When the computer whirs, and its one little flashing eye turns steady yellow, I tap my fingers on the keyboard wrist guard, hoping I’ll remember what I was going to a certain site for when I get there. Then I sigh and lean into my chair. In the background our washing machine chugs along as it has for nearly three decades.
Our small pooch wanders into the room and around my legs, her toenails clicking unsteadily, her eyesight and hearing long faded. In January she’ll be eighteen.
The wall in front of me, never repainted since we moved in last century, shows dark areas near the floor. I could scrub them… For now I focus closer to the ceiling, on photos of our children and some of my collectibles and various other life decorations.
Did you ever stop to wonder about the garden of Eden? I used to picture only jungle, like those illustrations in chunky, childhood picture books, with a lion strolling past Adam at waist-height, and a viney bush positioned strategically in front of Eve.
But last Friday, when I was scrubbing critical sections of the lower bathroom, my mind flashed on an image of land and sky, a broad expanse, stretching farther than the imagination.
All the world in that Garden. Every facet to enjoy, to discover, to craft expressions about and work at understanding. And yet, in the very center, planted and singular, stood the symbol of failure. Of limitation. The grinding toil. The “all the days of your life.” The struggle.
To imagine God meant me to escape that symbol, I’ve come to think, is to scribble childish cartoons, where the Father of everything slaps his forehead, saying, “Dang! Why didn’t I watch those two closer?!”
This was no accident. He didn’t just create serpents as necklaces for Eve.
I’m supposed to see, I’m thinking, the source of my aching, yearning, and churning. The reality.
Fix this. [Think of Morgan Freeman as the voice-over from on high.]
No, sorry, I can’t. Whatever I tell myself upon arising each morning, I’m unable.
Exactly.
Then I’ll never make it, I’ll never scrub it all clean or manage the payments on a shiny, flawless processor. I can’t keep my little dog from dying.
You’re beginning to get it, little creature. Now, try on this fetching skin outfit I’m made for you to wear for protection in the meantime. While you wait for the openness, for the unlimited vista, for the work that brings all loveliness, to return.
a good prayer for our days… thanks.
and those old King James bible pictures were terrifying.
Amazing the insights one gathers when cleaning the bathroom. Some of my most enlightened moments are in there, on my knees, doing a job no one else around here will do.
Good for the soul – like your post here.
Fantastic, Deanna. I put the “sugar shack” website link here. The post I wrote a little while ago somehow makes me think you and I are sometimes living in the same head. Very different words, but a bit of the antiphonal choir here. I love your Morgan Freeman voice. That was perfect.
“I’m supposed to see, I’m thinking, the source of my aching, yearning, and churning. The reality.” Wow.
With you, Deb, on the King James illustrations. Thanks for reading.
Yay, Cherie, for good works in the bathroom. :o)
Beth, I’d love to read the post, but I don’t see the link. I’ll take a look over at the Sugar Shack and see if I can find it. Thanks!
I think I spent too much time in dentist offices back when I was a kid. The Children’s Bible always fascinated me with the Tower of Babel in lurid technicolor and–hey! I remember that picture with Eve strategically covered by the vine. :)
I was amazed when I finally read Genesis:
“The woman saw the tree was… to be desired to make one wise.”
It seems to me that unlike the way I’d always heard it spun, Eve is the HERO of the story!
She is like Buddha or Jesus– seeking to be aware and awake, not trapped in a sleep state by some potentate who wants obedience to the letter of the law, not life abundant through the spirit.
Not sure that’s exactly what you were getting at, but it’s what came to mind…
Good things to think on.