What I’m Writing: Since the good news came, I’ve been digging into the second body chapter of “Everyday Annunciations,” going back to the experience at the heart of this book, the shock of being widowed at 51 and having to figure out a) why I ought even to imagine going on living, and b) what I was ever going to make of all the time left, time I’d have been just as glad, back then, to abort. This one takes on many kinds of unanticipated, often unwanted changes, disruptions in happy comfortable “normal” so radical that they shake their recipients’ established sense of identity, ways of life, and fundamental beliefs about meaning. As happened for me, they can make the future seem absolutely blank, and the challenge of reconstructing a viable life overwhelming—just at the time when the person feels the least competent she’s ever been to undertake that work.
This one is about moving from that experience of shock toward a basic level of assent to at least try to regroup; among the many example stories it shares are those of people who learned of dire medical diagnoses; those of people who lost homes to natural disaster and loved ones who defined their worlds to death; stories of saints thrown for a loop by unanticipated, overwhelming callings-within-callings (for example, St. John Vianney, who—after he thought he’d finally achieved his lifelong dream of being a successful parish priest—discovered that he’d been granted such power as a confessor that people lined up for three days to see him, so overwhelming him that he literally ran away from his village several times, trying unsuccessfully to escape). Its art focuses on paintings of the Annunciation which freeze-frame Mary’s moment of “great trouble” and disorientation recorded in Luke, aiming to normalize the struggles all humans face when everything is upended—though ours admittedly stretch much longer than Mary’s.
What forms does such trouble/wishing to run away take for contemporary ordinary human beings? How might we help ourselves be present—as awful as that can be–through such wrenching disruptions rather than attempting to deny them? How can we find the trust that we will at least provisionally, sooner or later, assent to see what might happen next in this strange, unwelcome new chapter (and what might we do to foster such evolution at its beginning)?
What I’m Listening To: Last week I downloaded the Amazon Music Classical app, and it’s glorious. So vast are its resources, in fact, that mostly I’ve been clicking on prepared playlists and channels featuring individual musical periods rather than wading into the overwhelming riches. Among my favorite discoveries: a black French musician playing Bach on his guitar; several female soloist rocking Hildegard of Bingen’s haunting glorious compositions, which sound postmodern rather than medieval. I will admit that as an enthusiast I’ve also pigged-out on multiple versions of two of my favorite symphonies, delighting in comparing takes of each back-to-back: Beethoven’s 4th, and Mendelssohn’s 3rd. Say what you will about technology, it can offer almost unimaginable resources sometimes.
Something Beautiful In My World: This past weekend my “daughter” (a former grad student who’s become that in all true non-biological ways—from now on no quotes) and I met up in Salt Lake City for a weekend to celebrate her birthday and my dawning book. One of the things we did was go up on the bench by the university to visit Red Butte Garden, walking the terraced grounds with their panorama of the city and lake below, then visiting the orchid show inside the conservatory. The day was blustery and just 50 degrees, but it felt very spring-like at the end of this extreme winter, and a few brave spring plants were starting to emerge, most fully the snowdrops pictured here. Today these poor things face being buried with a foot of new snow, and I’ve found myself worrying about them—but they’re snowdrops, after all, and maybe—be strong, little sweeties!
