Among the Living
After a day in a hot office, staring myself into blind stupidity with European Commission documents about how to carry out a tender procedure, I finally gave up and went down to the beach for a swim. The sea was rough, but honestly, it could’ve taken me and I would’ve given up without a fight. European bureaucratic rigamarole has that affect on anyone who is not a European bureaucrat. I walked down the beach to where the bay curved and waded in up to my waist, then stood staring out to the horizon, swaying like a drunk in the push and pull of the incoming waves.
There was a ship on the horizon, and suddenly I was overwhelmed with a feeling from my childhood. When I was young I would go hiking with my Dad, way up into the mountains, leaving the car and the road and all comforts behind. We’d camp under the stars, with the mountains standing around silent and the sun going down alone and the evening wind whispering like a lonely ghost in the haunted pines. I liked these trips, but the truth is that I liked going home afterwards even better. I liked arriving back at the car and taking off my boots and the way the car started up and the moment when we pulled out onto the smooth, predictable surface of the road with its neat yellow and white lines leading us to a better world. Anyway, sometimes when we were way up in the hills, trudging up a trail to another lonely, breathtaking view we’d hear the sound of cars on the highway far below, or the buzz of a plane overhead, or we’d lie on our backs and eat thick bread and cheese and see the vapour trail of a jet overhead. These things always gave me a sad sort of comfort. They let me know that other people existed, that the world hadn’t ended and left us alone there, that if we could hear and see the traces of other people, it meant that the way home was still near. It’s a bit stupid, really, because those highways and planes and vapour trails might have well been on the moon for how accessible they were, but that’s how I felt. A longing, yearning kind of assurance. It was the same when we did beach hikes along some ancient, wild coast and camped at night looking out to sea. Alone, we’d see the lights of ships at night, or their slipping silhouettes along the horizon by day, and I’d the feelings of home would rush up inside me, like sadness and hope, mixed.
Today, the ship on the horizon off the coast of Liberia was probably the farthest thing from a symbol of home that could be imagined, except that it was free to turn west and put full ahead for the New World, where, if you were lucky, you had a car parked in some clean National Parks lot, with white painted lines and a road across a clean, orderly land that leads you home.
I stood there in the water and felt an urge to swim for it.
But I didn’t. I swam across the bay and climbed out at Anna’s house and walked home, because I have to get up tomorrow and deal with an ECHO tender procedure, and like the hikes of old, you have to conquer what you came to conquer, really, before going home feels any good.
***
We sing here, and we preach. Every morning we have what they call ‘devotions’ before we start work. This means we pull up plastic chairs around in a circle in front of the house and sing hymns (all four verses) from photo-copied sheets and sometimes someone gets inspired and we sing a Liberian chorus, which makes us stand and clap and get a little more exuberant about the whole thing. Then we all sit down again and the designated person for that day preaches from the Bible. Liberians seem to come from the womb as full members of a gospel choir and with a full complement of street preaching skills. Every morning I hear an exposition of some portion of the Holy Word turned out in a fine cadence and tone worthy of a speech by Dr. Martin Luther King. Sometimes, I admit, I don’t even listen to what they’re saying. I just like hearing words spoken like that.
Actually, I like the whole thing. Which is strange. I’ve been Catholic for over a year now, having entered the arms of the ancient Church last New Year’s Day, so I haven’t been sitting in on a lot of old fashioned Bible preaching lately. Catholics, contrary to the myths that circulate, do use the Bible in their worship, but they tend to read it out loud and let the words hang in the solemn air rather than expound on it at length. I like that, too. Holy words drifting through the upper atmosphere of a cathedral have the ability to take you up with them. But there is something about these bouncy hymns and this arm-flapping preaching that reminds me of puppies tumbling around or a good barn-stomping fiddler who gets the crowd dancing. Sure, I think all my intellectual things, like: Who told this guy he could interpret a story about lepers as though it applied to the fact that our vehicles were breaking down at an unholy rate? But then the clapping starts and everyone shouts ‘Amen’ and ‘Praise the Lord’ and it doesn’t seem to matter much. The lepers needed healing, our vehicles need fixing, and who am I to split doctrinal hairs when we all need so much help?
Jamba, the cleaning lady, always makes me stifle a laugh, but I think she’s got it right. Without fail, when it’s time for ‘prayer requests and thanksgiving’, she rolls out in her low earthy voice: ‘I tank de Lawd, dat we here are countay amawn de livin’ dis mawnin’ … praise JeeeeezUS!’ There it is. Just thankful that we woke up today. I’m rarely thankful for the morning. I’d rather sleep and forget the day, but I am spoiled and soft. These people have seen terrible things. They’ve seen their sons and daughters shot and raped or worse. They’ve seen their homes burned and shot up and looted by soldiers full of drugs and demons, their nation fall prey to arrogant and bloodthirsty men, the kind of men the Old Testament writers described in no uncertain terms as ‘the wicked.’ Corruption is a way of life, sanitation doesn’t exist, and the old killers are all dressed up and sitting in the legislature. I’m surprised they still sing and clap and preach with such stomp, but I’m glad they do. It makes me love those holy words that drift around my cathedrals even more:
“These are Zion’s children,”
and while they dance they will sing:
“In you all will find their home.”
Amen.
There was a ship on the horizon, and suddenly I was overwhelmed with a feeling from my childhood. When I was young I would go hiking with my Dad, way up into the mountains, leaving the car and the road and all comforts behind. We’d camp under the stars, with the mountains standing around silent and the sun going down alone and the evening wind whispering like a lonely ghost in the haunted pines. I liked these trips, but the truth is that I liked going home afterwards even better. I liked arriving back at the car and taking off my boots and the way the car started up and the moment when we pulled out onto the smooth, predictable surface of the road with its neat yellow and white lines leading us to a better world. Anyway, sometimes when we were way up in the hills, trudging up a trail to another lonely, breathtaking view we’d hear the sound of cars on the highway far below, or the buzz of a plane overhead, or we’d lie on our backs and eat thick bread and cheese and see the vapour trail of a jet overhead. These things always gave me a sad sort of comfort. They let me know that other people existed, that the world hadn’t ended and left us alone there, that if we could hear and see the traces of other people, it meant that the way home was still near. It’s a bit stupid, really, because those highways and planes and vapour trails might have well been on the moon for how accessible they were, but that’s how I felt. A longing, yearning kind of assurance. It was the same when we did beach hikes along some ancient, wild coast and camped at night looking out to sea. Alone, we’d see the lights of ships at night, or their slipping silhouettes along the horizon by day, and I’d the feelings of home would rush up inside me, like sadness and hope, mixed.
Today, the ship on the horizon off the coast of Liberia was probably the farthest thing from a symbol of home that could be imagined, except that it was free to turn west and put full ahead for the New World, where, if you were lucky, you had a car parked in some clean National Parks lot, with white painted lines and a road across a clean, orderly land that leads you home.
I stood there in the water and felt an urge to swim for it.
But I didn’t. I swam across the bay and climbed out at Anna’s house and walked home, because I have to get up tomorrow and deal with an ECHO tender procedure, and like the hikes of old, you have to conquer what you came to conquer, really, before going home feels any good.
***
We sing here, and we preach. Every morning we have what they call ‘devotions’ before we start work. This means we pull up plastic chairs around in a circle in front of the house and sing hymns (all four verses) from photo-copied sheets and sometimes someone gets inspired and we sing a Liberian chorus, which makes us stand and clap and get a little more exuberant about the whole thing. Then we all sit down again and the designated person for that day preaches from the Bible. Liberians seem to come from the womb as full members of a gospel choir and with a full complement of street preaching skills. Every morning I hear an exposition of some portion of the Holy Word turned out in a fine cadence and tone worthy of a speech by Dr. Martin Luther King. Sometimes, I admit, I don’t even listen to what they’re saying. I just like hearing words spoken like that.
Actually, I like the whole thing. Which is strange. I’ve been Catholic for over a year now, having entered the arms of the ancient Church last New Year’s Day, so I haven’t been sitting in on a lot of old fashioned Bible preaching lately. Catholics, contrary to the myths that circulate, do use the Bible in their worship, but they tend to read it out loud and let the words hang in the solemn air rather than expound on it at length. I like that, too. Holy words drifting through the upper atmosphere of a cathedral have the ability to take you up with them. But there is something about these bouncy hymns and this arm-flapping preaching that reminds me of puppies tumbling around or a good barn-stomping fiddler who gets the crowd dancing. Sure, I think all my intellectual things, like: Who told this guy he could interpret a story about lepers as though it applied to the fact that our vehicles were breaking down at an unholy rate? But then the clapping starts and everyone shouts ‘Amen’ and ‘Praise the Lord’ and it doesn’t seem to matter much. The lepers needed healing, our vehicles need fixing, and who am I to split doctrinal hairs when we all need so much help?
Jamba, the cleaning lady, always makes me stifle a laugh, but I think she’s got it right. Without fail, when it’s time for ‘prayer requests and thanksgiving’, she rolls out in her low earthy voice: ‘I tank de Lawd, dat we here are countay amawn de livin’ dis mawnin’ … praise JeeeeezUS!’ There it is. Just thankful that we woke up today. I’m rarely thankful for the morning. I’d rather sleep and forget the day, but I am spoiled and soft. These people have seen terrible things. They’ve seen their sons and daughters shot and raped or worse. They’ve seen their homes burned and shot up and looted by soldiers full of drugs and demons, their nation fall prey to arrogant and bloodthirsty men, the kind of men the Old Testament writers described in no uncertain terms as ‘the wicked.’ Corruption is a way of life, sanitation doesn’t exist, and the old killers are all dressed up and sitting in the legislature. I’m surprised they still sing and clap and preach with such stomp, but I’m glad they do. It makes me love those holy words that drift around my cathedrals even more:
“These are Zion’s children,”
and while they dance they will sing:
“In you all will find their home.”
Amen.
posted by rjs | 10:37 AM
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