I am trying to write in peace. I am not succeeding.
Although Lucy is theoretically napping, in actuality she is upstairs in her crib yelling “Ay-yi-yi” at the top of her lungs. As best I can tell, she is re-enacting a rather dramatic scene from our household this weekend, when a chipmunk somehow got trapped in our living room. Steve chased it out by stalking it from one end of the room to the other, making loud noises behind it, and Lucy and I got a front row seat as it finally dashed out the open front door. Clearly, the whole scene made an impression.
Lucy is perfectly content in her imaginary re-creation. She would stay in the crib for hours, probably; she might even eventually fall asleep. I am free to write, or drink tea, or trim forsythia branches, or whatever I want to do. I am free. But I am not at peace. My concentration is as scattered now as that poor, imaginary chipmunk.
There is something about the silence of the house that is needed for creation, restoration, re-creation. I have never been able to understand the logic behind it, it is real. My mind drinks in that quiet. I thirst without it.
I think of a visit to the monastery with my clergy group last spring, when at my first meal I found myself next to one of the monks who was explaining how much the community was nurtured by their guests. I laughed, because all I had done on that visit–as on most previous visits–was sleep. Occasionally I’d eat, but mostly it was holy naps galore. The monk just nodded and smiled when I told him that. Evidently, it’s common.
In the house with a child who is not sleeping, I understand his claim of nuture a little better. Being around those who rest gives rest, too. One quiet creates a space for another. We offer that peace to one another, sometimes with intention but more often by chance.
I feel as if I should have greater thoughts in Holy Week, but all that occurs to me now is this: it was a week when people stayed awake, when eyes got propped open for too long, when rest could not come until after the worst. Those poor disciples in the garden; no wonder Jesus woke them up. Everything was being scattered. No peace on offer; no peace to be had.
