Patricia Wild

March Light

Quakers talk a lot about Light: Light Within, Inner Light, Light of Christ, etc. Growing up, I never paid particular attention to the quality of light or how it changed, season by season. (Who did?) Indeed, the first time I consciously acknowledged that sunlight moved from room to room, I was twenty-five years old, living in West Hartford, Connecticut, pregnant, and for the first time in my life able to spend my time doing things like baking bread and reading about breast-feeding and natural childbirth. I shared a sunny, second floor apartment with my husband—off working—and a grey tiger tabby named Canopus. Whose catnaps, I noticed, followed the sunshine. Oh! (Duh.) And maybe ten years later, at a gallery on Boston’s Newbury Street at an exhibit of American impressionists, I suddenly realized that I could identify when the paintings’ New England coastal or farm scenes had taken place without reading anything, simply by the quality of their painted light. Which, apparently I had been unconsciously noting my entire life. “I know this light!” (Besides, who does light better than the Impressionists?)

This past week, I found myself on a stepladder in the kitchen wiping down the dusty, greasy potholder rack over the stove. Scrubbing the floor under the stove. Vacuuming under upholstered chairs and behind the couch. Okay, so people were coming, always a nudge to clean. Okay, so my husband’s been coughing and congested for much too long so reducing allergens is prudent. Okay, so it’s bitter cold; vigorous housecleaning is a great substitute for my daily long walks.

But when I took a moment to look outside, I realized that, yes, the light was early-spring light. Lenten light. My cleaning was an ablution, “a ritual washing or cleaning associated with religious observance.”

Oh!

Can We Talk About. . . ?

Sunday afternoon at Friends Meeting at Cambridge, after an excellent presentation on Jobs not Jails, a few hardy souls suggested ideas for this year’s Good Friday leaflet. The theme this year: Jobs not Jails.

It’s always hard to write something collectively, of course. (Especially if you’ve already been sitting at meeting for worship, a potluck, and an hour and a half presentation!) But I’m guessing that for the fifteen or so of us who’d stayed, that we’d been asked to contribute our ideas had been touching and gratifying. (In the past, this yearly leaflet-writing task has always been the sole responsibility of our meeting’s Peace and Social Concerns Committee—to be added to/amended but eventually approved by our monthly business meeting)

Our collectively-difficult writing assignment was made even harder by how much we wanted to say about the criminal justice system! How much there is to say! Yet how much we yearned to raise probing and engaging questions, to not preach, to not get holier than thou, etc. (Our multi-faceted mission was somewhat simplified by the decision to have a table nearby with Jobs Not Jails info sheets, flyers publicizing the April 26th rally, and petitions.)

So here’s a DRAFT of what I’d hope to include in such a leaflet:

On this somber, reflective Good Friday, we gather here to silently bear witness to the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. Today we recall that when Jesus preached for the first time, the text was: The Spirit of the Lord God has taken control of me! The Lord has chosen and sent me to tell the oppressed the good news, to heal the brokenhearted, and to announce freedom for prisoners and captives. [Isaiah 61:1]

We are moved to ask:

Are not all people—people of conscience, taxpayers, residents of our deeply interdependent communities, those behind bars and those who love them—oppressed by our unjust, racially disproportionate, and incredibly expensive criminal justice system? Are we not all prisoners and captives?

The United States has 5% of the world’s population yet 25% of the world’s prisoners. What must we do to heal this national brokenness?

Can we talk about getting smart on crime instead of getting tough on crime (especially since getting tough doesn’t work!)

Can we talk about reconciliation? Can we talk about redemption? Can we talk about forgiveness?

Once upon a time . . .

This past weekend, our family rented an art-filled, conveniently-located-for-most-of-us farmhouse in Old Saybrook, Connecticut; nine adults and three children under the same roof. Overjoyed to spend a couple of days with my daughters, three out of four sons-in-law, and precious grandchildren, it wasn’t until I got home yesterday that I realized why this mini-vacation had been so thoroughly satisfying and relaxing: no Wifi. (A son-in-law checked; the rental owners hadn’t paid their ComCast bill.)

Sunday night, after roasting marshmallows in the fireplace fire, instead of watching the Olympics or “Downton Abbey,” my four-year-old grand-daughter and I pulled a couple of pillows off the couch so we could cozily watch the flames—and tell stories. She’d overheard me tell the Jonah and the whale story* to her older brother that afternoon and wanted to hear it again. When I’d finished retelling that ancient tale, then she told me a story about tiny, tiny people living in a rock—I’d explained to her brother that Nineveh was a real place and located in Iraq—at the bottom of the ocean. When a giant squid came to eat the rock, she said, the little people didn’t hear the squid at first because they had water in their ears!

Both times I told the story, I used the word “God.” Because it’s impossible to tell the story without mentioning that all-powerful, key figure in the drama, right? God tells Jonah to go to Nineveh. God sends the storm. And the whale. Jonah prays to God from inside the whale. Etc.

And both grandchildren simply took in that highly charged, highly loaded, capitalized noun. For my logical, scientific grandson, who has often informed me that there is no God, my saying, “This is how this story is told in the Bible,” was apparently sufficient. He’s reading Harry Potter these days. He gets the internal integrity of a good yarn, the understanding between an author and a reader that between the covers of this book, this is what the world looks like and how things work. And for my tiara-wearing because she’s often a princess grand-daughter, magic happens.

Yes, it does.

* My (incredibly talented) musician co-teacher and I are writing songs based on Bible stories with our high school First Day School students. First song: Jonah and the Whale. So I, not conversant with the Bible, actually know that story.

All One Under One Sun

Like most urban residents, I’m guessing, I’m neither here nor there when it comes to squirrels, ranking them in the same category as feral cats, slightly more appreciated than pigeons, but way less gratifying than the cardinals and goldfinches of my neighborhood. So when a squirrel showed up on my deck, yesterday, and started eating bread crumbs thrown out for birds, at first I was annoyed.

But because yesterday was Lilian Day, i.e. the day I spend with an in-the-moment toddler, I decided to take a moment or two to just watch this creature so close by. (Lilian was frightened by this bit o’ nature two panes of glass away and quickly returned to the inanimate toys in the next room.) It didn’t take long to realize there was something seriously wrong with our little deck visitor: He/she swayed back and forth as if drunk and occasionally keeled over. But did not stop eating. I am not the Jane Goodall of squirrels so do not know if that squirrel was starving or sick (or, in fact, actually drunk from eating fermented berries at his/her feet?), I just know he/she wolfed down every crumb!

Seeing this disturbing behavior, that urban pest became the object of pity, calling forth both my compassion and the sort of mindfulness that sometimes accompanies such love. Oh, yeah, I realized, it’s been a hard winter for squirrels, too. Oh, yeah, I realized again, we’re all inter-connected. This wondrous creature—and being so close allowed me to see every luminous hair—and I share this backyard, this neighborhood, this planet.

We are all one under one sun.

Mother Love/Deep Solidarity

Pulling on my thick-soled L.L. Bean boots Saturday morning, I recalled that I’d bought those boots several years ago specifically to wear to peace demonstrations! (Some war or other; who can keep track?) Boots on, dressed warm, I made my way downtown to Mothers Out Front‘s “Massachusetts Campaign Kickoff,” eager to be counted as one more warm body in support of “mobilizing for a livable planet.”

Walking along traffic-clogged Somerville Avenue, joining the throngs of commuters at the Porter Square T and then on the crowded sidewalks downtown, I felt something I’d never felt before on my way to a demonstration: Love. Deep, profound love for every individual I saw, passing by. Mother Love. Fierce, tender, sustained, respectful—no—awed by Life, by the Life Force, by the living, growing, evolving, wondrous creatures all around me. As if I were each and every stranger’s mom and would anything, anything to ensure each and every person’s blessed and healthy life.

“This is the gift of the Great Turning. When we open our eyes to what is happening, even when it breaks our hearts, we discover our true size; for our heart, when it breaks open, can hold the whole universe. We discover how speaking the truth of our anguish for the world brings down the walls between us, drawing us into deep solidarity. That solidarity, with our neighbors and all that lives, is all the more real for the uncertainty we face.” [Joanna Macy]

Branded # 7: Amity*

Last night I attended a reading at Porter Square Books by Debby Irving, an attractive, personable, and righteous Cambridge resident, re her brand-new book, Waking Up White And Finding Myself in the Story of Race.

Reader, I was upset. And jealous. Especially when Irving flatly stated that after taking a course at Wheelock College—where I went, for heaven’s sake!—and awakening to race matters, she couldn’t find any memoirs by white people on the subject! So decided to write one, herself.

Still stewing, I came home to find an e-mail from my dear friend, Delia, with this link. “Apparently I’m not the only one who’s been thinking about this poem first thing in the morning lately!” she wrote. As Delia knows, Robert Hayden’s incredible “Those Winter Sundays” introduces Chapter 2 of my memoir re awakening to race in this country. How grateful I was to be gifted with such loving—though inadvertent—support of a dear friend when I needed it! How lovely to again contemplate, “What did I know, what did I know of love’s austere and lonely offices?” !

My memoir’s entitled Way Opens: A Spiritual Journey. That journey continues. So when, ahem, I woke up this morning, I realized I’d heard something else last night: How there’s another, little-known narrative in this country about people of color and white allies. (And, yes, although although our record has been definitely checkered, Quakers have historically been counted among those allies.)

Post Way Opens, here’s where Spirit had led me: To be, as best as I am able, a criminal justice ally. And here’s what I believe I am led to explore: how best I can support Jobs Not Jail. (Not completely clear; need more discernment for sure.)

Reader: care to join me?

PS: Upon reflection, I realized that the above was clumsily written. Let me be clear: I commend Debby Irving and the wonderful and important work she’s done. There can’t be too many books on this incredibly important and difficult subject!

* “Friendship, peaceful harmony; mutual understanding and peaceful relationship.” My alma mater runs a National Center for Race Amity; who knew?!

Redemption Happens

[The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. John 1: 5]

I am not Erin Downing. My mother was not brutally murdered. Most likely, I will never know what it means to be Erin Downing.

As Erin Downing painfully and well-knows, the facts are these: On July 23, 1995, Erin’s pretty and vivacious mother, Janet Downing, was found by Erin’s brother, Ryan, lying in a pool of blood on the dining room floor of the Downings’ Somerville home. Janet had been stabbed 98 times and had eventually bled to death. Almost immediately, suspicion centered around the Downings’ neighbor, Edward/Eddie O’Brien, age 15, who lived across the street. Two years later, deemed beyond redemption by the prosecution, Eddie was tried as an adult, found guilty, and sentenced to life in prison without parole. (In 1997, had he been tried as a juvenile, Eddie would have faced the possibility of parole after 20 years.)

And Erin knows this: On December 24, 2013, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that juveniles sentenced to life imprisonment for first-degree murder are entitled to the opportunity for parole. This ruling was made retroactive; Eddie’s entitled to appear before the MA parole board.

Which is why Erin Downing is spearheading a petition campaign to stop Eddie O’Brien’s parole process.

Here’s what I know:

Nothing will bring Janet Downing back.

The criminal justice system will never alleviate the pain and suffering of victims’ families.

Eddie O’Brien isn’t 17 any more. And while I don’t know what kind of counseling or therapy or help he’s received behind bars over the past 17 years, I believe that whoever he was when he entered prison is not who he is, today. (And don’t all of us know so much more re “the adolescent brain” than anyone knew in 1997?)

Since 2010, parole in Massachusetts has been and remains no slam dunk. So although I believe Eddie O’Brien’s entitled to his shot at parole, he won’t get it. Even if he’s completely and convincingly and, in Truth, reformed, redeemed, remorseful. No way.

Redemption happens.

“People Don’t Come to a Memorial for the Brownies!”

They say God doesn’t give us more than we can handle.

Bullshit. [17:04 -18:20, especially]

Yesterday, I get a phone call from my Meeting’s facilities manager* telling me that the memorial scheduled for this coming Saturday is now a double memorial. (I’m the clerk of FMC’s Memorial Committee.) What was to have been a celebration for the life of a son, age 50, who died New Year’s Eve, will now also celebrate the life of his father, who died this past weekend. Oh, yes, and the mother/ex-wife is in the hospital recovering from surgery!

Although it has been pointedly pointed out to me that people do not come to a memorial for the brownies, as clerk of the committee responsible for an FMC memorial reception, I strive for abundance. I want to see the three, tableclothed tables in the middle of FMC’s commodious Friends Room absolutely covered with overflowing platters!

Usually, when someone well-known, well-connected at Meeting has died, abundance is not an issue. (We have delivered leftover food to a homeless shelter from time to time.) But because so very few people at FMC actually know this tragic family (they’ve not been attending Meeting for some time), it seems likely that very few people from FMC—and their overflowing platters—will come on Saturday.

So after speaking with John, I sent an SOS to Meeting’s list-serv—and, God bless ’em, several people quickly and warmly and generously responded.

Hosanna!

I believe both these things are true:

Many people face way more than any human being can possibly endure and are irrevocably broken.

Through simple acts of kindness and generosity—yes: brownies!—we manifest “that of God”in ourselves and to others and, sometimes, sometimes, we assuage broken-ness.

* John Field, a wonderful guy, who, among other responsibilities, books Friends Meeting at Cambridge events, arranges parking, supervises the Center Residents who wash the tablecloths and mop the floors, etc.

All Kinds of Love

[A neglected yet wondrous front yard in Cambridge, MA; January 31, 2013]

No paperwhites this year. My pretty, blue-and-white Chinese bowl, ceremoniously filled with smooth, small stones, water, and five or six bulbs on New Year’s Day and then placed on the piano, remains in the basement. My ninety-year old mother, preoccupied by her move into assisted living, didn’t distribute carefully bundled bulbs at Christmas to her children and grandchildren. Didn’t even mention them.

So, naively, I walked to Tagg’s last night, a locally-owned, new-style version of a country store. Hardware and upscale kitchenware and small appliances and nifty umbrellas that don’t collapse in heavy winds and garden supplies? Yup; Tagg’s got them. Paperwhites? Seems you’re supposed to buy paperwhites in November! Oh.

As my daughters would say: “A First -World Problem.” I get that. Believe me, as I sit here, warm and dry and safe, I know that the lack of paperwhites is not a big deal, okay?

And I get this: my mother’s no longer able to mother me; not really. And I get that although I’m a mother and grandmother and much loved, I will always long for that mothering. I’m too much a Quaker to whine about this. Just sad.

But, hey. There’s all kinds of love. At least four, according to the Bible: Storge, the familial love that once upon a time drove my mother to her version of Tagg’s to buy paperwhites; Eros (Yum); Philia (so very present in the halls of Congress these days, right?); and my personal favorite: Agape.

I will always remember my Wow! Does Everybody Know About This But Me? reaction when I first learned about all-loving, unconditional agape, that love that passeth all understanding. Pretty sure I was going through another divorce at the time. Pretty sure I was singin’ “When Will I Be Loved?” a lot. (BTW: did you know that Phil Everly, who died last week, wrote that song after he’d split up from his brother?)

And, hey: the wonder of a precious, living thing unfolds every Monday in my living room when I get to spend several hours with my granddaughter.

I mean, c’mon!

E Pluribus Unum

[ Kenny Irwin creations, Palm Springs, CA]

Although, more and more, my spiritual practice is about the Here and Now, I’ve spent the last couple of days looking at my 2013. Yes. Reading my journal.

What has struck me is this: the story I’ve been telling myself about this past year isn’t what I’d carefully recorded! I’ve glossed over several key—and sometimes painful—events, completely forgotten others that, in fact, had demanded enormous energy and dedication. (My work on an ad hoc committee at my Quaker meeting, which met weekly/sometimes twice a week for much of the spring and early summer, for example.)

Humbling. And illuminating.

Yet this is also true: The story I’ve been telling myself is what I’ve crafted from all the bits and pieces I’d carefully recorded. My aging and forgetful and biochemically-upbeat and cheerful mind has arranged and edited those bits and pieces so as to tell an upbeat and cheerful narrative.

We all do that. We all make meaning based on who we are and what we’re about. I’m remembering how, last week, my seven-year-old grandson, Dmitri, and four-year-old granddaughter, Ruby, made meaning of the rooms and rooms and glass case after glass case of stuff at the Harvard Museum of Natural History. Of all the stuffed animals—and there were thousands of them—they gazed at, in a sense, that afternoon boiled down to this:

Dmitri’s museum was the large, stuffed animal whose stuffing was leaking through the vertical seam down the animal’s backside.

Ruby’s museum was the pigmy shrew, probably the smallest and cutest mammal in the whole place!

A related observation about that excursion: The Museum, for the most part, is strictly Old School, i.e., not interactive. Yet Dmitri and Ruby loved walking through room after room, willy-nilly looking at whatever struck their fancy. Just like I did in the museums of my childhood. Seemingly, these 21st-century children didn’t need to push buttons or walk through a giant-sized simulation to be awed by the wonder and beauty and incredible variety of what surrounded them. Creation. Mystery. Something Greater than Themselves.

Making meaning is moment by moment selection and, sometimes, what we’re making meaning of can be experienced by simply standing, drop-jawed, perhaps, and quietly taking in whatever’s in front of us. The present, precious moment. The Here and Now.

Have Yourself a Merry Little Holiday (however you define that). . .

. . . and may it be warm and connected and happy and

may the new year be full of joy and wonderful surprises for you.

“All is calm, all is bright”

Sunday morning, just a few hours after our region’s first major winter storm ended, Friends Meeting at Cambridge decided the show must go on: We would do the Christmas pageant! Because the nasty weather kept most people home—in the wee hours of Sunday morning the snow had turned to sleet and sidewalks and streets were an icy mess—this year’s event relied on the few intrepid souls who’d shown up.

And it was wonderful! This year’s orchestra, for example, was comprised of a violin, a guitar, and a tuba. So when we sang “Silent Night,” you could actually hear the guitar, that “tender and mild” instrument supposedly played the first time that hymn had been performed. Children begged to take on speaking roles did so with elan—as if they’d come to Meeting that morning planning to be all three narrators in one or an angel and Gabriel.

The lovely young mother who’d agreed to be Mary weeks ago (and, indeed, showed up on Sunday with her husband and toddler daughter), married into FMC, so to speak, her husband being quite active, but rarely comes to Meeting, herself. After the pageant, she expressed surprise that after a couple of nonchalant run-throughs this seemingly impromptu performance had been so good!

But that’s exactly what a meeting for worship is, isn’t it? A seemingly random, unorganized, messy, in-the-moment happening that, most of the time, Inshallah, works.