All Choked Up

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It’s a good thing I’m not allergic to dust. As I’ve been cleaning my basement, gags and chest coughs have punctuated the effort.

After weeks of upstairs ripping, pounding and hammering on the floors, dust and sawdust downstairs has settled on every item, including miles of pipes and electrical lines running between basement ceiling rafters.

But my rag bag and I are gradually making our way through the debris, cleaning but also gathering piles of give-away, throw-away, put-away. I’ve been impressed by the pervasiveness of fine dust, which doesn’t limit itself to top-coating but works its way inside boxes and bags, too, necessitating a more sophisticated level of cleaning than I had hoped to do.

After three days of dust-removal, my thoughts have wandered through the many Bible stories in which dust played a part, beginning of course with God’s forming of the very first human being. That momentous occasion was dust’s finest hour. Shortly after that God told the serpent he’d have to crawl around in the dust on a permanent basis. With all the dust-crawling I’ve done, I can relate.

For the most part, dust has been a negative. Think about when Moses was up on Mt. Sinai having a miraculous encounter with God. His impatient followers were down below worshipping their newly-created golden idol. When Moses saw that, he taught them a powerful lesson by grinding the gold into dust, scattering it on their drinking water and forcing them to drink it. Impressive.

Another time God turned acres of dust into lice as a plague against his enemies, which must have been effective.

Scripture also uses a dust-picture to help us understand the smallness of the universe compared to his greatness.

We also find scriptural people sitting in dust or throwing it on their heads while mourning over sin.

And we’re all familiar with God’s description of what happens to our bodies after we die: they “return to dust.”

As I worked in the basement with dust-bunnies and cobwebs laced through my hair and clothes, I thought of my favorite dusty Bible story. The narrative says Jesus was busy debunking the shallow wisdom of the Pharisees as they stood ready, rocks-in-hand, to stone a prostitute. Jesus did something mysterious and wonderful. He squatted down and wrote a message in the dust.

What was it? Maybe a note to the woman: “Get ready for a big surprise.” Maybe a message to his watching Father: “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Maybe a simple, “Love covers sin.” Some day I hope to find out.

In the mean time, dealing with the dust in our lives can grow into a full time job as we clean up…

…both the sinful parts and the basements.

“Remember your Creator now… before the silver cord of life snaps and the golden bowl is broken. For then the dust will return to the earth, and the spirit will return to God who gave it.” (Ecclesiastes 12:6,7)

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Basement Blessings

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When I was 22 and single, I shared a small Chicago apartment with 3 roommates. Marti, Marsha, ClarLyn and I lived together in two bedrooms with one bathroom in perfect harmony.

I didn’t know any of them when I moved in but had heard they were three incredible young women looking for a fourth. Teaching school in Chicago’s Austin area, I was eager to be independent, so I moved in with them.

Our tidy apartment on the near north side had several unique features, one of which was a flight of down-steps immediately inside the front door. Another was iron bars on the ceiling-level windows. But we got a healthy break on the rent because it was a “garden apartment.” (Think basement.)

None of us minded living below ground level, because our basement was full of blessing. Relationships were good, laughter was plentiful and adventures were numerous. Looking back on those days, I can’t think of one negative.

Today I found myself back in a basement of blessing, the little basement beneath my cottage. It has needed my attention for 7 months, and on a 98 degree day, this cleaning chore I’ve put off indefinitely became coolly-attractive.

Although I anticipated bringing order to chaos, I didn’t anticipate uncovering blessings in the process: I found a big bag of groceries (non-perishable), cassette recordings of our preschool children, and the fiction book that convinced me to be a writer (in 7th grade).

“Raw” basements like mine have taken a bad rap. The dark, cave-like atmosphere most people dislike turned out to be a blessing to me today, a comfortable escape hatch from the heat. It was the perfect combination of staying cool while still getting something done.

How many other disguised blessings have I missed by avoiding the basements of life? These would be the low places no one wants to go, places that are emotionally cold and dark: hospital wards, funeral homes, poverty-stricken neighborhoods, homeless shelters, courtrooms, soup kitchens.

The highschoolers from our church just returned from a trip into these places, courageously participating in one uncomfortable situation after another. Stretching themselves to the limit, they made an effort not just to help those they found in life’s low places but to learn what it’s like to be there in the first place.

The report they brought back to the congregation was less about what they’d done for others than what others had done for them. In short, they came home carrying unexpected blessings found in life’s basement places. They also discovered that Jesus had beat them to these places and was busy unearthing blessings well before they arrived.

All of them learned it’s good to go to the basement.

My cottage basement blessings are small by comparison to those the high school kids found last week. But even tonight I’ll be enjoying still one more: a cool, dark night on a basement futon.

“Better to be lowly in spirit along with the oppressed than to share plunder with the proud.” (Proverbs 16:19)

Beaching it

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Today the mercury reached for the 100 degree mark on my kitchen thermometer as it did in much of the country. Without AC, my two best options were the basement or the beach. No contest.

Floating in the cool water looking back at the sand dune, I thought about Nate’s last beach visit. In the summer of 2009, just before we learned of his cancer but well into his back pain, Mary and I wondered if we should leave him to go to the beach that day. He was settled in his favorite chair at the cottage, his back resting on an ice pack, with his two favorites next to him: the newspaper and a mug of coffee. “Go ahead,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”

It was a coolish summer day, so Mary and I settled into our low beach chairs away from the water line at the base of the dune. Thirty minutes later, we were surprised to see Nate struggling down the sand, coffee and newspaper in hand. I was delighted and jumped up to get him a chair.

“You came!” I said, knowing the 10 minute uphill hike to the beach must have taken a toll.

He didn’t last long, but I admired the way he wanted to participate, despite substantial pain. Surely the cancer was secretly doing its damage by then, and his misery must have been extreme. Did he sense that day’s beach trip might be his last?

When life gets raw and options narrow, most of us cling to life’s ordinary things. If we suspect death might be coming, we adhere to our regular routine as if that might hold it back. A perfect example was the morning after Nate heard the words “terminal, pancreatic, stage 4, metastasized.” He got up and went to work…. as usual.

If we had even a blurry picture of what awaits us after cancer “wins”, we’d rush to our death beds. It may be psychologically healthy to hold onto our earthly lives, but heavenly-speaking, it’s absurd.

As Nate neared the end, he had one foot in each world. He held onto the commonplace, newspapers (unread), coffee (undrunk) but finally settled into his hospital bed like a beach-lover fits into a comfy beach chair. Peace enveloped him as he gradually curtailed his involvement with the ordinary and committed to the extraordinary.

Today as I looked at that little dune, I found the memory of Nate’s last visit to be sweet and felt deep satisfaction in knowing he’d been moved from the comfort of earth’s regular routine to the glories of eternity.

And it happened as smoothly as slipping into a cool lake on a hot summer day.

“Those who walk uprightly enter into peace; they find rest as they lie in death.” (Isaiah 57:2)