This is Jesse just before his health really plummeted about a week ago. What a frightening experience to see your son, your baby, seem to get better, then suddenly tank. I’ve visited sick people in hospitals for decades and I’ve seen it before. I’ve seen so many people rally, giving their family and friends certain hope that things are improving, only to see their health suddenly erode until they finally die. So when Jesse seemed to rally, then rapidly lose all control, I was very, very afraid. I was so afraid that the infection that had possessed his body would run rampant and completely take over. I felt like I was watching some kind of Zombie movie unfold before my eyes. But the doctors filled him with all kinds of antibiotics, anti-virals and anti-fungals, and somehow managed to turn this ship from destruction to gradual health.
Jesse’s feeling stronger. He’s eating and drinking. He has his completely unorthodox sense of humor back. They took him off I.V. today. They’re talking about sending him home tomorrow. They still have no idea what happened. They have theories. They always try to find the simplest explanation. But in Jesse’s case there seemed to be a freaky convergence of incidents that culminated in his whole system going septic. Then, of course, one has to worry about the possibilities of CDif in his bowels because of all the antibiotics destroying even the healthy bacteria that the body needs. He’s taking Acidophilus/bifidus on the recommendation of a health and wholeness practitioner friend in Ottawa. Everything seems to be improving. He’ll be following up with some specialists in the next couple of weeks. He’ll remain on some drugs too for the next while. What a freakin’ nightmare!
I want to thank everyone for your thoughts and expressions of concern. It was an expensive two weeks and some gave us money to help cope with that. Thanks! Some bought me a beer through my blog. Others gave food. Some gave greeting cards, notes, emails and plenty of facebook messages. They meant a great deal to us as we went through this crisis. It meant a lot to Jesse too. So, humbly and gratefully, I say, Thanks! Even though I’ve kept trying to post my daily cartoon and a short writing, they haven’t been the very best. I hope to get right back at it if Jesse comes home tomorrow.
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After years and years of serving communities, keeping the faith, and struggling through everything, the last thing I want to be is bitter, grumpy, sad, narrow-minded and hateful. I want to be happy, hopeful, gracious and loving. I don’t want to be sad so that after my life is over, people will jump to the conclusion that it was because of all my trials, my poor finances, my negative community experiences, my confrontations with other leaders, and my apparent lack of visible success. I don’t want others to conclude that I allowed all these to pull me down. I don’t want them to point to all those things and blame them for my sadness. The fault lies within me if I am not happy. If I can’t find reason to rejoice and be glad in all situations, then it is my fault and no one else’s. True, sometimes my sadness is completely justified and understandable. I am entitled to be sad. But I don’t want to just settle for that. I want my privileges too, my rights! And I have every right to be happy too. Sure, sadness, like a deep current, courses through my life. But the river itself is joy. That’s what I want to live by and be remembered for.
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I’m loving my iPhone. I don’t have the data plan. I only use the internet when there’s WiFi. I’m around my computer enough that I don’t need the data. But even just as a phone, with the amazing interface capability with my computer for calendar, contacts, iPod, etc., it is fantastic. Best phone I’ve ever had. My son chastised me for having no games on it. Perhaps I should.
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Right now I’m feeling like I have nothing valuable to say. I need, once again, to pull back. I am suffering. My wife is suffering because of it, and so is my family. I immediately need to pull back from lots of things to focus on what is most important to me. Right now, if someone offered to buy nakedpastor at a reasonable price, I would probably take it. Stay tuned. We’ll see what happens.
This morning I got up early to paint. I’d already had the coffee pot set to have my coffee ready and waiting for me when I got up at 5:55 am. Pitch black out! But the light from the kitchen revealed huge white flakes of snow falling. My daughter Casile was ecstatic! I took a couple of shots of her going down the driveway to catch her bus. I tried to capture the size and beauty of the flakes.
I have no interest in maintaining an organization. By now in my life (I just turned 50), I have no energy for trying to be something. I’m not interested in our church trying to become something or accomplish something. When I go home, I like to be with my family, sit down together over a meal, talk about the good, the bad and the ugly in our lives, watch a movie maybe or some TV, maybe see some friends, and sleep with my wife. That’s about it.
I’ve been thinking about roles. I don’t ask Jesse to please act like a good son. What the heck does that mean? I let him be who he is, and his particular and vastly interesting style of sonship emerges out of that. High risk high dividends. I don’t ask Casile to be a good daughter. I don’t ask her to act like a girl. I don’t ask my friend to please act straight. And if I should ever, ever tell Lisa that she needs to act like a good wife, “DECEASED” will appear across everything I do. So I don’t expect people to behave like good Christians. It’s an insult to who they already are. I don’t require our community to be presentable as a good church. It’s an insult to what it already is. And I can’t believe how offensive it is to so many.
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These handsome devils are my son, Jesse, on your left, and Murray on your right. Murray turned 19 yesterday. He’s legal drinking age now. We love Murray. He comes from a broken home. He’s at our house a lot. I’ll wake up in the morning and discover Murray sleeping in our spare room. He likes it here. We like him here. We had a huge meal of grilled burgers and my mom’s potato salad, which totally rocks. We had some beers too. Then we lit him a cake and gave him presents: McDonalds’ certificates, shirts, movie money, and a huge bottle of Colt 45… “strong beer”. He laughed and laughed because he likes to drink this once in a while. Then we watched A Mighty Heart. It was a happy evening.
I just don’t know how to “do” church anymore. In fact, I don’t want to do church anymore! I’m done. I’m not done with my friends, the people I am among, the people who call me their pastor. I’m not done with Jesse’s non-church-going friends who call me “pastor dave” as a joke. I’m not done with Casile’s friends who talk with us about their love lives. I’m not done with them. I’m so into them it hurts.
But I’m done with doing church. You don’t do church. If you’re doing church, then you’re not doing church. And I’m not trying to be Zen. This isn’t a koan. It is fact. You can’t do church anymore than you can do family. Can you imagine if I woke up Saturday morning and announced to Lisa and the kids, “Okay, we’re going to do family today!” They’d think I’d finally lost it. They’d groan and complain and hate us for forcing them to play a part in a play they have no interest in. But what if I got up Saturday morning, like we sometimes do, and we started the fresh ground coffee, started grilling the bacon and mixing the blueberry pancakes? What if we set it all on the table and just sat down to eat when it was ready? What if we then decided to go to the mall to spend some of the money they’d made that week on cds and clothes? Then we happened to notice that there was a movie playing at the theater, so we took it in. Then we went back home and everyone dispersed and went their own way to maybe reconnect if we’re lucky just before we go to bed? What if that happened? We weren’t doing family at all. Not even subversively!
Or how about another Saturday where I get up and paint, Lisa gets up and goes for a walk with a friend, the kids sleep in until 2pm, and we might pass each other at supper time, or maybe not. At the end of the day we are what we are. This is what is real.
This is how I see community. We get together and be what we already are without trying or pretending or even planning. Sometimes it is ideal. Sometimes it sucks so hard you die of boredom. I’ve seen this over and over again. I mean, if Lisa and I planned an ideal Saturday like I mentioned above, it just wouldn’t happen, mainly because the kids wouldn’t be the least bit interested in fulfilling our plans for them. If it happens, great! If not, whatever! Maybe another time. Maybe not. But we’re still a family. I just refuse to “do” it.
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This is the girl I married 27 years ago today. What a babe!! Then and now. She was 19. Yes, I married a teenager. I raise my glass to her. She is a phenomenal woman, dark and mysterious and the source of my earthly joys. She is my kiss from heaven. I love you Lisa!
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these are our children, jesse (18), josh (20), casile (14). we are blessed with the presence of these wonderful people in our lives. they are gifts. i used to believe that i wanted them to serve the church in some official capacity… worship leaders, pastors, missionaries. now, i leave that up to them and god. i’m just thankful for them and who they are. lisa and i were all smiles tonight because the 5 of us went out for dinner and a movie (“blood diamond”, a must-see). although they are full-time concerns, it is worth it. peace out.
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David Hayward is a pastor artistically stripping to the essential.
