Reflections

The past week has been a blur of making new friendships, and building on existing ones. I feel most blessed and awed by the love and trust that has come so naturally into these relationships. Which makes the next piece bitter sweet. WE ARE GOING TO KINGSTON! We received our visa granting documents today and plan to be on the Sunday evening flight home. I’ve been bubbling over thinking about our return with a fresh outlook and widened perspective.

Happy Birthday to Philip (singing), he is a quarter of a century old, but Alicia (our best friend) decided he might actually be two. So she baked him an amazing cake and put a big number 2 candle on top. She then proceeded to give him an Elmo card, which wished him a happy 2^nd birthday, a little toy car, and a picture book that teaches him about his mouth. I don’t know why she gave him the book; I doubt he’ll be able to read until he is at least 4. I hope she doesn’t expect me to read it to him.

Also this week, I celebrated my 6 week anniversary of arriving in Cayman with a long session of quantum mechanics and mind boggling properties of the physical universe. I figure it was my anniversary; I deserve a little break to focus on the physical plane. Now when people ask what I learned in Cayman, I can say:

I relearned that one cannot simultaneously measure, with definite accuracy, the momentum and the location of say, an electron. The more accurately one property is measured the less accurately the other measurement will be.

I also found that Quantum Wave Function Entanglement is being used by many scientists to draw conclusion about the underlying oneness of our physical reality, and even the harmony of science and religion. When the wave functions of two or more particles become entangled they can travel to opposite ends of the planet and still hold a perfect influence over each other. Their entanglement might cause one to spin up while the other spins down until they simultaneously shift into an alternative spins, perfectly balanced against each other, across untold distance. This can go on forever as far as we know. But the moment one particle is disturbed, without an instants delay, the other, no matter where it is, contradicts the disturbing force to maintain the balance, and the wave function collapses. Now that’s beautiful! (this is not scientific fact, it is just my understanding from what I have looked into so far)

The words of Abdu'l-Baha remind me: “ As a Persian Poet has written: -- ‘The Celestial Universe is so formed that the under world reflects the upper world.’ That is to say whatever exists in heaven is reflected in this phenomenal world.” Hearing this I find even greater beauty in this connecting, unifying, balancing occurrence scientists are calling Entanglement. I will let you decide for yourself what heavenly truth it reflects.

It is really getting late, so I will have to sign off for now. Perhaps next week I will have more to say about what I learned from my time in Cayman. Until then… Make a new friend! They will change your life.

(Mercy, Chris, Philip): Chris has reminded me to learn something new every day. He derives more fun from one game of Frisbee than most people are lucky to have all week. His exuberance for life is should be a mandatory curriculum in every primary school. Thanks Chris!

Across the Distance

Across the Distance: I feel the sun set behind Jamaican Blue Mountains.

We remain in Grand Cayman for the time being. So far our visit has, to date, yielded no less than five whole friends, 7 half friends, and one baby friend. We are very blessed, thank you Roberta, Alicia, Keyda, Tatiana, and Chris! We love you. Nonetheless our stay here draws closer and closer to an unknown departure date shrouded in the veil of bureaucracy. While we will undoubtedly miss these ever loving, accepting and generous friendships, we stand expectant of the promised moment when this veil will be cleft asunder by the coming of the Visa, reborn from the Jamaican Ministry of labor.

Now, with the arrival of sad news, my heart turns to Jamaica and asks God for its protection. Kingston is my post, my assigned measure, my task and my cherished undertaking. Even now, 270 miles away over the turbulent stormy waters of the Caribbean Sea, I find my work continues, but not in body. When turning to Kinston my mind automatically goes to one of two communities. During the three and months we were there, we split most of our time between the concrete paths and front yards of Sandy Park, and the steep mountain side tire-stair-steps and cramped living rooms of Highlight View. Home away from home, away from home. In these neighborhoods we were just starting to feel like regulars.

Every Sunday I’d bus from prayers at the center to market in Papine, where I bought my lunch from the Rasta man. Then I’d sweat the twelve minute shade-less walk to Highlight. The washed out mess-of-a-road into the neighborhood is lined with little shops and cook huts. I’d greet the chatters at the first two shops, the gamblers at the third, barbers at the fourth and smokers at the fifth. Okay, they’re all smokers, but these guys JUST smoke. I’d have lunch with Joan, bless with the church ladies, play with the kids and chat with the parents, all of which would eventually lead to a virtues class for 7-10 yr old at around 4pm. This was the way of things on just about any day of the week in one neighborhood or the other.

We found ourselves being greeted by name, by people we hadn’t yet met. We saw more and more faces we recognized from the hoods in the market, on the street, or at the bus stop. We had begun to integrate our lives into theirs, and theirs into ours. I am not writing this to lament the lost time of the last month and a half in Cayman or even reminisce what awaits us when we return. This all comes to mind because early this week we received an email telling us that a family of seven died in Sandy Park as their home was swept away by rising flood waters. They weren’t in our youth group or attending our prayer gathering, I don’t know their names and have yet to see pictures of the faces, which I may or may not know. But they were part of my life. They were within my assigned measure and part of my cherished undertaking.

Now I extend my heart 270 miles, and prayerfully walk the concrete paths of Sandy Park. I have found great comfort in my prayers. Through them, I hold hands with children on their way to class; I bless with church ladies, and have lunch with Joan. I whisper words of encouragement into the ears of children’s class teachers, and spell service onto open hearts. I live in Cayman, but I pray in Kingston Jamaica, in Boone North Carolina, in Iran, China, St. Lucia, St. Croix, St. Thomas (USVI & JA), Antigua, Martinique, Barbados, Trinidad, Tobago, Guadeloupe, Dominica, Grenada, and the Bahamas. I pray in streets, classrooms, sewing rooms, universities, front yards, sidewalks and coffee shops.

Friendships of the Heart.

Dear World Embracing Spirit,

Thank you!

I believe I met one of your most cherished daughters the other day. She swung her neighbor’s fat baby girl from her hip, with relaxed ease. Those who know her speak of refreshing friendship that has the power to heal hearts. She sells smiles for glances, no matter what expressions accompany them. She deals them all the way to work, like she just overstocked and there’s no time to lose. They all gotta go! On her thirty third birthday she wrote you a love letter full of thankfulness for everything you have given her. On the other side she wrote herself a birthday card, which she signed for all her friends who called from her homeland to bless the day she was born. She is frequently overcome by her exuberant enjoyment of life and laughs herself to her knees, a laughter which far exceeds the bounds of “contagious” and is more properly described as addictive. O Divine Mother, she if surely created in your image.

GRATITUDE!

“On the recollection of so many and great favours and blessings, I now, with a high sense of gratitude, presume to offer up my sincere thanks to the Almighty, the Creator and Preserver.” ~Willian Bartram~

Dear friends, family, and random blog stumblers,

I am writing from the Cayman Islands. Some of you will surely know why by now, but some will not. Philip and I had to leave Jamaica because we are applying for work visas and cannot be in the country while they are processed. This takes 4-6 week, and I have been here 4 weeks today.

CONTENTMENT!

I am filled with gratitude for my rediscovered appreciation of the Will of God. My time here has been a test of a very odd sort. I know, tossing your shirt to the wind, slipping on fins, and kicking your way through crystal blue waters to a thriving reef is rarely, if ever, someone’s definition of a test, but for his servants God is always making exceptions, so why not here. Most simply put, for those who love their work, work is love, and vacation is without. While this is not a vacation, our work has dropped from 6 full days a week, to 3 or 4 weekly task. I have found the repetition of four words very sustaining in this time. “God’s will be done.” I live without a doubt that our being here is the Will of the World Embracing Spirit. That knowledge is all I need, I am content.

“I have left behind me impatience and discontent. I will chafe no more at my lot. I commit myself wholly into thy hands… I know not what fate thou designest for me nor will I inquire to seek to know. The task of the day suffices for me and the future is thine.” ~George Townsend~

FRIENDSHIP!

Photo (Left to Right): Philipe, Alicia, Keyda, Princess, and Tatiana.

I have also found a swell in my heart at the appearance of three new friends. The story goes a little like this: We went with Roberta, our gracious and dedicated host, to a neighborhood where she knew one lady, Alicia, who was a friend of the Baha’is. Alicia greeted us at the road and led the three of us, Roberta, Philipe, and me, to her house. She introduced us to Jenny, one of the ladies she lives with. Alicia and Jenny are both from Honduras so their first language is Spanish, which Roberta speaks quite fluently, but Jenny soon showed us her excellent English skills by carrying on a long conversation with Roberta. I spent the next forty five minutes playing my Ukulele and silently praying for Roberta to have confidence and joy as she spoke with Jenny about faith, God, culture, community, language and family. Even having just met her and only exchanging the few Spanish phrases I know, I was drawn to Alicia’s silent grace and joy. Something about her glowed, a deep happiness I would say.

By the third time I saw Alicia I was beginning to realize she understood and spoke more English than I thought. We had invited her to study a book with us at Roberta’s house called reflections on the life of the spirit (this is the first in a series of books design to empower individuals to look after the spiritual wellbeing of their communities). With very few contacts on the Island and only having become more attracted to Alicia’s radiant smile and warm heart, Philip and I were excited to hear she had a birthday coming up. When we found out she had no plans we insisted on helping her celebrate, she soon accepted.

And that is how I came to pass, that on September 23^rd, the same day my father was born, we made our first friend in Cayman. It started with cheese cake, as many good things do. It grew through Philip’s often ridiculous, but great friendship-making-jokes. And ended, as many good things do, with the words “I love you” eagerly and honestly exchanged between friends.

Keyda, our second friend, is Alicia’s neighbor. She is from Nicaragua but has been living here in Cayman for four and a half years. She has a fat baby girl who we all call Princess; she is our third friend, though she is still warming up to Philipe. They brighten our days with an uncanny radiance. Keyda is a constant source of clever jokes, Spanish lessons, many odd and often funny questions, and every once in a while a moral dilemma. Princess is full of slobbery teething kisses, wet and curiosity fingers, and two toothed laughing smiles. Alicia seems to gives us all a glimpse into the reality of joy; for her it is not a state to be achieve, but rather a quality of her soul. She embodies and emanates joy. She has brought us more laughter than I often feel I could deserve.

“…resemble the life of the angels in heaven -- a life full of joy and spiritual delight, a life of unity and concord, a friendship both mental and physical.”

~ Abdu'l-Baha~

ONENESS JOUREYS.

Your fellow soul, Mercy.