To Save or to Savor

wintering

My view of the park these days is from far away – inside my house. You know – it’s so darn cold. The kind of cold that slaps your face, but it’s not bracing or refreshing – it just hurts.

That’s kind of how I feel about all the things going on in the world – the war, pain, suffering – it seems far away – because I’m In Here and it’s Out There. Even if, like the park, the reality is happening just across the street.

Our minister told this story yesterday in church – that Martin Luther King, Jr., shoved his plate of food away from him at a meal after seeing a photograph in the newspaper of a dead Vietnamese child killed by an American soldier.

“Does it not taste good?” someone asked.

King replied, “No food will taste good to me until I’ve done everything I can to stop this terrible war.”

Damn, and Oh dear. I think of all the tragedies occurring on this globe in the name of my country, both here and abroad – I consider the children dying in Gaza right now – I look at the food on my plate, product of blood and tears and sweat, poorly paid workers, truckers doing overtime – my bed filled with the down of a wrung goose – how can I dream on such a bed, how can I warm myself in these clothes, how can I find sustenance in this food, when all of it came to me through such suffering?

I’m currently reading a book by a Unitarian Universalist minister, William Murray, called A Faith for all Seasons, and in it he quotes another UU minister, Richard Gilbert:

I arise in the morning torn between the desire

To save the world and to savor it -

To serve life or to enjoy it -

To savor the world or save it?

The question beats in upon the waiting moment -

To savor the sweet taste of my own joy

Or to share the bitter cup of my neighbor;

To celebrate life with exuberant step

Or to struggle for the life of the heavy laden?

I love this, because it articulates a very personal inner tension of mine about how to live – I’m often like that Atari games ping-pong ball, plonking incessantly between the options of Enjoying Life, not taking things too seriously, going with the flow (which can feel selfish, indulgent, irresponsible) and Trying to Make a Difference, conscious and aware, (which can also feel myopic, self-serving, fake, self-righteous).

Murray answers this poetic question by suggesting that our lives are made meaningful when we savor and save the world – both.

But I find myself suspicious that even a mix is too easy, and all of it too abstract, and yet my own ability to toss a plate of food away in distaste, with disgust at my role in the chain of exploitation hard to address because I am supporting two small

children, and I need to eat in order to be a mother to them.

Is that a cop out?

I am also aware that extreme, dramatic acts are sometimes easier to perform than small, daily practices that go unnoticed and unpraised.

Someone once told me that King wasn’t such a great parent or husband to his kids.

But I wonder about that, too – maybe great people just can’t be asked to be everything.

Today, during Obama’s inaugural speech, I thought about his daughters, and how, despite the reports that their father makes it a point to spend quality time with each of them everyday, however brief, they are probably going to get some kind of short end of the parenting stick. I mean, come on – leader of the free world isn’t going to be helping them with their homework every night after dinner.

But is that necessarily bad? Following one’s bliss requires sacrifice. And when it comes to children – who end up sacrificing with their parents, usually without a choice about it – how does a responsible parent ask that of his or her children? Or do they not, and then just deal with the children’s feelings later? Is there something to be said for the calls to service for the greater good that do justify the sacrifice of an individual family, whether they choose it or not?

But I’m digressing.

I heard so much during the Obama speech that infused me with a new hope, my cynicism about this country and our prospects a hardened carapace cracking – but my heart was snagged by something he said (paraphrase) about not being faint-hearted and settling for the easiest way out – and I thought, oh lordy cakes, I often settle for the easiest route, I don’t strive for greatness; he’s talking about me: I am faint-hearted.

It is easier to stay indoors.

I don’t know how to have integrity and strive for greatness and follow the rugged path toward my bliss – or maybe I do but am afraid of what such a journey would require. But I know that I am inspired by the story of Martin Luther King, Jr. and by the poem today about Love, and by Obama’s speech to address my heart and ask it to be braver and louder with its truth. Part of me wants to go out and start building bridges and digging ditches – but I know I need to actually dig right here, to hear what it is I need to do.

Maybe by learning to save the part of the world that is mine to save, I will learn to savor it, because it is part of the act of love.

Maybe I will find a way to eat what is before me, knowing my privilege, my heart breaking with sorrow and gratitude and humility and joy, maybe there is a way to be here that is not the easy way out, but the right way in.

I feel more hope today that there is.