Tag: Personal reflections

Expectations themselves are neutral things. They can be used to spur us to excellence or to inspire us to grow and discover who we are. But they can also be used to deny our self-worth or sense of belonging. When John the Baptizer refuses to be defined by the expectations of the priests and Levites, he is holding onto the identity he has as the voice crying out in the wilderness.

The threat of a single fundamentalist pastor to burn Islam’s holy book in a tiny never-heard-from-before church in Florida made international headlines recently. This incident broke open the raw areas in our collective consciousness where freedom of speech, religious conscience, and common decency meet. But it also reflected back to us our deep tendency to blame others for our ills.

Now, let me say that my wife sought something different. She wanted peace and quiet, and to be closer to nature. She does enjoy sailing, but she enjoys more watching eagles fly over anchorages. We both got what we wanted. She got closer to nature. I got challenges. And before it was over, nature kicked my butt.

I was in Ms. Bloss’s dancing classes, and I loved to dance. One day a dark haired, freckled, extremely attractive girl asked me to dance and later I invited her to go to the movies. When I took her home, she reached up and kissed me. I walked away with a particular lightness of step and I always remembered that kiss as my first love.

Like Peter, I forget to seek God when things are going well. When I’m on a mountaintop, I rarely open my eyes to take in the glorious view. Through an intellectual exercise, I know that I am blessed, but this blessing fails to filter into my soul. Only when the jaggedness of grief or deprivation assaults me do I begin my tardy search for God anew.

St. Mary the Virgin’s Cabaret came at the end of an era when there were over a hundred live theaters in midtown Manhattan and tickets cost .85 cents. All that quickly changed with the coming of television, yet the St. Mary’s entertainers kept hoping for the big break that would find them rediscovered, remembering a few colleagues who had been called out of retirement for roles in Broadway shows.

“Every night I pray that God will take me, but I wake up the next morning and he didn’t!” My mother said this often during the months before her death on Oct. 28. On her good days, she was looking forward to her 100th birthday on April 17.