Tag: Lotus

A year of ‘uneasy’

It has been a 365 of the Unusual. When Lockdown and Covid began its agenda on us all, I prepared for a season of quiet, introspection.

But that changed. It was a year of meeting new people in all kinds of places. There were women with burns’ accounts that broke me before I could put that in stories for them, there was the young man who called at 12 midnight about his dad with the virus, and we watched that dad get better! Yeah Faith walked in with wide arms and I had to be held, had to be taken where I’ve never been before. The Govt said ‘Stay home’, we shivered, sanitized, then followed the call outdoors, whenever. A funeral, a wedding, a prayer meet, a birthday. Veggie stalls and Mall, nothing looked the same again. Not even WhatsApp. Not Gmail. Instagram. Our words were changing like our worlds. Overnight we feared the same thing, the same way.

Blindness didn’t seem as daunting. Education and fashion trends took a Lil walk someplace else. Protocols changed. We wore pajamas to zoom meets, lipstick ‘neath mask? Ugh. We stared at leaf and sunrise. Sunsets and rain. Everything seemed changed, re- arranged. We met loneliness on new terms. We became beggars for blessings, for Grace. Praying happened with acceptance from people who shirked its very stance. We thought about existence, pain,humanity. We wouldn’t forget George Floyd, we couldn’t look past emotional and other poverties. And Isolation. We became old and young at the same time: we were sifted like wheat in sieves that did not stop.

What is,life?” The Poet asked. A Sparrow replied,”Transient, like I.” “Us!We!” Said the Atheist. “Aha.” Cried the Preacher. “Ouch.” Wept the sinner. “Amen.” Said the Prayerer, before we all sat down to sanitize our psyche, nodding heads and elbows for the high 5s we could not high 5.

Somewhere in that, I found Josh Garrels whom I absolutely fan!

Have not been much of a ‘fan’ ever, must confess. Except for ice cream, and the plant kingdom. Heard his ‘Freedom,’ & Born again if you haven’t please do. This one that screamed for Cover👇🏼in a day, happened so fast, hadn’t time to even know i could be videoed (pardon spatial mess, uncombed-ness, and son Joh sit/rocking like a lotus in yellow Tee:) he continues to inspire with his brand of innocent fire. I thank You Lord for every reminder that Your arms work via my feeble ones, if am willing.

These Lyrics have me forever. Origin: Teresa of Avila who survived epilepsy till she succumbed at 67- notorious for her wit and joie de vivre….

https://youtu.be/hbH8dRjAS8o

Advertisement

Flavour of the month

GoDogGoCafè

If you zoom in, you’ll see those Lotus low left in tiny pond at Cubbon Park here in Bangalore city. India. Warm warm day, 28 degrees already!– lunch and ice cream in the shade. Too much fun to take pictures, but we got a few.

2 weeks ago, Haven fellowship @ Cubbon Park.

March always feels like sunshine warming herself up from cold waves and February mist/rain.

March’s flower- Daffodils, (in India its called Nargis), oh what beauties these are too, ‘Heralds of Spring’! As we get a new sunset, my heart fills with new colors. It’s like we must determine our flavour. What tones would you choose, what Flower/ (flavour) would you be?

Not a question I’ve thought of before,

NetPic.
.

but today…..a young person at our Haven fellowship; all he could talk about was the Love of God, and how on earth did God love like that? He asked.

The more I listened to him, the more it struck me how different he was from the rest of us with issues at finance, or health! This guy, (I’ll call him Len) got eyes like liquid stars when he talked of the Love of God that drew him in. He spoke a few soft sentences and it went round and round that one thing: the Love of God.

Unrelated pic? But another of God’s touches of Love: little Chikku adopted by my cousins Shirl&Dan. At their table.

After we went each into our lives, post service, there’s that gentle fragrance, of the touch of God. Like Light and Rain that falls on the good, the bad, the ugly. Nothing changes the way It falls in at us.

As this new month arrives, I’m feeling all blessed- up grateful for the flavors life brings in. Unsure of my own flavour, but I’d love to sample more of the Aroma of Christ:

how He is Manna and Dew in our days, how His Love has no limits, limitations. How It overwhelms all other love, need, want, showing me a pathway of peace and one that does not misunderstand my place in it all.

Tokens of His care, for ‘the littlest of these...’
(Thankyou ShirlDan; hope your infant squirrel Chikku won’t mind breach of privacy?)
….

As I wrap this, a lone bright star twinkles through branches of trees outside. Another month approaches, I love the way a new month feels, especially this one. Fragrances of Lent, of a Father Heart with room for us all.

It is almost too good to believe, the whole story of ‘Easter‘, the Cross, Gethesemane, the Passion of Christ for us each. We tend to lean on our own needs and their fulfillment, more than what is,

or perhaps tend to misunderstand why this or that happened in our lives. Why there is war, or crime, illness, loneliness, why something is the way it shouldn’t be.

My sister’s Gulmohar tree with shoeflower, last month at David’s Pasture.

And then there are people like Len, all still in wonder at the Love of God.

I’m basking in those four words, THE LOVE OF GOD. Maybe it’s fragrance is best expressed in Joy? And I’m lending myself this, for the next 30 days. Maybe that’s the truth of Lent. That we take for free, not just as a Lending, the absolute Joy that comes from knowing how deeply we are loved by the One that made us, each, so intricately complex, every cell and thought process. How magnificent the aspect of each human, far more than lilies of the field, or all the blossoms in every tree, ever. I find myself staring at humans. Irises. Brows. Fingers. Smiles.

Our daughter Vi
..

Laughter. The fantasticity of Births. Deliveries. Pain. Relief. Grace. Healing.

The way my friend Maya looks when she’s happy. Uncle J’s stillness. Light in the Gulmohar tree, and Dina’s voice when she prays. The hush of waiting…..

Even a mother may forget her child, but I will not forget you..” quote, Bible. Pic – Sis Shirley and furry babe Chikku.

it’s all too much beauty stacked in one life, and I’m bursting grateful for the opportunity to see it all. Not just the shiny bits but the grey of dawn as I wrap this.

Gratitude: it’s the flavour I want to be, for it delivers one to Joy.

I couldn’t have dreamt that up all by myself.

Related Posts:

idialects@gmail.com, updated in Contacts. Apologies, this Blog is taking a while to update. There’s some mail still going to my old blog address. And I don’t understand how 2 or 3 of my Blog friends are unable to see any email from here. If that’s you, please do let me know. Thanks! 🌻

RN.