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Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Cafe

Having grown up in northern Oklahoma, known for the Cherokee Strip Land Run September 16, 1893, and home to the Pioneer Woman statue located in Ponca City, I had a rather romantic notion about pioneering.  Pioneers were rugged, resourceful, adventurous people.  I thought I would have loved to have been a pioneer.  Eventually I came to realize that they endured some unimaginable hardships that I wouldn’t have wanted to experience. 

I could easily get sidetracked here both because of the history of the Oklahoma land runs on the territory given to the Cherokee and other tribes removed from their homelands  (Trail of Tears come to mind?) and because of the back story of the Pioneer Woman statue.  But that is not the point of this blog.

In the fourth grade we had a shelf of books in our room to include a number of biographies.  I read the one about Jane Addams, the first “social worker,” first called “friendly visitors.”  I decided immediately that is what I wanted to do.  Mostly I single-mindedly pursued that goal.  Twenty-five post graduate years later, working as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, I felt a tug in another direction. The direction was quite indistinct.  My inclination was to find a mentor, which I did.  The mentor urged me to take Clinical Pastoral Education, which I did.  I then had an opportunity to do a three year lay ministry course.  One thing kept leading to another and I eventually was ordained and accepted a call to a church in Montana. (I must have some pioneer spirit!)

During those years as a pastor, my duties, though varied, provided a solid structure to my life.  And then I retired.  Any routine is elusive.  Many people thrive on the freedom of retirement.  I certainly aspired to it.  But I find myself feeling like a pioneer trying to negotiate the landscape of my life.  I thought I had the perfect plan:  spend a large portion of time with our grandchildren several states away; join the choir at church; do occasional supply pastoring.  But I find my life choppy, not coherent, certainly not with the ever-evolving path that I experienced on the road to ministry.  And I have encountered obstacles I hadn’t anticipated that make the journey more challenging. 

The site VeryWellMind addresses this. “Retirement brings a new sense of freedom, but it also comes with challenges and difficult emotions. It’s a change in identity, finances, relationships, and how you spend your time—no wonder it can be difficult to adjust.

“You’ve likely thought a lot about how you’ll enjoy your golden years. But there’s a good chance you never thought much about the psychological effect retirement might have on you. Retirement often means a loss of identity. Whether you identified as a banker, cook, or teacher, retirement can cause you to question who you are now that you’re no longer working.”

That same article suggests “experimenting” with your life,  which, curiously, is a technique we used as therapists.  “Experimenting” gives one room to explore without feeling so much anxiety about the results.  Afterall, it’s an experiment! 

Ralph Waldo Emerson would applaud this.  He said “All life is an experiment.  The more experiments  you make the better!”

To those who may also be feeling like “pioneers” trying to master a new stage or circumstance, I encourage you to join me in “experimenting!”

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

Didn’t get it together this week! See you next time. Blessings to you! Kate

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Cafe

In a moment of despair, fearing that the recent fall I took might have done some real damage to my back. I turned to a sure-fire remedy:  poetry.  Actually, I went to my email to search for a favorite site “inward/outward.” There I found a post on healing which included a link to another site where I discovered a beautiful poem by the talented Jan Richardson:

The Healing That Comes A Blessing

I know how long

you have been waiting

for your story to take

a different turn,

how far

you have gone in search

of what will mend you

and make you whole.

I bear no remedy,

no cure,

no miracle

for the easing

of your pain

But I know

the medicine

that lives in a story

that has been

broken open.

I know

the healing that comes

in ceasing

to hide ourselves away

with fingers clutched

around the fragments

we think are

none but ours.

See how they fit together,

these shards

we have been carrying—

how in their meeting

they make a way

we could not

find alone. 

The post I had first read that led me to the poem also had a comforting thought that I have held onto:

“…there is no assurance of physical healing, only the awareness that I am held in a great web of love.  No matter what happens to my body, my spirit can be whole and at peace.”

So many times I have experienced that “great web of love.” I am reminded I continue to be surrounded by that web and can be whole and at peace, regardless of my personal state. For that I am most grateful. If you are in great pain or dire circumstances, do listen to your body, pay attention to that web of love which holds so much comfort, support and guidance. 

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Cafe

While visiting our grandchildren in Maryland, just at the 6 month post-surgery milestone and was doing very well, our 6 y.o., in a burst of exuberance, ran towards me to hug me just as I came inside after a walk.  I wasn’t expecting it, wasn’t prepared, wasn’t “planted.”  Down I went!  I expect it will be at least a month to recover lost ground.

How have I responded?  I have grieved.  I was so happy with my improvement.  I have struggled with acceptance that I don’t bounce back as quickly as I did when I was younger.  I honor my grief and my struggle.  Yet setbacks come in many ways in the course of a lifetime.  We give ourselves a great gift when we are able to move on from the grief and struggle to a path forward, to the actions and attitudes that support recovery.

In setbacks we have a clear choice: to despair or to accept the challenge to overcome the setback.  I think of all the things I have survived, from my earliest recovery from rheumatic fever to the experience Terry and I had when we were defrauded by our longtime business manager.  I won’t be defeated by this setback!  Consider this:

“Giving up on a goal is like slashing your other three tires because you got a flat.” — Setback Quotes.QuotesGram

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

As I seek to make my way through the present state of affairs here and abroad, I periodically have to do a “reset.”  Today I found some things I thought worth sharing for others who might need a reminder that we can seek light. We even have opportunities to be light to others.

From Albert Camus, this timeless classic:

Or consider this thought:

Sometimes even my own thoughts serve to remind me to “reset.”

12 October 2018 ·

I am amazed sometimes at how in the midst of upheaval and the anxiety that can accompany it, that a sense of peace can envelop me. I am always sustained even when my awareness is clouded.

As evening begins to wrap its arms around my corner of the world, I hear the murmur of birds and crickets and tree frogs. I surrender to the moment.

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Café

Mulling over what I might say about our present conflict-ridden atmosphere, I came across the term “conflict prone.”

The term “conflict prone” refers to a situation or individual that is likely to lead to conflict or disputes. It describes characteristics that may result in unrest or disorder. For example, areas described as conflict-prone may experience frequent clashes or tensions. 

(Ludwig AI)

When I was seven or eight, my mother, always a soft heart for “strays,” arranged to pick up a little girl for church every Sunday.  Every time as we got closer to their home, my stomach would begin to clinch.  It never failed that her family was on the porch hurling insults and obscenities at each other.  Given that in my home during my entire growing up I heard my father say “damn” once. I only ever heard my mother, extremely frustrated, on three occasions exclaim “hell’s bells!” I had never experienced such vile language and certainly didn’t expect family members to be so hateful to one another.

As a therapist I often encountered such families, where conflict was the order of the day. “High-conflict personalities are fundamentally adversarial personalities,” reported Bill Eddy. LCSW, JD, in a November 6, 2017 article in “Psychology Today.”   “They don’t see their part in their own problems and instead are preoccupied with blaming others—possibly you….They all have the basic HCP pattern of: 1) targets of blame, 2) a lot of all-or-nothing thinking, 3) unmanaged emotions, and 4) extreme behaviors.”

What I observed in my practice was that these personalities generally grew up in households where this style of “communication” was most often how people “related.”  Sometimes it was a more recent development in response to some change the family was not navigating well.  In any case, this argumentative stance typically served to maintain a distance that kept people from having to develop relationship skills about which they felt less competent or less inclined to learn or practice. 

Surprisingly, when I simply typed in “conflict” the first thing that came up was an article I myself had written in 2007 to my conflict-ridden church.  “Conflict is the beauty and the curse of diversity,” was my opening line, a quote from one of the members present at the meeting where the church sought to find a way forward.  They had identified ways to become healthier, to include covenanting among themselves that:

 6.We will behave respectfully towards one another.

  7.We will build bridges to one another.

Some of the ways # 6 and # 7 could be operationalized  would be to:

• Tell the truth. (Each of us have our own truth, our own perspective.

 We can honor each other’s truth).

• Honor transparency.( Be upfront. No hidden agendas, no “code”

 is spoken that disguises information).

• Practice open and civil communication.  (Communicate respect in

voice tone and body language). 

That church did eventually become healthier but it took a very long time, leadership, a united will and motivation  May all those factors come into play to develop a desire for a healthier nation, surely buried somewhere within us, to be revived.

   The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Café

Lately I feel like I am “dumpster diving” for scraps of hope in the trash bin full of the shreds of our democracy.  Or perhaps I am more like a beggar by the side of the road with my crudely written cardboard sign: “A kind word. A kind gesture.  Anything to keep me going…..God bless.”

And yet, even just today, a friend relayed an exchange she had heard on tv where the interviewee was asked how she was coping.  She said she spent 85% of her time doing normal things, taking care of daily responsibilities, spending time with friends; the other 15% she took actions to address the problems confronting us at this time.  This effort towards balance resonated with me.  Then today on Facebook I saw where another friend is spearheading an effort to gather food for the Crow tribe’s food bank which lost its federal funding due to Doge cuts.  To know of these endeavors is balm to my weary spirit.

The writings of those who seek to uplift, to challenge us to continue to work for the common good, to remind us of all the good of which we are capable also bolster me.    Last June I listened to an On Being  podcast by Krista Tippett in conversation with Ocean Vuong.  Some of the thoughts that especially caught my attention:  “We have to create conditions for hope….bring more vivid, intentional language into our atmosphere…pay attention to the words you use to engage…building a vocabulary that makes it more likely for what is more life-giving and redemptive.”

A master of that type of vocabulary was John O’Donohue, about whom I have written before.  In another On Being podcast in which Tippett interviewed O’Donohue, he referred to Pascal’s phrase that one “should always keep something beautiful in your mind,” adding that he had often “like in times when it’s been really difficult for me, if you can keep some kind of little contour that you can glimpse sideways at, now and then, you can endure great bleakness.”  (from a podcast February 28,2008)

In this time of ‘great bleakness,’ may we also experience hope for and vision beyond the present circumstances. I have only just now come across the book “Hope In the Dark. ” I have not read it but am intrigued by the description: “This book encourages us to look away from the brightly lit stage and the tragedy being acted on it, and to see into the shadows, to an alternate understanding of how power plays out.  It is an incitement to activism, a manifesto for realizing how we can achieve change—it is filled with hope.”

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Café

Returning from a family vacation when my daughter was five, a vacation she had particularly enjoyed, I heard her singing to herself in the back seat: “I love my mother and she loves me and she knows I’m good. And I love my daddy and I love God and I love everybody.  And I especially love my mother.” I’m not sure what garnered me that much affirmation but I’ve kept that memory tucked away for the times she “didn’t especially” love me!  But I digress.

My point is that we have those moments when we just have a magnanimous sense of love that spreads a wide net around us.  But I think of the saying “I love humanity.  It’s people I can’t stand.”  Sometimes our “love for all” is a rather thin veneer over bias/judgement/distrust/even hate.  Many churches post some version of “All are welcome” and some even live up to it.  But many times even church folk discover how difficult it can be to live that out.  I recall some years ago the story of a pastor who disguised himself outside the church as a homeless person before the Sunday morning service.  One person after another passed him by without acknowledgement or an offer to help or to invite him in.  This is not a judgement on those who ignored him.  It is a call to us to recognize our own instincts to recoil. 

Once when I was acting as sabbatical pastor at my home church, a clearly homeless person showed up, installed himself on one of the pews, pulled off a trench coat to cover himself with it as he stretched out on the bench.  Because we had once had a psychotic person who totally “unraveled” during a service, I asked two members to sit nearby should our visitor need some help.  Yet this fellow seemed to be taking the opportunity to rest, not engaging in the service: that is, until the end of the service when he asked to share something.  I took a big gulp and said “Yes, of course.”  He then began to sing a hymn in a beautiful melodious voice.  It was not a hymn with which I was familiar but it was heartwarming.  Everyone applauded this startling performance. 

While that is a memory I cherish, I recognize that it might have evolved very differently had he been aggressive or threatening or in some way disruptive.  In such an uncertain and tumultuous time, it is easy to develop suspicion and distrust.  While I don’t advocate throwing caution to the wind, I do encourage us all to keep a check on our thoughts, our feelings, our behaviors that a poisonous atmosphere does not invade our spirits. 

From Brainy Quotes: “The greatest and noblest pleasure which we have in this world is to discover new truths, and the next is to shake off old prejudices.” And from Goodreads: “Viewpoints differing form our own are a blessing to tear open the canvas of ignorance covering our lives.”

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate

Mercy Now

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Café

As we drove to North Carolina to visit friends this week, a song came on the radio by an artist we recognized.  I have been meditating on her words since then.  Thank you, Mary Gautier, for penning these words, recorded 20 years ago but every bit as timely today.  Select verses from the song “’Mercy Now.”

“My Church and my Country could use a little mercy now

As they sink into a poisoned pit

That’s going to take forever to climb out

They carry the weight of the faithful

Who follow ‘em down

I love my Church and my Country and they could use some mercy now.

“Every living thing could use a little mercy now

Only the hand of grace can end the race

Towards another mushroom cloud

People in power, well

They’ll do anything to keep their crown

I love life, and life could use a little mercy now.

“Yes, we all could use a little mercy now

I know we don’t deserve it

But we need it anyhow

We hang in the balance

Dangle ‘tween hell and hallowed ground

Every single one of us could use some mercy

now

Every single one of us could use some mercy

now

Every single one of us could use some mercy

now.”

I consider “What else might be said?’  But once again borrowing on another’s words, those of Cris Jami,  I share this:

“Always seek justice, but love only mercy.  To love justice and hate mercy is but a doorway to more injustice.” Amen.

The invitation is open to share two cups of tea anytime at Hope’s Café or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we bearers of hope, the “wait staff” at Hope’s Café, for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate