Christmas Carol paradoxes 6 – James Taylor?

[1.5 minute read]

My goodness, Christmas carols are loaded with contrasts and paradoxes. And so am I. Good and bad. Deserved and undeserved. Earned and unearned. Beautiful and ugly.

Not what you think:)

Scholars debate facts about the historical Jesus, including his birth, the nativity. Let’s grant for a moment that it is entirely fabricated; why did the authors present it? That too is debated. But we have it. And it is wonderful mythology. Largely because we know how the rest of the story goes, the plain-born baby and the adult Yeshua and the timeless Logos are tied together through time and life – a lifetime. It makes it easier to imagine this baby loving us, even as a newborn.

We usually think of ourselves loving a sweet baby. But this song flips that on its head, and it is “baby” who loves us so sweetly.
…

I close my eyes at night
Wondering where would I be without you in my life
Everything I did was just a bore
Everywhere I went it seems I’d been there before
But you brighten up for me all of my days
With a love so sweet in so many ways

I wanna stop and thank you Baby, yes I do
How sweet it is to be loved by you
Just like honey to the bee, Baby
It’s like sugar sometimes
Feels so fine

I needed the shelter of someone’s arms
And there you were
I needed someone to understand my ups and downs
And there you were
With sweet love and devotion
Deeply touching my emotion

You were better to me than I was to myself
For me, there’s you and there ain’t nobody else

…except everybody and everything being sweetly loved by you.
I am being loved

.

Neil D. 2022-12-07

Share your favorite carol lyrics and the paradoxical mysteries they raise inside you, below, please!

Librarian of the Monarch Chorus

The owner’s name is Jimmy (not really; I asked, but names here are changed). He serves tables and washes dishes. He suggested a cup of ice with my Brisk from the fridge.

Glancing at the menu, “What do you recommend?” I asked. It’s all good he says.

I answered, “Burger?”

“You want everything on it, right?”
Right. He didn’t push fries – just asked.
Sure. He shouted the order to the girl behind the counter.

“Out for a ride?” Yep. Where you riding from? Oakmont, but not really sure where I’ve been today. “Those are the best rides aren’t they?”
Yes, yes Jimmy they are.

I pointed my camera at the QR code on the Town Days poster, “My kids might think this is the cool way to do this…”

“How many kids you got, Neil?” Three boys. “They out riding too?” One for sure, another wishing.

“Who’s that behind the counter?” Brit and Candace. Daughters of a friend.

I looked at photos of my sister’s family at their daughter’s graduation happening today. Joy. Beauty. Pride. Relief. Hope.

I looked at a photo of a decades-old, small-town newspaper announcing a local young woman away at college being added to Who’s Who. Perfect match to the 80’s hits Jimmy picked on his bistro’s jukebox. She was librarian of the Monarch Chorus. A sob out of nowhere escaped my chest.

I looked up in embarrassment, wondering if Jimmy heard or saw.

On a wall it says, “Music… It’s not what I do. It’s who I am.”

Funny. Two hours ago I think I said, “We aren’t what we have. We aren’t what we do…”

So, ok, I don’t see any reason any of us can’t be Music.

.
Neil D. 2022-06-11

Kay’s Light

Hey Siri. Search for Dunkin nearby… One block past South Broad Street on Locust. Opening at 5:30 in 3 minutes, 6 minute minute walk. One cigarette. Chilly, but I have gloves.

First guy passed, arguing with himself, loudly, his face twisted up in some kind of deep pain.

Wherever steam rose through the sidewalk, a heap of human being lay to stay warm.

A few medical students rode by on bicycles in their scrubs. An apparent local rode by on his antique bike, holding a Giant grocery bag in one hand.

In the brighter lights of an intersection by some historical building, I checked my wallet to see if I had any cash in case I was asked. I liked the faux gas lamp’s faux warmth outside a church dwarfed by buildings on three sides…

“Your gigantic-est coffee please.” “What size?” Sheesh… “What’s the most gigantic size you have?” squinting at the menu, just now locating the undersized S, M, and L. But it wasn’t L.

She answered pleasantly, “Extra large… Cream and sugar?” Yes please. As I waited, the guy behind me in a long, dark raincoat and blinding white sneakers didn’t seem to want to talk, so I checked out all the Christmas decorations and hummed with the carol.

Three blocks, halfway back, she was strolling toward me, carrying a flatscreen TV in a clear plastic bag, talking out loud to no one. Crossing the alley toward me, “Can you spare a smoke, sweetie?”

“Sure… Need a light?”

“I got one. Thanks. Most people just walk by…”

“What’s your name?”

She was already three strides away, looked halfway back over her shoulder, “Kay.”

Kay lit up my dark morning. She doesn’t need a light. She’s got one. Me too. You too.

.

Neil D. 2022-12-02.
From the City of Brotherly Love

Depressed on Thanksgiving

If today you feel sad, anxious, or depressed, I do not urge you to look on the bright side of things to be thankful for, if that is no impulse you have. If you feel abandoned or rejected by the world, I do not further reject your sadness by veiled encouragement, aimed at soothing mostly me, not you.

Perhaps your depression is no signal of your brokenness. On the contrary, perhaps it is a signal that you are a functioning whole human being, in a plight that rightly calls for you to respond with despair and the deep-rest of depression. At a horrible time, you are not pretending to be otherwise. That’s to be commended as whole and functional, not to be condemned as broken.

I am not glad that you are depressed, but I am glad that you are here, witnessing that you are still whole in brokenness. That you are still you. That any notion about the depth of despair or the loftiness of joy are only notions, not a human being who can experience those and all in between, because in the wholeness of this moment, you transcend them while *being* in them.

If I could see you with *my* eyes, that is what I would see. A full human being, being however they are in this moment, and being full, whole, enough, and with me. Any way that you are in any moment is an ok gift to me. Sadness is ok, as ‘right’ as any other experience of you, and not broken at all.

Neil D. 2022-11-24

Thanksgiving and introverted pillowcases

At my age, with the blessings showered on me, it is gladly effortless to list things I am thankful for. I honestly find it more challenging to list things that I am NOT thankful for. But the top of that list is easy.

Before I launder my bedding, I do NOT stuff a pillowcase into the tight corner of a fitted sheet. But, in every load, there seems to be a shy son of a bitch who finds its way there. As if it likes to be the only damp item emerging from the basket. No way it can dry, all rolled snugly in the corner. You know who you are, you bastards!

Neil D. 2022-11-23

PS. I put the son of a bitch on a hanger and let it dry in the cold air we all have to breathe.

It might be shy, but the bastard is conceited – as if I don’t have extra pillowcases.

Voters are part of the problem

We have latched on to the simple phrase “the government” as a scapegoat, as if we cannot affect it. As if it is not us! As if “the government” has a life of its own and is not constituted by the lives of each citizen.

It is the egocentricity of each of us which makes us feel powerless. Since we cannot change the world ourselves, as an individual, fuck it. I can’t affect “them.”

Holy inflated ego, Batman.

“Look Neil, I tell everybody to vote, and I vote myself, and I stay informed, etc.”

I, I, I…

When was the last time you asked someone why they don’t vote, and listened without interrupting to tell them they’re wrong because they aren’t you? They aren’t your ego.

YOU are part of the problem. Why would someone else expect “the government” to listen when the person standing in front of them will not?

You want action right now, because YOU know all the answers. The answers are simple. Because your ego is simple.

You are not powerless, and either is any other individual you might talk to. But you do not have the power to overturn current institutions in an instant. So your ego gives up. You are part of the problem.

Truthfully, everyone is part of the problem, aren’t they.

That’s not something hard for your ego to swallow. It’s just that your ego-mind doesn’t include you among everyone. This is true of the individual you are talking to also! Are you including them in your world? It is prior “government” that hasn’t included them, and that’s why they don’t believe in institutions, in you, or in themselves.

If you’d like to fix the world, stop aiming to fix the world.

Right-size your ego, for crying out loud. And recognize that your ego is not a small thing, but is more powerful than you ever realized. Think honestly about how conflict evolves. It doesn’t come out of nowhere. It comes out of each way individuals think, act, and speak every moment.

So, if you want to unfriend your adversary today instead of hear them compassionately, future generations can thank your ego for its contribution to their wars. Nice legacy.

You are no insignificant agent at all. There’s nothing you do that doesn’t matter eventually, in enormous ways.

“Election Day” is a day. That’s enough to satisfy your ignorant ego? “No, Neil. I am an activist all the time.” Your thoughts, words, and deeds affect other human beings every moment.

You may not affect a policy today, but you will absolutely affect other human beings a dozen times today.

Your power is – in very real reality – unfathomable.

Neil D. 2022-11-09