We had a cook-out yesterday, for the Fourth of July. Nothing big, major, just a collection of people, large quantities of food and uncooperative weather with rain and temps so low we all put on jeans and brought out sweaters. And it was fine, fun in some ways. But also difficult. Difficult in that bringing different people together who don’t one another kind of way. When it is just a few friends, three or four of us, or old friends, where there is nothing to plan for because the ease is already in place and everyone knows where the waters glasses are and the extra rolls of toilet paper - I do great with this, love this. But when it is more people than this, I just plain struggle. I struggle because I feel everyone’s energy, and it is so visceral for me, so in my body. I feel the anxiety of this woman over there, and that the topic of her kids has come up and the other guests are all wondering why her kids aren’t there and her custody agreement is really no one’s business, but I feel that moment of discomfort in her. I feel it and I breathe it. I feel the tension in another woman, who is either angry or anxious, and her words are short and defensive and its like the energy she is giving off has an actual color and taste to me.
I feel all of it, the subtle shifts, the unspoken words, and its like they give off vibrations I can feel against my skin. And sometimes it is hard for me to know how to allow myself to remain open enough to feel, but to not take what is not mine, swallow it to the point where I am now carrying around what was never intended for me. Sometimes my skin feels so thin, so porous. And when I say things like “I’m an introvert” I think this is often what I’m meaning. That being around groups of people, it can exhaust me because I am aware and I feel, and I have to be by myself again to ground, to detox, to have space to feel through what is there, and discern when it is mine or only something around me I had happened to soak into me. And then late last night, Elliott and I are sitting on the porch, and it is calm inside me again, and it is a relief to know that rest. And Fireworks have been exploding for the last two hours and the rain has stopped. And the air is so thick, with fog and smoke. And I feel the silence and spaciousness. And I need that, god how I need that.
I have kept my flowers alive, the ones potted and on the front porch. Normally by this point in the summer they have withered and died because I failed to water them regularly, getting caught up in other activities and then feeling sad that the flowers planted on mother’s day have seen their demise due to my neglect. And this year, in July, they are in full bloom, robust, thriving. And looking at them, enjoying them, I’m aware of how fully IN my life I am right now. Not as much looking ahead or forward, making plans and striving toward goals. Just in the days. It’s not that I don’t want to have vision. Because I do. But it’s that feeling that the destination I am unavoidably headed towards is death, one way or another. And it will happen, life will happen, whether or not I “plan” for it. So I kind of want to spend the days.
It makes me think of the Renaissance paintings of the ascension of Christ, depicting that point in the story, after the resurrection, when he leaves earth and returns to the heavens. And in the paintings, it is often just his feet that are shown. And where I’m at right now, is being wildly interested in the feet of god, the parts of this life that can be seen and touched and tended to. The flowers to be watered. The dinner to be cooked. The body that is asking for rest, for a nap, so weighted with all the work I have done. The glass of Sauvignon Blanc, crisp with a tart taste of grapefruit. The car that had a broken window unable to be rolled up and then storms came and drenched the interior and then Friday, going and getting the car deep cleaned. Shit did that feel good. The jello jigglers George and I made, blue and red and cut into the shape of stars. The ants, which have returned again with a vengeance, as they do every summer, invading my kitchen, and my rather humorous “war” with them. The organizing I have been doing; the storage room with bins of seasonal decorations and winter clothes and baseballs and tennis rackets and tools and my art supplies. My clothes closet, trying on every last piece of clothing I own, happy to weed through and remove what I no longer need or love, to let it go. And now my remaining clothes, each item loved, is on its own hanger or folded in a drawer and just opening the closet door and seeing that order, it is this overwhelming feeling of pleasure. This is my life, the one I feel so fully in. The lightbulbs to be replaced. The second cup of coffee and call to a friend. The release when Elliott digs into my neck with his hands to work out a persistent knot. The feel of silk nightgowns against my skin fresh out of a late night bath. The book of poetry sent to my friend who’s mother had died. The kiss that turns into something more and how I am simultaneously comforted and turned on by the feel of his weight against me.
Just living. Being in the day. Caring for and loving the feet of god.
And speaking of god, of dare I say it, Christ, Elliott and I made the decision to leave the church we attended off and on for the last few years. We were never regular in our attendance, never devout in the Episcopal Christian faith. But we did try. It was a way for him to attempt to salvage the god of his childhood, to come to that god but with a new lens. It was a way for me to attempt to find a home, some place to find god that was not the god of my childhood, taking communion and that sense that everyone was welcome at the table. And yet. . . and yet, it was not really mine. It never was, not as I wanted it to be. And then we were in church one morning and George was sitting with us, rather than being in the Sunday school. And there was something about that, about realizing that he would take what was said there and it would become the god of HIS childhood. And I can’t fully explain it, except I could not give him the god of the Christian church, no matter how liberal it is. Realizing that though Elliott and I may experience what we would call god in multiple ways: dance, a good beer, friendship, the ocean, the shifting of seasons and cycles of this earth, good stories, sex, this city, pretty much all of life. But that this was being called “life” and what was in church was being called “god”. And its not what I want to give to George, because it not actually my experience. So we made the choice to leave. And here we are now, without a "spiritual home", a set place of belonging. And to be honest, I feel sad. Not because I have lost something, but because it was never really mine, even as I tried to make it mine. And also feeling open, that in letting this go, some kind of space has been cleared and we are now just in it, the life, the living, the god that always been there, right there, in front of me and inside of me.
