springtime
I feel like a strange confluence of meaningful events have arrived all at once. They do every year, but still, the build-up of symbolic events leaves me feeling rich in emotion, if not entirely sure where to direct my emotional attention. But it's Lent, first of all, and it's also Holy Week, which is even more powerful. And it's Holy Week. Which means the end of this journey we've taken with Jesus through the desert, and now we've arrived in Jerusalem, and soon we're facing the bleakest, blackest hour on Friday, but next Sunday is Easter. The first Easter after Jeane died, I think we all felt that it wasn't fair. One woman at church cried at Easter and said, "It's not fair... because he got to come back, and she didn't."
And that's why Paul had to remind the church at Corinth that Jesus was the first fruits of the dead.That even though their friends were dying, it was okay, because Jesus' resurrection means that death isn't forever. Because it was hard at first to remember that. It was hard for us to remember that, that first Easter when Jeane wasn't there. Because Jesus was distant death, and Jeane was immediate. And we wanted Jeane back.
But now, five years later, I feel like the coming of spring yesterday, and Palm Sunday, and just having St. Patrick's Day (which is the anniversary of the last time I saw Jeane, at a Lenten soup supper at the Morfords' house...) on Friday, and then spring, which is, like Easter, a reminder that everything that dies returns. There are crocuses out today. Crocuses. And Jeane is dead.
It's strange. I have a knot in my stomach, and I'm stressed over thesis, and I'm stressed over what on earth I'm going to do after graduation, and at the same time it's hard to believe that life has continued for the past five years.
I got a letter from Old First today... just a form letter, but it's so filled with hope, with plans, with vision. The pastor there right now is trying so hard, and it gives me hope for my church, that maybe they'll survive after all. She's written a personal note to me. It just says to come by when I'm in the area, but it's the kind of thing that briefly compels me to skip all the peripherals and move back to NJ, getting a job be damned, and being in the one place that feels most entirely like home.
It's Holy Week. And it's spring. And it's the anniversary of Jeane's death. And there is no liturgy in the world that helps me make sense of the meanings of all of this.
I'm going to take a bath and try to get rid of some of the stress, then go track down my advisor and try not to sob in his office.
And that's why Paul had to remind the church at Corinth that Jesus was the first fruits of the dead.That even though their friends were dying, it was okay, because Jesus' resurrection means that death isn't forever. Because it was hard at first to remember that. It was hard for us to remember that, that first Easter when Jeane wasn't there. Because Jesus was distant death, and Jeane was immediate. And we wanted Jeane back.
But now, five years later, I feel like the coming of spring yesterday, and Palm Sunday, and just having St. Patrick's Day (which is the anniversary of the last time I saw Jeane, at a Lenten soup supper at the Morfords' house...) on Friday, and then spring, which is, like Easter, a reminder that everything that dies returns. There are crocuses out today. Crocuses. And Jeane is dead.
It's strange. I have a knot in my stomach, and I'm stressed over thesis, and I'm stressed over what on earth I'm going to do after graduation, and at the same time it's hard to believe that life has continued for the past five years.
I got a letter from Old First today... just a form letter, but it's so filled with hope, with plans, with vision. The pastor there right now is trying so hard, and it gives me hope for my church, that maybe they'll survive after all. She's written a personal note to me. It just says to come by when I'm in the area, but it's the kind of thing that briefly compels me to skip all the peripherals and move back to NJ, getting a job be damned, and being in the one place that feels most entirely like home.
It's Holy Week. And it's spring. And it's the anniversary of Jeane's death. And there is no liturgy in the world that helps me make sense of the meanings of all of this.
I'm going to take a bath and try to get rid of some of the stress, then go track down my advisor and try not to sob in his office.