Two is Greater Than One (A Bike, A Stroller and the Things We Think We Know)

Bare chested, my three-year-old twins ride, stacked, in the low-rider bike.  Isaiah can’t pedal and Levi’s legs are too short to reach, so they tag-team.  Isaiah sits in the back - a place-holder, and Levi in front - the engine pulling them forward.  Flesh pressed against flesh, they zip around the driveway, giddy with speed, shouting their little-boy slogans, planning to take over the world.

I pulled out the double jogging stroller this morning, preparing to sell it.  They climbed in and begged me to push them around.  I walked them up and down the driveway, flat tire and all, remembering the feel of the handle on my hand and the presence of my older son as we walked all over town in the early days and years of their lives.  Day after day they sat facing the world together in that stroller, side-by-side, a binky-toting, onesie wearing, unified front.

This is back when the two of them were small enough to share one single shoulder.  They often slept tangled together in a cozy knot.

Pretty quickly they graduated into the double stroller.  Look at those sweet little bundles!

There they are - a "binky-toting, onesie-wearing, unified front."

//

Yesterday, rolling through the grocery store, side-by-side again in a giant cart, they made a joint decision to move their birthday to Spring.  “You can’t do that,” I said, “your birthday is what it is.  It’s the day you were born.”

Passing customers grinned as they often do – these boys talk with their volume set on LOUD all. the. time.  

  

I remember sitting at a lunch table once, discussing twins with friends.  A kind-hearted soul bemoaned how difficult it would be to never have a birthday of your very own – to always have to share that day with someone else. 

This is how we see it in our culture, isn’t it, a loss to have to share something?  But I wonder if we aren’t the ones missing out.  Maybe these boys are the lucky ones, always having someone to share with, someone to pedal when you can’t. 

//

Yesterday was the last day of their first year of preschool and they arrived home, oblivious of the brief evaluation tucked into each of their little backpacks.  They don’t know their letters or numbers, cannot identify common colors or shapes – apparently, they’re behind.

But I am learning from them still – the way they know instinctively, two is greater than one.

//

Earlier this week I purchased a fifty pound bag of chicken feed.  After trying, unsuccessfully, to hoist it over my shoulder, I walked to the car with it wrapped precariously in front of me, a bulging sack cradled in my spindly arms.  I remembered then, as I often do, how I gained about sixty pounds when I was carrying the twins and the mere thought, the mere memory, of walking under all of that weight was enough to cause my pelvic floor to groan.

I carried those boys, tangled together, Isaiah holding his place at the bottom and Levi riding on top.  For nine months, they led me, bulging out in front, their flesh pressed together, growing in their knowing.  And they lead me still.

I Hear a Voice

When fear creeps in, clinging,

I hear a voice say, “Open.”

When I leave, by well-worn mental paths,

the time, the place, the space I'm in,

I hear a voice say, “Return.”

When I watch the boys on bikes

chasing round and round the van

in the driveway, when I see my daughter

smile secretly at the dog in the yard,

I hear a voice say, “This is good.”

When tears rise at the mere thought

of an act, when my heart somersaults

in my chest and the muscles of my legs

clench tight, I hear a voice say, “Pay attention.”

This is the voice of knowing,

the voice that leans whispering

Truth.  “This is light.  This is darkness,”

the voice says, “It matters not where

you are, for I am with you, always.

My Grandmother's Lap (#SmallWonder Link-up)

Easter weekend I made my favorite icing, tinted it pink and worked with a wide butter knife to spread it across the gentle curves of lemon cupcakes.  It was my Grandmother's recipe, the only icing I've ever really liked.  The recipe got me thinking again about my relationship with my Grandmother who died this past summer.  Later in the week, as I thought about my relationship with her, I felt God lean in close and whisper, "It was a gift."  So, with gratitude, I return to the memories and feel them for what they are and were - pure grace.  

I sat in my grandmother’s lap

in a long, wooden pew

in her old, ornate Methodist

Church.  The shiny pipe organ

breathed in and out and a man stood

up front in a long robe.

Sometimes we children 

made our way also to the front

and sat gathered at the feet

of the man in the long robe,

like ducks, heads tipped

up waiting for the hand that

scatters bread. 

Returning to the pew, to my

Grandmother’s lap, I felt the summer’s

heat rise in the old building.  Light

poured in through stained glass windows

and my long brown hair clung to the back

of my neck.

My Grandmother’s small hands, always

cool, lifted my hair, gently gathering it

up and to the side.  Then she blew her own

breath onto my exposed neck and air,

cool like a fresh spring, trickled across.

'Man cannot live on bread alone,'

Jesus said and those hands, that breath,

were grace to my love-parched skin,

the simple act of comfort-given and received

while I sat in the church, in the worn wooden pew,

balanced on the shore of my Grandmother’s lap.

Photo Source.

*   *   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post of about five hundred words or less about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.    

What Keeps Me

I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside. - C.S. Lewis

What keeps me
from the joy and wonder
of This Day, This Moment,
is the Dream, the Longing,
to be in some Other
place - maybe the Past,
a possible Future or
Alternate Now.  

I want so badly to Escape
that I'm unwilling 
to turn the key 
of Surrender, 
to set myself Free
by dropping into
What Is and so I remain
locked apart, Absent.

If, as Lewis said, 
the Doors of Hell are Locked 
on the Inside, it's possible also 
that Life is one long
lesson in Learning
to Turn the key.

Linking with Playdates, #TellHisStory and Give Me Grace.

Love's Frayed Tether (#SmallWonder Link-Up)

This week it's my great joy to welcome a guest post by fellow #SmallWonder host Amber Cadenas.  Amber blogs regularly at Beautiful Rubbish: everyday art of learning to see.  In her own words, Amber "writes with the hope that others might be inspired to see their own lives through different eyes."  I want to encourage you to take a little time to poke around her blog and get lost in the stories there - stories as deep and painful as they are beautiful.   

*   *   * 

When I cannot bear to sit a moment longer 

alone in our quiet home and the din 

of disquiet within me

I find him -

resting upright in the dark of our spare room

and on the futon beckon him to lay down

and stretch my body the length of him

tucked in snug as a ship at dock

one arm latched securely around his chest

my head resting a top 

the space where his heart pumps

Slowly, slowly I open

floating in the tide of his heat

my cheek rolling and rocking

with the pulsing life beneath 

his skin

and I surrender

to the deep of sleep in this rhythmic lull

of wonder

What I have not been able to see 

or hear

or taste

or feel

in these sensory-over-loaded-and-numbed-out 

day to days of late

breaks through the veil to once again proclaim

life

Right here 

right now

Wonder and I become one

as the moment rocks and breathes

pauses and turns

anchored in love's frayed tether.

*   *   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days. 

You're invited to link-up a brief post of about five hundred words or less about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.    

To Experience Resurrection (A Poem)

You have to return to the tomb

to experience resurrection. 

Return to the place where once

you knew without doubt

all hope was gone, the last

dying gasp of breath expelled.

Then silence, stillness

and the great tearing open

of sky and earth. 

The first sign of spring

is the revelation of all

that’s died.  Snow’s clean

slate hides decay,

but when the sun’s warmth rises

its first disclosure is the depth

of loss – the grass,

brown and trampled, barren

broken limbs scattered, earth

exposed and the empty stretch

of field filled with brown stalks

of decomposition.

This is the time of waiting,

the time in which we grow

weary and lose heart. 

You have to watch the barren

earth, pull back brown leaves,

lean close scanning the hidden

places.  You have to stand beside

the stone, Martha would tell us,

your trembling hand pressed against       

its cold, hard surface.  You have to enter

the dark cave, Peter whispers, not knowing

what you’ll find. 

You have to sit through the long,

dark night to see the first light of morning,        

to feel the sharp intake of breath

as the sky’s closed eye, cold and gray

cracks open slowly, then with growing

determination.  This is what you must do

to experience resurrection. 

This post is linked with the High Calling.

Seeing the Psychiatrist (I Don't Want to Forget)

“The babysitter’s coming tomorrow.”  I say as we shuffle back and forth in the bathroom getting ready for bed.  “I have to see my Psychiatrist,” I add, drawing out the word in a way that makes it sound fancy.
 

Even now, seven months after hospitalization, I’m still uncomfortable with the idea of being one of those people.

“When was your last appointment?” my husband asks from his seat on the radiator, speaking over and around the toothbrush in his mouth.

“Um, I’m not sure.  Maybe February?” 

At the sink, I pull my toothbrush from the cup and squeeze out a daub of toothpaste.  “It’s kinda silly, I still have prescriptions I haven’t filled because I’m not going through them as quickly as I could.”  In fact I’d been tempted to cancel the appointment this week – it felt inconvenient, coming on my kids’ first day of spring break and unnecessary as I really didn’t need any refills. 

After a pause, I add, “I think it’s important, though, to help me remember.”  Then, in case he doesn’t know what I mean, I continue, “I was in the hospital, ya know?  It was a big deal.  It is a big deal.  I don’t want to forget how hard it was, how close we were to the edge.”

The edge of what, I do not say, but I feel it.  The edge of darkness, the edge of all-consuming fear.

“Do you feel like you forget?” he asked. 

“Yes, I do.”

I forget because I don’t want to remember.  I forget because no one wants to talk about it, hardly anyone asks.  I forget because I’m afraid – afraid that it happened in the first place, afraid it could happen again.

The pill bottles help me to remember.  Pulling the two red bottles from the cabinet, putting in the extra time to cut pills down to size for the days and weeks ahead, feels like a welcome humility.  

I continue to see a counselor, perhaps more often than she thinks I need.  Those hours set aside on the calendar remind me to look at myself, to come up for air and do a systems’ check. 

And the appointments with the psychiatrist who listens briefly before handing out her scripts, they help too.  Driving up to the building, I enter the same door I excited that bright August day.  Every time I face that place, I face the past; I face a part of myself that paid a price for being neglected for far too long and I remember.  

I don’t want to forget again. 

It may seem counter-intuitive or self-punishing in some strange way, but in the Christian tradition we acknowledge remembrance as a necessary part of the journey toward healing, toward resurrection.  This is what we do in Lent and Holy Week.  We re-walk the steps, re-read the texts, take, break and eat the wine and the bread.  We re-enact the suffering and saving so that we will remember.  

We don't want to forget.  

We tell the story of our own bondage and salvation; we return to the tomb if only to remember how cold and deep the darkness was before we saw the first piercing shaft of light. 

May your remembering be blessed.  May you find the courage to not forget.