Sunday, January 09, 2011

The Disposables

Am stopping off very briefly to point you in the direction of Mark Tucker's downright gorgeous photographs of the benefit night for The Contributor held at DPC last night.

It was a fantastic evening, with an art show of photographs of Nashville taken by homeless and formerly homeless photographers, Cajun food from Bro's, an awards show for top vendors of 2010, and a concert featuring some incredibly talented musicians and songwriters.

In a day overshadowed by the shootings in Tucson, AZ i am grateful to have gotten to be a part of it and to have witnessed it (that's me in the red beanie with a roll of tape glamorously grasped in my teeth stringing up lights). In a packed fellowship hall filled with cheering vendors and supporters, Joel whispered in stunned delight during the awards giving, "In all my years in this church, I've never seen the hall like this..." it was such a witness to both The Contributor and DPC's vision of even ground, where there is no us (the homeful) and them (the homeless). The transformation that has occurred in the lives of some of the vendors is remarkable.  

Julie Lee (performing in the red cardigan) brought together an amazing group of musicians. it was a stellar line up. when Anita Smith (bottom row, far left) rehearsed at sound check everyone stopped in their tracks - the kind of gospel voice that puts chills up & down your spine. and the harmonies Julie, Sarah (Masen) Dark and Elizabeth Foster provided on Odessa Jorgensen's (second row, far left) exquisite song writing were exceptional.

As for Arizona, after a DPC member raised a prayer during this morning's "joys and concerns" at DPC for those in Tucson and beyond who are grieved and affected by yesterday's violence, i jotted in my notebook, 

place the words of peace on our lips
place the action of peace in our hands
place the spirit of peace in our hearts
i'm not sure what to say that hasn't already been said... but i was struck by a line shared by a commenter over at Bruce Reyes-Chow's page... it's from Madeleine L'Engle,


"Like it or not, we either add to the darkness of indifference and out-and-out evil which surrounds us or we light a candle to see by."
Peace be with you,

LB

Monday, January 03, 2011

midwinter

The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not understood it.
- The Gospel of John 1: 5

On every world world, wherever people are, in the deepest part of the winter, at the exact midpoint, everybody stops and turns and hugs. As if to say, 'Well done. Well done everyone! We're halfway out of the dark..." 
- Karzan Sardick in Dr Who: A Christmas Carol, by Steven Moffat (2010) 

A flagrantly inadequate round-up of what happened between November 5th and today...

packed up life in Dublin
said farewell to friends, family, & hometown
emigrated to America
hugged family & friends
ate some donuts
celebrated Thanksgiving
painted walls, moved some furniture
got married, surrounded by our family
caught a head-cold
went to church
celebrated Christmas in West TN
painted more walls, moved more furniture 
welcomed dear friends to stay 
made a resolution
celebrated New Year's eve
watched Dr Who Christmas Special. it was. (see above)
listened
borrowed some books from the public library

New Year's resolution:
to live life at a pace considerably slower than i lived through most of the above 
  
an all too brief run down of things that the coming weeks will bring:

filling out more immigration forms
plan for community gathering to celebrate aforementioned marriage
receive delivery of belongings currently crossing the Atlantic in a ship
giving some time and energy to The Contributor street newspaper
making art with friends
more painting of walls, refinishing some furniture

writing

a for-now adequate summary of very short term plans:

sit by fire & read books
enjoy hanging out with Joel on his last 3 days of holiday vacation (see resolution)

Happy New Year, friends. hold on. to each other.

LB

:: happy ::


photo credit: Lisa Connor