Fall in Bend
I love fall in Bend.
Warm-ish days and cold nights signal the change I always enjoy seeing come through the door. The trees around town and in our neighborhood will soon stand out as clownish, dressed in crayon-colors of reds and yellows and oranges popping against the ever-green evergreens. Sounds of dried leaves scratching across pavement plays a background soundtrack that can lull the most anxious heart toward rest. And there are still those wonderful hours of bright sunlight begging for a chair to be placed in the driveway to watch the world go by.
And so there I sat a couple of weeks back, reading a good book and scooping up some free vitamin D, when a neighbor walked over to chat. I pulled out another folding chair and my friend of nearly 20 years and I enjoyed an unhurried half hour discussing much and solving little. A gift of otherness, caught for a moment on a driveway, all served up by a warm fall afternoon’s invitation.
Soon it will be winter. Soon enough we will be shoveling and skiing and slip-sliding and shivering. I do enjoy that season, but for now, I love fall in Bend.
I have a tendency to think ahead more than I need to. Just today (Monday) Bachelor posted the first 5” of hopefully a full winter. In the fall when the temps cool, I can lose myself in skiing fresh powder in the bowl and days with no lines on Cloudchaser and epic times with good friends...all in my mind.
I can enjoy a good daydream as much as the next guy. While it’s a fun mental excursion, what I miss in that is being present, sitting in the sun on my driveway. That moment, if not captured and savored and lived, is lost.
A growing edge for many of us is working on being present more often.
Eating slower with more awareness of textures and flavors and smells helps chase me to ground.
Or looking longer so that I really see, opens up new understandings in other areas.
And allowing smells to capture my imagination as I bike, like at the several coffee roasters scattered around town.
Call it mindfulness, or contemplation, or whatever you will, in our ramma-jamma modern life this can be rushed right by. Many of us spend so much time moving on to the next thing that we can miss the presents the present present. And that is where the Spirit whispers.
Jesus gets at this idea of living today and not worrying about or hoping for tomorrow in the Sermon on the Mount. Give it another listen, this time from the Message:
What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with the getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.
In this passage from the end of Matthew 6, Jesus teaches a Kingdom way that is counter to the culture of both his time and ours. It must be part of human nature to look ahead and easily miss what is happening right in front of us, and living a counter-culture life takes effort.
When all around us the pace of life quickens, and while we drown in the flood of information fire-hosing our way, Jesus’ words are meant to refresh. When it seems everyone is heading in another direction, changing course or just standing will appear odd to the folks living fast, but do it anyway.
Living counter to the culture may look like setting a folding chair in the driveway, or taking time to visit with a friend over a long lunch, or walking the river trail and marveling at the colors and dancing riffled water, or going on a news sabbatical to cleanse your mental palate. It really is pretty easy to do, with intention.
When we reflect and integrate Jesus’ intention to “...get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with the getting, so you can respond to God’s giving”, we open the door to a different way of living. It is a process that moves us along a bit farther on the Jesus way.
Think today about being a bit more “present” in every conversation, every errand, every task. Pay attention to not miss the mystery embedded in even the most humble moment. If God is anywhere, he is everywhere. Take some time in your day to purposely slow down and breathe deeply and sense his presence.
How ‘bout some music...
And a funny for the road
Walking along the beach, a man finds a bottle. He rubs it and instantly, a genie appears.
“I’ll grant you three wishes,” the genie says. “There’s just one condition. I’m a lawyer’s genie, so for every wish you make, every lawyer in the world gets the same thing, only double.”
After thinking for a moment, the man says, “For my first wish, I would like $10 million.”
“Lawyers will get $20 million,” the genie reminds him.
“What else do you want?”
“I’d love to have a red Porsche,” he says. Instantly, the car appears on the beach.
“What’s your last wish?”
“Well, I’ve always wanted to donate a kidney.”
******************
A group of women were at a seminar on how to live in a loving relationship with their husbands. The women were asked, “How many of you love your husband?” All the women raised their hands.
Then they were asked, “When was the last time you told your husband you loved him?” Some women answered today, a few yesterday, and some couldn’t remember.
The women were then told to take out their cell phones and text their husband: “I love you, sweetheart.”
Next the women were instructed to exchange phones with another woman and read aloud the text message they received in response to their message.
Below are hilarious 11 replies. If you have been married for quite a while, you understand that these replies are a sign of true love... Who else would reply in such a succinct and honest way?
1. Who is this?
2. Eh, mother of my children, are you sick or what?
3. Yeah, and I love you too. What’s wrong?
4. What now? Did you wreck the car again?
5. I don’t understand what you mean?
6. What did you do now?
7. Don’t beat about the bush, just tell me how much you need?
8. Am I dreaming?
9. If you don’t tell me who this message is actually for, someone will die.
10. I thought we agreed you wouldn’t drink during the day.
11. Your mother is coming to stay with us, isn’t she?