Daniel

What beautiful little people. They run out ahead of us. Run on after us. Fill us with the echoing deep--the questions we can't answer. But they ask them again and again until we remember that we've always wanted to ask them too. But what a little person you are, my son, when I look into your face and wonder at all things you will do. The parts of you I'll never know. The parts I'll know so well. The way you'll go beyond us--you'll step into a wider universe and carve a longer path and somehow on this day you were born I'm reminded that I will die. But you will go on and then your son and God knew you before you were born and knew your face and the way you would smile and that quiet moment when it was just you and me in the darkness on soft white sheets and you were breathing so softly I could hardly hear you and your soul was so close to mine and you were God's. I knew you were His before you were mine and it comforted me. It's hard to not feel afraid of all the times people will hurt you and all the times they won't see your soul the way I do--and it's because they don't know you...and because we don't know ourselves and we don't know God. That's why we ignore strangers and quietly hate the ones that are boring or ugly or too needy. We can't see them as sons and daughters of somebody. What could they have been? What was the name God gave them when they were born? Did anyone look at them in the darkness on soft white sheets and see their soul? You are beautiful, my son.

'third culture kid': what to do with change (not the money kind)

I remember the last time I fought change. I fought it with everything in me. I was eleven years old. Our family was moving from a small town in Turkey on the border of Bulgaria to a city on the coast of the Aegean Sea. We were moving for lots of reasons. My sister and I didn't care about any of them. We had friends we loved in our little town. We knew where all the good ice cream places were. We would swim in the river in the summer and pick plums from the trees behind our apartment building. We would play soccer in the dusty streets with the Turkish boys and our few girlfriends brave enough to follow our lead. This town was where we learned to be Turkish. Learned to fit in despite the little blonde Americans we were. The day one of my friends told me she sometimes forgot I was American was a day I'll never forget. She'd done what I was always hoping she would. We didn't want to be different. And we didn't want change.

And then, out of nowhere, we were moving. There was nothing we could do about it. Every crack in the grey, cement apartments, every part of the rusted playground, every face we knew there became more dear than we could have imagined. We were leaving it all. Within a matter of weeks Edirne was just an aching memory. We cried so many tears together that hot summer. We hundreds of letters to our friends with rose petals and kiss marks on the envelopes. Looking back at those letters they look more like love letters than letters between friends. But there is nothing that tugs at the heart like loss. And a kind of romantic image rises up from the ashes of a lost town, a lost friend. And a love grows that isn't far from the tenderness of romance and the rage of patriotism. We were eleven and ten. But we knew something.

Since then I haven't fought change. We were defeated by it that summer. Since then I sat back quietly and let my life be defined by it. And I learned to ignore it as best as I could. Pretend it didn't exist. I've left so many places, so many people. They disappear into my past and when I see them now and then I pretend nothing has changed- because I have to. Because change is hard on souls and because I'd rather not admit all that space and time and life that's built a chasm in between us...and I'd rather not do the work of bridging it all. There's isn't time to anyway. The visit ends quickly and we slip back into our lives as if we'd never been friends.

My 'old friends' have never been current friends. What I mean is, apart from my family, the people I've known since I was little are scattered all over the map. No continuity, no responsibility to each other. I began to think of change as an all-encompassing-thing. When I move places, I change friends. And the old ones are filed away in a place dear...but not too near my heart. Otherwise things would hurt too much. That ache would come back.

And so when I got married I went through the drill. I began to file away the old memories, the old faces. A few of them moved to different states and that made it easier to believe that we now had separate lives...that we could detach our hearts from each other and not think too much about the loss. It's like a kind of death. You can think I'm being dramatic if you like. But I believe this with all of my heart. Those who have lived around the world and been far away from those they love know:

change is a kind of death.

And to survive you have to keep track of all the different worlds you've lived in and try to keep them all crammed into your heart somewhere---keep them as a part of your heart---but not too close--afraid of all the terrible fragments--and the ones that won't fit together--and the inability to make sense of it all.

So I got married and tried to build a new life from scratch like I was used to doing--God, it was hard. And I felt like I was getting no where. And I couldn't stop thinking about two friends from college who were still in the area. Two dear friends--Lisa and Rachel. But I was going through the drill. I knew the rules. Nothing from the old world could enter into the new one. That's how it's always been. I felt there couldn't possibly be enough love, enough friendship in any of us to bridge the gaps, to build back towards each other after graduation and marriage and so much change. I felt a strange kind of disdain for their friendship--as if being old friends wasn't as valuable as being new friends. And so I betrayed the fact that I'd never had old friends.

This post is for you, Rachel Lyman and Lisa Cohen (recently married to her wonderful Kristofer Cohen). The two who wouldn't let me slip away. The two who stayed. Who weren't afraid to tell me the truth (that I was being a butt for trying to move on from our friendships). Who taught me it's possible to dance with change without letting it crush you.

My dear friend, Rachel--you are a beautiful, sweet, creative, EXTREMELY intelligent, gentle, compassionate (like Jesus-status compassionate), wild, free, wonder-filled and faithful woman. We have been through thick and thin. We've had times when we've seriously disliked each other...and times when things were awkward and times when things were wonderful. I am truly honored to call you 'friend'.

My dear friend, Lisa--you are a beautiful, lionhearted, tender, strategic, EXTREMELY intelligent, passionate, wise, intense, eloquent and faithful woman. I still remember the first time I met you and we had a two hour conversation and I was so overjoyed that you were going to be my floor partner. We've been mad and sad at each other and critical and encouraging. I will never forget the year I spent with you on the Hood. Your wedding reminded me what a ridiculously good planner you are. My jaw just dropped at the choreographed dance. 'Get it Lisaaa'. I am truly honored to call you 'friend'.

And so I learned that there are three things you can do with change. You can fight it. You can deny it. And you can dance with it. Thank you Lisa, thank you Rachel for teaching me how to dance.


what have you done with change? What friends have taught you how to dance?

Seven Months

You came teaching my girl. You came teaching. You turned seven months on May 1st. You grow more beautiful each day. You have spunk and sparkle and you are good at jumping. I was talking to a friend today about how it feels to be a mom...how sometimes- maybe most of the time- you don't quite feel like a person. Caring for others constantly forces you to forget yourself. And I guess that's what I mean by 'don't feel like a person'. You don't have time to stop and just be. But then she said, 'Don't worry. You will feel like a person again someday. Just a different person.' And then it hit me. It hit me how much we change as parents. How someday we will emerge from caring for kids constantly but we'll be better at a lot of things and wiser and older and humbler and better at this thing called love. Man, it's hard sometimes. Loving.

I see now how little I knew about real life back in college- back when everything was a theory...and I was pretty sure I knew everything. Some things, maybe most are things you won't understand until you use your life muscles a little bit and get dirty- get in the trenches. Life is really gritty and really scary and so real. And to go from all theory- all thinking- to all doing, doing, doing is a strange paradigm shift. But jumping into the deep end of marriage and parenthood wasn't so bad.

In this culture I'm young to be married and even younger to have a kid. Remember that place in between worlds in The Magician's Nephew? A forest full of pools leading to other worlds- dying worlds, worlds about to be born. I often feel like I'm there and I belong to more than one world- more than one pool. Everyone my age is discovering themselves- their career- their soul-mate- who they are--- and everyone with children is a decade older than me. So I'm caught in a world where everyone is in a different place and sometimes it feels pretty fragmented. But. Maybe that's the magic of living anyway- that we're all in different pools-different worlds..and somehow, sometimes we meet in the middle--this world--these bodies--this thing we have in common. We're all drifting souls that bump into each other and it all seems random and wild sometimes but sometimes it seems so not.

Like I meet an old man riding a horse on the Fullerton trails and he's telling me how he fought in world war II and how his wife passed away and this is her horse and he soled his because he didn't need two anymore and the jackass bikers always ride too fast and they better slow down 'cause they don't know what a 190 pound horse can do to their rear-ends and just remember to savor every moment of it cause even when you get in little spats it's ok 'cause in the end all you have is each other and you need each other and then when they're gone you miss them sorely and there's nothing like living you're whole life together and thank you so much young lady for your time talking. it sure was nice talking. and he gets this distant look in his eye and I can imagine him sitting by himself at home eating dinner and what it is to be alone. And just like that our lives collide and they mean something in the other's.

Anyway, I'm glad to be here-- changing and colliding with these souls. And this little Winter soul we met seven months ago is especially wonderful. You came teaching my girl. You came teaching.

Rashes and Runny Noses

When I remember what I have, what I don't have get's smaller. It fades away into the distance like a forgotten nightmare. I tend to focus on the flaws, on the problem. I'm good at finding the flaws- in an idea, a person, my piano student's finger technique. But soon the little flaw, the little speck of dust starts getting pretty large and I start freaking out because it's actually a black hole coming to devour every bit of joy and peace I have. And just like that I loose. I feel awful. Nothing is right. Everything is wrong. It's the end of the world.

The speck and the log...remove the log from your own eye so you can remove the speck in your brothers eye. How often do we turn specks into logs and miss the actual log? There are logs. There are big problems in our lives that need removing. I just think we're not usually aware of them. Judging others is a big problem but I feel like Jesus is pinpointing a human tendency that is deeper- one that is constantly devouring us. Our perspective is limited and therefore our perception is flawed or at the very best, incomplete. We don't see the universe from the right angle. We don't have a good vantage point. We are tiny ants in a huge kitchen. Two-dimensional beings in a million-dimensional world. We are not God and we are small. And our limitations make us extremely vulnerable to blindness.

For weeks now I've been stressing about Winter not sleeping through the night, about a rash on her bottom, about runny noses, about money, about friends. And whenever one stressful thing ends, I pounce on another and turn it into a black hole that devours me day after day, night after night. God, I want to be done.

Our lives are filled to overflowing with His grace. His love is everlasting. It surrounds us and hems us in on every side. He is our rock and our deliverer. He has plucked us out of the flames, rescued us from death. He gives good gifts and He knows what we need. He is strong and good. I'm weak and pretty bad. So why is my default to try and figure things out for myself until I'm really stuck and then cry out to God in panic. The thing is, we've all been doing it since infancy. This aching pull to be independent, to do things ourselves, which really means breakdown of relationship, breakdown of vulnerability and love...we've been doing this since birth. We've been living in the echo of Adam and Eve's loneliness for thousands of years.

On the second day of Winter's life I noticed something. When I tried to pull her in to breastfeed her she would squirm and wriggle and complain. When I let her find the milk herself, it took longer but she wouldn't complain. I don't know how it's possible for a such a young life to already be tugging away, already trying to do things for herself. Is it always wrong to be independent? Of course not. We have separate bodies. We are built for independence. But we are also built for dependence. The tension moves back and forth like the tide. We are forever in need of each other. We are forever standing alone before God's face.

I have a vision often, a strong impression of what it will feel like to stand before Him- before all of that greatness and splendor and love. Before the face I ache for every moment. Before the face that is the answer to every pain, every tear, every fear and darkness. In that vision I feel my aloneness more than I have ever felt- not loneliness like i feel on earth- my utter nakedness in the universe...every pain and joy of my soul exposed...but the nakedness is comforting. Somehow before Him, I am glad I'm naked. In that vision I am home. Probably my deepest fear is losing someone I love to death- David, my sister, my parents, Winter. And I wonder, could I face Him even in that- in His taking away could I still look Him in the eye. And somehow I know I could. I know that His face is enough.

Beyond the log, beyond the speck...is His face. Beyond the real logs- the darkness, the turmoil, the longing, the fear...is His face.

And in the meanwhile. We have each other's faces. To remind us of joy, of love, of hope. To ignite and reignite the image of God that we carry. To acknowledge, to comfort, to weep and rejoice with. To remind us that the black holes aren't so black and holey...and the rashes and runny noses aren't so bad.

Large Streets of Purpose

I'm glad to be alive today.


I felt inspired today…and felt a little bit of joy and that full feeling you get when you do something that seems worthwhile.


I'm always doing something worthwhile, I know. Feeding and dressing and cleaning and loving this dear little babe. Our little Winter. Logically, it's totally worthwhile. Doing dishes, vacuuming our old Turkish rug, frying chicken in cinnamon, doing laundry. Those are all worthwhile things too I suppose. Anyway, they have to be done. But almost every day lately I wonder what my purpose on this planet is. I wonder why I feel useless. I feel knots in my stomach staring out the window holding a crying baby. There's no one expecting anything from me today. No place I have to be. No thing that urgently needs my attention. Except. The one beautiful soul in my arms. She expects everything from me. She expects life from me. She goes with me everywhere. She sees everything I see. Her tiny bones are growing every moment. Her tiny hands are exploring every moment. And she only knows a world with me in it. I'm her anchor. The first voice she heard was mine. I pushed her body out to life and joy and pain and sorrow and fear. So how could I leave her for that empty craving I feel to be important and have deadlines and have people expecting things from me out in the big world…for being busy. Maybe I used business to run away from something. Maybe I felt that if something was expected of me by important people I would be important. Hell, what am I saying? Winter is important. But I guess there are two kinds of important and really, the second kind of important is the only real important. All the powerful people in the world don't really matter do they? At least, their power makes them matter no more or less. They too were once babies drinking milk from their mamas and their importance, their extraordinary worthwhile-ness hasn't changed. They will always matter in the only way anyone matters.

The reason I felt glad to be alive today was because I stopped trying to justify my life. I had ideas and I did them…and succeeded. I found rubber toys at the goodwill for Winter to chew her sore gums on. I bought pastel paint colors to dress up some furniture. I kissed my brother goodbye for the weekend. I fed our small, purple beta fish (Gravy) with a lump on his fin. I crossed a large street and a man in a pick-up truck screeched to a halt two feet from mine and Winter's bodies. I looked into his face and he had a kind one. He's probably someone's grandpapi. How awful it would have been if he'd stopped later. How awful. And the blood rushed to my head and I said, 'Oh my gosh.' and those could have been my last words. But they weren't. Praise be to God who blows breath into our lungs and keeps the blood pumping through our veins. Praise be to God who holds us when we dance and when we sleep and when we cry and when we make love and when we are in our mom's tummies and when we feel no purpose. Praise be to God when we feel no purpose.


And praise be to God when we do.

You've Answered.

You’ve been true to Your word. You’ve shown me Your Son and Your love and the meaning of the great divine sacrifice. It’s a meaning that shakes the very core of my being. It’s a meaning that’s as close to my life as the breath in my lungs and the blood pumping through my veins. It’s a meaning that nothing, not life or death or any power in the universe can separate me from. It’s a meaning that has the power to carry me through my life until my last, feeble breath. It’s a meaning that gives me peace and makes me whole – makes my body and my spirit and my mind move towards it, yearn for it, love it - move because of it with all the strength that I have. But You don’t need my strength. You need my humility. You need my heart. You need my eyes to watch and trust Your hand, Your work, Your weaving throughout history, throughout the universe, the plan for the redemption of men and the explosion of Your glory.

The meaning is hard to say with human words and it certainly isn’t in the tradition of the wisdom and greatness of man. The meaning is light in darkness, strength in weakness, hope in wretchedness, love in the face of hate, courage in the face of fear, faith in the face of doubt. It is the meaning of His uncovered face, loving us into the casting out of fear and the healing of our bones. It is a meaning that looks to His face to work those paradoxical moments into our hearts, our minds, our existence. He looked on our wretchedness and wept with compassion. It is a meaning that is just as weird, farfetched, mad, wild, romantic and fantastic as it is clear, wise, beautiful, logical, just and good. A god died for the shattered souls of men. The God died so that we could know Him because knowing Him was the only way we could ever live a greatness, a glory, a completion, a wholeness, a healing, a filledness, a satisfaction, a pleasure in the fullness of Another. It was the only way we could learn to love.

David’s thousand-year-old song is mine today. He is my home, my sun, my shield, my food, my joy, my strength. Because of Him I can pour out water on the dry places. Because of Him my heart and body sing for joy.

Psalm 84

How lovely is your dwelling place,
O Lord of hosts!
My soul longs, yes, faints
for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and flesh sing for joy
to the living God.

Even the sparrow finds a home,
and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may lay her young,
at Your altars, O Lord of hosts,
my King and my God.
Blessed are those who dwell in Your house,
Ever singing Your praise!

Blessed are those whose strength is in You,
in whose heart are the highways to Zion.
As they go through the Valley of Baca
they make it a place of springs;
the early rain also covers it with pools.
They go from strength to strength;
each on appears before God in Zion.

O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer;
Give ear, O God of Jacob!

Behold our shield, O God;
Look on the face of Your anointed!

For a day in Your courts is better
than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the
house of my God
than dwell in the tents of wickedness.
For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
the Lord bestows favor and honor.
No good thing does He withhold
From those who walk uprightly.
O Lord of hosts,
blessed is the one who trusts in You!

The Ending

Every new valley I walk through ends the same way. Somewhere deep in, when the fear grips my throat and hope's a short wick, after a lot of struggling and bruising and stumbling around, I bump against some shape in the dark. I fumble about a little more, running my hands across it. I realize it's beautiful, perhaps more beautiful than anything I've ever seen. I realize I'm suddenly further on in the path than I thought. And the thing I'm feeling in the dark is the answer to all of the aching questions I'd asked a few miles back where the black was thickest and my wounds deepest. Back when I thought I'd die in there and there weren't any answers. And then it dawns on me that it's not an idea or a shape, it's really Him, breathing softly, waiting for me at the end of my darkness.