No place like home

"Your office is so homey," said a parishioner today.  I smiled.  That's the idea.  Make people feel at home. Of course, some find the place a bit frenetic.  I understand that too.  But, I just can't give the stuff up.  In a few minutes, people know a little more about me: I love the Wizard of Oz, have a 'thing' about cathedrals, collect Jiminy Cricket characters, and am a Chicago Cubs fan.  When they know a little about me, they feel more comfortable sharing their own stories.

I think that hearing others' stories and entering into their lives is the greatest privilege of my vocation. It's important to me to create hospitable space so that people feel comfortable.  The physical space is one thing, spiritual space is another.  Listening requires the ego to set itself aside to make room for the other.  In doing so, we also make room for the divine.  That's a lot more difficult than hanging a painting of Ely Cathedral!

Today, the people who claim to lead our nation find themselves at a standoff.  There is no hospitality.  There is no setting aside of egos.  How can anyone hope to touch the divine energy that is all around them when you refuse to see your colleagues as something less than human.

It makes me want to click my heels and go home.

The fireflies are out. How lovely.

“The fireflies are out.  How lovely.”

The quote is one of the first lines delivered by the character Ethel P. Savage in the play The Curious Savage.  I know because I played Ethel P when I was in high school theater long ago.  She was an eccentric lady with blue hair, a hidden fortune, and a propensity to annoy her children.  Ethel wasn’t the only eccentric lady I was cast as.  Our director also awarded me the role of Veta Louise Simmons in the play Harvey.  (Yeah, the one with the rabbit.)

I loved those characters.  As a teenager who struggled with her emotions, Ethel and Veta provided a way to escape and have fun.  Oh, I played other parts as well, characters who much more closely matched my age at that time, but Ethel and Veta were the most special. 

It was the flash of the fireflies outside my window that made me think of them.  Tonight, I’m much closer in age to those characters than I was when I played them.  Then, I modeled my portrayal from observing my own grandmothers – how they walked, and moved, and told stories.  Now, I’d be able to play them from my own experience.  Ethel’s anger would be more prominent as she’s being abandoned by family who should have loved her; her empathy deeper for those who struggle.  Veta’s exasperation at her fate may be played less for comedy and more for sympathy.  My observances of people in the context of my several callings would inform these characters now.  Art imitates life.  Regardless, the delivery would still make an audience laugh out loud.

Perhaps, some day, I’ll get the chance to play these two again. If not, I’ll reminisce and perhaps someday appear in public with a delightful shade of blue hair. It goes with everything.

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