HANDS RAISED

I have a confession. I always peek. When I’m instructed to keep my eyes closed, I covertly raise my head just slightly and look expectantly for the hands.

There in the quiet, I imagine the whole room is the muddy depths and we, every one of us, are struggling to reach toward the luminous surface, desperate to catch our breath—

We are all underwater. Some of us, like ducks furiously paddling, are doing our best to give the illusion that everything is just fine. And then there are those who have given over to the sinking, allowing our passions and lifelong dreams to be slowly swept away.

I learned how to float one summer at the community pool nestled under the canopy of Kansas City Cottonwoods and Elms. Buoyed by the water, I would stretch my long arms and legs as far as they would reach and stare up at tiny birds gliding on the wind, feeling kindred to being completely, utterly weightless.

Weightless. When is the last time you felt anything that comes close?

In cases of drowning, victims are instructed to act in complete opposition to instinct, which is to absolutely avoid the fight. It seems we contribute to our own demise when we struggle, arms flailing, shouting, gulping, grasping, striving.

We go through our lives expending much of our energy trying to hold a beach ball underwater. What we repress is never invisible, certainly not to ourselves. The angst of our private near-drownings infiltrates our cells. 

And then there is the gift that comes with stretching out to touch what is misunderstood and feared.

As I write I feel the pressing lightly of thumb and middle finger in the center of my back…”Breathe gently. Stretch and let the water hold you. There. Just like that. Now look up at the sky and imagine being pulled upward. Relax. You’re doing great!”

Those childhood whispers come to me in other voices now. Choir on Sunday morning. Snow falling in the forest. Prayer deep into the night.  Encouragement like tiny drops of chlorinated water, baptisms of joy washing over and through.   

When the struggle ceases there is this sweet surrender of body to water and then the liquid lens of endless sky.

Hands raised on Sunday morning. A peek at the Divine.  

In honor of someone whom I deeply love giving his life to his Creator, Sunday, December 5.