Perhaps my last post was a bit too perky and over optimistic about transition. I swear to you – I just heard birds griping about the weather. There was a gripey tone in their chirp. As an implant from Texas, I suggested to the local Omahans the other day that their surprise about the weather was funny to me. They didn’t think it was “funny,” telling from their looks. But seriously, man, it’s Nebraska – it’s cold. I get it that it’s May. But the next time I hear someone say, “OMG – can you believe this weather?” Well, yeah. Yes, I can. Because I live in Nebraska.
Of course, this week’s clouds spitting sleet and snow at me (I secretly take it personally) is a new suggestion – perhaps I jumped the gun with the whole “transition” concept. It’s more like a regression. In triathlons, your transitions are just as important as your race. You swim, you run in to transition, get your shoes on, maybe a t-shirt and pants, your helmet, and your bike. Then you ride back in and back into transition, hop off, maybe change shoes again, don’t forget to take off your helmet, then head off for your run. If the weather just went from transition to regression, in triathlon lingo, it’s like doing your swim, running in to transition, putting your shoes and helmet on, jumping on your bike and racing it back into the water you just swam in.
This week we went from 70 degrees and sunny and everyone (me) wanting to put their herbs out in the garden while the kids frolicked in the yard and get my hours logged for Mission 4/1 Earth – it went from that to an abrupt high of 35 degrees, 20 mph wind, rain, sleet and snow. And it did all that in less than 24 hours. Maybe less than 12 hours. But who’s counting? Uh, this girl. And those birds with that bad attitude tone of a chirp, apparently.
But this blogging for Darkwood Brew is keeping me quite accountable, and so I refuse to be the one bringing in to conversation that it’s cold out and the weather is wack. My kids have no idea my disdane for the weather. I’m so inspired (stubborn) to embrace nature that I was actually accused of being too perky. We’re all supposed to be very solemn in this time of miserable weather. But I didn’t get the memo.
And that’s the low tones of harmony. I’m the higher tone – chirping back at the birds Bob Marley licks: “Everything’s gonna be alright!!!”
And so, as Dr. Foote spoke on the Sheep Herders and their dogs and the connection, so is our connection to community. “You have to trust when you no longer see the dog – you trust the dog is doing the work when the handler tells the dog to look back. The dog, who has worked so hard, has to trust the handler to walk away from the sheep.”
It’s harmony.
As a parent, the older my kids get, the more I have to trust them to do the right thing. I don’t really want to. I kinda want to go to junior high with them next year, but the principal said no. Yeah, I asked. I’ll drop them off, I’ll trust the school and my kids to all do the right thing when I’m not in earshot to tell them to do it. But I’ll also trust my husband and I, that we taught them well.
It’s harmony.
The Pneuma Divina this past week: Genesis 1:14 –19 – God made day and then night. In more poetic terms, God made two different lights to shine and then was pleased with it.
It’s harmony.
The cold wet weather, even in May, can only make the warm blanket of summer that much sweeter. The precipitation, no matter which form, will make the grass greener.
It’s harmony.
We need harmony. Without harmony, there’s just one humdrum note. And then there’s no transition. So trust the connection, even when it regresses.
