Foolish love for a tainted world

“It takes a great deal of courage to see the world in all its tainted glory, and still to love it.”

— Oscar Wilde

Evening jaunts around our little 'hood make me fall in love with this place over and over. Tonight, running down Fifth Avenue, my world smelled smelled like corn tortillas as I passed Barrio Star at happy hour. When I walk through Little Italy, the public bocce ball courts and Jacaranda trees woo me. I even feel an odd ownership of the planes that scream over our roof as they descend toward the tarmac. As the light show and long evenings of summer commence, I'm taken by this corner of the world we call home. 

But the world, as Wilde says, is tainted.

While I ran tonight, my brother two states north attended a vigil on his college campus. There was a shooting, again. This time at Seattle Pacific University. He's fine, his friends are fine, but other students aren't; and it was so close. As everyone will note, it could happen anywhere. I don't have much to add to the ongoing conversation and grief over shootings, but suffice to say it shocks and scares us that it could happen anywhere. Even in the little college neighborhood where Ben lives and studies.  

On days like today I don't feel courageous for loving this tainted world. I feel foolish. I feel like I'm about to have my heart smashed. There is real beauty and real evil, and one of the few truisms that actually feels comforting is that God, like us, hates the evil. And there won't be any in His restored world. So then. Let's help each other be brave and love the tainted glory of this one. 

Busy vs. Hurried (Go Outside)

We backpacked the weekend away in the gorgeous back country of San Diego. It fully delights me that you can drive 45 minutes east of the city and wind up in the mountains - real mountains, with pine trees and peaks and altitude and the whole bit.

Assuming the hike in would take half a day, we started around 8 am - an overestimation that got us to the campsite well before lunch. But those extra hours were some of the weekend's best. What I love about camping is how expansive time becomes. An entire day centers around survival (pitch a tent, build a fire, cook a meal, find a secluded spot in the woods to pee) and the spaces in between are reserved for simple leisure. I read for most of Saturday afternoon, something I hadn't done for months or years. Long-form reading doesn't seem to have a place in life's busyness; a quick blog post or thumbing through Instagram fits our harried schedules better. But I miss the restorative and simple enjoyment of settling into a story.

I read an article last week on the need for soul healing. Hurriedness, the author suggests, disconnects us from God and each other. He calls it a symptom of a fragmented soul. Being hurried, he wrote, is entirely different from being busy. One is an inward form of striving - the antonym to submission - while the other is simply a description of external circumstances.

This distinction struck me as exactly right. Jam-packed days can feel restful and fulfilling, even as I'm climbing into bed at the end. And conversely, I'm often internally disconnected and rushed on a slow Sunday. Hurry is combatted by soul rest, soul healing. Which is exactly what reading on a Saturday afternoon in the sun was. 

So here's what I'm thankful for about our time in the mountains. Rest. Reading deeply. Boy Scout Troop 2000 who saved our sorry selves when our water sanitizer didn't work. Yep - rescue comes in surprising forms. And also: wide skies, grass naps, picnic lunches, and morning hikes that welcomed new scenery with every turn. California's foothills just get me: green chaparral and yucca, shivering gold gold grass, pines in the distance, spring flowers spilling onto the trail. Here's to more soul rest and more reading, mountains or not. 

Female farmers, and more food for more people

Through Plant With Purpose, I was lucky enough to put together a piece on female farming for Christianity Today's Her.meneutics blog. Excerpted below - read the whole deal here, if you'd like.  

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It's spring, and as sporadic rains fall on thirsty California, I am thinking about a certain biblical promise. Found in Hosea, it follows an assurance that God will heal, revive, and raise Israel up again: "He will come to us like the rain, Like the spring rain watering the earth" (NASB).

From a literary perspective, this comparison sounds just right. If God were an element, he'd be rain – soft yet torrential, the only remedy for desperate thirst and drought. But in Hosea's agricultural society, this promise was also literal. Rain was a saving grace, the invaluable resource that allowed crops to grow.

Today, rain still represents survival to rural families in the developing world. Small-scale subsistence farmers stake their lives on agriculture, relying on what they can grow to feed their families, earn an income, and send their kids to school. Armed with few resources, basic elements like water, seeds, and good soil mean the difference between hunger and health.

Yet, around the globe, millions of female subsistence farmers don't have equal access to basic resources to cultivate the land and sustain their communities. Mothers, sisters, daughters, and wives represent the backbone of the rural economy, especially in the developing world. They grow the food their families eat, cook meals, sell excess produce at market, and care for the household.

According to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization, women make up nearly half of the rural workforce, yet receive only 5 percent of agricultural extension services, such as training and seeds. Despite their role in the rural food system, female subsistence farmers remain one of the most under-resourced demographics in the world.

Wood Floor Dining

On the day we moved into our apartment, Davis and I raced each other up the stairs with box after box of wedding gifts. By the time the car was empty, a small summit had overtaken the living room. We sat on the wood floor, overheated and relieved, and salvaged two clean plates from a Pottery Barn box. Someone had given us fancy olive oil for the wedding, and we ripped and dipped chunks of leftover ciabatta bread. We ate our first meal in that home amid chaos while listening to Voxtrot and saying thank you - not quite communion, but close. 

That same night, friends came over bearing gifts: toilet paper, hand soap, butternut squash soup, a pot, and beer. (Side note: always, ALWAYS bring a friend who's just moved toilet paper, so they can finally use their own bathroom. And bring them cold beer.) We made grilled cheese sandwiches and heated the soup and sat on the floor again to eat, a little tribe this time.  

Of all the meals we've eaten in our apartment, those two might be my favorite.

I love them for their unexpectedness and informality. And I always liked this about Chilean hospitality, too. No pretense, and no invitation needed; if you showed up at a friend's house you could count on being welcomed and fed. On more than one occasion while living in Chile, I watched guests appear unnanounced at the dinner table, while my host mother ran to the kitchen for extra plates and food. Even for planned gatherings, there was little prep. No cleaning or fuss - just heat the grill and open the front door. 

What I love about our home is not how it looks but who fills it. Here's to informality, and more meals on the floor. 

Tenacity

Like most mornings, I pad

into our kitchen and scorch water.

Coffee blooms in veins

as the day rises. 

But before full consciousness

I was wrapped around you

arm over ribs

head under chin

and your pulse, like a miracle,

beat the bridge of my nose.

Life - 

rhythmic and determined.

Your unconscious resolve

is still new enough to wake me.

and rest arrives

On Sunday evening I stood in the doorway of our kitchen, which leads out to the deck. The sun was dropping behind Point Loma and the planes roared over our roof every few minutes. It felt like summer, like fiesta, like I would combust from gratitude for the past few days.

After a week of morning fog, we got California’s winter best: a hot day with clarity and freshness you’ll never feel during summer. It was startling enough that Davis got me out of bed on Saturday morning (with the lure of coffee) to walk to the cliffs and see the surf. Best friends got engaged, two people who are meant for each other. Parents came to visit, parents who are both family and friends. I walked up to Balboa Park in the evening with a book & blanket in hand, surprised at my contentedness. I didn’t feel like thrashing through tasks or scattered by responsibilities. The tasks and responsibilities were there, but they were obscured under the shadows cast by late-afternoon sun. True rest comes when you can forget what's pressing and just sink into what's needed.

It’s taken me a while to get comfortable alone. I used to crave moments by myself, but the past few years have brought an off-and-on loneliness that tricked the joy away from solitude. Loneliness will do that - make you fear being alone which, as everyone knows, is not the same as being lonely. So when I stood on the deck on Sunday evening, the sensation of contentedness was the most welcome warmth.

First Things First

I'm writing here for the accountability of an audience, and to be reminded that our lives contain certainties and surprises that are best shared. Writing has always been just the remedy for eyes that have forgotten to look up, or an inner life that's lost its richness. I hope to note both brimming-over days as well as true grace amidst the humdrum of daily routines. 

Here is a little online space  to store words and stories and lessons in provision and deepening joy in Jesus. I'll be reminding myself to look up, all the while hoping I'm encouraging you to do the same. Until gratitude seeps from my pores and I wear contentment wrapped around my forehead.