When Flogging Molly sings this, I don't think they were implying anything about Jesus. But to I'm sure many artist's chagrin (if they were ever to find out), I hear Jesus in even the most secularly intended music (If only Jay-Z knew that I heard "hallelujah" instead of "New York" in Empire State of mind and had a really great spiritual moment. So much for "life starts when the church ends").
It's Easter, He is risen, and really the first to leave this world Alive (And in a much more live way than we'll be, I think- but that's just because He is the definition of Life itself, so how can we compete with that?). My Easter experience got me thinking about life and being alive and I have been thrown into a menagerie of thoughts, so forgive the random episodes of differing topics in this post, they are the product of a lively day where my thoughts drift in and out, changing with the restless spring wind and altering light.
This was my first Easter away from home, and the "Easter Bunny" mailed me a package a few days before full of amazing goodies even though I'm 24 and 1,000 miles away from home. I went to church- which was packed and bright and cheerful and I was reminded how much I love it and how much I'll miss it when I move for my next phase of life in a little over a year.
A couple in their 80s invited me over for brunch- more like insisted. Louie, the husband, who makes me desserts and brings them to church just for me, asked if I had anything to do, and when I said I didn't, wouldn't take 'no' for an answer. Louie is an awesome guy who I bonded with as his son has a very similar form of cancer as my mother and he asks me how she's doing every week.
Anyway, East Sunday finds me at a kitchen table with three 80 year olds (the couple and Joan's brother in law)in a house that has been owned by Joan's (the wife part of the couple) family for 80+ years. The door is open and a breeze wafts through the screen door as I drink ginger ale and a glass of ice water. I look out at a backyard that would only belong to older people: bird feeders and squirrel feeders (refilled religiously, as would not be the case with busy, younger people unless they were especially bird obsessed) set up everywhere, perennial bulb plants, ancient desks and things from another life out on the porch with flowers brought from church sitting on top of the desk, blooming right in my view. The walls of her kitchen were covered in pictures and notes, trinkets, crosses, phone numbers, etc.Duplicate products of which she probably had a few (like plastic wrap, etc) but forgot she bought it so had more, were stacked on shelves. I ate real food, made from scratch, in the old, simple, but delicious style, the way that the older generation cooks- with butter and brown sugar- no new special ethnic spices, nothing processed or prepared. Louie had made most of it. I sat there eating real, fresh cut carrots, homemade apple pie, looking out into the back yard, completely at ease. It reminded me of my childhood growing up in my grandparents' house. There is something so magical and real and poetic and perfect about real houses that are lived in, decorated with life rather than perfectly planned decor. Something wonderful that allows your imagination to go wild about places with real yards, where an older way of life persists. I grew up in some combination of the 1930s, 1960s, and 1970s.I did not have a computer or cable TV until 7th or 8th grade and never had video games. I spent my time writing, playing in the backyard. I never had a barbie dream house, I made them out of cardboard boxes, using Tupperware and odds and ends as furniture. I've always cherished my childhood, and I felt like I revisited it, almost as though I had Sunday Brunch with my grandparents- I found myself talking about my real grandparents, which I rarely do as I have little occasion for it.
At the same time however, the situation was saddening. Conversation turned to Joan's sister, who her brother-in-law, Earl, had just visited in the nursing home. All he talked about was her, how she ate, what floor she was on. His eyes were sad, he was quiet, thin and hollow looking- they talked of how worn out he had been taking care of his wife before she went to the nursing home. How long had this been going on? People are old and face medical issues for a long long time- it seems it takes some people 20 or 30 years to die. I couldn't imagine such a thing,taking care of someone who is sick, living that, and for such a long, extended period of time. Except, I almost can imagine it- thinking about my mother and how her medical issues never seem to end- the only thing that keeps me going is that it will go away and get better, one way or the other. But with Louie moving about the house in his tired gait (and yet he's more active and able than my mother who is 20 years younger), Joan talking about watching her sugar intake and all the things they cannot eat, Louie saying "don't ever get old," and the sorrow in Earl's eyes, I wondered, "how many of us leave this world alive?"
Of course, none of us get out of it alive physically, but how often does the physical decay of our bodies and of the loved ones around us get into our being, weary our soul, until spiritually, we are no longer alive? Do we find ourselves hopeless, scrambling around, grumbling at the spouse we've known for 50+ years, only to wake up and find we don't know them anymore?
I am so so frightened of growing old- I've always thought I would die young. And it's not growing old physically as much as it is spiritually, mentally- I'm afraid that somewhere along the line, this world will kill my soul, that I won't leave this world alive. Maybe Jesus then will bring me back to life? But you can't live this life dead, and you can't be effective in your ministry or be the hands and feet of Jesus if your soul is dead.
I think of this fear and what it means to my next phase of life: how do I find a career that won't kill me? A teaching job that won't kill my soul, where I won't feel that all I'm doing is failing students as I have for the past 7 years now? Can I be in a relationship, get married, and trust that it won't suck the life out of me, that I won't suck the life out of someone else? That I can have children and not have everything sucked out of me, that I won't damage them?
Dying is easy (when it actually happens) life (and living while slowly dying) is hard.
I suppose all we can do is pray for the faith and grace to see the beauty in the world, to see and feel God with us so all the slow death doesn't kill us, so we can leave this world Alive.
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