Some things I've learned and some I've let go of

Daily Devotion - May 5

I will send a brief message each day (except Mondays)
while we are pausing gathering in person.
- Kara

What are some of the things you've learned during this Quarantine? I am not talking about deep life lessons or spiritual truths.  Those are well and good, but I feel like it's too much trying to find a silver lining for me to go there with that yet.

I mean, concrete things. What have you actually learned. For example, my sister used YouTube to fix a broken fuel line in her minivan. That sort of thing. 

I have few.

Things I've learned:

• Pickled onions. Oh my ever-loving word. How have I not known about these before now??  They're amazingly easy, and having them in my fridge for sandwiches, salads, wraps, etc. is changing my life. (Not to overstate things or anything).  
• On the topic of food, I've also learned how to make beans. From scratch - from the hard, stone-like things in the bag, not from a can.  That is because I rushed out and bought a lot of beans when this started, because they told us to.  But homemade beans are delicious. So, that's a win.  Also homemade salad dressings. Yum.
• How to clean my window blinds. The metal kind. I don't know if I did it right, but soaking them in the tub in dish-soapy water and wiping them off did the trick. (I have yet to figure out how to clean the soft accordion looking ones, though).
• Computer things. So many computer things. Let's just leave it at that. I feel like I've taken a whole community ed course on video conferencing, social media, and website design, and I should get some kind of credit for it.
• Elderberry gummies are DELICIOUS.

Things I've let go of:

• Our family calendar. In March, it hurt too much to change it.  Then it felt horrible to fill in April with nothing but zoom things, so I left it a big empty page hanging in the hallway.  Same with May.  
• Regular-length, down-to-the-wire sermons.  It's weird to preach to tiny faces on a screen from my living room, and I know my own attention span watching someone talk at me on a screen is not ideal, so shorter it is. After 20 years of preaching, it took a global pandemic to accomplish something no other methods or strategies could: shorter sermons, completed earlier in the week. Who knew?
• The rule about not playing in the car.* Do it- yes!  Two hours? Sure! With the hairy, sheddy dog? OK! Radio on, why not? All the seats down? Absolutely!  (It's not like we take it anywhere...) *See also, the rule about not sleeping places that are not your bed.
• Days that go like I planned.  First of all - my planning has become weirdly concrete. I am making a list every morning that literally includes things like, "make dinner" and "call sister" - because I feel like if I'm not tethered to the ground somehow I will float off.  And when I do things not on the list, I add them afterwards just so I can check them off, like "make muffins" or "rake leaves."  But most days don't go how I think they will. And I've learned that's ok.  There's always tomorrow, (and the day after that...)

For me, today has been a helpless and sad kind of parenting day where all I can do is say, on repeat, I'm sorry. This is hard. I wish this were over too.  Tears were abundant, and schoolwork was impossible, so instead of "order groceries" and "pay bills," what happened was "drive child to a park to run bare-footed in grass," and "roll down a hill together until I think I will barf." (And you can bet I wrote them down on my list and checked them off as completed!)

There will be lots of time in the years ahead to ponder how this experience has changed us all, and changed us each.  I look forward to the deeper spiritual insights on that future day when the lessons have coalesced and there is energy for pondering them.

Right now, I am making my way through this one day that is my life, trying to be as present as possible, which sometimes isn't all that possible.  But like we said Sunday: love. That's what it's about. That's all it's about.

In the meantime: how are you making your way through today?  What's made you laugh? Where are you finding rest? What have you learned? What have you let go of? 

CONNECTING RITUAL:

Perhaps tonight at bedtime, whenever that is in each of our homes, we might pray in this way and so join our hearts.

For the gifts of today - thank you.
Especially...

From the burdens of today, release me.
Especially...

For perspective and peace I pray.
for hope and spark, I pray.
For patience and strength, I pray.
For release and rest, I pray.

Thank you for life.
Help me live present.
And when I can't, help me come back to love.
Amen.