Tag Archives: life

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Despite Lack of Knowledge

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So many of the things I have known are other things that I do not know.

For instance, the hill. It has always been the symbol of the free, of nature, of the earth. It has stood in stark contrast to the perverse civilization of Court Street. It has provided a safe haven for underage drinkers–haven because away from police, safe because it’s difficult to binge drink on a hill that you have to walk down in the dark.

And so, all this time, I have known the hill as operating outside of systems.

Today, I was sitting on the hill, enjoying one last sunset, and I noticed cigarette butts and broken glass. The hill has always been something I do not know.

But it did not change the magnificence of the sunset.

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Reflections, or, He Shoots Lightning From His Feet

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I want to pack up every thought I’ve had in a box and place it in a corner where I will one day forget about it and when I finally rediscover it I will assume it’s a box of old basketball trophies (the kind you get for participating) and because you can’t do anything with old basketball trophies I will put it out with the trash and never have to think about it again.

I want to pull back all the words I’ve ever spoken as if they existed on measuring tape and I could push a little button on the side of my head and they would all come back to me and even if the shock of all of those words hurt me a little and made me feel a little dizzy at least they would stop hurting anyone they have stung.

I want to walk backwards through life and watch as everything I’ve ever done unravels and I want to know how it feels for the pressure to decrease steadily steadily steadily steadily.

I want to line up every person I’ve ever known and I want to stand on trial before them so they can judge whether I have helped or hurt them not because I want to know if I am a good person or a bad one but because I want to know how to maximize the helping and minimize the hurting.

I want to write down everything and everyone I have ever loved so that I can chart it [love] and diagram it [love] and dissect it [love] and maybe figure out what it [love] means.

I want to curl up into God like He is a king-sized bed and I am a three-year-old child and I want to feel all of my secrets wash away under me deep under the covers into long-forgotten and never-traveled bed-spaces.

I want to gather all the people I have seen but whose names I do not know and feed them cake and throw a party with small talk and then later big talk and then much later tears and when I leave I will know many new names and I will have made many new friends and fallen in love perhaps twice or more.

And I want to dance so hard that I create a storm and no one will be able to get near me and they will look at me and they will say that storm used to be a boy but then he danced and now he shoots lightning from his feet.

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A Short Reflection on MLK

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Some days I don’t leave my house because I speculate other people will annoy me.

I get into moods where I’m frustrated at others’ lack of depth, immaturity, selfishness, or condescension. Today was one of those days.

I recently finished a collection of speeches by Martin Luther King, Jr. Perhaps the hardest to read was his eulogy at the funeral for three of the children killed at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing.

I found his words remarkable, especially when he started talking about Southern whites:

And so I stand here to say this afternoon to all assembled here, that in spite of the darkness of this hour, we must not despair. We must not become bitter, nor must we harbor the desire to retaliate with violence. No, we must not lose faith in our white brothers. Somehow we must believe that the most misguided among them can learn to respect the dignity and the worth of all human personality.

I’ve spent four years learning how to be critical, learning how to recognize bad arguments, bad behavior, and bad living. I’ve spent four years placing people into convenient categories. I’ve spent four years defining myself as “not other people.”

King called that community to love, though. He told them not to lose faith in the enemy.

I don’t have an enemy. I create enemies for the drama.  So how much easier should it be for me to have faith in the people who annoy me?

Picture found here.