173. High Ropes

In 1983 I registered for the third time for a Women’s High Ropes Course just outside of Boston. I had registered for it in 1981 and in 1982 and both times I cancelled out (losing my money). So in 1983 I registered and and made a rule for myself that if I didn’t go, then I couldn’t ever register for it again. I went. I was 50 years old. I was also the oldest one there, and probably the only one with arthritic knees.

The first half of the day we did community building exercises, working to become a group, to trust and encourage each other. The second half of the day we moved to the ropes course. As I started the course they attached me to a belay system, so that if anything went wrong they would belay me down.

The first element was a wide rope ladder, wide horizontally but the steps were also wide apart and a stretch for my knees. I reached the second element, which was a horizontal tree lashed between two upright trees and scrambled onto it, sitting down. My next job was to stand up so I could walk across it. My cheering section on the ground shouted to me to “Just stand!” and didn’t realize that it was almost impossible for my knees to get me into a standing position. I grabbed the upright tree and pulled with my arms, scraping them against the bark.

I leaned against the tree and surveyed the walk on the horizontal tree. I noticed a wire running alongside my walk. The woman below on the other end of my belay system shouted, “Don’t touch the wire—you’ll get a shock!” I continued to lean and think that over. I doubted it. I started across and half way across I felt myself teeter and gently steadied myself by holding onto the wire. (No shock.) I let go and finished that part.

The next element was a wire walk but it was easy since it had two shoulder-level wires to hold onto so I just did it. The last element was a swinging rope ladder. It also had ropes to hang onto and I got to the place where everyone before me had been belayed down. I stopped, looked down at her and said, “Belay me down.” She said, “No.” I said, “Everyone else has gotten belayed down at this point.” She said, “Not you, Ann. You have to go on and touch the tree ahead of you. Then come back to this point and I’ll belay you down.”

I was mad! (And powerless.) I grabbed the ropes on both sides and almost stomped along the swinging ladder. It swung wildly. I reached the tree and hit it with the palm of my right hand. I can still feel the sting of the bark on my palm. I reversed myself, stomping backwards and said, “Now, belay me down.” She did.

I got myself out of the belay system and said to her, “Why did you do that? Why did you make me go farther than anyone else.” She said, “Ann, you did the whole course so thoughtfully and so carefully. You were so cautious. I wanted you to get the feeling of looking at the goal and going for it. I made you mad—and you did it.”

I was mad and she was right. It’s the part I most remember about the course — going for the goal, hitting the tree with the palm of my hand.

It pushed me, clear beyond my physical capabilities, in some of the same ways that Zack was pushed in the Tough Mudder race of yesterday. My course was easier and different than his. I was twice his age. And we both learned lessons.

I learned to tell people to tell me truth—don’t try to mislead me.

And I also learned to go for it!

172. What Can A Race Teach You?

The Saturday before Thanksgiving, my grandson Zachariah Price was part of the four-person team that won the Tough Mudder in New Jersey. I have to confess that I had never heard of a Tough Mudder race, but when I got the details, I was impressed.

This one was a 10-mile course with 32 obstacles per lap, lasting 24 hours. Zack’s team completed six laps and won the race. On Thanksgiving Day when I saw him, he was limping because of the chafing behind his knees from wearing a wet suit. When we had dinner this Thursday night his limp was gone.

He and I talked on Thanksgiving about the race. He said he was glad he’d done it. He thought it was the hardest thing he’d ever done. He felt it was good to be part of a team since they each had different strengths. And he was impressed with the humanity of the race. He said he never saw anybody with a hand out for help that didn’t get it. You pulled your own teammates over obstacles and you pulled anybody else who wanted or needed help.

The fun for me of listening to Zack reflect on the race was him getting in 24-hours both the concept of teamwork and the very real experience of helping others. In days of go-it-alone and watch out for Number 1, those are powerful concepts.

I would hope they would last for a long time for Zachariah. Actually I hope we all get hold of them and they last for all of us.

171. Three Questions

I was just reading that in the Islamic tradition it is suggested that before you speak, you ask yourself three questions: Are the words true? Are the words kind? Are the words necessary?

Well, I think I try to abide by the first two questions. I do try to speak truth. And I try to speak kind.

However, I have to admit that necessary is a whole different category. Sometimes, I confess I chatter and a good bit of what I say is far from necessary. But then I think from time to time you need to be able to chatter. Part of my day I am alone, and I recognize that then when I’m with someone I’m just so delighted to be having conversation, that the words bubble up and out.

How about your words?

170. Where Is the Baby?

In our family over many years as we set up the manger scene during Advent, we hid the baby Jesus, since from a logical point of view he would not be in the manger until Christmas morning. Sometimes I hid the baby. Sometimes one of my children would hide the baby. We started this tradition when we lived in an A-frame house in Pomona, NY and there was a year when someone hid the baby, and on Christmas morning had forgotten the hiding place. That made an interesting Christmas Day because every once in a while things came to a stop while we all hunted for Jesus. (I’ve always wondered if the person who bought that house ever found him.)

Seven or eight years ago I heard the story of another family who hadn’t observed that tradition and was setting up the manger scene. The mother came back to the livingroom to find the manger empty. A short while later she opened the bread box and found the baby there. She asked her nine-year-old. His explanation was simple: My teacher in Sunday School said that Jesus is the Bread of Life. I thought he shouldn’t be in the manger until Christmas so I put him in the bread box.

That solves the problem for me of not remembering. Now I put him in the kitchen drawer that would be the bread box if I actually kept bread there. Then I know where the baby is on Christmas Day. And actually on the day after Epiphany when I take decorations down, I put him back there until next Advent.

A poignant aside: I do the ordering for the World Mission Gift Shop at our church and much of it comes from an organization called SERRV. A few years ago SERRV changed its name to A GREATER GIFT and I have a little dark green box that holds the baby and proclaims on the outside of the box— A GREATER GIFT.

169. Advent Tasks

Last Saturday on the day before the first day of Advent I was the speaker at my daughter’s United Methodist Church in Highland Mills, NY. I often discover as I prepare for an engagement like this one that I am the one who ends up richer and it was true this time.

Each of us at the event came home with a paper ornament with four things written on it. I had made these construction paper ornaments and divided them with a marker into four sections. Each person in attendance was given an ornament and a marker and as I went through the program, we all filled in the sections.

They were sort of the tasks of Advent—the things we need to be doing in this season. During the waiting for new birth, there is a time for reflection and for action. The first section has two words—Find God. I think this has to be done over and over again, because I lose the connection. Sometimes it feels stronger than others. And sometimes I think I have to go to some quiet place to find God, when the reality is that God is among the people, and at the food bank, and at the prison—and God is where the people are.

The second section also has two words—Give Gifts. Not just the gifts of Christmas although I love that part of this holy day, for I search and scramble to find gifts of meaning for those I love. But there is also the gifts we can give daily—attention to friends, and as a matter of fact attention to strangers. Those are gifts too and we can pause in our business to speak and listen to a stranger.

I just this moment realized that I left out a story last Saturday in this section, for I had found a wonderful African story about a man who presented the missionary in his community with this wonderful, beautiful shell, because the missionary had explained how people often gave gifts on Christ’s birthday. The missionary asked the man where he had found such a lustrous shell and he described the bay and the time it took him to walk there and get the shell. The missionary exclaimed about how wonderful it was that he had made that effort for him, and the one who brought him the shell was excited and said, “Long walk, part of gift.”  That’s what I mean about the joy of gift giving—it’s being willing to make the long walk to find the special gift.

The third section has the two words—Reach Out. I described the meaning of the Blue Christmas service, often held on the winter solstice which is the longest night of the year. Churches, including ours, are holding these quiet services to acknowledge that some people are living in a “long night” and are having a hard time with the excitement and noise and joys of the holiday. It is in thinking about those folks and reaching out to them that we can help them know that others care. But also, reaching out is just part of the Christ story—as this Jesus reached out over and over again.

The fourth section has three words—or one word hyphenated: God-In-You. And that’s that wonderful acknowledgment that there is God in each one of us. Sometimes it’s hard to see it in others. And sometimes it’s hard to see it in ourselves. But it’s there and when we go through our lives acknowledging the God in each one, then—we treat each other differently.

So my ornament hangs where I can see it now. And it encourages me to take the time this Advent to find God, give gifts, reach out, and see the God-in-me (and the God-in-you).

168. Love the Decorations

I woke up this morning to a decorated house and over the years I have learned that I love it. I get them out on the first day of Advent (yesterday) and I leave them up through January 6 (Epiphany). But the main thing is that I love every minute of those 36 days.

There are a number of scenes set in my three small rooms. In my bedroom is that old, old, wooden barn, and the manger bed is empty until Christmas morning. There are candles surrounding the barn, including stained glass trees. And on top of my laundry hamper, sits Rudy, a genial reindeer who if you push his paw will belt out “Jingle Bell Rock.”

In the diningroom are several scenes. On the table is the Advent wreath, which now has one candle that has been lit. And beside it is the angel chimes which my grandchildren assured me “dinged” even though I couldn’t hear it. On another surface in the diningroom is a wooden carousel with all the pieces and parts of the Christmas story rotating when the candles are lit. And hanging from the window is the paper chain, marking the days until Christmas. On one of the bookcases is the wonderful basket for cards received. Above another bookcase is the manger scene that Aunt Fran painted years ago. And on still another bookcase is the snowwoman cookie jar, new this year, just waiting for her first batch of oatmeal cookies. And as I sit at the diningroom table, above me floats the foil Santa, which I have hung for over 30 years.

In the livingroom already there are stockings hung on the mantle, and on the bookcase is the Advent tree, with its first ornament already hanging, waiting for one to be hung each and every day. On top of the wall of bookcases there is the ceramic tree at one end, and a lit Mary, Joseph and child at the other end, with Christmas coffee cups in between. And on the round bookcase there is a small metal tree waiting for its ornaments since the decorators ran out of steam and said “This tree can wait for another day.” Even the dolls and bears in the small child’s rocking chair have new things on. Belinda (the rag doll) has a Christmas bib, and the fancy bear Lila and David gave me six years ago has her Christmas bell on for the holidays.

I’ll relish these decorations — all of them — every single day that they are up. For they speak to me of the merging of past and present, of fond memories and new births today, of love from friends and family, of new opportunities for me this year to reach out in love. Advent has begun and my decorations shout it out daily.

167. The Child and the Star

—

there’s a child who is hungry

there’s a child who is cold

there’s a child who is scared in the place where he lives,

but once long ago in a manger time

a child was born under a star

—

there are children so sick that they may even die

there are children so poor that they ache

but the child of the star came to lead a new way

and the child of the star gives hope

—

there’s a child who is twelve and she cannot read

there’s a child who just cries in the midst of the war

but the child of the star led a life that was just

and says to us now

—

find a way for each child

find some peace for each child

find love for each child

—

© Copyright 2008 by Ann Freeman Price

166. Paper Chain

We are on the brink of Advent. Tomorrow will be the first Sunday of Advent and the two most important things for me to have ready are my Advent wreath. and my paper chain.

In the years my children were very small, we continually had questions about when is Christmas? how many days now? over and over and over again. So we made a paper chain—each one of us had our own chain. It was the simple strip of paper taped into a circle, and then the next strip of paper gets inserted into the first circle and taped into another circle—until you have a paper chain of how many days it is until Christmas. Each morning when you get up, you tear one link of the chain off and you can count again how many days it is until Christmas.

I partly used it to teach the children that Advent started each year on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, so it definitely wasn’t like the commercial Advent calendars that always start on December 1. This year Advent starts on December 2. But some years Advent starts on a Sunday in November.

Then I added another element to my chain. (I actually wrote about the three kinds of time in these postings on September 27.) On each strip of paper I put a circle, a straight line, and a dot. The circle was to remind me of circular time—the seasons, the clock, the moons. The straight line was to remind me of historical time—you start at one point and continue to another—born in 1933, and now it is 2012. The dot was to remind me of kairos time—that kind of time, those moments that you never want to miss—the time of fulfillment. I want to have those times during Advent (and all through my life).

So make a chain and prepare to wait—for that is one of the themes of Advent—waiting for new birth.

165. Speak Truth to Power

I have a friend who is the most activist friend I have ever had in the category of war and peace. She goes on marches, she writes letters, she gets group to visit congress people. She has her senators and her representative’s phone numbers on her cell phone so that she can call them quickly when there is a need.

She believes in what she does. She feels that when her grandchildren say to her “Well, during this time that was so bad, what did you do?” she wants to be able to answer with a list of concrete actions that she has taken.

And she does all of this from a solid foundation of faith—this is exactly what she believes Jesus would have her do. And she does it. She speaks truth to power.

164. On the Floor

When my mother was in her late sixties, she was a little over-weight and had very arthritic knees. She lived in an apartment by herself in Indianapolis, Indiana. Her best friend, Carol, would call her every morning and if she didn’t answer, Carol would call the super of the building.

He would go to Mother’s apartment and try to open the door. If she had put the night chain on, then he would get the tools to cut through that. He would find that Mother had fallen and was on the floor. She was always just fine, but she couldn’t get up by herself once she had fallen. When all that was happening, I decided that I would get up and down off the floor every day of my life.

Mama died when she was 74. Now I am 79, and I do it. I get up and down off the floor every single day. It’s not always graceful, but I can do it. Usually I do it as a natural part of the exercises that I do each day, but if I skip the exercises, I still get down on the floor and then get up again.

It’s a skill I am determined to not lose.