Andi and I often joke about how similar Blore living is to LA living: the pollution, the crowds, the endless roads, the constant fires (well, ok, so the fires here are a little toxic, consist mostly of burning trash, and are set deliberately on the side of the road, which is a little different than in LA, which, unfortunately, we are all probably going to learn again this fire season). But the most striking, and difficult, similarity is the lack of seasons. Which is in itself really quite strange that I even notice: this Southern California born and bred boy misses the seasons. Desperately. Andi has corrupted me.
One of our dear friends (who is also one our favorite writers) just wrote this:
A lot of people are participating in the Blue Bike Blog Tour today, writing thoughtful blog posts about how the themes of Notes from a Blue Bike work in their own lives. I wish I could do this, but I think I'm too in need of reset and renewal. (Or maybe I just need spring to come.)
I can tell you this: reading this book ... reminded me that there are seasons. It reminded me that there are ways to resist the busyness. It reminded me that it's okay to just take a small step, especially if you don't exactly have great margins in which to take giant leaps.
Unfortunately I don't know anything about the book or the blog tour. But I can say this: we really miss seasons. They are for us, we have come to realize, the only way to keep time. (And this from the people who have a giant dry-erase board calendar as the main decoration in their office!) But the one thing we feel everyday here is that all those squares on the calendar are the same just as all the seconds minutes hours of the clock are the same: 82 and sunny, everyday. The monotony of time without seasons is just impossible. If you allow me a moment of ridiculous naivety and simplicity: it's just not natural. We are bodies surrounded by bodies, together living and dying, changing and growing. Living is a bodying forth into life, the perpetual rhythm of death and rebirth that we are given over to as bodies. Without seasons there is no change, no growth, no living, no sense no feeling of life. Seasons are not only a reminder of this but a way of living the rhythm of this eternally transient worldly existence, transient in its totality ... the rhythm of Messianic nature which is happiness.
The seasons, in their obliviousness to our needs and desires, force us into this rhythm, this dying and being reborn, this living, that happens all the time, in the tiny little occasions of our being. Although it is hard to believe, MSP readers, in the not too distant future a tiny leaf will appear on a tiny branch on a tiny tree on the banks of the Mississippi. You probably won't notice this at first, and even if you do, you will also quickly realize that you still live in MN and so even though it's April it's still snowing. But that doesn't matter. One night in late May you'll be driving home from work, and as you start to cross the river on the 94 you'll suddenly realize that it's 6:00 and the sun is still out, and you won't be able to remember when the days started getting longer. And then you'll look across the bridge down the river and you'll see it: green. Everywhere. All the trees have leafed. And it's amazing and beautiful and you almost drive off the road. It will seem like it happened over night. But it didn't. It never does. It just happens. With little small steps that become giant leaps.
One of our dear friends (who is also one our favorite writers) just wrote this:
A lot of people are participating in the Blue Bike Blog Tour today, writing thoughtful blog posts about how the themes of Notes from a Blue Bike work in their own lives. I wish I could do this, but I think I'm too in need of reset and renewal. (Or maybe I just need spring to come.)
I can tell you this: reading this book ... reminded me that there are seasons. It reminded me that there are ways to resist the busyness. It reminded me that it's okay to just take a small step, especially if you don't exactly have great margins in which to take giant leaps.
Unfortunately I don't know anything about the book or the blog tour. But I can say this: we really miss seasons. They are for us, we have come to realize, the only way to keep time. (And this from the people who have a giant dry-erase board calendar as the main decoration in their office!) But the one thing we feel everyday here is that all those squares on the calendar are the same just as all the seconds minutes hours of the clock are the same: 82 and sunny, everyday. The monotony of time without seasons is just impossible. If you allow me a moment of ridiculous naivety and simplicity: it's just not natural. We are bodies surrounded by bodies, together living and dying, changing and growing. Living is a bodying forth into life, the perpetual rhythm of death and rebirth that we are given over to as bodies. Without seasons there is no change, no growth, no living, no sense no feeling of life. Seasons are not only a reminder of this but a way of living the rhythm of this eternally transient worldly existence, transient in its totality ... the rhythm of Messianic nature which is happiness.
The seasons, in their obliviousness to our needs and desires, force us into this rhythm, this dying and being reborn, this living, that happens all the time, in the tiny little occasions of our being. Although it is hard to believe, MSP readers, in the not too distant future a tiny leaf will appear on a tiny branch on a tiny tree on the banks of the Mississippi. You probably won't notice this at first, and even if you do, you will also quickly realize that you still live in MN and so even though it's April it's still snowing. But that doesn't matter. One night in late May you'll be driving home from work, and as you start to cross the river on the 94 you'll suddenly realize that it's 6:00 and the sun is still out, and you won't be able to remember when the days started getting longer. And then you'll look across the bridge down the river and you'll see it: green. Everywhere. All the trees have leafed. And it's amazing and beautiful and you almost drive off the road. It will seem like it happened over night. But it didn't. It never does. It just happens. With little small steps that become giant leaps.
I love this. I love you guys. Please come visit us as soon as possible and we will do all the seasonal things for whatever season it ends up being. Come in the fall and we will rake leaves together. Come in the winter and we will ice skate. Come in the spring and help us plant our garden. Come in the summer and we'll take you to the beach. (It is pretty amazing that there are such great beaches in this deeply Midwestern city.)
ReplyDeleteYes. And yes. And yes. And, OK, yes. And apple orchards, too?
DeleteOh, and you would really like Notes from a Blue Bike I think. There's a lot about living overseas, and then synthesizing the ways you've changed from living overseas once you've returned.
ReplyDelete