Category Archives: spiritual growth

My Year in an Eddy

For several years, I’ve felt a prompting to write about eddies.

The exact genesis of this thought is fuzzy. I think it came from watching a movie or documentary that showed an eddy in a river. At the time, it caught my attention. I was going through a period of great spinning-around-and-going-nowhere. The cause and results of water eddies seemed a perfect life metaphor. “I should spend some time writing about this,” I thought.

I began by learning more about eddies online. Eddies are the opposite-flowing and often circular water patterns that occur in bodies of moving water. Think river or ocean. They are formed by an obstruction to the flow of a river or the irregularities of the ocean floor.

I started to write numerous times, but the words were labored. As the time between writing attempts widened, I ultimately forgot about eddies and went on with life.

A year or two later, I went for a walk at a local park. Near the beginning of the path, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a yellow fire hydrant.” Strange,” I thought. “Who notices fire hydrants?” Dismissing the feeling, I continued walking. No matter how far or fast I walked, I couldn’t escape the thought that I should go back to take another look. When I could no longer ignore the urge, I walked back for a closer inspection.

Standing before an ordinary yellow fire hydrant, I tried to suppress the thoughts of how strange I must appear when I noticed the quizzical faces of other walkers. “Pay no attention,” I thought as my eyes quickly scanned the object. It wasn’t long before I noticed raised, metal-forged words:

“EDDY Iowa.”

I did a double-take. And remembered about eddies.

Later that day, I learned that EDDY is a model of fire hydrant dating back to 1875. In the early 1970’s Clow Valve Co, located in Iowa, purchased the business of their manufacturing. It is said that the EDDY model is a top choice for firefighters because of how quickly and easily its valve opens under pressure.

“Opens easily under pressure.” I logged that thought for future reference.

Fast forward several years to today, July 25, 2022. For the past 11 1/2 months, due to a knee replacement infection from four years prior, I’ve been unable to bear weight on my left leg. The infected knee apparatus was removed last August, and an antibiotic-carrying cement spacer was inserted in its place. As the infection slowly resolved, followed by months of waiting for knee revision surgery caused by a huge Covid backlog, the surgery was set for the end of June. With great excitement, that day arrived. But it was not to be. In the pre-op area, less than an hour prior to surgery, I had a significant allergic reaction to the infusion of an antibiotic that I’ve had in the past. The surgery was canceled and rescheduled for the end of July. Another full month of waiting.

Last week, while reflecting on the trials of the past year, the eddy analogy came to mind. I thought about the ways in which the past year had been very much like a metaphorical eddy. Lots of swirling around and feeling as if I was going nowhere.

I pulled from memory the things I had learned from my walk-in-the-park experience about the EDDY valve as well as eddies that form in the water. “Opens easily under pressure,” I remembered. It was the key benefit of an EDDY valve in a fire hydrant. The inability to walk for a long period is a building by how difficult simple tasks had become. Between using a wheelchair or hopping on one leg with a walker or crutches, to say that normal life was disrupted is an understatement.

Last summer, following the initial surgery, I determined to do my best to use this time of difficulty to see the gifts and lessons that could come from it. Well-intentioned as I was, there were many times of tears and deep frustrations at the realities of the inability to walk. There was a pressure of sorts that built and could only be relieved by opening myself to its source. I recalled an excellent book, called “Broken Open,” written by Elizabeth Lesser. In it, she offers tools to help us make the choice we all face in times of challenge: Will we be broken down and defeated, or broken open and transformed?

I read the book nearly ten years ago, after my darling, beloved husband died by suicide. Someone had given me Lesser’s book, which gave me the courage to open to the depths of my grief and dismay. The process of slow transformation began there, and with the expert assistance of a gifted therapist, pressure relief came slowly. Therapy was an EDDY valve of sorts. A safe place to explore my feelings and gently open to allow the pressure within to dissipate, making transformation possible. In the opening to brokenness, I slowly found a path to joy and a new chapter of life. Thank God for the metaphorical EDDY valves that exist for our benefit when we are willing to break ourselves open in the face of tragedy and obstacles.

Turning to the phenomenon of eddies in nature, I recalled what I had learned about their slower, reverse direction in a river when an obstacle like a boulder changes the flow. The inability to walk was my huge life boulder. I recall saying to several people that my life had turned into something that I did not recognize. In that way, it resembled a swirl flowing opposite to anything I had known.

But river eddies don’t end with just the obstacle.

Eddies create the perfect place for kayakers in turbulent waters to rest. In fact, I learned that experienced paddlers look for eddies along the way when their arms tire and they need a break. Despite its many obstacles, this year provided opportunities to rest from my own efforts in favor of the knowledge of God’s presence and the resulting rest and the deepening of my faith and patience.

Eddies also occur in the ocean and are sometimes more than 100 miles in diameter. Eddies and small currents can be viewed from space. They indicate the presence of phytoplankton blooms, caused by the swirling motion that brings nutrients, found only in colder, deeper waters to come to the surface, bringing nourishing elements for sea creatures that live there. In the past year, it was necessary to plumb the depths of my faith and spirituality so that the benefits residing there reached the surface challenges of living a smaller, more limited life.

Significant eddies in the ocean are assigned names like hurricanes. The names follow chronologically along with the alphabet. In this spirit, I’ve decided to name my year-long eddy, “DOROTHY;” a Greek name from Doron (gift) and Theos (God).

Understanding the benefits of eddies has been God’s gift of presence and transformation for me this year, in the challenge of living through an obstacle that seemed insurmountable.

Essential Bits

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It’s happened to all of us. In conversation, someone makes a seemingly unimportant comment that suddenly, for us in that moment, becomes essentially important.

This happened to me recently and I’ve been thinking about it ever since. The comment came at the tail-end of a session in a writer’s workshop that I was so fortunate to have attended in the south of France. One of the participants, a birder, mentioned her deep desire to travel with again her husband to Southeast Asia, in search of Bowerbirds.

“Bowerbirds?” I asked; having never heard of them.

She explained that there are eight types of Bowerbirds in the world; named for the colorful ‘bachelor pad’ nests – bowers — built by the males, to attract their mates. There is one species in particular, she described, that gathers only blue-colored items to add to its bower-weaving of twigs.

I had lived my life quite well, thank you very much, without ever hearing of or seeing a bowerbird before that day. Yet, something in her comment about the bits of blue stirred the edge of my soul, leaving me with a deep yearning to learn more.

Off we went to write for the afternoon. Trying to clear my head, and find inspiration for our writing assignment, I tried to write a few fledgling sentences, But I just couldn’t get my mind off of bowerbirds. Deciding to stop my self-imposed resistance, I soon found myself in my web browser, devouring myriad photos and articles; each tidbit piquing my interest to learn more. I even came across a link to a PBS Nature program entitled, “Bower Bird Blues.” “For God’s sake,” I thought, “does the whole world know about bowerbirds?” An avid nature program consumer, I wondered how I missed this. And I wondered why, suddenly, it seemed so urgently-essential for me to learn more about this species of bird.

In one particular photo, I marveled at the diversity of blue items had been woven into the nest of a male satin bowerbird. A scrap of fabric. A bottle cap. A blue berry. Even a piece of blue shell. Some items from nature. Others, man-made. Again, my soul stirred.

Still feeling unsettled, I decided to go outside to the terrace of the chateau where we were staying. As I gazed at the blue of the sky and of the sea, like camera lens being moved into focus, I slowly began to understand my need to know more about the blue gatherings of the bowerbird.

When I arrived in France for the workshop, all but one of the women was a complete stranger to me. As our week unfolded, the diversity of our group was apparent. We were eight very different women, with different life experiences, living in different cities, with different life styles. Yet, from each person, in the opening of themselves through our writing exercises and conversation, something essential was shared from their heart with mine that I didn’t realize I needed. Until then.

From one came the inspiration and courage to try new experiences. From another, a witness to the transformative power of a deeply immersive experience. Still another, finding humor in unexpected places. And from yet another, the encouragement to dream, after the age of fifty. And so on.

And there is was, in metaphor of blue fabric, bottle cap, berry and shell – a unique gift from each woman, as essential for my well-being as the blue of the sky and sea before me. Such potent reminders of the power of human connection and of the essential necessity of community.

Now, ten days later, and thousands of miles from that idyllic place, like the bowerbird, I find myself remembering eight special women, and gratefully weaving their essential and unique gifts, so generously shared, into the ever-changing bower that is my own life.

The Red Bridge

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In the early days after my husband, Randy, died, I found myself checking a status box on a form, to indicate my marital status. There, for the first time since it happened, I saw the dreaded word: Widow.

My reaction to the word was swift and visceral. It jarred me to my core. I felt the stab of the pointy “W’s” on either end, and the huge expanse of emptiness in its gaping holes in the “d” and the “o” in the middle. Widow? My head was spinning. What?! I am now a widow??

Today, I was going through the journal I’ve been keeping with some of my notes and scribblings that will someday be a book about my loss and journey in grief. At the end of the page with my most recent notes was the word, “Widow,” followed by the word, “Window.” I honestly don’t even remember writing this.

And I saw that all that differentiates these words from each other is the letter “n.”

As I considered this, an image of a red bridge immediately came to mind. Last week, when a dear friend who lives in another city came to visit, we went to a Japanese garden that is near my home. In the many years I’ve lived here, for one reason or another, I have never been there, but have always wanted to see it. The garden did not disappoint; resplendent in its early-spring bloomings; offering a place of beauty and tranquility in the middle of a not-so-safe neighborhood.

As in many Japanese (and Chinese) gardens, there were lovely ponds; two of which with arching red bridges carrying us from one side to the other. The first of the bridges was quite short, but also quite curved — so much so that, on the rainy day of our visit, I held on to its railings as I crossed it, so as not to slip on the steep arch.

The red bridge was shaped as an arch — like the one in the letter, “n.”

Widow. Window. The “n” smack-dab in the middle.

A red bridge in a Japanese garden is called a Guzei and is laden with symbolism. Bridges, in Japanese gardens, represent a crossing from the physical to the spiritual, and offer a way of transformation toward a place of wisdom.

The color red also represents a notion of the sacred, as well as wisdom and transformation.

A red bridge, then, offers a double-dose of these concepts; entwined with the Zen concept of preserving the life force, rejecting attachment to the physical and coming to a place of true discernment. A double-dose of positive growth and spiritual transformation.

In my journey as a widow, I realized, I’ve crossed many metaphorical red bridges; offering a window, an opening, into something far beyond the small borders of the box I checked on that form, indicating my new marital status.

A new identity, yes. And maybe in the process of crossing, I had to hang on for dear life. But in that often-steep and foreboding transformation, what I have ever-so-slowly discovered, is an opening to more of the garden that was, and is, my life. And, there is beauty on the other side.

I marvel at how God moves and works in our lives. It is no coincidence that we crossed that red, “n-shaped” bridge just days before I revisited my journal notes about the word, Widow.

Oh! The kind and gentle way that God safely carries us to the next beautiful vista of our own life when we can, even in pain and uncertainty, trust the process of transformation.

A Daisy a Day, Dear

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There is a sacred place in, of all places, Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin. In a park there, on a memorial bench dedicated to his late wife, an elderly gentleman leaves one daisy every day in honor of her favorite song was:

“I’ll give you a daisy a day, dear

I’ll give you a daisy a day

I’ll love you until

The rivers run still

And the four winds we know blow away.”

With the deep snow and frigid temperatures of this winter, however, his daily practice was made very difficult.

Until one day.

Two strangers who worked for the local Parks Department noticed tracks in the deep snow leading to a bench bearing a plaque with a woman’s name and photo. In each of the holes drilled on the metal bench, there was a single daisy. This was clearly someone’s sacred place. For these employees, shoveling paths through the park is not part of their job in the dead of winter. But they decided to make an exception in this case. So, on their own time, every day, they shoveled a path from the parking lot to that bench so that the man could have easier access to his wife’s memorial bench.

When the man saw the cleared path, he reported that his knees nearly bucked in shock at this act of kindness from strangers.

Today’s Lenten reflection word is PLACE.

Where is your sacred place? And what are the obstacles, physical or spiritual, that make it difficult for you to reach it?

Today, I wonder, how can I identify and remove my own obstacles, to enter a sacred space in myself?

And, even more importantly, like those Parks Department employees, how can I open my self to observe the metaphorical footsteps in the deep snow that clue me in to how I can help someone else reach their own Sacred Place?

Spoiler Alert

Still Unpacking

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I’ve been unpacking for the past four weeks. While my dirty laundry is long-since washed and my suitcase, shoes and toiletries are all put back in their places, I am still in the process of unpacking from my experiences in recent weeks. My soul, heart and mind are so full that I’ve found it difficult to write. But today, like finding a dresser drawer with a bit of room to put away clean laundry, I have found a bit of space in which to finally begin the process of unpacking.

I had the blessing and honor of traveling to Monaco, France and Italy with my sister — an incredible whirlwind of sights, smells, tastes and emotions over twelve jam-packed days. I witnessed firsthand the magnitude of history that is simply not possible in my west-coast US life. I stood in St. Peter’s Square with thousands of pilgrims and experienced a sense of joy, unity and community that transcended any differences in our understanding of God. I smelled and tasted exquisite food and drink — fish, pasta, coffee, wine and gallery-worthy displays of gelato; all created from a true passion for la dolce vita. I stood and sensed the vibration of the millions of souls (and soles) that had walked on the same centuries-old cobblestones that were now under my very own feet. I even went sailing, for goodness sake, on a racing boat on the Mediterranean Sea! My fingers actually touched the rich wood of a door that was hung hundreds of years ago, as well as stone walls and marble columns that were erected over many lifetimes. And oh, the art! Mind-numbing masterpieces in fresco, stone, bronze and oils on floors, walls, stories-high ceilings and even on bridges. All soul-moving, heart-filling and senses-exploding experiences! The question, almost haunting me: How can I really take this all in?

Upon arrival home, I felt transformed, as if something in these experiences fundamentally shifted something deep within myself. All of it just seemed too big, too grand, too much for this mere mortal. Over these weeks, I’ve felt some inexplicable need to do something with all of it. Not doing as in an action, but doing in terms of putting it all away — finding space someplace in my being for it. And, I’ve been stuck for weeks. How can I possibly assimilate these amazing, not-your-average-twenty-first century-Renton-Washington-United States experiences into the pre-trip version of Lisa? Like the shy introvert that I am, it’s been sort of like becoming acquainted, slowly, with a new friend, who, by the way, is now part of myself. She, whose heart had felt a split-second connection with the soul of the artist who painted or sculpted the masterpiece so long ago; who saw it through new eyes, like the groups of present-day school children who gathered into the churches and museums on field trips. It’s like I’ve needed these weeks to get to know her over tea, in long walks and in whispered heart-conversations while huddled under my covers in pre-dawn hours.

Then, it came to me: this process of ‘unpacking’ is much like the process of photosynthesis. The plant takes in the light and does something with it. According to Wikipedia, it’s a process used by plants and other organisms to convert light energy into chemical energy that can be later released ‘to fuel the organisms’ activities.’ The word itself, from the original Greek is φῶς, phōs, “light”, and σύνθεσις, synthesis, “putting together”. A constant process of putting together light. I read that the average rate of energy captured by photosynthesis in our world today is approximately six times larger than the current power consumption of our human civilization! Talk about transformation!

Eureka! That’s IT! In what I now know will be a long-term process, as I open myself like a plant in the garden to that which so moved me in my travels – that light – the energy of this can be assimilated first into myself, and then, miracle of miracles, when released, it can alter the very air around me.

And so, I share this with you in hopes that this putting together of the light that so stirred me, will also stir something in you, for your benefit. Is this not the calling for all of us? Whether our hearts are touched by experiences in Europe, or in our own back yard; in the grand display of the most spectacular of natural wonders, or in the tiny puckers as seen in the knuckles of a newborn baby — as we open ourselves to all of this, whatever this is for each of us, an energy of sorts is created and something actually happens. We, and those around us are transformed.

It is from this new realization that I ask an important question to you, and to myself today: What, in my own life, can I begin to unpack; to synthesize, for the essential benefit of my light-dependent self, and for those around me?

Oh, and while I’m at it, I’d love to share a small sampling of photos from my trip with you! Enjoy and be transformed, as I was.