THE THREAD | Apples take baths in the rain

At bedtime your four-year-old daughter is whispering. You tuck her in, kiss her small brow, and sit nearby as she drifts off to sleep. And then, out of the hushed dark, a whisper: Daddy, did you know apples take baths in the rain?
 
No, you whisper back, I had no idea.
 
She whispers that one small miracle, then says nothing else. Through a slit between the curtains, a slant of the streetlight’s glow slices across the ceiling. The leaves of the tree outside the window flutter in the wind and cast shadows through the slit. The shadows dance along the beam of light above you, high above all that troubles your mind.
 
She drifts further off, rolls her head to the side. Her cheek rests in the opened palm of her hand. She releases a soft sigh, you exhale a deep low breath hoping to ease her drifting, and the autumn breeze against the windowpane joins the collective hush.
 
You exhale again and look over to see her asleep now. You look above to see the slant of light, the shadows of leaves, how they too drift, how they are swayed by a gentle breeze just beyond your walls. Just beyond your walls the world continues to hum in its movements. The world of streetlights and autumn leaves and gentle breezes, but also the world you layer on top of that world. The world of breaking news.
 
In the newspaper, on the television, the radio, the screens: Something consequential. Something urgent. A decision. A tipping point. Lift of a lever, push of a button, scroll of a feed. News continues to break. The headlines these days, real and imagined, have rattled you, shaken you. What is this breaking?
 
A strong gust of wind thrums and clatters against the window, throws open a neighbor’s gate. The shadows on the ceiling now thrash and riot. What is breaking? Your concentration, yes, of course. Your capacity to carry so much at once. Your comprehension of the whole. The battleground state of your mind. This will of yours, to tether yourself to the miracle and messy work of love—will it also break?
 
No, you whisper back. Let the news break itself for now. There is already enough broken, breaking, in deep need of repair, reprieve, and grieving. Enough work ahead, planting seeds among the rubble. Enough work to keep yourself tethered to love, tethered to this gift of a world that exists beneath the breaking, the world that carries on beyond your walls, with or without your worry, with or without you.
 
Yet here you are, rattled and breathing. Here you are, shadows dancing along the beam of light above you. It could have been otherwise. Here you are, and here is the only world you will know. A world breaking. A world where apples take baths in the rain.
 
You are tired now. You too begin to drift off. You sigh your heart toward that which you know is never spent.
 
And then, out of the hushed dark, a whisper.

 

~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~


"Peace is not the absence of struggle but the presence of love."

-Frederick Buechner


~ ~ ~

 

What I'm reading: Eula Biss' Having and Being Had, Peggy Orenstein's Boys & Sex

What I'm listening to: Gillian Welch's The Lost Songs Vol. 3, Jeff Tweedy's Love is The King, Sturgill Simpson's Cuttin' Grass Vol. 1 (I'm not sure Sturgill translates well to bluegrass; these versions just make me want to listen to Metamodern Sounds instead.)

What I'm cooking again because it's delicious: Linguini with crisp chickpeas and rosemary

What's reminding me to seek hope: This conversation between Tim DeChristopher and Wendell Berry

 

~ ~ ~

Peace and grace,

Andrew
 

~ ~ ~

P.S.  Feel free to pass this letter along to the folks you know. Or you know anyone who might want to receive this weekly email, click here.