Soulful Muse

One of my cats is captured by the bright light of my laptop as I write this and as the cloudy sunset captures mine. (It’s Wisconsin, what can I say? We have lots of “cloudy sun!”)

The experts call it a “transition,” what a nice work to use instead of saying, “You’re in a hole, a deep hole” that doesn’t appear to have a ladder. This is the “in betweens” I’ve loved to write about but this “between” is a bit too pinching when it happened to me.

“Why look to the forward when you haven’t finished the past,” I read somewhere. I wonder what change she was going through and if she “finished” her past.

“Finishing.” No idea what that means. If corporate standards abruptly finished me, my “finishing” is now my forced task? What is there to finish when the finishing was finished for me in one, long sentence with no feeling or appreciation for the many “finishings” I furnished for many years for older adults. (Funerals)

“Give yourself time,” is a comforting reminder from friends when time is all I have to give myself. Time for what? I’m getting pretty good at staring at something for no reason. I click out of it and find something else to stare down. (My apartment has never been cleaner and I promised myself to do laundry three weeks ago. “Tomorrow, tomorrow!”)

The soft word “transition” reminds me when garbage collectors became “sanitary engineers” as though they attended MIT and a secretary became an executive assistant. This is not a “transition” for me because the past would then meld with the present. This period is one-sided: focused purely on the past and what happened.

When I find a new position, then I can use the word “transition” but until then I’m in a hole with lots and lots of time surrounding me.

My other cat is sound asleep in the other room. I think that’s the cat capturing the dream of my next step.

The motion is simply back and forth but to a four-year-old, it’s reaching the stars on the “back” and familiar hands propelling him with the “forth.” Whatever thoughts contain a youngster are exchanged with the glory of this arc-movement. His only responsibility is a slight kick to keep “reaching the stars.”

The “back” are dad’s strong hands that held him for the first time four years ago and now pushes his smiling son toward the sky. “The sky,” it’s only about eight-feet upward and then back to those familiar hands.

What’s dad thinking about? It’s tonight’s pending supper because his wife’s not feeling well. “Weiner’s again? Oh, why not. There’s some macaroni somewhere in the pantry. How long should I keep pushing him? Just look at his smile, it’s wide open when the air hits my small guy with just an eight-foot expansion.”

Is the pliable boy now, at most an astronaut or a gravelly-sounding airline pilot ready to tell his passengers that their upward trip is about to begin? By dad’s clock, the whole event is measured by time but for his son, it’s timeless energy needing to be spent.

The whole experience is over in less than ten minutes but the bonding is forever kept somewhere – within the youngster’s young mind this small event is captured and stored in a mind’s place that is never retrieved but felt, dad’s mind is stored with another chance to be with his son while wondering what college will cost in fourteen years.

The two of them return to the house – son running but dad slowly walking, not because it’s “Weiner-night-again” but what a great son he has and his prayerful hope that his son “reaches for the stars” in whatever he says or does.

books by Fr. Joe Jagodensky, SDS, available in paperback or Kindle at Amazon:
“Soulful Musings”
“Living Faith’s Mysteries”
“Spiritual Wonderings and Wanderings”

I’m listening to an “easy listening” station right now that plays instrumental versions of the originals songs. It’s relaxing and I can fill in many of the lyrics.

Those guys like Roger Williams, Percy Faith, Bert Kämpfert, (I think you need to be over fifty to recognize the names) do not produce original music. One finger on a piano with a backup band produces an instrumental variation of the genuine song.

We are all “instrumentalists” attempting to copy the Jesus we follow. His 2,000-year-old lyrics still provides us with a melody for our lives. We can remember the lyrics, at least some them. We especially remember the chorus of any song we hear. Since his time – the names change, new issues arise but the musical notes Jesus left for us remain, amazingly, the same.

“Mack the Knife” is playing now but I can never remember all those weird names. So much for remembering.

Jesus wrote loads of songs for us about total forgiveness, offering the best wine last (the elderly?), a tiny seed becomes huge, asking a blind man what he wants from Him (as though it’s not obvious!), giving into a woman who wants justice and Jesus’ “dog” reference doesn’t cut it, making a big man out of the small-minded man in that tree, and constantly telling the twelve deaf guys that the music is about fishing for the benefit of all. (Jesus meant “fishing” to be a verb and not a noun.)

I can recall the beginning lyrics to, “The Way We Were,” the song playing now. Mem’ries light the corners of my mind, Misty water-colored mem’ries of the way we were…Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind, Smiles we gave to one another for the way we were…

Each of us is entrusted with the beautiful melodies written for us by Jesus. Our task, inside and outside Lent, is to allow that melody to continue. Entrusted to keep those musical notes heard to the rich and from the poor.  There may be flats and sharps along the way the melody of community and reaching out to each other will always have a resounding ending to it. The original composer, Jesus, promises us that.

Whitney Houston’s, “Saving All My Love for You” is playing now. No lyrics but the same melody. The lyrics to be made in our days and times are left up to us.

books by Fr. Joe Jagodensky, SDS, available in paperback or Kindle at Amazon:
“Soulful Musings”
“Living Faith’s Mysteries”
“Spiritual Wonderings and Wanderings”

I’m told an unreasonable child at two or three years of age will refute all of mom’s declarative statements seeking a reasonable response to the question, “Why?”

Mom tries her best to show her best reasoning by speaking to a mind that’s the size of an acorn but will grow to its fullest many years later. Mom gives the kid her best shot and the kid replies with a second dose of “Why?”

Mom, unflustered with her college degree tucked away and a full-time working profession, offers the unreasonable but adorable child a second plausible explanation to her declarative directive. Mom smiles to herself at her quick offer of her second response when the first one was just as valid.

Nada, not a second passes before the still unreasonable-but-seeking-a-reason-but-now-becoming-a-precocious-child says back to mom without hesitation, “Why?” Mom now with clenched teeth offers a sterner reason, with less reasonable reasoning than her first two reasonable responses. (“Three strikes and you’re out, kid?”)

A young person asks, “Why?” and we fill their opening heads with concepts and formulas that we hope will see them throughout life. The “Why’s” of the young are rarely answered but only signals and clues are slowly planted into their growing heads. During the child’s high school and college years, the “How” begins to play trying to figure out the “this from that” from every arena of life. (The “How’s” of our lives are more easily explained.)
When the child’s mind is fully developed that silly “Why” still arises only without mother and her canned, clever responses. The “How” is understood and then made into a job or career. (A “job” is something you do for money, a “career” is your investment in something important.)

But what is the remaining, unanswered question? That’s easy, it’s the “Who” question. “Who” are you at any given point in your life? “Who” do you want to be? How do other people answer your “Who” question for you? “You’re going to this college and that’s that!” When you are the only person on this planet to answer your “Who” question. “Who” have you become and are you content with that self-definition? And why do these three kids keep saying, “Who?”

Or, as Jesus asked, “Who”‘ do others say that I am?” So asking that question of ourselves puts us in pretty good company. “Who” will you continue to be with all your habits and routines already cemented in your life? Simply stated, can you answer this simple question that God asks of you every time you enter this sacred space or seek God out in prayer, “Who” are you?

Jesus answered all those preliminary questions but his only remaining, unanswered question always was, “Who are you?”
—“Are you the Son of God or just one of the prophets?
“What good can come out of Nazareth?”
—Constant demons, every step of Jesus’ way says, “I know ‘Who’ you are!”
                        —“If you are ‘who’ you say that you are, then jump off the cross and save yourself.”

Jesus gradually grew to know his “Who” in this life and then acted on it. His actions spoke for the “Who” that he was. He didn’t need to define it to anyone. If you believe that you’re a good person but cheat on your taxes because everybody does it, then your “Who” becomes a “What?”

Mom just wanted the (first cute-then precocious-then obnoxious) kid to get into the car. We just want to get through life with meaningful purposes in both our personal lives, relationships, and occupations.

Jesus just wanted to show us that if we answer the “Who” question first, then the “Why” of our lives will be resolved and solved.

books by Fr. Joe Jagodensky, SDS, available in paperback or Kindle at Amazon:
“Soulful Musings”
“Living Faith’s Mysteries”
“Spiritual Wonderings and Wanderings”

“The Who” and “Who Are You,” vintage rock ‘n roll

“Note to Myself”

In the movie, the rich guy in the fancy car says to his handheld recorder, “Note to myself” which is later transcribed by his secretary and placed on his desk.

“Can’t forget that,” “Great quote,” “Gotta save this one.” Where do I put wanna-be-remembered-words except in notes? “I can use that in a sermon one day,” I say to myself as I write a note to myself and place it where myself can find it on that future day if I remember that I wrote that note to myself to “remember.” (You gotta be over sixty-years-old to appreciate that sentence.)

Alzheimer’s or just age as this saving began years ago and now I have an accumulation of notes either from my thoughts or thoughts of others that I feel were worth preserving and to be used some unknown day but surely worth saving and retrieved when the time is ripe. A friend at his exit door has a note saying, “Got lunch?” I’m not that bad, you gotta eat.

The ripe time? I’m glad I note my thoughts or the thoughts of others and store them, but it’s the remembering what I wrote that escapes me.

It’s a small pile that’s curling at the edges. Neatly stack but still qualifies as a pile of “wanting-to-be-remembered-things-to-be-used-at-some-future-unnamed-time.” When my apartment is cleaned after my death, I hope someone will sift through my small note stack instead of just throwing them out. (I thought they were important or I would not have made note of them.)

When a new sermon stares before me on a blank page I don’t go through those saved notes, I look at the page and fill it with it warm thoughts and remembrances of someone who’s in a better place. (There’s some place better than Wisconsin on a February’s night?!)

The mount grows taller the older I get but I rarely look at them. I remembered to write them down so I would not forget what they touched or provoked in me the first time. They’re neatly stacked to my left and I see them now. Without the notes the blank page becomes full of faithful information and faith-filled references. I can’t remember what I saved but I guess I saved what I remember.

If I flip through those notes now I suspect I’d find that what I filled those blank pages with is pretty close to those notes. Isn’t it why I saved those “wanting-to-be-remembered-thoughts” in the first place?

Here are some of those notes:

TV’s “Dr. House,” “Is it that I think so little of you or so highly of myself?”
Fran Leibowitz, “The world went into television and television became the world.”
Benjamin Button, “People we remember the least, make the greatest impression on us.”
Unknown, “In a public place it’s a restroom, in your home it’s a bathroom.”
Louis C.K., “You’re angry because an invention you didn’t know existed thirty seconds ago doesn’t work!” (Early days of airplane WiFi)
Archbishop Liestski, “Defined by our differences, polarized by our politics.”
Liam Neeson character, “Give me an hour, I’m good; give me a week, I’m great; give me six months, I’m unbeatable.”
Unknown, “I’m a victim and beneficiary of my own reputation.”
My sermon preparation: First draft is sarcastic, the second version is cynical and the final version is touchy-feely.
Carl Jung, “What’s missing in you has to be seen in another person,” and “I thought marriage was a solution to my mystery; then I fond out that I’m the mystery.”
and finally
Unknown, “Don’t leap, lean.”

Wouldn’t you save those?

books by Fr. Joe Jagodensky, SDS, available in paperback or Kindle at Amazon:
“Soulful Musings”
“Living Faith’s Mysteries”
“Spiritual Wonderings and Wanderings”