That Rock Again

How are you at goodbyes? Bad? Good? I asked myself this question the other evening while sitting in the sauna, a cold season ritual begun ten years ago so that I could go to bed warm and be able to sleep, later continued as one more piece to the puzzle of putting Lyme bacteria into submission.

But about goodbyes, we have all heard of people who sneak away in order to avoid a painful or awkward goodbye. Maybe you know one of these folks personally. On the other extreme, we have Bilbo Baggins who made a big show of his departure. On his 111th birthday, he hosted the entire Shire for a party. When they were well and truly sated with every good thing, he gave the anticipated speech. Beginning with compliments to all of his fine friends, he paused and perhaps fidgeted a moment before continuing, “I, uh, I have things to do. I've put this off far too long. I regret to announce that this is the end. I am going now. I bid you all a very fond farewell. Goodbye.” Then, as most of you will know, he abruptly disappeared from their sight, leaving his nephew Frodo whom he had adopted to attend to the shocked neighbors.i

Friends, this is my goodbye.

When I rebooted the Fierce Joy & Hope blog in January, I did not know the shape it would take. Nor did I know who or how many would choose to read it. It was an experiment, and has been a good one as it propelled me to begin writing more regularly and on a variety of topics. And some people read what I wrote. Thank you for your part.

I don’t know what is ahead for me. Although I have often thought I was in charge of my life, I have never really known what’s ahead. Still, I am confident that the Spirit will guide me as long as I leave her an opening. I am sure God is not through with me. As I used to tell the church’s nonagenarians, “as long as we are still breathing…” Maybe longer.

Lead me to the rock that is higher than I am
      because you have been my refuge. Psalm 61:2-3

i J.R.R. Tolkien, “A Long-Expected Party,” first chapter of The Fellowship of the Ring which is the first volume of the novel, The Lord of the Rings, 1954.

What We Do & Why It Matters

Be proactive

Begin with the end in mind

Put first things first …

Since the Wausau School District made the decision to implement “Leader in Me” – a program for building leadership and life skills – a substitute teacher will find age-appropriate versions of each of Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits posted in virtually every classroom and throughout the halls of every school, kindergarten through twelfth grade. We see “Leader in Me” t-shirts on the backs of children throughout town. When teaching suffixes to elementary students, we can reference “sharpen” from Habit #7's “Sharpen the saw” and the kids have an instant reference.

When Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People was published in 1989, I was at first intrigued but was soon turned off by the hype. Everyone was referencing this book! Yet the products and material have endured. Countless lives have been touched. Clearly, I needed to revisit my opinion.

Although last week’s post did not reference 7 Habits – I wasn’t thinking of the book or its author – it does fit pretty well with Habit #3, “Put first things first.” Then, even before I went in for this week’s subbing adventures, “Begin with the end in mind” had been rolling around in my head. Looking into it, I find that Covey invites his readers to envision what those who someday gather for our funeral might say about us. Hm. Except for a youthful wish to be considered wise, I have given more thought to what I will think of my life in my twilight years. In either instance, having a vision for one’s life is what Habit #2 is about – whether one is six or sixty-six.

Do you have a vision for your life?

I used to, way back when I was a teenager and young adult, but I stopped thinking about vision once Jay* was born and I had a piano and a house. (I recognize now that I surrendered it in favor of my then-husband’s vision.) Although I’ve accomplished a number of goals in the last dozen years, I hadn’t thought about vision. Maybe it’s time.

I recall in an episode of the original Star Trek series, “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield,” the Enterprise is caught in a battle between two powerful entities. The ship is placed in a super-speed loop from which they struggle to escape. Scotty, with his ever-quick responses, tells the captain that “at Warp 10, we’re going nowhere mighty fast.”

This may describe most of my adult life. Yours, too?

In Adam Leipzig’s TEDx talk about finding one’s life purpose, he speaks of the people he informally interviewed during his 25th college reunion. Distilling what was different about the happier ones, he asks listeners:

1. “Who you are;
2. What you do;
3. Who you do it for;
4. What do those people want and need; and
5. How they change as a result.”

He then points out that only two of the above are about ourselves. “Three of them are about other people.” Those happier people he spoke with were outward-facing. I found all of this interesting but what truly amazed me came toward the end of Leipzig’s talk. He said that when someone asks you what you do, after you’ve wondered about their motivation (or ignored it), just say your response to #5 above, about “how what you do changes the people you do it for.”

Wow.

I’m sure I don’t have this polished but here goes…

1. Who am I? Jayneann
2. What do I do? I teach, equipping and empowering people
3. Who do I do it for? School students, refugee women…
4. What do those people want and need? Someone to accompany them in their learning and who believes in them
5. How does what I do change people? They come to believe in themselves and their capacity to succeed.

Wow, again. I think this might have worked. The next time someone asks what I do, instead of saying, “Not much, I’m on medical leave” or some equally sad statement, I will say…

“I help people believe in themselves and their capacity to succeed.”


* not his real name

Knowing What Matters

What would you do if you found out you had one year to live? It’s an old question, one we’ve each heard countless times. Most recently I heard it voiced by a wise twenty-something. (Am I the only one who regularly is taken aback by the young sages among us?)

For the tenth or eleventh year, my daughter Kay* is working on a novel as part of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). The NaNoWriMo website describes itself as “a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to creative writing.” Kay has been a storyteller since she could talk. She began to believe in the possibility of a career in writing fiction when her eighth-grade English teacher said she believed Kay could make a living at it. (Never dismiss the influence you can have in someone else’s life!) Some of Kay’s NaNoWriMo months have been spent reworking earlier drafts but, yes, she really has quite a collection of novels that she continues to polish.

Last week, one of her characters was reflecting on her life. Like Kay, Cassidy refuses to fool herself about the amount of time she might have remaining. Even with decades of living likely to be in front of her, she evaluates her life rationally, the number of years she can expect to live, all that she hopes to accomplish before she dies. For reasons I will not go into (it’s not my story) some of those closest to her have not considered or do not need to consider the existential questions which Cassidy asks herself.

Having recorded this character’s deliberations only the night before, the topic was on Kay’s own mind when we got together for our evening phone chat. After talking about what had happened to each of us during the day, a headache that was relieved through attention to pressure points on the bottoms of my feet, a car that she had taken into the shop for repairs, she told me that she had been thinking about the question “If I found out I would live only one year…” After speaking her own truth on the subject, she invited me – if I chose – to share my own. Kay has shared the gift of her being with the people around her for twenty-six years but she has not yet shared her gift of storytelling except in classes or with those of us closest to her. She still has stories to write, polish, and publish. I am in my seventh decade and while I love life, I find that I have very little I would need to do. I’m aware that this response reflects the grief I’m experiencing these days. I suspect that it's also simply another facet of aging.

After Kay and I expressed ourselves on the topic as well as we could in that moment, I gently reminded us both that this question is significant precisely because it encourages us to take that hard look at how we’re living our lives right now. While a person might be enjoying how they spend their days, would they continue to be satisfied if they learned that they had only one year to live? Five years? Five weeks? Holding that idea lightly, we might ask ourselves if there is something else calling to us that we could be working toward. What is begging to be accomplished or celebrated? Who are we being called to love? 

What do we notice when we make room for questions like these?

Two years ago, I joined Kay and countless others in writing daily during November as part of NaNoWriMo. Wanting to process a knot of relationships which had emerged during my three years in Wausau I wrote a memoir. This writing was also another way for me to shut out for a few hours at a time the inaudible cries of the world during that first Covid-19 autumn. This month, I am writing and except for the fact that I sit at my laptop four hours each day, I find it satisfying. In recent months (years?) I have felt that there is a writing project awaiting me yet what thread I am to follow has eluded me. My hope is that in writing about a variety of topics, I will discover a theme that I’m drawn to follow. I’m still trying to find ways to work on a project and also accomplish needful things… I also want to be open for whatever that quiet inner voice might suggest.

*not her real name

Facing Baggage

In recent months, I had been feeling increasingly yucky, beginning in July when a surprising uptick in fatigue left me wondering if I would have enough stamina for the Boundary Waters canoe trip. Thankfully, I felt strong and healthy then and even for a couple of weeks afterward. By early September though, the fatigue returned with other symptoms gradually increasing as well so that by late October I was getting worried. What was going on?

Finally I realized that my systems were overloaded with dead bacteria that needed help in exiting. Jarisch-Herxheimer reaction (aka Herx) is the term for the reaction one experiences as harmful microorganisms within the body die away due to treatment. In the last three years, I have observed most of the long list of Herx symptoms I found online. Again thankfully, in continuing my searches I have found similarly long lists of ways to manage Herx reactions and I include a small few of them in my weekly regimen. The problem is that, beyond this, I forget to consider Herx when my symptoms flare, as they will from time to time. For weeks, or in this case months, it does not occur to me to consider this culprit. 

When I finally put the pieces together a week ago and started treating the Herx more aggressively, symptoms slowly subsided and I began to feel better. With my head clearing, I am thinking that I may be at a place in my healing journey where I need to shift the treatment balance. While continuing to battle bacteria (though perhaps less intensely), it may be time to work more intentionally on removing the dead bits of bacteria which I have learned can continue to do damage for years after bacterial death.

If your eyes glazed over with all of that, here's a different picture. In a dream on Saturday morning, the hose of my vacuum clearer – nicknamed the TurtleBug years ago by my daughter – was so jam-packed full of junk that it could not draw air. When I opened its access door, the bag was so full that it exploded, spewing colorful paper and plastic junk all over the floor. Notice a pattern?

So, here's my epiphany. This same sort of thing happens in other facets our lives as well, in our relationships, and in society as a whole. It’s no surprise that residuals from past disagreements can continue to interfere with our connections with others. We might talk it out, forgive, and think that we have let it go yet still be hindered by frustration, grief, or pain. (Our nation – if we can figure out how to heal the breaches that seem to have become insurmountable – will face similar challenges.) I use things like charcoal and clay, infrared sauna and Epson salt soaks to help my body rid itself of the bacterial byproducts that can leave me feeling sicker. Until last week, I had not made the connection that just as I will shift the balance of treatment for my mind and body, I would do well to apply this practice to other areas of my life. One, by working to dismantle the resistance that keeps me from accepting things I cannot change. Another, by trying to shift the balance in how I connect with other persons.

Even when we have no active conflict, I would like to be mindful of what is driving my part in our interactions. Relationships are really important to me. With friends and family, acquaintances and even people I dislike, I can walk away from our conversations feeling better about my part when I pay attention to the baggage that might be influencing me without my noticing. I’m going to try to work on this. Wish me luck!

With a Love like That

Even

After

All this time

The Sun never says to the Earth,

“You owe Me.”

Look

What happens

With a love like that,

It lights the Whole Sky.

~ Hafiz

I recall reading once that early peoples would have been terrified by an eclipse. Was the sun angry? Had they done something wrong? Would it return? I didn’t think about it at the time but older now, maybe wiser, I think, sure, they were afraid the first time. After that, it was just another (rare) part of life.

August 21, 2017. White-knuckled I drive through a near-empty stretch of Nebraska.

Months earlier, I’d suggested a road trip through Utah and New Mexico to my daughter and been surprised by her keen interest in seeing the solar eclipse. We researched the best places to view it. Tennessee didn’t interest me and since I longed to show Kay the southwest, we settled on Nebraska (on the way to Utah’s National Parks). The Thursday before departure, trusting I’d done all I could to ready the church for two weeks pastorless, I returned to the house and packed the car. The next day, Kay and I met in Appleton, touched up our Ren Faire costumes, and hung out. Having just moved to a different church in July, I worked to decompress so that I could be fully present and enjoy this vacation with my college-aged daughter.

Five years later, the details of our adventures are fuzzy. I recall spending the night in Milwaukee prior to heading to the Bristol Renaissance Faire. In the rush of costuming the next morning I misplace my credit card, recalling only after canceling it that I’d stuck it in my bodice. We enjoy Ren Faire, finding it as lively with music and entertainments as ever. Around 4:00, hot and tired, we begin our trek south and west, eating along the way and arriving at the Airbnb after dark.

The next thing I recall is on the morning of the eclipse. Having left Omaha, Nebraska behind, we're sailing along on I-80 making good time when we encounter a wall of traffic. Where did all the cars come from? We're in the middle of nowhere! Slowing to a crawl – eight to thirty miles per hour – my anxiety skyrockets. The eclipse is at 1:04 local time and while I don't care one way or the other about that, Kay has her heart set on seeing it. Ninety minutes later the highway magically clears. We make up some time but won't make it to our destination. 

We drive until the world begins to darken then, taking the next exit, pull into a vacant junkyard surrounded by corn fields. Laughing in excitement, we hop out of the car. The moments that follow as daylight disappears change my opinion about the wonder of seeing a solar eclipse. Laughter continues to abound, in part because the experience is beyond words. What I had dismissed with indifference turns out to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I’m grateful for Kay's persistence in voicing her desire to see it. (The rest of the vacation is good though since Google Maps’ estimated travel times are based on traveling 15-20 mph beyond the speed limit we are always behind schedule.)

Later this fall, the Wausau Lyric Choir will sing Hafiz’s poem set to music by Joseph Martin. I suspect few members of this ensemble (founded as a Lutheran choir) will know they were written by a 14th-century Persian Moslem poet.

“Even. After. All this time.” As we breathed these words during our initial read-through, my heart was captivated. The sun never says, You owe me. Imagine if it did. If it could. We do owe. Our very existence. To the sun’s warmth and energy. How seldom I think of this. How infrequently am I grateful for this source that makes all else possible. Still caught by the words’ essence yet slow to warm to the second half of the poem, I acknowledge that initially it seemed too Christian for me. Learning the origin of the words helped me to embrace their universal meaning. God, Allah, Source, the Universe, however we name it, we are recipients of life. We are – all of creation – blessed by a love, an endless intention for well-being, that surpasses the imagination’s ability to grasp.

With a love like that 

Anything is possible.

The Best Medicine

Do you laugh easily?
Are you good at telling jokes?
Do you enjoy relaxing with a favorite comedy after work?

Maybe you're one who gets the folks around you laughing by telling a story about what happened at the supermarket Wednesday. That's not me. I used to be able to draw people in with an amusing story as I preached on Sunday morning. Not so much that I considered stand-up comedy but enough that I thought I might have learned some timing. Unlikely. In the twenty-seven months since I went on medical leave, my only recollection of making someone laugh was with a dubious expression when they defended their procrastination a little too innocently. They cracked up. I'm trying to stop joking with my bestie. Whether it’s my delivery, their reception, or both, it doesn't work. They invariably take me seriously. Thankfully, we laugh together enough that I get my daily quota.

Since humor can be challenging for autistic folks, this could be my problem. While I can laugh alone at Buster Keaton's physical comedy, for ’most anything else I need another person laughing to get me going. Two years in a row, I laughed most inappropriately in a conference room full of people as the bishop and a superintendent were announcing which churches were welcoming new pastors. Something in their traditional wording fooled me into thinking I heard a joke. I've adapted somewhat.

• This year, I covered my mouth so that if errant laughter erupted, most people (Bishop Jung) wouldn't hear.
• I don't bother watching comedy alone.
• I make a point of being around people who laugh. Together, we laugh at ourselves and life.

Last week, I spent a few days in Green Bay visiting my kids. When Jay mentioned enjoying watching “The Good Place” the rest of us weren't surprised. The fantasy comedy series delves into all sorts of philosophical questions. Ever since he discovered philosophy in college (took every class offered and earned a 3rd major!) he's had a passion for it. 

Leaving the supermarket yesterday, I told Kay about something I'd seen in the dairy aisle. She responded quickly with a “derriere” quip. We laughed heartily though little of it made any sense. Later we watched “She Hulk” and while I didn't laugh much at this unapologetic comedy, we both laughed frequently at Washington Irving's word pictures as we read aloud a seasonal favorite, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. (And we made it to “The End” for the first time!)

These last two and a half years have been hard for all of us. I suspect that the pandemic and the polarization we find nearly everywhere make it harder to find humor in everyday life. And yet, laughter truly is the best medicine. A colleague who contracted Lyme disease some years ago credits his healing, in part, to daily laughter therapy.

I've said many times that we humans are made for relationship. We're also made for laughter. Whether we actually cry or not, life offers many opportunities for tears. It's our job to make sure we notice – and create – abundant openings for laughter as well. This can be hard. When our days are filled with grief or the ones we laugh with are far away, it can seem like nothing's funny. Still, we need to laugh. To giggle and guffaw. To grab our sides with tears streaming down our faces. We need this!

Partly because of a limited capacity for screen time because of the disease, I don’t get my daily quota of laughter. I can feel it and I’m not sure how to resolve this. Do you have an idea? I’d be delighted (and grateful) if you offered a suggestion.

    

And as always, if you like what you read, please share it with friends

Long Term

A study followed 33,000 people in Scotland who had tested positive for Covid and 63,000 who had never tested positive, checking symptoms at six-month intervals. The study’s authors wanted to examine the long-term risks of Covid by comparing the frequency of symptoms in people with and without previous Covid diagnoses. Published on Wednesday in Nature Communications, the study found that, eighteen months later, one in twenty people who had been sick had not recovered at all. Another 42% reported only some improvement in health and well-being.i

This sounds like terrible news. And I admit that fear of long Covid is what kept me diligently masking for so long. Yet there is also good news here. According to Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly, chief of research at the V.A. St. Louis Health Care System, because the study uses a control group, researchers can accurately assess which symptoms are associated with long Covid (and not something else). “It also tracks with the broader idea that long Covid is truly a multisystem disorder… not only in the brain, not only in the heart – it’s all of the above.”ii

According to Dr. Jill P. Pell, senior author of the study and head of the School of Health and Wellbeing at the University of Glasgow, “Covid can appear differently in different individuals, and it can have more than one impact on your life…”iii

While long Covid is clearly terrible, I find good news in this report because

• It reminds us that researchers are diligently working to learn more about the long-term effects of a disease that many people are now dismissing; and
• Medical practitioners will be better prepared to help people with end up with long Covid as well as with other ailments with similar symptomatologies.

One of those other ailment which “is truly a multisystem disorder” and “can appear differently in different individuals” is chronic Lyme disease. For me and for the tens of thousands of people who struggle with the disease, this study and others like it offer great hope.

But wait, you say. Tens of thousands? That many?

An estimate based on insurance records suggests that about 476,000 are diagnosed and treated for Lyme disease in the U.S. each year.iv Although the CDC/NIH estimates a treatment failure rate of between 10-20%, the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS) found that among those treated early, 16% to 39% remain ill.v For those treated for chronic Lyme, estimates range from 26% to 50%.vi (These numbers do not include those who never learn they have Lyme.) Using the CDC’s old estimate that 300,000 people in the U.S. contract Lyme each year, Lorraine Johnson, CEO of LymeDisease.org, offers a prevalence chart. (Disease prevalence is the cumulative number of people who get a disease and remain ill – whether treated early or later.vii)

Even in the best case scenario, that would be 300,000 people within ten years. A more realistic number would be between 600,000 and 1.2 million in the same timeframe (and many people have had Lyme for decades). So I greatly underestimated when I said tens of thousands.

A survey of about 3,000 patients with chronic Lyme disease found that more than 70% reported only fair or poor health.viii 

This suggests that a great many people are suffering from an ailment that can be as debilitating as long Covid but without the press, and often without support of no medical professionals who take them seriously even if they don’t know how to help, insurance that covers their treatment, or even family support. In short, without a social or a medical safety net.

If there are blessings to come out of this pandemic, my prayer is that better care for chronic Lyme patients will be one of them.

i     Damian McNamara, “For Many, Long COVID's Impacts Go On And On, Major Study Says,” WebMD, last viewed on October 15, 2022, https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20221012/for-many-long-covids-impacts-go-on-and-on and Benjamin Mueller, “Nearly Half of Covid Patients Haven’t Fully Recovered Months Later, Study Finds,” New York Times, October 12, 2022, last viewed on October 15, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/12/health/long-covid.html?campaign_id=154&emc=edit_cb_20221014&instance_id=74673&nl=virus-briefing&regi_id=126117459&segment_id=110042&te=1&user_id=c32140b396f770fc82f0c145275a76b0.
  
ii    Benjamin Mueller, NYT.
  
iii   Benjamin Mueller, NYT and Damian McNamara, WebMD.
  
iv    CDC, “How many people get Lyme disease?” last viewed on October 15, 2022, https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/stats/humancases.html.
  
v     “Lyme Basics: Chronic Lyme Disease,” last viewed on October 15, 2022, https://www.lymedisease.org/lyme-basics/lyme-disease/chronic-lyme-disease/. While I have found lymedisease.org to be a helpful resource in my own Lyme journey, I cannot assure the reader that everything presented there is fact-checked and without bias.
  
vi    “Lyme Basics: Chronic Lyme Disease.”
  
vii   Lorraine Johnson, “Growing Number Of Chronic Lyme Patients – Still No Government Action Plan?” July 11, 2015, last viewed on October 15, 2022, https://www.lymedisease.org/lymepolicywonk-growing-number-of-chronic-lyme-patients-still-no-government-action-plan/
  
viii  Lorraine Johnson, Spencer Wilcox, Jennifer Mankoff, Raphael B. Stricker, “Severity of chronic Lyme disease compared to other chronic conditions: a quality of life survey,” March 27, 2014, https://peerj.com/articles/322/ referenced in “Lyme Basics: Chronic Lyme Disease.”

It's all in the mind! (well, a lot of it)

“I get to paint the garage!”

It’s Wednesday and this was my thought upon waking up this morning. Now that I’ve sipped some tea, let me explain…

I’m not delighted to paint the garage. It needs it and would have been painted last year if I hadn’t broken my foot. I look forward to a sense of satisfaction when I survey the freshly painted back wall. Returning my friend’s ladder will also feel good. But I don’t enjoy this project as I do some others.

Why the predawn enthusiasm then? Psychologists tell us that we can change the way we feel about tasks or relationships by changing the way we talk about them. When we express frustration or distaste, this colors our perspective. The relationship becomes burdensome. The task, more onerous. The reverse is also true. When we speak with pleasure or excitement about our relationship with a sibling or the task ahead, we are more likely to approach it with anticipation. “I get to paint the garage!” reflects an intention to change my mindset.

“A mindset is a belief that orients the way we handle situations—the way we sort out what is going on and what we should do.”i Carol Dweck wrote about fixed and growth mindsets – “My abilities are set and I can’t change them” versus “If I keep working at it, I’ll improve.”ii Gary Klein studies other types of mindsets as well. He explains that mindset influences whether police officers or military personnel use intimidation or trust-building as they seek compliance.iii

I’ve only been working (again) on my mindset for a week so I can’t say yet if it’s helping. But I’ve been changing into painting clothes without inner complaint – I’m a messy painter – and haven’t groaned about carrying the heavy ladder. The work is happening. Maybe that’s enough.

I'm not suggesting that “fake it ’til you feel it” is always a useful strategy. I was mistaken to believe it would suffice for absent feelings in my marriage. Yet it worked for John Wesley, founder of the Methodism movement (and subsequent Methodist denominations) when his faith was shaken. An Anglican priest, he had felt called to travel to Georgia to win people to Christ but, once there, he failed not only in that but also in his efforts to win a certain woman's affection. Dispirited he boarded a ship to return to London. During a storm at sea, he noticed that some of his fellow travelers displayed a sense of peace he did not feel. Once home, he spoke with a trusted friend, Peter Bohler, laying out his belief that he ought to give up preaching.

Wesley:     “How can you preach to others, who have not faith yourself?”

He then asked Bohler “whether he thought I should leave it off or not.” 

Bohler:     “By no means.” 

Wesley:    “But what can I preach?”

Bohler:     “Preach faith till you have it; and then, because you have it, you will preach faith.”

That was in March. Wesley was persuaded to persevere. In May he approached Bohler again who instructed him to keep at it. We can imagine Wesley grieving for a lost faith that might never return. Yet only days later he experienced a conversion experience that Methodist churches commemorate in late May each year.iv From then on, Wesley worked tirelessly, preaching faith because he had it.

What does this mean for us? Maybe nothing. Maybe something.

The counselor I’m seeing assigned me homework to help dismantle feelings of insecurity. (While I have no more fears than other people, mine often run rampant through my mind.) I’m to say, “I value our relationship. -- is a good, committed friend.” I’m often settling into bed for the night before I think of it. That's okay. I say it and smile because they are a good friend.  

Will this help long term? As in all things we get to choose – each day, sometimes each hour – whether we will hope and trust. 

Let's hold to hope!

i   Gary Klein, “Mindsets: What they are and why they matter.”, May 1, 2016, Psychology Today. Last viewed on October 6, 2022.
ii  Carol S. Dweck, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, Random House, 2006. Last viewed on October 6, 2022.
iii Gary Klein, “Mindsets: What they are and why they matter.”
iv John Wesley was a prolific journal writer all his adult life. “The Journal of John Wesley is composed of 50 years of Wesley's reflections. These writings offer a first person view of the thoughts, feelings, and prayers of a man whose intelligence and organizational skills were only surpassed by his enthusiasm for spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ.” Here you can find records of his first and second conversations as well as his conversion experience. Last viewed on October 6, 2022.

A Bear Ate My Lunch

The sun always seemed to shine during that semester at New Mexico State University. The exchange group (national and international students) regularly went on Saturday outings. Hikes in the Organ Mountains are the ones I remember. The sky was so blue, the vistas so different from the ones I grew up with in Pennsylvania.

Returning to New Mexico a couple years later, I joined fellow teachers on short hikes. In cross-country skiing, I learned about cardio and the quiet of a snowy mountain. Downhill skiing, I felt the exhilaration of speed and, initially, the fear of a tumble as I approached the end of a run and didn’t know how to stop. I also met others who enjoyed outdoor… excursions. (One had just backpacked the John Muir Trail, a two hundred miles trek from the Yosemite Valley and to the summit of Mount Whitney.) In addition to hiking mountain and desert, we went spelunking and rock climbing. With a borrowed backpack I joined them on a weekend trip, learning the thrill and exhaustion of carrying all one’s gear.

Soon after, I bought a cheap frame pack, a decent hip belt, and a good sleeping pad. I only used the pack a handful of times but I relished visiting wild places while challenging myself in ways I never had before. Having joined a few trips, one July day I headed to California. My powder blue Escort rebelled at the dry heat of Death Valley. Every twenty minutes I’d pull to the side of the road and let the radiator cool enough to add water before continuing. Finally reaching higher country, I spent the next day waiting as a mechanic procured, then installed, another radiator. With the car again dependable, I toured Devils Pilepost one day, then walked the path up and down Mount Whitney another, jogging the last mile or so before dusk became dark (and me with no flashlight).

After partaking of these and other light romps, I drove to Yosemite, registered at a ranger station, threw the pack on my back, and started walking. If you missed it I was alone, my first, and only, solo backpacking trip. Glorious! I’ve never since been so present in my skin as to recognize by touch whether that brush of contact on the arm or neck was a mosquito, fly or spider’s line.

Being small in stature, I’d opted not to add the weight of a tent to my pack. The second morning, my left eye was swollen shut from an insect bite. On what was to have been the third of four mornings, I awoke to find that I hadn’t slung my food bag high enough up the tree to evade bears. A few grains of rice, two dehydrated peas, and some bright red crumbs on the ground below were all that remained. I’d enjoyed freeze-dried strawberry slices the night before, savoring the sweet-tart zing on my tongue. Wanting the prolong the experience, I had left half the package for the next night’s supper. I wished I’d eaten them all! That day, as the chocolate chip cookies in the car called to me, I hiked twenty miles downhill, arriving at the parking lot around 10:00 p.m.

Until quite recently, that trip marked the end of my great outdoor adventures. Within three years I married, had a child, bought a piano, and got a mortgage. I settled into a traditional life, learning a little about plumbing, paying the bills. The American dream. To say that I failed would be inaccurate. I may have done poorly in marriage (I’m too close to assess) but my kids are amazing and I wouldn’t trade them for a world of adventures. Those years, both the good and bad, made me who I am.

But that was The Box, and not my box. Stepping out of it, I began peeling back layers of assumptions and wrong beliefs, slowly coming to know myself.

Recently I was instructed to ask each morning, “What does Jayneann need?” Sometimes a response comes easily. Other times I have no answer. In those moments I remind myself that re-membering is a process and that as I continue to reclaim who I am, more often I will know.

Busy as a . . .

Pushing away Virginia creeper vines and scraping away as much soil as I could before hitting rock, I quickly added a plant, covered and watered it, repeating the process a few times. These native plants are still young so they’ll have no trouble sinking their roots between the boulders that make up my friend's yard. Wild bergamot grows along roadsides locally. Mine, which came from a friend last year, is doing so well that I thought I’d share some of it. Spotted beebalm is less common and I’d have never known about it if some hadn’t appeared in my sideyard seven years ago. Local nurseries don't sell it and it took me years to discover what it is. All I knew was that it’s a pollinator magnet with weird flowers.

I brought some to Wausau and now that it’s established, it’s the only plant on which I consistently find great black digger wasps. These shy native pollinators will fly past the other flowers to get to this favorite.

Transplanting complete, I returned to the house, socks wet and feet cold. Today is a gray day, 55° (12° C). Definitely sweater weather. I’ll miss sitting in the red camp chair by the natives bed. I’ve really enjoyed seeing what’s new there each day, especially the last two months as the plants flowered abundantly and bees were at their busiest.

Some people are nervous around bees but I’ve never had trouble with native ones. (I’m not speaking of yellowjackets, native or introduced, which I was glad not to see in my yard this year!) Yes, I’ve had my share of stings, even one from a bumblebee when I stood picking raspberries too close to the hole in the garage wall where she was nesting. Generally though, bumblebees are peaceful creatures too intent on their flowers to give humans the time of day. I can walk through their midst gently pushing plants to one side and the other, “Excuse me… Excuse me,” and they ignore me entirely. And except for a few species, bumblebees are solitary creatures.i

It’s been thrilling these last two summers to identify some bee species. Honeybees, of course, were introduced but we have many native species in North America. Sweat bees are green and quite small. Eastern bumblebees are small and prolific in late summer beds. Brown-belted bumblebees are twice as big but like their cousins are just as peaceful.

I’ve found it difficult to take clear pictures of any of them. These busy creatures are in such constant motion that the SEEK app has a tough time identifying species.ii I was really hoping to get a name for the huge one I first saw last summer. All summer I’d been watching for it and finally saw it last week. Much larger than any of the others (body length is maybe an inch and a half), its back legs as it grasps a flower remind me of those on a small grasshopper, only black. Alas, SEEK could only say it’s a bumblebee.

And why, you ask, am I going on about bees? Well, besides the fact that our lives depend upon the pollinators that we are actively exterminating and which so many unjustly fear, and besides my belief that G-d cares as much for these insects as for humankind, bumblebees please me. I’m tickled to see them so industriously going about their business.

In them, I see my old self, when I was so task-focused that I could accomplish great numbers of mundane things yet be oblivious to what else was around me. Though I can no longer do as I once did, I guess I admire it. You’ve probably heard the axiom “it takes all kinds.” I used to be that kind. Some of you were too, or still are. And if it’s healthy for you, then that’s excellent. The rest of us may be better for you doing your thing so tirelessly, so devotedly. Thank you!

These days I’m more of a watch-the-plants-and-bees kind of person. And that’s okay too, at least for now. Some days though, like last Friday, I get to practice being something in between. That day I substitute taught at the local high school and middle school. It was a great day, a busy one made busier by a shortage of substitutes. I arrived expecting to lead German classes but because a Spanish teacher called in sick at the last minute I covered a couple of her classes as well. (It was exciting to find that a couple years of German study on Duolingo had prepared me to help third-year students in that language and my experience and shorter studies in Spanish equipped me for Spanish students of the same level.iii)

Usually substitute teachers have one or more breaks beyond lunch (when the regular teacher would have preparation time) but on this day I had a bare fifteen minutes to regroup. No complaints. Being useful feels good. I returned to the house tired yet content, recalling how I used to do this every day.

And wondering how the bees do it …

i  Douglas W. Tallamy, Nature's Best Hope: A New Approach to Conservation That Starts in Your Yard. I’m really glad a friend loaned me their copy of the book. I took issue with only a couple non-technical bits this entomologist wrote (one about Lyme disease) and found it well worth my time to read.

ii  SEEK by iNaturalist is slower to identify insects than plants. Still, it’s better than the app I tried before it and has improved in the year since I installed it on my phone.

iii Duolingo is a language-learning appeared language-learning that allows users to practice vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and listening skills. I use the free version. It’s great though I really need to find opportunities to work on conversation.

Angry. Really?

Friday night I played a mindless game on my phone long past bedtime. Finally setting it aside, I cleaned my teeth and prepared for sleep. Since I try to avoid such traps, I wondered about having succumbing to the game's lure. “I’m angry,” came a quick answer. Really? Letting the possibility roll around in my mind, I realized that, yes, I was angry. But why?

I guess I was bothered about feeling fatigued on returning from my camping trip to see daughter Kay in Door County. It had hardly been strenuous. Gentle walks each day, plenty of sleep, a modest amount of social interaction. Why was I so tired? Instead of getting the tent and other camping gear cleaned up and arranged on the shelf in the garage, I lounged around, listening to my body. I put away a few things between extended breaks and told myself that this would do for now. Yet I felt frustrated. (One.)

While vacationing, I recycled unopened most of what arrived in my Gmail Inbox. Now back at the house, I read a perfectly fine email, a query that got me thinking about tasks I’d been avoiding either doing or thinking about. None of it is bad, just uncomfortable with a fair amount of uncertainty. Not sure how to proceed, I’ve lacked motivation and have delayed taking action. Maybe it’s time to proceed even without clarity. Sigh. (Two.)

A pervasive swirl of feelings regarding my solitary state shelters (usually) below my awareness. Most of the time, I enjoy my life and find solitude of my own choosing satisfying. But after a point, aloneness becomes excessive. (After the isolation of the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, many of you are probably nodding in understanding.) We Homo sapiens thrive in the society of others. To be deprived of companionship can be torturous. But for me, family is far away. And I’m cautious of overwhelming a friend. 

With the returning energy of healing, I returned to substitute teaching last winter. Getting into the classroom once or twice a week and working with the youngsters there was wonderful! While I barely spoke with adults, subbing fed my need for connection. Sadly, frustratingly (there’s that word again) I noticed by spring how easily my autistic mind can become overloaded. Similarly to how someone with chronic fatigue will need to ration their physical activity, I need to ration my social activity. Even one engagement beyond my regular weekly activities and connections can put me over the edge. Again, sigh. (Three.)

There’s more, of course – mass graves in Ukraine, melting ice sheets, pets treated poorly – but this was enough for me to concede to being angry. As I lay there in the dark, I recalled a journaling exercise I’d once used. I wrote “I’m angry…” then for three minutes wrote of things that angered me, shocked at how easily I filled the page. The words just kept coming. But I was cozy in bed now so, no, not this time. Thankfully, by acknowledging my frustrations I was able to set them aside and sleep.

What bothered me about Friday’s experience was that I didn’t know I was angry. It seems I still don’t have a healthy relationship with the emotion. In my early years, I learned to pretend that anger wasn’t present. Later, a slow-simmering anger punctuated by occasional blowups pervaded my marriage. After leaving that relationship anger seemed to vanish. But while I couldn't recognize it, Kay could and I learned to trust her awareness. Now, alone, I often miss the signs.

Friday the anger snuck in unobserved. If it had spilled the tea and generally made a mess of everything, that would have been unpleasant but I’d have known. And knowing, I could have worked through my frustrations rather than employing a trick to distract myself from them. (As we all know, that works only for as long as the distraction lasts.)

Reading Richard Rohr’s devotion for Sunday reminded me to keep practicing letting go of those things I cannot change. Frustration about chronic conditions or loneliness is understandable but it does nothing for my peace of mind. Such things are a part of my life as much as shared stories and laughter with my daughter or a sense of wonder on wandering through a forested campground after dark. 

Gratitude in Everything?!

Thanks & Gratitudes, 1001-1006

What are you thankful for? Are there things for which you’re thankful but not grateful? Maybe, like me. you’ve wondered what the difference is. I tried to explain it in a sermon once but didn’t convince myself. The words mean different things to different people. There’s no consensus.

“What am I grateful for today?” is a regular part of my practice but I don’t usually talk about it until November (and then I feel guilty) so I’m writing this now. For today, thanks is what we express and feel in the moment and gratitude is when we’ve allowed ourselves to be affected, and potentially changed, by someone or something.

I’m regularly thankful for breath, food, drink, sleep, family, friends, health, house, body, clothing… That’s easy. With practice, finding things for which you’re grateful can become equally simple, at least on our better days. During a book study at the Appleton church we were encouraged to keep a gratitude journal, recording five things each day. “The rain” doesn’t really express gratitude but “The rain soothed my frayed nerves” does. Having said that, I admit to using shorthand, only seldom writing complete thoughts. I know what I mean as I write it. And I’ve moved to only recording three things.

Today though, I’d like to explore the idea of being grateful for the hard things because when we allow these experiences to affect and shape us, we become more alive to the moment. We become better versions of ourselves.

If you cannot consider the idea today, I respect that. But I want to examine it for myself, at least. I suppose the idea first took root during an e-book study a few months into my medical leave. Something one of the women said helped me realize that, in at least one way (which I’ve since forgotten) I could view the Lyme disease was a gift. If this is a gift, what else is?

A difficult marriage led me to lean on One greater than myself and, perhaps through that, to accept that I have value just as I am and to cultivate friendships with people who accept me. I learned not to focus on my weaknesses. This might have happened anyway but it came in the context of marriage. And I’m grateful.

While I would not wish my situation on anyone, this time apart has been good for me. I could probably write a small book about the negative aspects of having chronic Lyme disease and having to go on unpaid medical leave. There has been a fair amount of grief. And yet…

I’ve grown. I have time for the inner work. Stress is nearly absent. Only months into the medical leave, Kay* voiced her opinion that my job had been slowly killing me. As I’ve learned more about myself as an autistic person, I’ve come to accept that, for me, pastoral ministry – a job that doesn’t accommodate difference kindly or easily – was a perfect storm. The expectations on every level, the assumptions about how pastors behave, the hours, the people who prefer familiar ways at all costs… My blunt manner, perfectionism, sensory processing issues, need for rest, inability to read non-verbals… Add Lyme disease and it was impossible.

I’m grateful for my life as it is today. While my mind and body slowly heal, I can visit my kids, go on a Boundary Waters adventure, and refinish the 100-year-old front door of the house. I get to tutor Afghan women in English, participate in a tai chi class, and sing weekly with the Lyric Choir – none of which I’d have had the time and energy for if I was pastoring a church.

Through living with chronic illness, I’ve learned compassion at a depth I might never have known. Granted, I’m around fewer people but I’m more patient than I used to be and less likely to challenge their opinions. Believing that people are doing what they can in that moment, kindness comes more easily. My rough edges will always be present but maybe the light shines through me a little clearer now. In the “Better Person” category, I’m most grateful for this.

Yet I feel the hypocrisy. Gratitude is easy when one’s life is as good as mine. If one of my children was to die, I might be grateful for my strength but never for the loss. That a loved one might someday disappear into dementia terrifies me. Easy words fall silent here.

While I recall reading that gratitude leaves us happier, I can offer no promises. I only hope and pray that when we each face the impasse that cannot be borne, we both invite and accept the help of others until we can again smile and sleep and feel grateful.

* My daughter, not her real name

On Coloring or the Spiral of Self-Discovery

A text came, asking, “Do you ever ignore a call, like something the universe is trying to tell you?” Probably, but I do try not to…

Have you ever come to the end of a book and wanted to reread it right away? Maybe it's my choice of reading material lately but it happened again last week as I reread don Miguel Ruiz’s The Four Agreements. After describing the agreements, he explains ways to break the old agreements we accepted when we were being “domesticated.” (I love that descriptor!) Not for the first time, I wondered about my most authentic self. Who am I when I stop pretending to be the way I think “they” want me to be?

Years ago, I began this unlearning in part by collecting phrases like “stepping out of the box” and “coloring outside the lines.” Last week while processing Ruiz’s words (and painting the garage), I thought about this way of coloring and realized that I haven’t colored in years and don’t, in fact, enjoy it. 

The previous owner didn't have a tall enough ladder to paint the gable green.
My aesthetic sense suggested I keep it and even add a couple more courses of white.

Friends color. They make beautiful mandalas and other pictures. It’s meditative. They relax as they use purple here and green there. Not me. I could never color in the lines well enough to meet personal expectations – it was stressful to try – but I wasn’t able to intentionally color outside the lines either. I gave up my crayons at the earliest opportunity. I still get out the watercolor pencils occasionally. They set around for a couple months before I put them away again. Whether I keep them to torture myself about inadequacies or out of a hope that someday I’ll be able to enjoy using them, I don’t know.

What this says about me, I can’t say. But I’m guessing you’ve experienced something similar in your life at one time or another. Anyway, I have issues with coloring. Remember that and that I try not to ignore the universe’s calls.

This morning’s church service was led by four women who meet monthly to share their spiritual journeys. (Just seeing them brought a “yes” to my awareness. I missed my covenant group after moving to Wausau five years ago but the feeling faded. I forgot. It’s time to be open to another group’s pull on my heart.) In her story, one of the women mentioned coloring outside the lines and my ears perked up.

When I met with Sister Gabrielle during my retreat in July (I wrote about it here) she was excited to hear that I play piano. “How? … classically-trained … how often … oh, that’s perfect!” Seriously, she was like a kid with a new toy as she assigned me homework. Every day I was to spend fifteen minutes playing like a small child with no experience or training, ignoring the internalized voices that tell me music has to sound a certain way. “Play a note, then another. Try this, then add that. If you follow a melody or find yourself thinking c-minor or harmony, stand up, spin around three times, and start over. Set a timer and just do it.”

We spent a good while discussing this. When I asked why she wanted me to do this, she explained that I need to break myself of the things that have ruled my life for so long. Since piano is where I received my deepest training, I need to start there. She’s a classically-trained painter, she said in passing, and this saved her life.

Huh. Okay. The first time I sat at the piano, I was able to play this way for 6 ½ minutes. Then my head hurt. Through July I gradually extended the time to nine minutes but was astonished again and again at how mentally exhausting it was. I didn’t enjoy the exercise but it was homework so I did it anyway. As I did, a funny thing began to happen. Since returning from the Boundary Waters I haven’t been regular in my practice and am not using the timer, yet I notice that I’m enjoying this odd homework and looking forward to the next session. I find myself wondering what will happen next. (Interesting, since “I wonder what will happen next” is part of my mindfulness practice.) Without meaning to, and while actively working not to imitate anything, I’ve begun hearing structures in this plunking and playing that seem similar to Bartok’s simple piano pieces or to what one hears in contemporary movies.

I’d been talking with this spiritual guide about a yearning to discover who I really am, what I like and need. That’s what led to the assignment. Now it seems that everywhere I turn, I hear that I need to undo the domestication of my early years and the ways I was expected – or thought I was expected – to conform in order to fit in. It’s funny really. I thought I’d done this work. Revisiting it wasn’t part of my plan. I guess it’s like I used to tell Orville and the other 90-somethings I visited. As long as we’re still breathing, God isn’t finished with us.

When we open ourselves to the holy that’s in us and around us, well, Frodo Baggins isn’t the only one to learn that “It's a dangerous business … there is no knowing where you might be swept off to.”

Yes, You Can! Touch Another's Life

Two weeks ago I opened the small book that had laid on the table all summer (except for when it was in my pack at the Boundary Waters). The first time I had read it, I didn't realize the author had also penned these words:

“The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done... The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet.”i

When I first read Telling Secrets by Frederick Buechner (pronounced Beek-ner) I was at a crossroads. For months an awareness had been growing in me which I felt would be wrong to ignore. I knew that as a clergyperson I was expected to respond in a certain way yet in my bones I felt myself being let in another direction. I had made a habit in recent years of following such leadings but, mindful of how easily we can be swayed toward our own preference, I was cautious. I prayed… I journaled… I listened and watched… I prayed some more...Then, one momentous day in April, as the city readied itself for a snowstorm, I began reading. But not for long. I stopped short on page 3. 

“I have come to believe that by and large the human family all has the same secrets, which are both very telling and very important to tell. They are telling in the sense that they tell what is perhaps the central paradox of our condition – that what we hunger for perhaps more than anything else is to be known in our full humanness, and yet that is often just what we also fear more than anything else.”ii

It's important, the author explained, to tell the secret of who we are, even if only to ourselves, lest we begin to accept the version we show the world. Telling our secrets helps us to see where we've been and where we're headed. Our telling also encourages others to share their secrets with us. Such exchanges are “what being human is all about.”

Opening my journal, I began to write, copying those first two sentences and then composing my response. As I worked, I found peace and knew what was next for me. My life’s path was shaped, in part, by these words which confirmed what I already knew but wasn’t ready to believe on my own. I would live my truth – whether it worked out well, whether I faced repercussions, or not. 

We each have the potential to affect another’s life. It’s not just preachers and writers (though Buechner was both.) I began posting here again not because of the “Rev.” that precedes my name but because I have things to say that could lend others courage or temporarily lighten their load.

“Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery that it is. In the boredom and pain of it no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the holy and hidden heart of it because in the last analysis all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace.”iii

That said, Buechner's art is part of what has kept me from pursuing a long-held dream. Although sometimes more florid than I prefer, he wrote as I’d like to write. I can’t compete. My writer-daughter would say I don’t need to – I just need to write my story. True, yet it’s hard to see past his ability to shape words into ideas. (Don’t even get me started on Victor Hugo!) 

Only after I began rereading Keeping Secrets on August 15th, did I realize Buechner's contribution to this incapacity. 

On that day, I read again that he was ten in 1936. “Hm, that’s the year Daddy was born.” And then “This was published in 1991. Thirty years ago. He’d be 96 today. He’s probably dead.” This thought left me sad. And surprised at the sadness. 

I too believe that “Coincidences are God's way of getting our attention” and found it an odd coincidence that – as I learned a few days later – Frederich Buechner died on August 15th. 

It seems strange that he’s gone when he had only recently come alive for me. I empathized when he wanted to fix his daughter’s illness. Sat with him in the cramped space of Little Ease, knowing that a place of torment can become home. Nodded when he said that a rustly license plate propped on the bookshelf was “as holy a relic as I have ever seen.” And I’m thankful, because my life is better for having known him, even just a little.

“One life on this earth is all that we get, whether it is enough or not enough, and the obvious conclusion would seem to be that at the very least we are fools if we do not live it as fully and bravely and beautifully as we can.”iv

i   Found at frederickbuechner.com/quote-of-the-day/2021/7/18/vocation on August 26, 2022, originally published in Wishful Thinking, 1973.
ii  Found at frederickbuechner.com/telling-secrets on August 26, 2022, originally published in Telling Secrets, 1991.
iii Found at frederickbuechner.com/listening-to-your-life on August 26, 2022, originally published in Now and Then, 1983.
iv Found at libquotes.com/frederick-buechner/quote/lbd4a2z on August 26, 2022, originally published in The Hungering Dark, 1981.