Hymns of Harmony

[At the going away party, I felt] grateful to be alive then and there with such good fortune and so many loving, special friends. It was almost too much for me, and I had to wander off to the edge of the redwoods to be alone for a little while. I started listening to the insects absently, until I began to hear patterns and waves of patterns in their music. I could hear one chorus end and another start and hear the creatures all shift and syncopate their music to the new wave, and I realized, for the first time in my life, astounded, that they weren't making random noises, that they were actually singing in huge harmonies, harmonies of sweeping waves, harmonies involving thousands of voices! Ripples of subtle shifts were repeated as heard and transmitted for as far in any direction as I could focus my hearing. I looked up at the sky and the clouds and the stars and moon, and I looked at the silhouettes of the magnificent trees around me, the motion of the branches in the gentle wind. I thought of my many friends who loved me, .... I felt that rare oneness with the universe, that sense that maybe it all does mean something. I felt complete.

~ Reuel Parker

I think this sums up why we need "wild places."
How do we remain connected to the wider/larger harmonies of the world, with God's creation, with a sense of Paradise here and now?
As people on the water, where do we find these moments of astounding connection?
How do we share them with others?
How do they shape our lives as Beloved Children of God?
How do we join in this hymn of praise?

Blessed Be

A Book Review: Harlan Hubbard's Shantyboat

In 1944, Harlan (an artist and viola/violin player), and his new wife Anne (a librarian and cello player),  build a shantyboat on the shore of the Ohio River (at Brent, just downstream from Cincinnati) and drift down to the Gulf of Mexico.

I had no theories to prove. I merely wanted to try living by my own hands, independent as far as possible from a system of division of labor in which the participant loses most of the pleasure of making and growing things for himself. I wanted to bring in my own fuel and smell its sweet smoke as it burned on the hearth I mad made. I wanted to grow my own food, catch in the river, or forage after it. In short, I wanted to do as much as I could for myself, because I had already realized from partial experience the inexpressible joy of so doing (Hubbard, 38).

They spend two years after the construction learning their "apprenticeship" to river life, and growing a garden along the shore to stock up their provisions. Down the Ohio they go, stopping at Payne Hallow after a winter of drifting. Here they set about growing a large garden, fishing and bartering for eggs and milk during the spring, summer and fall before setting off down the river again. Little do they know at the time, that they will return to Payne Hallow and homestead there. The next spring, they stop at Brizzle's Bluff on the Cumberland River. Again a season is spent growing garden crops before setting out for another winter drifting, this time moving quickly to the Mississippi. Their next layover is at Natchez. Then the following winter they are off again, getting to New Orleans in March, 1950. The total distance is 1385 miles.
One of the interesting things about this voyage, and the book, is that Harlan never mentions the United States is fighting World War II, nor that the war ends, while they are drifting down the river. This story is told with delight, humor and an overriding sense of passion about living life. Lest you think they are a young couple, Harlan is 44 and Anne 41 when they marry. And, as Wendell Berry points out, this experience shapes their relationship to one another and the world around them. In some ways, their homesteading is a continuation of this way of life.
Many people have an idea that cruising, or shantyboating, costs lots of money. But it needn't. I'm not saying the life that the Hubbards lived on their shantyboat is for everyone, but I will say that their life provides a different way to live, one that is full of time for leisure as well as work. (For those familiar with the Nearing's books on the Good Life, you may find some similarities here).
By traveling every winter, the Hubbards were able to use the strength of the rivers' currents to move their boat/home. Their only other power was of a human kind (sweeps on the shantyboat, oars on the john boat) plus a few times in which they are towed a short distance. This allows them to grow/catch their own food, and by canning, keep it until they are able to grow more. For eggs and milk (and the like) they barter what they have for what they don't (i.e. catfish for milk and eggs). For heat, and other supplies, they use drift wood.
Harlan lived, as Berry points out, a life of faith: "What we need is at hand" (Berry, 93). Is this not truly seeing the world as a place of abundance?

How are we living? Are we living in ways that give us growth: in spirit, in character, in creativity, in accomplishment, in pleasure, in joy?
Here's to a New Year filled with this kind of growth!
Blessed Be
Rev. Joel

***
See Harlan Hubbard's Shantyboat: A River Way of Life. (University of Kentucky Press, 1953) and Wendell Berry's Harlan Hubbard: Life and Work. (University of Kentucky Press, 1990).
Or visit the website devoted to the Hubbards: Harlan Hubbard.com

Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 2011

Public Domain Photo

On this Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day - What do you dream of? How you willing to work purposefully for a greater good? How might a greater good/the Kingdom of God be calling you?

Blessed Be

PS - I was hoping to add a video of the speech, but didn't realize that the video of the speech is copyrighted. I did find a link to a text transcription of the speech, and an audio version, so you may hear and read at the same time.

Believe it or not, the "I Have a Dream" speech was originally titled "Normalcy, Never Again." and the first drafts never included the phrase "I have a dream". The popular title "I have a dream," came from the speech's greatly improvised content and delivery. Near the end of the speech, famous African American gospel singer Mahalia Jackson shouted to Dr. King from the crowd, "Tell them about the dream, Martin." Dr. King stopped delivering his prepared speech and started "preaching", punctuating his points with "I have a dream."* 

It was one of the realities of how speeches are lived events that we now have this speech/sermon and the new title.

The speech can be found here: American Rhetoric: Martin Luther King Jr.

*quote from: Martin Luther King Online

New Year's Poetry

We've got three posts today - two poems, plus this one. I ran across both of these this week, and they seemed perfect ways to start the new year. I found Marge Piercy's to be a call to come join in the work of the Kingdom, of Paradise. While Dorothy Day's reminds me to be patient, both with myself, others, and the tasks before us. We do make a difference in each others lives, and the lives of those around us, just as with each small step, we also make a difference in what we are able to accomplish. The small "bricks" add up into a beautiful cathedral.

Blessed Be

Rev. Joel

Commitment

People say, what is the sense of our small effort.
They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time.
A pebble cast into a pond causes ripples that spread in all directions. Each one of our thoughts, words, and deeds is like that.
No one has the right to sit down and feel helpless.
There's too much work to do.

~ Dorothy Day

To Be of Use

I want to be with people who submerge in the task,
Who go into the fields to harvest and work in a row and pass the bags along,
Who stand in the line and haul in their places,
Who are not parlor generals and field deserts but move in a common rhythm when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud. Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil, Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry and a person for work that is real.

~ Marge Piercy

Happy New Year, 2012

 
Humans "are [here] to balance out the ecosystem." We are not destined to destroy the natural world. - Richard Bresnahan tells David Carlson in Peace Be With You: Monastic Wisdom for a Terror-Filled World. (2011, Chapter 12 "Feet of Clay").

As we enter a new year, how are you encountering the natural world around you?

Here is to hoping 2012 is a year full of peaceful, balanced encounters with the world we live in, a world infused with the Divine, a world of Paradise.

Blessed Be

Richard Bresnahan: potter residence at St. John's University