It's VBS week. It means singing songs with the k-6 crowd and being inspired by them. I would encourage you to volunteer in some way with school aged children. They will surprise you with their enthusiasm, humor and beauty. It's worth it. You will serve them, but really, you'll walk away having been served by them.
It's really the summer time. It's June. A year ago this time I was in Spain with a group of high school kids and grown ups. It was such a great trip. Just last night the gang started dreaming of going again. I would love nothing more.
The mosquitoes are out, the garden needs some serious help, I feel a little jumbly crumbly.
I feel jumbly crumbly because I am all over the place. ALL. OVER. THE. PLACE.
Melodrama, VBS, band practice, Keynote speech writing, retreat song jingle-writing, appointments for boys, festival hopes with unfinished plans. I don't have time to think. I don't have time to write.
In a perfect world I would weed the garden, think about songs, plant things, run, then jump in the pool. But nothing this side of heaven is perfect so I will try and do what I always do- fit the dreaming in the cracks between the work and world and the where we're going next. And that's OK.
It's a good reminder to stop waiting for the moment when the calendar is empty and we can stretch out like cats in the morning sun. Real life is doing the work and holding firm to the idea that we can fit the dreaming in here and there as we can provided we turn off the Netflix (that's me). Hell, I wrote 52 songs in 2014 back when I had a full-time teaching job. I'm pretty sure I can do the work when I get the time.
The reminder is this: the creative stuff is important. Don't put it aside for later. Prove that we, the people, can do great work even when we're pressed for time. We can hang with the big kids by using what we've got when we've got it and freak everyone out. Why? Because we refused to quit when life was doing everything in its power to bring us to our knees.
That's the reminder.