I am reading a book that asked me the question, “What do you want to be remembered for?” I thought about that question and tried to think of an answer. As I was thinking about that question, it kept leading me to another question that seemed to occupy more of my thoughts than the first question. The new question that came to mind is, “Who do I want to remember me?” I haven't answered either.
They are family, distant maybe in miles but not in blood, that connection which is redder, richer, old blood, the sincere blood of the ages running deep into the earth's past. I think of this as the nourishing blood that grows great families. Such was the case this last weekend as the remnant of my paternal family came to call. They are few, a true remnant, three quilt squares that make up a dear blanket of family warmth. They come from Detroit, where their fathers fled the difficult poverty of southern life, worn thinner by a world war, to the north's promise of work, building cars and commerce that fueled much of the abundance of the late 20th century. They are the connection to the old black-and-white photos saved in our parents' scrapbooks, old boxes, and hallway picture frames. People we never knew but whose good blood now runs through me and mine. It is always good to see these few three. To renew the ties that bind, to sit in the shade and piddle over the long past, to eat, drink and be merry, to hold hands and pray and know as we are known. We worshiped together in the church of our ancestors, visited the haunting homes that housed our struggling elders in an America that is much longed for today. Oh the blood of land people, those that lived on what his good earth provided, so kind in their rich abundance of children, able to pass on and on and on the family that now spreads out because of their calloused hands, bent backs, and determined spirit. To say my heart was renewed this weekend would be an understatement…my soul, heart, and mind sing with the blood of ages…even that sacred Blood of the Cross;
“Blest be the tie that binds
our hearts in Christian love;
the fellowship of kindred minds
is like to that above.
When we are called to part,
it gives us inward pain;
but we shall still be joined in heart,
and hope to meet again.”
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| The blood gathers at Fair Haven. |
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| The home my dad's mom, Mamaw lived in as a child. |
We finished installing Zac’s sculpture, and it was such a pleasure to work alongside our son, the sculptor. Benson Sculpture is now safely and creatively in our children's hands. God is faithful. The unveiling is next week, and I will post an image of the piece then.
The little things that make life, life. None is more important than the warmth of another person being shared with you. The warmth of their body soaking into yours. Combine this with love, and you have a symbiotic relationship of the divine. As the nights grow colder, I am reminded of this little thing of life, the two becoming one, the 98.6° of binding, celestial life.
For the past 35 years, my lover and I have spent a considerable amount of time with our family creating Benson Sculpture and traveling around the country and the world creating sculptures. Today we begin again. Sissy and Oliver join us as we drive to Zac and Britt’s to install Benson Sculpture's newest work. Zac won a large commission, and we are all working the install this weekend. “On the road again, just can’t wait to get on the road again, making sculpture with my family and my friends, and I can’t wait to get on the road again.” Thanks, Zac, and you to Willie. Images to follow.
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| Our last major work, Seven Pillars. |
The infinitesimal nature of my own being, when set against the vastness of the night sky, draws me toward an inclusion in Someone ultimately powerful, even omnipotent. It touches the soul in me and awakens an ever-increasing longing. I have always been a gazer, a long-looker. I was the kid in school who stared out the window, imagining all the places there were to go and all the things there were to see. A window has always been my favorite form of indoor entertainment, a kind of portal transporting me to the heart of God. When I was in the Navy, just before we would leave port, I would fill my pocket with rocks. Once we were finally in blue water, I would stand beside the bulkhead and drop them, one by one, overboard and marvel at the experience they were having. I wanted to live that kind of meaning myself. I did not understand any of this when I was young. I only knew that my imagination seemed to carry me somewhere beyond the ordinary. Now I know better. It was God all along, wooing me to life and “life more abundantly.”
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| Some of those who helped me drop stones in the sea. |
Life is an all-out war to find meaning. Most people give up after a few dynamic searches in their youth and life itself, the life they have becomes the meaning they try to make of it. But my life is not that meaningful in bringing me meaning. It eventually drops into entertaining me and my appetites, and that becomes a downward spiral of ever-decreasing returns as your body becomes less and less able to live up to what entertains you. I need something that can bring meaning to me at 28 and me at 68 but, more importantly, ever-increasing meaning and purpose in a body that can be it or, better yet, a body that can DO it. How? To completely and wholeheartedly commit to being with God, in Christ, through the Holy Spirit every morning, as with an oxygen tank a thousand leagues under the sea. He will give you lifelong meaning and purpose, but more importantly, he will give it to you one day at a time. The here's only purpose is to prepare you for the hereafter, and the hereafter for you being there.
