There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; you suffer and get old.
Nothing you can do can stop time’s unfolding.
You never let go of the thread.
~William Stafford

Last week I went to see the Botticelli exhibit at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. To imagine these amazing paintings and sculptures traveling from the Uffizzi Gallery in Florence boggles my mind. How do you even pack such treasures?! It was a stunning and beautiful exhibit and reminded me once again about the enduring nature of humans. The last years have been challenging and, on some days, we have seen some of the ways those of us who walk upright can be less than what we were created to be. Seeing this art, created so long ago, reminded me once again of the long line of ancestors on whose shoulders we stand. Over the hundreds of years since these artworks have been in the world much has happened that is tragic and much has happened that infuses the world with beauty and lifts us up to the greater good. It is the way of life.

Standing in front of a sculpture that dates back 2000 years, I wondered at all that it had been witness to over the years. The faces of the women have been worn away with time…except one…who continues to look down in her dance(?) and the features of her face give us a glimpse into her time. What did the artist hope to communicate in this work? Who were these women? What were their lives like? Being the young country that we are it is so easy to believe we are the pinnacle and forget all that has gone before. I believe we do this at our peril. To be in the presence of something that has held ‘onto the thread’ for so long brought me a sense of comfort and hope. 

I have been privileged to see amazing places and beautiful art that has transcended the upheavals and the triumphs of countries, of generations. To see the actual signature of an artist that became known and appreciated only after their death can give us the courage to make, to do, to speak, to act because we never really know how what we bring into the world will contribute in a way we never imagined. Sometimes we have to explain ourselves at the same time knowing we may not be understood. Yet, ‘we follow the thread.’ 

As we enter this week when we offer gratitude for so much, I will be lifting a quiet voice for the artists that have been vigilant through time. The artists whose work allows me to glimpse a time gone by… who survived the trials of their time. The artists who chose to bring their voice of beauty and truth into the world without knowing if anyone would ever appreciate it. The artists who knew they could do ‘nothing to stop time’s unfolding’ yet held onto the thread until it could be passed to those of us in this millennium, this century, this decade, this day, this moment. For these and for all who continue to create, I offer thanksgiving and make a silent promise to hold onto the thread.

Something I’ve forgotten calls me away
from the picnic table to tall trees
at the far end of the clearing.
I remember lying on grass
being still, studying forks of branches
with their thousands of leaves.
While trees accrued their secret rings
life spread a great canopy
of family, work, ordinary activity.
I mislaid what once moved me…
~Margaret Hass

I know a tree. It sits at the intersection of two roads I travel over and over daily. Sometimes on wheels and sometimes on foot. It is a tree that has lived in this neighborhood for so many more years than I have and has kept watch over the comings and goings of lives past, present and future. Its shade has been comfort to a bus stop on hot, summer days and a cool, housing place for a tire swing for the children who live nearby. 

But in the last couple of years, this tree has been visibly dying. Its leaves no longer sprout in the way it once did. In one of this summertime’s windy days, of which we have seen many, an entire large limb was cut off by the unseen forces and fell to cover a part of the well traveled road. Its secret rings, its great canopy is folding up. And yet, part of this connector of earth and heaven refuses to give up. In the hollow of it a green shoot has begun to show forth its inner life. What a spirit of resilience! Seeing it was a sign of an enduring hope that filled my own spirit. I am so glad I noticed its arrival and how it continues to hold space into what is now unfolding into winter.

…Today I have time to follow
the melody of green wherever it goes,
a tune, maybe hummed
when I was too young
to have the words I wanted
and know how a body returns 
to familiar refrains…

Clearly, this tree has decided it has just a bit more within to return to ‘familiar refrains.’ Reflecting on the last years and all that has happened in our world, like many folks, I find I am reawakening every day to another piece of what was once familiar. And within that awaking there is such joy, such promise for what may still become. I also find that I am aware of those parts of this beautiful Creation that have continued to point we human ones to the life that always beat, the life that stands rooted and points us toward the impetus that lives at the center of our beating heart and at the center of this beating Universe. Life. Life in all its fullness. And its strong desire to pull us into becoming all we are capable of. 

…Now like a child, I sit down, lie back,
look up at the crowns of maple,
needled pine and a big-hearted boxwood.
Fugitive birds dart in and out.
In the least little wind, birch leaves turn
and flash silver like a school of minnows.
Clouds range in the blue sky
above earth’s great geniuses
of shelter and shade.

Each time I pass by this sentinel of wood, I will glance up toward the leaves that want to continue to grow. Like the ‘fugitive birds that dart in and out’, I will allow the wisdom of this tree to be a strong reminder of the possible, the hopeful, the promising. When you are in the presence of ‘earth’s great geniuses’, it seems the proper thing to do.

It arrived just in the nick of time. I had been on the waiting list for months and on a morning when my spirits were teetering on the edge of really, really sad and despair it showed up in my inbox.. Over the last years I have added audiobooks to my reading regime. I know some people don’t think of this as actually ‘reading’ but it works for me. Along with the words my eyes take in of both fiction and nonfiction, I have added words whose impact come to me through the voices of people I cannot see but who read to me just as I was once read to by my mother. These books mostly accompany me on the walks that continue to bring sanity and, hopefully, health to my life. 

The book that arrived was The Day the World Came to Town: 9/11 in Gander, Newfoundland by Jim Defede. Truth be told, I think I had actually read the book before not long after its release. Another reason for audiobooks is that you get to hear what you read before in new ways. This book recounts the stories of so many people who were diverted to this small town, Gander, in a part of the world most of us know nothing about, Newfoundland.  I don’t really know how the author collected the stories but he manages to weave the variety of characters that may have been on any random plane coming from various places across the Atlantic when the Twin Towers and Pentagon were attacked. As air space was shut down, these people, thinking they were on a trip that was perhaps exciting or boring or exhausting, suddenly found themselves on the ground in a place many had never heard of unable to make their way to the destination they had planned. At the beginning they had no idea why they were where they were or what had happened to create the situation. 

What follows are stories of such unbridled hospitality and kindness it simply makes a person weep. As word got out that the people were stranded, the people of Gander mobilized to provide housing, meals, transportation, entertainment, even friendship to complete strangers. People gave freely of their time, their resources and their homes. The newly arrived were invited into people’s houses to shower and do laundry. Since their luggage was still on the planes and they could not access it, folks were given clothes or driven to places to buy new ones. Underwear seemed to be the main concern. Pharmacists rallied to find what prescriptions were needed and made contact with physicians in the States who could confirm medications. Animals…did anyone think about the animals on those planes?…were rescued from the bellies of the planes and cared for, soothed, seen and loved by people who might never meet their owners.

This book, these stories, came at the right moment when my heart was breaking for what is happening in our community and our country. As the political parties throw poison darts at one another it seems many have forgotten what the purpose of politics and government is really for. This system, this body has the work of creating a living space for all people. All. This is difficult and sometimes painful work. But when it works, when it really works, we get a glimpse of what humanity in its best form looks like. That’s what happened for six days in the tiny town of Gander. People reached out and treated complete strangers as they would hope to be treated in the same situation. Someone much greater than me said this and implored us to live our lives doing as the people of this town no one had heard of did.

Many times while my feet were hitting the pavement, earbuds firmly inserted,  and  I was being washed in the beauty of these stories, my eyes filled with tears. The tears were for those who behaved with love and kindness and for the many ways I have witnessed the failings of this over the last weeks.

As I came to the end of the book and heard of how those who came to town went home forever changed, I was struck with the name of where the planes had landed. Newfoundland. New. Found. Land. I wondered if those whose lives had been changed, both the guests and the hosts, still carry at least a glimmer of those days. Do they think of those they met and those they served and wonder why it can’t be more like that more often?

Then I was reminded that the poet Judy Chicago said it much better than I ever could:

And then all that has divided us will merge
And then compassion will be wedded to power
And then softness will come to a world that is harsh and unkind
And then both men and women will be gentle
And then both women and men will be strong
And then no person will be subject to another’s will
And then all will be rich and free and varied
And then the greed of some will give way to the needs of many
And then all will share equally in the Earth’s abundance
And then all will care for the sick and the weak and the old
And then all will nourish the young
And then all will cherish life’s creatures
And then all will live in harmony with each other and the Earth
And then everywhere will be called Eden once again. 

As the days tick away toward this election, may there be just an ounce of what happened in Gander as people cast their votes. Perhaps then we might all be in a New Found Land. 

**This book was the inspiration for the amazing Broadway musical Come From Away.