stairwell accompaniment:Fiona Apple

We are laughing more than expected. Still usually confused as to why this is all so joyful. We live simply. And we are trying harder to live simply so that the others can simply live. We are finding redistribution. And so we try hard. We get messy. We try hard again.
We are driving to friends. And having friends visit. Because we collect the type of friends who commune in extended stay situations with us in our one bedroom apartment. We collect the people who share sleeping bags with us on cold adventures, write us love poems, pick up the phone when we won’t, tell us their things and listen to ours, offer us food and lead us into situations which call for swing! dancing. Our collection is tiny and enormous.
We are reading only as much as we are putting into action. Stopping short of simply soaking or gaining knowledge. Right theology is only as good as right living.
So we change.
We are desiring to be outside. Spread our wings, stretch out legs, fill our lungs. Winter’s heavy weight is slipping off. Slowly. Surely. Slowly. It’s coming.
We are studying. We are sleeping. We are going slower, giving it a second thought, taking another breath.
We are writing a book. Through our black pen and in our lives. Each day another page hoping that when read, will make you laugh, you blush, you cry, you imagine more than you see. We will show you ours.
We are planning dreams and staying in the present. We are dreaming big.
We are learning to do things upside down as we see how rightside up our tendencies are.
So we change.

getting in on this

“Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only by daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, “Who is the Lord?” Proverbs 30:8-9

stairwell accompaniment:Joe Purdy

live every day as jubilee. unenroll identity. pave the way for moses. allow the cat to amble around my shins. commune. photograph the familiar. tell you my secret. have you tell me. break bread with pharisees. read to the incapable. patch my jeans. accept gratitude. ask without self-interest. lament those who lack regret. lament my own lack. pray for irrational grace. tend to unseen crops.

become far less easily pleased

We are swimming with the snakes at the bottom of the well. So silent and peaceful in the darkness where we fell. But we are not snakes and what’s more we never will be. And if we stay swimming here forever we will never be free.

I heard them ringing the bells In heaven and hell. They got a secret they’re getting ready to tell.
It’s falling from the sky. Calling from the graves.
Open your eyes, boy, I think we are saved.
Open your eyes, boy, I think we are saved.
Let’s take a walk on the bridge. Right over this mess. Don’t need to tell me a thing, baby we’ve already confessed. And I raised my voice to the air and we were blessed.
Everybody needs a little forgiveness.
Everybody needs a little forgiveness.

We are calling for him tonight on this thin phone line. As usual we’re having ourselves one hell of a time. And the planes keep flying right over our heads no matter how loud we shout “Hey, hey, hey !” And we keep waving and waving our arms in the air but we’re all tired out.

I heard somebody say. Today’s the day. A big old hurricaine is blowing our way. knocking over the buildings. Killing all the light.
Open your eyes, boy, we made it through the night.
Open your eyes, boy, we made it through the night.

Everybody needs a little forgiveness.
-Patty Griffin