Let's Start At the Very Beginning

A week ago today, I set off on my Grand Adventure/Experiment Car Camino! After driving over 2000 miles I kicked off the inaugural All Souls on the road with a service in front of First Parish Church in Plymouth, MA. This congregation has actually been around since 1606  when it met secretly at William Brewster’s manor house in Scrooby, England (which led to the song, Scrooby Dooby Doo, where are you? But I digress.)

It was a great success! It was not only fun, but meaningful to speak about the power of covenant while standing in front of the church who made the first covenantal agreement on how to be church and how to be with each other. It was truly amazing to think of the power of a promise. The current minister of First Parish Church, told me that a couple of years ago the congregation gave its historic Meeetinghouse to the General Society of Mayflower Descendants. The building was plagued with decades of deferred maintenance and GSMD had the ability to do a national fundraising campaign to restore the building and open it as a visitor's center. The sanctuary will still be available as a Sunday worship space for First Parish in perpetuity. Of course, they’re currently doing Zoom like we are, but it’s nice to know that for all times, the promise will be kept in this location.

For more information about this church, you can check out the history on the church’s website here or on the Mayflower Society’s website. 

Following the service, and ensuing Board of Trustees meeting, I made my way to a campground outside of Provincetown, MA where Rubi and I stayed for two nights so that we could explore P-

Town, an old favorite haunt of mine. During this time, I re-sorted my supplies and managed to get rid of two collapsible bins I had been using to store non-perishable foods and cooking supplies. The reality is that my Jeep Cherokee is not the largest SUV on the block and I’m trying to make the sleeping arrangement as comfortable as can be for Rubi and me. If it were just me, I’d be fine, but the two of us together makes it a little cramped for my long-legged dog. I’m already worrying about how Wham! is going to fit in! What I really need is a camper-van or at least a big Econoline-type van. Let me know if you hear of anything! 

Beyond the unknown elements of simply driving so far, I have been learning things along the way. During the second night at the campsite it rained pretty much continuously. That made for a peaceful sleep, but I was concerned about my screen tent; the directions said quite clearly that it were the least bit damp, not to pack it in its bag. Sure enough, when I awoke the next morning, there were heavy diamonds of dew decorating the roof, sides, and poles like a bedazzler fanatic had gone wild in the night. To make matters worse, leaves were plastered onto the six paneled roof. 

I kept an eye on the tent while sort and packing up everything else. A quick look at the sky showed me that there were be no burst of sunshine to brighten the day and dry off the tent; it was foggy and misty and with every gust of wind, more leaves joined the party on the roof. 

Finally, it was the only thing left to pack. I was flummoxed. I tried shaking the sides of the tent but the leaves remained glued to the top. I tried wiping down the poles and side and ended up with a soggy towel, but a still soggier tent. What was a non-camping grrl to do? I stood there running through my options: stay until the sun came out which, according to my weather app wouldn’t be until Friday; sneak away and leave the tent—absolutely not! ……crickets….. 

Then an inspiration struck me! I remembered a friend had given me a high-powered windshield scraper just before I left; it was hefty. Not only did it have a rotatable brush on the end opposite the scraper, it also could extend to 50 inches! I grabbed that, extended it as far as it would go, and then used the brush to sweep off most of the leaves. The more recalcitrant ones faced the inexorable pull of the scraper blade. In spite of the wind trying to resist my efforts with more partiers parachuting onto the roof of the tent while I was cleaning it, I soon had a leaf-free tent. It was still damp so I put the tent bag in the back of Jeep and laid the loosely folded tent on that. Soon enough, I was driving merrily on my way. 

My first stop was in a small town to fuel up and grab some coffee and another gallon of water. The clerk told me that town had voted to take out all coffee and soda machines at gas stations and convenience stores. Then she decisively took my to go cup and said, “But I’m gonna cheat. Stay right here.” Soon she came back with my cup filled with steaming black coffee from the pot she kept in the back for herself. 

As I drove away, sipping on the fresh nectar of the gods, I mused about my inaugural experience. I was learning things about myself, I was adapting to the elements, I was creating solutions seemingly out of thin air. I sang along with Mary Chapin Carpenter, Something Tamed and Something Wild; who knows what other lessons I’ll learn along the way? So far I am the most inordinately proud of my leaf-clearing solution; this shows you what a sheltered life I’ve lived. 

 Now, a week after my nerveless beginning, I am in New York City, relaxing in an apartment a friend

generously invited me to use. She’s been working remotely from Chicago and so the Manhattan apartment was just sitting empty. It’s a beautiful two bedroom with gorgeous hardwood floors and beautiful artwork on the walls; I get to take a bath! 

And on Friday, Rubi and I will head out to points unknown on our way to Sunday’s destination—which is known. From leaf-sweeper to city dweller to figuring out where to stay en route to Sunday, this adventure has gotten off to an auspicious start. I have already been reminded that I have everything I need, that people are generally kind without agenda and that life’s journey is filled with diverse and beautiful way stations along the path. 

 Onward and upward.

Why Not?

 After my blog post yesterday, a couple of people from All Souls reminded me that I had said my phrase for 2020 was going to be, “Why not?” Not just for me, but for anyone who might approach me and say, “I’ve got this crazy idea to…” I warned them my response would be, “why not? How can I help you make that happen?”

One friend commented she was glad the pandemic hadn’t gotten in the way of that phrase.

Ironically, I had forgotten about that theme for 2020 I so cheerily sent out into the universe in the way, way back, long, long ago, January 2020 service where I voiced that phrase for the first time publicly.

And yet, that is exactly what I have been living into as I began this car camping (SUV RVing sounds so much more glamorous, doesn’t it? But it is such a long phrase; maybe I can shorten it to SUVRV. Well, not much difference.)

I was pondering how often we set intentions out into the universe and then forget about them and one day find out they have been busy becoming reality. Sometimes these are good things—like my “why not?” intention, but often times they’re debilitating like, “I’ll never get the raise, the girl, the time and money freedom; I’ll never be good enough, skilled enough, happy enough.”

We set those intentions out sometimes and then begin to unconsciously live into them. We forget the power of our words to form reality. Our words are more than phonemes; when we become hooked on phonics, it really can be an addiction—conscious or not—to perceiving our world through our words.

Why not? I said in the bright, sunny, pandemic-free days of the New Year, 2020. And those words winged their way into the future, not worrying about a coronavirus or social distancing or masks, or even death. And here I am, nine months later, seeing those two simple words boomeranging back into my world.

They are not a magical incantation, creating spaciousness and ease; they are merely harbingers of a future I am still living my way into.

What were the words you spoke into the new year? If you participated in All Souls Fire Communion that we do on the first Sunday of the new year, what words did you write to leave behind in 2019? What words, what intentions did you release into 2020?

What my friends reminded me of in their comments about my “why not?” mantra, is that we really do get to determine how we live our lives. We may not be able to determine what happens to us, to our nation, to our world; we may not get to demand a fool proof vaccine so that we can all cavort about mask free in sweaty, intimate closeness of a concert, or bar, or the more genteel surroundings of a theatre or theater, but we do get to speak our word into this reality and make it so.

Rubi and Nori's Excellent Adventure

 Just now I am sitting in the Slowter Room at the First UU Church of Columbus, OH. The Slowter Room sits off of the Worship Hall and is a comfortable room for people who, for whatever reason, can’t be in attendance in the Worship Hall. I am guessing nursing mothers or parents with small children. Of course, no one is in the Worship Hall on Sunday mornings now; First UU of Columbus, like All Souls, is zooming their worship services. They were, however, kind enough to let me camp out in their parking lot and use the facilities while I am here.

I have travelled almost 1300 miles in two days and have one more long stretch to go before I reach my Sunday destination. It has been an easy start, though; last night I stayed with my sister in Lawrence, KS and Rubi stayed with my niece and her dogs. Tonight, we are in a safe neighborhood in Columbus and tomorrow we will have another long day of driving, leaving only a little bit to go on Saturday.

I confess it feels a little surreal that I am actually doing this. As one friend remarked to me a couple of days ago, “You know when you sent me that blog post about SUV RVing and said you could totally do this, I didn’t think you actually would!”

Another friend texted, “Hey, I want you to know that I truly ADMIRE what you are doing with this little adventure of yours. It did not make sense to me at first, but then I realized it makes PERFECT sense. It’s YOU following your heart. I’ve not always been very good at that. I usually manage to talk myself out of my own adventures, big and small. Since facing my own mortality I aspire to live more authentically, more from my heart, and less from my (sometimes screwed up) head! You’ve inspired me to do this even more! So hey, keep me posted. Bon Voyage!”

Both of those comments made me realize that I have once again, taken on something big without bothering to think about the difficulties I might face. The other time I realized this was shortly before walking the Camino de Santiago in Northern Spain. After several people told me in admiring voices how brave I was, I began to think maybe I had bit off more than I could chew. But wasn’t it just walking??? Five hundred miles?

These types of exploits are certainly nothing I would have attempted in my younger years. Like my friend, I would have talked myself out of them, let fear make decisions for me rather than love; let my list of limitations hold me back, rather than leading with my dreams. Certainly, a benefit of growing older is that I am more confident in my own skin and in my own dreams. I do not fear failure—or worse, looking foolish--as much as I did when I was younger.

Still, as I logged the miles over the past two days, I sometimes wondered aloud at what I was doing and why.  It is not like I was ever the camping, hiking, peeing in the woods kind of lesbian, even when I was younger. And now here I am, age 58, embarking on this great unknown journey. And I confess, more than once, I have asked myself, why??

The answer to that question, I have come to realize, is why not? Why should we let a pandemic limit our horizon? Why should we let social distancing keep us from the wonders of this world? Why should I let the fact that there is no place to blow dry my hair into its proper volume and height keep me from expanding my vista?

Of course, I will be very careful, wearing masks, using hand sanitizer and washing my hands frequently. But more importantly, I will be choosing to live life out loud, presenting a wider vista for All Souls on Sundays, and connecting my words with the landscape of our nation.

I have no idea how this will turn out—it’s a Grand Experiment!—but already I know that when I risk my comfort and sense of safety to meet the world head on, I will learn some new things about myself, my world, and my sense of place.

How does where I am impact who I am, my sense of self, my sense of safety? Each of us has a comfort zone or bubble or context in which we live and move and have our being. We orient ourselves to our place like a pin marking where our car is parked on a handy smart phone app. We navigate our lives by these familiar mile markers. What happens when that familiarity is gone and in its place are unfamiliar   markers with no known context?

And how does Place impact what I speak about on Sunday? My goal is to preach from places that are connected with the Sunday service theme. What will that look and feel like for me? For those who tune in to All Souls Sunday service?

These are things we will discover over the course of the next several weeks. I look forward to being on this journey with each of you, this Grand Experiment that will have ramifications for each of us who choose to join in.

 

 

 

 

T Minus Four Days

In just four days I will be taking off on an adventure. On Wednesday, September 23, I will double check my list, load up my vehicle, buckle Rubi into the backseat and begin the All Souls Car Camino. I already have the destinations picked out for the first three week jaunt. The first three days will be mainly driving hard to reach my first preaching destination by the 27th. But I will have plenty of music to listen to and much to think about as well. Here are some thoughts that will be occupying my mind: 

My son. My son, Sam, just turned 25 last week. We had a small patio party, just him, and his three moms. We socially distanced—I had a corner all to myself!—and we work masks when we weren’t eating or drinking. Of course, Sam followed the new standard of placing his birthday candles into a piece of bread and blowing them out on that, facing away from the others. I think that’s one tradition that will remain forever changed, now that we really get how many germs get transmitted through breathing out! What a strange time to come to the crux of maturity, the soft spot on the back of the skull finally thickening, settling once and for all the matter of adulthood. Such an uncertain future awaits all those who are finishing school or setting out into life, hoping to find a living in it. And yet, I’m so proud of Sam, and of the man he is becoming. He takes his own path, follows his own Camino, discovering along the way who he is and where his journey might be leading. He is kind and compassionate; funny and introspective; brilliant and wiser than me. My life at 25 was so much different than his is now. I was awakening to my call to the ministry, doing in the street protests for queer rights, the pandemic facing us then was AIDS and I was losing too many friends. My future felt like the hard edge of a coin; I wasn’t sure on which side I would land, but I felt the future rushing toward me with gale force strength. Now it feels somewhat as if we’re all trudging toward the future on a treadmill; not really going anywhere but trying our best to get there, nonetheless. 

RBG. Rest in power dear, fierce, compassionate Ruth Bader Ginsberg. I had fervently hoped you could make it until January 22, 2021, but you more than deserve this rest. The love and gratitude people have for you more than showed in the incredible, record-breaking contributions to candidates who share your values and commitment to quality of life and freedom for all people. Of course, it leaves many of us also quaking in fear that this administration will hypocritically do what it refused to do when Scalia died a full 9 months before the 2016 election. Then McConnell said the next administration should decide. Today he is already saying the Senate will push through a candidate before the election. RBG, you were a shining light, a living Lady Liberty defiantly holding the torch of justice high to cast its light over the encroaching shadows of lawlessness and injustice at the hands of those who hold political power in this once great nation. A grateful nation thanks you. 

All Souls. Of course, All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church will be on my mind and in my heart as I seek new ways to bring the powerful message of justice, love, and equity to your Zoom Rooms from around the nation. I’m so proud of All Souls and how we’ve pulled together during this singular time in history---both in the last four years and in the last six months. You have continually shown up at the feast of justice and equity, the table of inherent worth and dignity and made sure there’s room for all. For Almost 130 years you’ve been a beacon of light and love, providing a compass point by which we might all navigate the moral arc of the universe, bending it toward justice. 

Location, location, location. Of course, I’ll also be thinking about where to go next, where to stay, poring over free camp site listings on public lands, or seeking out the driveway of a friend, the parking lots of Unitarian Universalist churches. I’ll be reflecting on how vast this nation is, how diverse its peoples, its topographies, its languages and cultures. I’ll be remembering the peoples who populated this land long before the Europeans showed up. I’ll be wondering what comes next in this unique experience called democracy; I’ll vow to show up the day after Election Day, regardless of the results to continue to grab hold of the moral arc, obstinately refusing to surrender it to the tyranny of fascism or joyously reaching hold with a new hope that we can yet continue to breath life, liberty, and love into this country until it reaches out in ripples of awareness to all. 

If you would like to help with Car Camino, here’s a link to my Amazon wish list. Thanks to all who have already so generously donated!

On the Road Again; No, Really!

 I had to laugh when I re-read my last blog title: On the Road Again. Oh how rosy everything seemed in January, 2020; how proscribed the future was:   I would train for the demanding Kumano Kodo pilgrimage in Japan and I would walk that in April. The rest of the year I would be either on the treadmill at the gym or hiking in the glorious environs of Colorado Springs.

Such optimism! Such benignly arrogant belief that 2020 would be an equal partner in meeting the goals I had set for myself!

I know I'm not alone in this.

And then COVID-19 --barely a whisper when I wrote my last post--began a full-throated operatic acciaccato, the discordant, broken notes clanging into March, disrupting whatever harmonious convergence of events I had imagined.

And for some reason, although I have been pretty much at home since mid-March, I was too discombobulated to continue writing in my blog. To be sure, I often thought of writing here, sharing pandemic stories of grit and determination, epiphanies that I only received because I was home, on lockdown. I would rehearse these blog entries in my mind; they just never made it onto the silver screen.

I kept pretending I would write "tomorrow," that I was too busy to write, but in reality what was happening is that I was overwhelmed by thought of putting words to paper; to write about the pandemic seemed to be like shooting at a moving target. Each day there was something more dire to focus on than the day before: escalating numbers of people sick or dying from COVID, new atrocities from the person who sits in the Oval Office, outrageous claims by questionable experts. So I didn't write anything.

And the impact of that, my ten faithful readers, is that I have not been in conversation with you; what's been missing this entire time is a sense of connection with you and a level of integrity regarding my commitment to my blog.

And so I come back to these pages, creating for my life and my blog the possibility of being a consistent, powerful, authentic voice as we deepen our lived experience in the midst of this pandemic.

And, again, I have to laugh at the title of my last blog post: On the Road Again. That was eerily prophetic.

Beginning in just a few weeks, I will be on the road again, doing SUV RVing as I travel around the country, delivering my Sunday messages and participating in all my weekly meetings from different locales. I hope to widen the horizon of All Souls, remind us of our interconnectedness to all living beings, celebrate the oneness of everything of which we are a part.

I preached about this new venture on September 6, 2020. You can listen to my sermon here.

I may have lost my voice in the cacophonous notes of the pandemic, but I have found it again, and will create, in these pages, a dramma giocoso, a serious opera with jokes!

And so soon I will set off, not on a walking pilgrimage in a far distant land, but in my 2017 Jeep Cherokee, with my 20 month old Golden Doodle, Rubi, and (soon) my cat, Wham!; a car camino, if you will.

I hope you will join me on this journey. I promise I won't use any more opera terminology! Buen Camino!