Heirloom Friendship

These gorgeous heirloom tomatoes were left on my kitchen counter by a woman who  graces my life with joy. She listens intently to my stories, and I am entranced by hers. She often challenges my staid ideas and forces me to think beyond what I’ve always believed to be true. We share books, recipes, and tears. She is a phenomenal woman, and I am grateful to call her my friend.

The dearest friends in my life are treasured heirlooms. Precious and rare, they fill the empty spaces in my heart, and like heirloom tomatoes, they are more flavorful than bland store-bought acquaintances. These are individuals with strong convictions and passionate dreams. Not content with silly gossip, we dig deep into life’s messes and help one another tackle our demons. We acknowledge differences, yet support the wackiness that defines us.

My friends are all extraordinary. Some I've known since grade school, a few from high school and college years, and others just recently walked into my life, but all are part of my complicated puzzle. Each one fits perfectly, bestowing grace and forgiveness and wonder.

As I approach the last months of my 59th year, I hang on to these friends with a determined fierceness. I cherish every visit, email, text, Facebook message, and phone call. These sweet, unpredictable beings may be odd and quirky, but they grace my table with their unique presence. They are my heirlooms.

Heirloom tomatoes: open-pollinated tomatoes (Vegetables pollinated by insects or wind without human intervention. Most heirlooms come from seed that has been handed down for generations.) Heirloom varieties boast greater flavor than that found in hybrids (intentionally cross-pollinated varieties of plants that aim to produce an offspring that contains the best traits of each of the parents). (bonnieplants.com)

Listen for Hope

I am often a messy mix of joyous and sad. I often battle these conflicting emotions, which I guess makes me human. I celebrate nature’s beauty while acknowledging the sorrow that permeates the world's soul. I sit with both.

Yesterday we rose early to head downtown. We first ate breakfast at a little outdoor breakfast joint that serves heavenly eggs and exquisite blueberry pancakes. The cream fresh. The coffee exquisite.

We then headed to the grand city park that graces acres of green space.The weather was perfect. As we walked past fields of wildflowers and graceful bridges spanning calm waters, I felt nature whispering, “You're going to be okay.” The beauty and simplicity of nature heals and soothes the heart.

I look around me and see God, but I also know the devil lurks. The devil isn’t some mythical creature clad in red. The devil exists when we turn on one another with violence and malice, for when we give into that, evil is winning. No president, no four star general, no religious zealot can lead us out of this mayhem. We are forced to look inward and decide who wins. We must fight the horrors that lie within ourselves. We battle and brawl until we have no more strength left, and then the next day we begin again.

If you are a student of history you know we humans have been heinous to one another since the first man stood upright. Millions have been slaughtered in the name of power or glory or whatever god they worshipped at that time. Bodies continue to litter the landscape while “leaders” claim triumph. Just uttering the names of Stalin, Hitler, Genghis Khan, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, or Henry VIII sends quakes of sorrow throughout the world’s graveyards.

But we human are also remarkable. We love and nurture and protect with such fierceness. We hold each other up. We grab hands. We look evil in the face and yell, “No!” We are Ripley in the movie Aliensas we scream, “Get away from her, you bitch!” We are Oskar Schindler. We are Mother Teresa. We are Rosa Parks. We are John Lennon. We are Joan of Arc. We are Harry Potter. We are Hermoine Granger. We are Anne Frank.

The battle we face today is fear. The fear of what we imagine has been taken from us. The fear of who we see on the streets is different from what we see in the mirror. The fear in our own hearts of what we can’t explain or rationalize away. All of us are engaged in this battle every day. We win when we push back the fear and embrace the unknown, the scary, the doubt, the discrepant. We need to walk with it and feel it deep within our spirit.

My friend Nancy talks about the energy in the universe, and in order to combat the negative we must send out the positive. The other day the great Anne Lamott wrote:

“Get outside, even just to the front porch, and look up at the sky and into the treetops, and say the great praise prayer: WOW! Listen for the sound of birds - or bird...close your eyes and really listen. If birdsong was the ONLY proof we have that there is a bigger deep reality than what transcends what we are seeing on the news, it would be for me. Eyes closed, breathe, listen - secret of life."

So this morning I will head out for a walk before the heat rises. I will hear birds sing their hymns. I will fight for love. I will battle for peace. I will sit with my discomfort. I will resist. I will be loud. I will be quiet within my soul. I will resist. Because even though my grief is deep, I will not let go of hope. As James Baldwin wrote, “Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does. Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.”