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| I have many things to be grateful for; today I'm compelled to confess my gratitude for the following:
- the adoption of Alyssa on Friday,
- the adoption of Alyssa Nicole Deliverance Boehner on Friday!!!!,
- a poem published in Priscilla Papers,
- a co-authored chapter published in The Activist Impulse,
- the COL proposal passing,
- a fantastic year in the Writing Center,
- scholarship aid for PhD studies,
- an article in the peer review process for the Journal of Education and Christian Belief,
- the sustenance of a loving community of family, church family, and friends.
For this we pray to the Lord...
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i didn't get ashes on my forehead yesterday, though that's probably a really meaningful ritual for some folks. i did go to wednesday night homework club for what turned out to be a challenging and somewhat disheartening evening.
seems like every year when the season of lent rolls around i feel as though i really can't give anything more, and it's not because i'm under some delusion that i have it all together. i struggle to understand lenten "sacrifices." do coffee, chocolate, FB, meat, video games, etc. keep me from God? if so, i should give them up. i suppose these sacrifices clue us into the deeper meaning of sacrifices and Christ's sacrifice for us. seems to me though that sin is the thing to give up, not just for lent, but forever. that, of course, is easier said than done and probably just not doable. either way i find that doing things rather than not doing things helps me connect with the gospel narrative. to be fair someone participating in a lenten "sacrifice" probably would acknowledge the need to fill the space left by the "sacrifice" with prayer, reading, service, etc. i dunno. i yearn deeply for Christ's justice to be more present in this world. in light of how unlikely this sometimes feels like it will be, i get impatient. i wonder what 40 days of doing without something that seems so small, even silly, might effectively do. yet small things matter. me, i'm small, keller park, it's small, the kindergartener who was perpetually tumbling himself out of his chair to avoid his schoolwork at tutoring last night, he's small. i've always felt an affinity for john donne, and his metaphysical conceit (though i don't fully understand it). anyway, so i don't know what i'm giving up for lent, but i'm going to try to experience gratitude in the midst of often painful reminders of individual and social (ecclesial?) limitations. i too often focus on what i don't have anyway.
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| alyssa turns two today. i'm going to write her a poem:
-deliverance-
Swaddled in an over-sized bunny rabbit
snowsuit and dropped down the river
through the reeds past the
alligators and hippopotamuses,
This pitched basket shielded you
from some of this world's furious symmetry:
the wounded wounders,
the victimized victimizing.
I remember the first time I held you,
a sleeping bundle soon to squall.
At two you can bounce like a bunny
and say ouchy all better.
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| i made up a lullaby for alyssa last night:
nighttime dance, nice and slow.
take it easy; go with the flow
of sleepy eyes and drowsy lullabies.
it's time to rest, so do your best
to sleep.
my dad used to make up melodies to scripture verses that we would sing together at bedtime. we reminisced about psalm 100 over our thanksgiving meal.
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I told my students today that critical thinking means being awake to our assumptions; ends up I was riffing off of Kant's famous words about David Hume. I tied this into a writing unit focusing on the topic of family and identity using the Sandra Cisneros essay, "Only Daughter." I asked my students to critically consider their feelings about their families identifying what they appreciate and what they don't appreciate about their upbringing. One student shared about having two families; he had prayed for us at the beginning of class today addressing his prayer to "Christ." We wondered to what extent we should want to earn the approval of our parents. I also taught today on the importance of understanding a text before trying to work with it on a personal level, which my students immediately applied to relationships.
I used to write poetry. Now I write lesson plans.
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