people away."
And then here are some ideas from Parker Palmer about the culture of an organization. He is speaking about the shadows that cast themselves over a group, especially leaders. Insecurity which devalues the position of others to gain more self worth, the idea that the universe is a battleground forcing us to live competitively, functional atheism which leads us to impose our will on others, and then this:
"A fourth shadow within and among us is fear, especially our fear of the natural chaos of life. Many of us are deeply devoted to eliminating all remnants of chaos from the world. We want to organize and orchestrate things so thoroughly that messiness will never bubble up around us and threaten to overwhelm us (for messiness read dissent, innovation, challenge, and change). This shadow is projected as rigidity of rules and procedures, creating an ethos that is imprisoning rather than empowering. (Then, of course, the mess we must deal with the prisoners trying to break out!)"
"And the final shadow is the fear of death itself. Leaders who participate in this denial often demand that the people around them keep resuscitating things that are no longer alive. Projects and programs that should have been unplugged long ago are kept on life support to accommodate the insecurities of a leader (or leaders) who do not want anything to die."
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Time and Place Books
I have several authors in my past who have written what I would call "Time and Place" books. Their words have come to say something vital to me in a particular time, when I was in a particular place. Had I read them earlier or later, it might not have been so meaningful. But in a particular moment, something in the experience of the author speaks to something in me ("deep calls to deep", I believe we call it).
Melanie had come upon Glenstal Abbey in Ireland, and was reading Mark Patrick Hederman, among others. Another writer surfaced, who was a friend of the abbey. His name was John O'Donohue, an ex-catholic priest (which I resonate with), theologian and poet. He died not long ago at the age of 52. Now we've read quite a bit of his collection, but the book that sang to me was "Eternal Echoes".
This is one of my notations from a section in that book:
I was stringing together a few thoughts from J O'D this morning about being open to others.
First, he quoted this, that "you never step into the same river twice." In a moment, both you and the river are different.
Second, he spoke of the power of naming something. "The name is the doorway to reverence. We need to exercise great care and respect when we come to name something. We always need to find a name that is worthy and spacious. When we name things in a small way, we cripple them. A name should never trap a thing." "Oh, he does this...she does that." This is setting limits.
Third, "expectation is resentment waiting to happen."
I was thinking about how I love to name things because it gives me a certain sense that I understand that thing or person. It gives a sense of control. As soon as I have named or labeled them, I have closed them off. Like before, I have created a fiction. The fiction protects me, or it enhances my own view of myself by reducing the other.
Being open, I suppose, is knowing that each person, even one I am closest to, is a mystery. I never step into the same river twice. They have changed and so have I. I have trapped them when I name, label, categorize. These labels create expectation, and when the person breaks free of my expectations, I am resentful.
The sad thing is that when I close myself to another, they will in turn remain closed to me. And I have robbed myself.
Melanie had come upon Glenstal Abbey in Ireland, and was reading Mark Patrick Hederman, among others. Another writer surfaced, who was a friend of the abbey. His name was John O'Donohue, an ex-catholic priest (which I resonate with), theologian and poet. He died not long ago at the age of 52. Now we've read quite a bit of his collection, but the book that sang to me was "Eternal Echoes".
This is one of my notations from a section in that book:
I was stringing together a few thoughts from J O'D this morning about being open to others.
First, he quoted this, that "you never step into the same river twice." In a moment, both you and the river are different.
Second, he spoke of the power of naming something. "The name is the doorway to reverence. We need to exercise great care and respect when we come to name something. We always need to find a name that is worthy and spacious. When we name things in a small way, we cripple them. A name should never trap a thing." "Oh, he does this...she does that." This is setting limits.
Third, "expectation is resentment waiting to happen."
I was thinking about how I love to name things because it gives me a certain sense that I understand that thing or person. It gives a sense of control. As soon as I have named or labeled them, I have closed them off. Like before, I have created a fiction. The fiction protects me, or it enhances my own view of myself by reducing the other.
Being open, I suppose, is knowing that each person, even one I am closest to, is a mystery. I never step into the same river twice. They have changed and so have I. I have trapped them when I name, label, categorize. These labels create expectation, and when the person breaks free of my expectations, I am resentful.
The sad thing is that when I close myself to another, they will in turn remain closed to me. And I have robbed myself.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Monday Update
Here's the latest...
The weekend was mostly recovery from the surgery. We got home late in the day friday. Sunday we had a quick run to the Emergency Room because of an air under the skin issue. (Hard to explain, not anything to be worried about.) The Housholders joined us there and Andrew kept things moving along, for which we were thankful.
Today we saw Dr. Posey. Because of the timing of the chemo study labs and the surgery on my lungs, we are not going to be able to be in the study. However, that puts control of the chemo more into Dr. Posey's hands. That said, we will start this Wednesday on the same drugs that we would have used in the study. (The big difference is that the study won't be paying for all that.)
So...chemo starts this Wednesday, and we go every Wednesday for three weeks. Then we take another scan to see what's happening. (We're starting a month to the day from when we found out about this cancer.)
We're working on dietary changes and resting up. Looks like the fight is on.
The weekend was mostly recovery from the surgery. We got home late in the day friday. Sunday we had a quick run to the Emergency Room because of an air under the skin issue. (Hard to explain, not anything to be worried about.) The Housholders joined us there and Andrew kept things moving along, for which we were thankful.
Today we saw Dr. Posey. Because of the timing of the chemo study labs and the surgery on my lungs, we are not going to be able to be in the study. However, that puts control of the chemo more into Dr. Posey's hands. That said, we will start this Wednesday on the same drugs that we would have used in the study. (The big difference is that the study won't be paying for all that.)
So...chemo starts this Wednesday, and we go every Wednesday for three weeks. Then we take another scan to see what's happening. (We're starting a month to the day from when we found out about this cancer.)
We're working on dietary changes and resting up. Looks like the fight is on.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
More on Benedict's Care of the Sick
From The Rule of Benedict/ Insight for the Ages by Joan Chittister:
Benedict says: Let a separate room be disignated for the sick, and let them be served by an attendant who is God-fearing, attentive and concerned. The sick may take baths whenever it is advisable, but the healthy and especially the young should receive permission less readily. Moreover, to regain their stremght, the sick who are very weak may eat meat, but when their health improves, they should all abstain from eat as usual.
The abbot and prioress must take the greatest care that cellarers and those who serve the sick do not neglect them, for the shortcomings of disciples are their responsibility.
Joan Chittister writes: Care for the sick, in the mind of Benedict, is not a simple warehousing process, though that in itself could have been a great contribution to a society without hospitals. Care for the sick, In Benedictine spirituality, is to be done with faith, with attention, and with a care beyond the technical. The infirmarian is to be 'concerned.' Baths, a very important part of Roman therapy and hygiene in a hot and sticky climate, and red meat, a treat used only rarely in early monastic houses both because of its scarcity and because of its purported relationship to sexual agitation, are both given generously and recklessly. Care of the sick, you see, is done in the name of God and to the person of the suffering Christ. Nothing was too much. Nothing was to be spared. Nothing that coudl do good was to be called forbidden.
We have to ask ourselves, in a society of technological health care, how much of it we do with faith and lavish attention and depth of soul and a love that drives out repulsion. We have to ask ourselves how willing we are to take a little of our own energy on behalf of those who are no longer the life of the party, the help on the job. How much of our own precious time do we spend on those with little time left?
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Some thoughts on what is true
I think I wrote this in 2008.
You can't get here from there
We used to use the term “paradigm shift” a good bit to describe dramatic changes in the way one would see the world. I also remember the term “watershed”, and in that image I picture a dam that is holding back water that suddenly bursts, and the water crashes out. That is close to describing what I think and experience in the way ideas take a hold of a person…and to somehow explaining how I suddenly find myself in such a different place than I inhabited just a few years ago.
I heard Amy Grant (of all people) once say that she had a jar of ocean water in her room as a child. She imagined what the ocean was like and could probably describe something of it. But then in her late teens, she went to the beach for the first time. She was awestruck. It was nothing that she had imagined…it was so much more. It’s not that the jar of water wasn’t some fragment of what “ocean” is, it’s just that it doesn’t begin to encompass it. The moment she steps from the car, sinks her feet in the sand, runs to the water’s edge, feels the iciness of the waves, or just simply sees it, breathes it…it’s a watershed.
One of my favorite thoughts about truth was the Hebrew idea that if something were true, it would hold water. It wouldn’t collapse or burst when you put pressure on it. In fact, it would expand when it was filled. If it eventually burst, then it wasn’t true.
I have previously described my thoughts and beliefs like horses at the starting gate. Imagine that I had built a horse track. And the gate was a framework for all that I believed- sort of a systematic way of organizing my thoughts-and restraining them. It’s sturdy and it’s locked. But then, these wild and powerful horses are led into each stall. They snort and kick and butt the gates. They are contained until someone rings the bell and opens the doors. Then “they’re off!!!” Once they run, there is no stuffing them back in, and that gate no longer holds them. You just have to ride it out, see which horses carry you to the finish, or see which ones might even break out of the track and run away (or which horse will just stop short and start eating the grass). You don’t know until they are free.
I recently heard in interview on NPR with the author of the book “Shop Class as Soulcraft”. I’m fuzzy on detail, but he said he finished a PHD in philosophy and went to work at a think tank in Washington, believing that he would get to pursue ideas and logic- sort of a free-for-all of thinking. But instead, he found that the organization had already established an acceptable set of conclusions, and his job was to reason backwards to find suitable premises that would always lead back to those conclusions. In other words, there was a set framework, and they used all their powers of reason to make sure that the framework stayed in tact (that the horses never left the gate). He quit and opened a motorcycle repair shop.
Charlotte Mason, an English educator, said that when we only deal in “fact” and not living ideas, that we are not even really dealing in those facts. We will stop short of them for fear of going beyond them. Living ideas will burst through “facts” all the time as new exploration and discovery change the way we see, and constantly bring forth new connections.
In my old denomination, we had a framework for describing the world. It was contained in several documents, in particular, a confession of faith. (We expected people to have a paradigm shift when they became Reformed, we just never intended that anyone would have another one after that.) We said our primary source of belief was the Bible, but it was really only seen through the Confession and the other documents (we mostly used the Bible to validate the Confession, but seldom to question it). I, through regular and long study of these documents, found many beautiful things…ideas that were planted in my mind like seeds. But with each idea came many questions as well. These questions begin to paw at the gate. For a very long time, a strong gate can contain all the ruckus, but at some point, you have to ring the bell. Horses were made to run.
A glass of water, a starting gate, systematics- they all contain something of what is true, but they are static and they are dead. I suppose you could put the jar of ocean water in the fridge, then pour it over your head to get something of the experience, but it can never replace that first running dive into the icy surf. It’s one thing to bring someone ocean water and then say, “let’s go to the beach”. It’s another to hand them a jar and say, “this is the ocean. Don’t ask questions.”
All this to say, I had a framework that I studied, taught, defended, and reasoned backwards from. But more and more, it could not contain either my questions or my experiences. Finally the gates opened and all Hell broke loose.
To be fair, I didn’t just calmly ring the bell. I brought about my own demise as a pastor and hurt a lot of people in the process. I can hear people saying (because I have said this about others myself), that I have changed my views on things as a convenient way to rationalize my own sin. “He is deceived”. That may be true (if one were deceived, how would one know?). Nevertheless, I have had a watershed, and there is no going back. There is no stuffing where I have come experientially and theologically back into the jar. I make no claim to being wiser. I’m just on this wild horse and I can’t stop it.
But I hear one voice all along saying, "Do not be afraid." Christianity did not collapse just because we figured out that the earth revolves around the sun. If it does give way, then what was the point in the first place?
You can't get here from there
We used to use the term “paradigm shift” a good bit to describe dramatic changes in the way one would see the world. I also remember the term “watershed”, and in that image I picture a dam that is holding back water that suddenly bursts, and the water crashes out. That is close to describing what I think and experience in the way ideas take a hold of a person…and to somehow explaining how I suddenly find myself in such a different place than I inhabited just a few years ago.
I heard Amy Grant (of all people) once say that she had a jar of ocean water in her room as a child. She imagined what the ocean was like and could probably describe something of it. But then in her late teens, she went to the beach for the first time. She was awestruck. It was nothing that she had imagined…it was so much more. It’s not that the jar of water wasn’t some fragment of what “ocean” is, it’s just that it doesn’t begin to encompass it. The moment she steps from the car, sinks her feet in the sand, runs to the water’s edge, feels the iciness of the waves, or just simply sees it, breathes it…it’s a watershed.
One of my favorite thoughts about truth was the Hebrew idea that if something were true, it would hold water. It wouldn’t collapse or burst when you put pressure on it. In fact, it would expand when it was filled. If it eventually burst, then it wasn’t true.
I have previously described my thoughts and beliefs like horses at the starting gate. Imagine that I had built a horse track. And the gate was a framework for all that I believed- sort of a systematic way of organizing my thoughts-and restraining them. It’s sturdy and it’s locked. But then, these wild and powerful horses are led into each stall. They snort and kick and butt the gates. They are contained until someone rings the bell and opens the doors. Then “they’re off!!!” Once they run, there is no stuffing them back in, and that gate no longer holds them. You just have to ride it out, see which horses carry you to the finish, or see which ones might even break out of the track and run away (or which horse will just stop short and start eating the grass). You don’t know until they are free.
I recently heard in interview on NPR with the author of the book “Shop Class as Soulcraft”. I’m fuzzy on detail, but he said he finished a PHD in philosophy and went to work at a think tank in Washington, believing that he would get to pursue ideas and logic- sort of a free-for-all of thinking. But instead, he found that the organization had already established an acceptable set of conclusions, and his job was to reason backwards to find suitable premises that would always lead back to those conclusions. In other words, there was a set framework, and they used all their powers of reason to make sure that the framework stayed in tact (that the horses never left the gate). He quit and opened a motorcycle repair shop.
Charlotte Mason, an English educator, said that when we only deal in “fact” and not living ideas, that we are not even really dealing in those facts. We will stop short of them for fear of going beyond them. Living ideas will burst through “facts” all the time as new exploration and discovery change the way we see, and constantly bring forth new connections.
In my old denomination, we had a framework for describing the world. It was contained in several documents, in particular, a confession of faith. (We expected people to have a paradigm shift when they became Reformed, we just never intended that anyone would have another one after that.) We said our primary source of belief was the Bible, but it was really only seen through the Confession and the other documents (we mostly used the Bible to validate the Confession, but seldom to question it). I, through regular and long study of these documents, found many beautiful things…ideas that were planted in my mind like seeds. But with each idea came many questions as well. These questions begin to paw at the gate. For a very long time, a strong gate can contain all the ruckus, but at some point, you have to ring the bell. Horses were made to run.
A glass of water, a starting gate, systematics- they all contain something of what is true, but they are static and they are dead. I suppose you could put the jar of ocean water in the fridge, then pour it over your head to get something of the experience, but it can never replace that first running dive into the icy surf. It’s one thing to bring someone ocean water and then say, “let’s go to the beach”. It’s another to hand them a jar and say, “this is the ocean. Don’t ask questions.”
All this to say, I had a framework that I studied, taught, defended, and reasoned backwards from. But more and more, it could not contain either my questions or my experiences. Finally the gates opened and all Hell broke loose.
To be fair, I didn’t just calmly ring the bell. I brought about my own demise as a pastor and hurt a lot of people in the process. I can hear people saying (because I have said this about others myself), that I have changed my views on things as a convenient way to rationalize my own sin. “He is deceived”. That may be true (if one were deceived, how would one know?). Nevertheless, I have had a watershed, and there is no going back. There is no stuffing where I have come experientially and theologically back into the jar. I make no claim to being wiser. I’m just on this wild horse and I can’t stop it.
But I hear one voice all along saying, "Do not be afraid." Christianity did not collapse just because we figured out that the earth revolves around the sun. If it does give way, then what was the point in the first place?
This Blog
We're not exactly sure about the content of this blog. We will definitely be posting updates on the medical side of things, because so many have asked to be able to follow along.
At the same time, we are having a larger conversation...at least, I am having one in my own head. So, we will also post ideas that have struck us along the way. The last five years have been significant for Melanie and me, with plenty of fodder for discussion without this cancer coming along.
So, we may process a little bit on this blog, if you don't mind. It won't hurt our feelings if you only want to read the update sections.
At the same time, we are having a larger conversation...at least, I am having one in my own head. So, we will also post ideas that have struck us along the way. The last five years have been significant for Melanie and me, with plenty of fodder for discussion without this cancer coming along.
So, we may process a little bit on this blog, if you don't mind. It won't hurt our feelings if you only want to read the update sections.
Saturday Morning at home
The last few days are drowsy, but I thought I would recap them.
We went Wednesday to see the Thoracic (now I know what that means) surgeon. For some reason we thought he was going to knock out the lung/breathing issues that day, but it turned out it was just a surgical consult, and that I would be going in the next day for surgery. They were going to attempt a procedure where they put talcum powder on your lungs to make them seal up and prevent fluid from collecting. However, this didn't work as expected. So, plan B was to put a catheter in my lung that allows us to get rid of the fluid ourselves, in the comfort of our own home. I guess we just add that to the weekly chore list?
Anyway, we spent a day or so in the hospital for that. In the middle of a rush of some 100 people that came in and out of the hospital room, we had one nurse, Angela, who really did seem like an angel. Once, as they were wheeling me down the hall for something, she took my hand and whispered, "Highly favored! Highly favored!" She stood by the bed as we were about to go home, with tears streaming down her face, talked for ten minutes about the importance of each day. I said to Melanie afterward, that I thought I had read a lot of books to get try and understand what Angela learned from living and loving. Her last comment was, "Now, go comb that hair. It looks bad, and you don't want to go out of here looking defeated."
There were a number of skilled and helpful people who tended to us. You hope for a certain skill level when someone is opening any portion of your torso. Angela just stood out because she also offered us her presence, and we knew that we were on her mind (just like so many of you have shown us). That just helps us carry along.
So, recovery this weekend, then we see Dr. Posey again on Monday to get some sort of line on the chemo schedule.
We went Wednesday to see the Thoracic (now I know what that means) surgeon. For some reason we thought he was going to knock out the lung/breathing issues that day, but it turned out it was just a surgical consult, and that I would be going in the next day for surgery. They were going to attempt a procedure where they put talcum powder on your lungs to make them seal up and prevent fluid from collecting. However, this didn't work as expected. So, plan B was to put a catheter in my lung that allows us to get rid of the fluid ourselves, in the comfort of our own home. I guess we just add that to the weekly chore list?
Anyway, we spent a day or so in the hospital for that. In the middle of a rush of some 100 people that came in and out of the hospital room, we had one nurse, Angela, who really did seem like an angel. Once, as they were wheeling me down the hall for something, she took my hand and whispered, "Highly favored! Highly favored!" She stood by the bed as we were about to go home, with tears streaming down her face, talked for ten minutes about the importance of each day. I said to Melanie afterward, that I thought I had read a lot of books to get try and understand what Angela learned from living and loving. Her last comment was, "Now, go comb that hair. It looks bad, and you don't want to go out of here looking defeated."
There were a number of skilled and helpful people who tended to us. You hope for a certain skill level when someone is opening any portion of your torso. Angela just stood out because she also offered us her presence, and we knew that we were on her mind (just like so many of you have shown us). That just helps us carry along.
So, recovery this weekend, then we see Dr. Posey again on Monday to get some sort of line on the chemo schedule.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Julian's Prayer
Our dear priest visited us yesterday and gave us a copy of St. Julian's prayer - the context for our blog.
Author of the world's joy
Bearer of the world's pain
At the heart of our distress
Let the unconquerable gladness dwell
Holder of the heavy heart
Healer of the grief of change
Help us turn to you and know
All shall be well, all shall be well
And all manner of thing shall be well.
Author of the world's joy
Bearer of the world's pain
At the heart of our distress
Let the unconquerable gladness dwell
Holder of the heavy heart
Healer of the grief of change
Help us turn to you and know
All shall be well, all shall be well
And all manner of thing shall be well.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Thursday Very Quick Update
We are all settled into our beds here at UAB Hospital. Steve got a lung pleurx instead of a vat and is recovering with some nice meds. We'll fill in more over the weekend.....
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Wednesday night...
We went to get the lungs discussed today, and it looks like we're heading to the OR tomorrow morning. They are doing a VAT thing, and will repair the lung. I'll be in for about three days. That was a bit unexpected, but at least we will get to fix the plumbing problems.
I think we have now hit every registration desk at Kirklin Clinic.
If all goes well, we'll start chemo on the other side of this.
Thank you for so much love and support.
I think we have now hit every registration desk at Kirklin Clinic.
If all goes well, we'll start chemo on the other side of this.
Thank you for so much love and support.
Wednesday Quick Update
Today we take another run at solving the lung issues. So we'll go in this afternoon and see if we'll get some relief there. Then, if that goes well, chemo should follow soon after.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
If
This is the poem some of the teachers were mulling over this morning:
If
Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!
If
Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!
Monday, March 21, 2011
It's Monday
We spent a lot of this weekend with very good people. Saturday night several of my buddies came and sat on the front porch. Lots of tears, laughter, bourbon and a little bit of howling at that very large full moon. These are such good men and we all feel better when they are around.
Sunday we gathered around the family bed with a significant number of children and watched the Chronicles of Narnia, thinking about wonder and wardrobes. And then another dear couple came and sat with us for awhile.
That sort of time is enough for me.
It should a lighter doctor week, except Wednesday they are going to do something else with my lungs. They said it involves talcum powder. Don't ask me.
Sunday we gathered around the family bed with a significant number of children and watched the Chronicles of Narnia, thinking about wonder and wardrobes. And then another dear couple came and sat with us for awhile.
That sort of time is enough for me.
It should a lighter doctor week, except Wednesday they are going to do something else with my lungs. They said it involves talcum powder. Don't ask me.
Friday, March 18, 2011
St. Patrick's Day update
I love St. Patrick's, but yesterday we celebrated in mild form, eating Chinese food in the living room with a gaggle of our children and a few visiting friends. (One daughter, who shall remain nameless, was at an Irish Bar and I'm sure was representing me well.)
We began the day at UAB. Excuse my medical descriptions, but it's not my field. They wanted to put in some sort of port for chemo. I was thinking that meant another IV, but it was off to the OR. It's easy to give in to that sort of thing once they inject that drug into your arm. While laying there (or is it 'lying'?), they saw that the fluid was back around my lungs. So they called up Doctor Posey (our oncologist) and he said, "as long as he's just laying there, flip him over and drain him." So they did. That made 4 liters so far. That right lung is handy, and I do a good bit better when it's not squished.
OK, enough of that. I don't even like reading about it and it was my lung.
So, for now...
We're waiting for chemo to start, and they are trying to figure out how to get some sort of cork in whatever that fluid comes from.
Oh, and we did meet a second oncologist yesterday, Dr. Heslin. (We were referred to him by the Reed Foundation, thanks to RealtySouth and my broker John McGill.) He agreed that what Dr. Posey was doing was our best option to start off. So now we have a reliable second opinion.
At some point we'll have to narrate all our stories about the many people we've met at UAB so far. There are many angels, and there is a good bit of comic relief.
We began the day at UAB. Excuse my medical descriptions, but it's not my field. They wanted to put in some sort of port for chemo. I was thinking that meant another IV, but it was off to the OR. It's easy to give in to that sort of thing once they inject that drug into your arm. While laying there (or is it 'lying'?), they saw that the fluid was back around my lungs. So they called up Doctor Posey (our oncologist) and he said, "as long as he's just laying there, flip him over and drain him." So they did. That made 4 liters so far. That right lung is handy, and I do a good bit better when it's not squished.
OK, enough of that. I don't even like reading about it and it was my lung.
So, for now...
We're waiting for chemo to start, and they are trying to figure out how to get some sort of cork in whatever that fluid comes from.
Oh, and we did meet a second oncologist yesterday, Dr. Heslin. (We were referred to him by the Reed Foundation, thanks to RealtySouth and my broker John McGill.) He agreed that what Dr. Posey was doing was our best option to start off. So now we have a reliable second opinion.
At some point we'll have to narrate all our stories about the many people we've met at UAB so far. There are many angels, and there is a good bit of comic relief.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
March 15 Update
One of our priests suggested that it might be helpful for us to keep a blog or login to something like 'caring bridge' or something to keep our friends and family in the know concerning Steve's care and sickness, doctor's visits and updates. So, this little blog will be our attempt to do that.
I titled it 'all manner of thing shall be well' to remind us each time we log in to remember the words of Julian of Norwich's oft quoted phrase:
"All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well."
Here is our timeline since Steve's diagnosis:
March 2, 2011 - Steve has a CATscan at St. Vincents Hospital after a season of stomach pain. Pancreatic cancer that has metastisized to liver is suspected.
March 8 - our first appointment at UAB. Diagnosis confirmed. Steve's parents, our priest Glenda Curry and our good friend Donna Hannum were with us.
March 10 - our first appointment with Dr. James Posey, Steve's oncologist. We agreed to start chemo as a treatment.
March 11- Dr. Posey removed fluid (2 liters!) from Steve's right lung.
A look ahead -
March 16 - Steve gets bloodwork done to send to clinic trial to see if he qualifies for the chemo study.
March 17 - Steve has an appointment at 7 AM to get his port put in.
Week of March 28 - chemo to start. The chemo treatment is Gemcitabine, combined with one other drug if we are part of the trial. This course will last about 8 weeks.
I titled it 'all manner of thing shall be well' to remind us each time we log in to remember the words of Julian of Norwich's oft quoted phrase:
"All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well."
Here is our timeline since Steve's diagnosis:
March 2, 2011 - Steve has a CATscan at St. Vincents Hospital after a season of stomach pain. Pancreatic cancer that has metastisized to liver is suspected.
March 8 - our first appointment at UAB. Diagnosis confirmed. Steve's parents, our priest Glenda Curry and our good friend Donna Hannum were with us.
March 10 - our first appointment with Dr. James Posey, Steve's oncologist. We agreed to start chemo as a treatment.
March 11- Dr. Posey removed fluid (2 liters!) from Steve's right lung.
A look ahead -
March 16 - Steve gets bloodwork done to send to clinic trial to see if he qualifies for the chemo study.
March 17 - Steve has an appointment at 7 AM to get his port put in.
Week of March 28 - chemo to start. The chemo treatment is Gemcitabine, combined with one other drug if we are part of the trial. This course will last about 8 weeks.
Monday, March 14, 2011
A sudden shift of sight
The poem, "Prayer of the Ox", has shaped my view of myself for some time. And less than a month ago, I re-read Old Jack, and came across that section about his fifteen years of toil to get free of his debt. I had seen in both of these my way forward.
I had for the last five years, found myself sinking into a financial mire, needing more than I could earn, no matter how much I worked. It had seemed that before, in my earlier work, that everything I touched turned to gold (though internally I was so miserable). But in these recent years, though inwardly so renewed, all my work seemed to turn to dust. I could see a mountain, like Jack's mountain of debt, standing in front of me.
My hope settled into the words of the poem and Old Jack's headstrong, obstinate labor. "Dear God, give me time." I knew that if I could just keep plodding ahead, eventually I could pull myself, my dear wife, and my children from the hole. And on the other side, though there was so much loss, it would be enough. And that was my own headstrong vision for the next decade of my life. It was my stubbornness, that could not imagine any way other than what would rise from my own strength of will and sense of responsibility.
But then I began to have pain...and even then, I would grit my teeth, fill ice chests, and push that cart out to the street.
As I sat waiting for some sort of scan, thinking I had an ulcer (it took me three months to finally get to the doctors), I knew I was coming to the end of myself. I listened to Brian's song, "then shall my passions all be love", I could feel a release. "I have come to the end of myself, and walked into the light", I wrote in my notebook. I knew that my strength was not enough, that I was laboring in ways that were foreign to who I was, and that I would submit myself to a newer, truer way. (In that moment, I envisioned returning to the church, putting a clerical collar back on.) I would still have to face that mountain, but thought that I might trust that the rain would fall, trees would leaf, and seeds sprout...and I would be left to grace.
An hour later, I looked at at the backlit photos of my insides, and was told I had pancreatic cancer.
This new "guest" will now define my way forward. And already, I have had to sit down on the wrong side of the mountain, and know that I would not be pulling us over the top. But at least now, I remember who I am. And I remember who and what I love. And that seems like enough, more than enough.
I had for the last five years, found myself sinking into a financial mire, needing more than I could earn, no matter how much I worked. It had seemed that before, in my earlier work, that everything I touched turned to gold (though internally I was so miserable). But in these recent years, though inwardly so renewed, all my work seemed to turn to dust. I could see a mountain, like Jack's mountain of debt, standing in front of me.
My hope settled into the words of the poem and Old Jack's headstrong, obstinate labor. "Dear God, give me time." I knew that if I could just keep plodding ahead, eventually I could pull myself, my dear wife, and my children from the hole. And on the other side, though there was so much loss, it would be enough. And that was my own headstrong vision for the next decade of my life. It was my stubbornness, that could not imagine any way other than what would rise from my own strength of will and sense of responsibility.
But then I began to have pain...and even then, I would grit my teeth, fill ice chests, and push that cart out to the street.
As I sat waiting for some sort of scan, thinking I had an ulcer (it took me three months to finally get to the doctors), I knew I was coming to the end of myself. I listened to Brian's song, "then shall my passions all be love", I could feel a release. "I have come to the end of myself, and walked into the light", I wrote in my notebook. I knew that my strength was not enough, that I was laboring in ways that were foreign to who I was, and that I would submit myself to a newer, truer way. (In that moment, I envisioned returning to the church, putting a clerical collar back on.) I would still have to face that mountain, but thought that I might trust that the rain would fall, trees would leaf, and seeds sprout...and I would be left to grace.
An hour later, I looked at at the backlit photos of my insides, and was told I had pancreatic cancer.
This new "guest" will now define my way forward. And already, I have had to sit down on the wrong side of the mountain, and know that I would not be pulling us over the top. But at least now, I remember who I am. And I remember who and what I love. And that seems like enough, more than enough.
Excerpt from "The Memory of Old Jack"
This is from “The Memory of Old Jack”, when Jack Beechum has finally paid off a huge mortgage from a second farm he had tried to buy; a failure that cost him 15 years of labor:
Clear and whole before him now he sees the object of his faith as he has not seen it for fifteen years. And he feels opening in himself the stillness of a mown field, such a peace as he has never known. For the last five years he has lived at the limit of his strength, not looking up from the ground, perishing at night into lonely sleep as though his bed was a grave from which he rose again in the dark, sore in his bones, to take up again the labor of repaying the past. And now, the shudder of realization in his flesh, he sees that he has come through. He has been faithful to his land, through all its yearly changes…
He lost his life-fifteen years that he had thought would be, and ought to have been, the best and most abundant; those are gone from the earth, lost in disappointment and grief and darkness and work without hope, and now he is only where he was when he began. But that is enough, and more. He is returning home-not only to the place but to the possibility and promise that he once saw in it, and now, as not before, to the understanding that that is enough. After such grievous spending, enough, more than enough, remains. There is more. He lost his life, and now he has found it again.
Beyond him was the peace and rest and joy that he desired. Beyond the limits of a man’s strength or intelligence or desire or hope or faith, there is more. The cup runs over. While a man lies asleep in exhaustion and despair, helpless as a child, the soft rain falls, the trees leaf, the seed sprouts in the planted field. And when he knows that he lives by a bounty not his own, though his ruin lies behind him and again ahead of him. He will be at peace, for he has seen what is worthy.
It seems to him that his life has come to its true beginning. He is forty-eight years old.
Clear and whole before him now he sees the object of his faith as he has not seen it for fifteen years. And he feels opening in himself the stillness of a mown field, such a peace as he has never known. For the last five years he has lived at the limit of his strength, not looking up from the ground, perishing at night into lonely sleep as though his bed was a grave from which he rose again in the dark, sore in his bones, to take up again the labor of repaying the past. And now, the shudder of realization in his flesh, he sees that he has come through. He has been faithful to his land, through all its yearly changes…
He lost his life-fifteen years that he had thought would be, and ought to have been, the best and most abundant; those are gone from the earth, lost in disappointment and grief and darkness and work without hope, and now he is only where he was when he began. But that is enough, and more. He is returning home-not only to the place but to the possibility and promise that he once saw in it, and now, as not before, to the understanding that that is enough. After such grievous spending, enough, more than enough, remains. There is more. He lost his life, and now he has found it again.
Beyond him was the peace and rest and joy that he desired. Beyond the limits of a man’s strength or intelligence or desire or hope or faith, there is more. The cup runs over. While a man lies asleep in exhaustion and despair, helpless as a child, the soft rain falls, the trees leaf, the seed sprouts in the planted field. And when he knows that he lives by a bounty not his own, though his ruin lies behind him and again ahead of him. He will be at peace, for he has seen what is worthy.
It seems to him that his life has come to its true beginning. He is forty-eight years old.
Prayer of the Ox
Dear God, give me time.
Men are always so driven!
Make them understand that I can never hurry.
Give me time to eat.
Give me time to plod.
Give me time to sleep.
Give me time to think.
(From Prayers from the Ark)
Men are always so driven!
Make them understand that I can never hurry.
Give me time to eat.
Give me time to plod.
Give me time to sleep.
Give me time to think.
(From Prayers from the Ark)
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Care of the Sick
from Joan Chittister's The Rule of Saint Benedict
Benedict writes: "Care of the sick must rank above and before all else so that they may truly be served as Christ who said: "I was sick and you visited me" (Matthew 25:36) and "what you did for one of these least of my people you did for me" (Matthew 25:40). Let the sick on their part bear in mind that they are served our of honor for God, and let them not by their excessive demands distress anyone who serves them. Still, the sick must be patiently borne with, because serving them leads to a greater reward. Consequently, the prioress or abbot should be extremely careful that they suffer no neglect.
Joan Chittister's commentary: "The rabbis say, 'The purpose of maintaining the body in good health is to make it possible for you to acquire wisdom.' Benedictine spirituality is about coming to a sense of the fullness of life. It is not about being self-destructive or living sour lives or dropping down its of privacy so deep that no other ever dare intrude. Benedictine spirituality never gives up on life even though death is known to be the entry to its everlasting joy. Why? Becaue, the rabbi shows us, every day we have gives us another chance to become the real persons we are meant ot be. Why? Because, the Scripture says, to serve the sick is to serve the Christ.
The point for us all, perhaps is never to give up on life and never to doubt that every bit of kindness, every tender touch we lay upon another in life can heal what might otherwise have died, certainly in them, perhaps even in ourselves."
Benedict writes: "Care of the sick must rank above and before all else so that they may truly be served as Christ who said: "I was sick and you visited me" (Matthew 25:36) and "what you did for one of these least of my people you did for me" (Matthew 25:40). Let the sick on their part bear in mind that they are served our of honor for God, and let them not by their excessive demands distress anyone who serves them. Still, the sick must be patiently borne with, because serving them leads to a greater reward. Consequently, the prioress or abbot should be extremely careful that they suffer no neglect.
Joan Chittister's commentary: "The rabbis say, 'The purpose of maintaining the body in good health is to make it possible for you to acquire wisdom.' Benedictine spirituality is about coming to a sense of the fullness of life. It is not about being self-destructive or living sour lives or dropping down its of privacy so deep that no other ever dare intrude. Benedictine spirituality never gives up on life even though death is known to be the entry to its everlasting joy. Why? Becaue, the rabbi shows us, every day we have gives us another chance to become the real persons we are meant ot be. Why? Because, the Scripture says, to serve the sick is to serve the Christ.
The point for us all, perhaps is never to give up on life and never to doubt that every bit of kindness, every tender touch we lay upon another in life can heal what might otherwise have died, certainly in them, perhaps even in ourselves."
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