Notes from the Underself

This festival seems to be about subtext for me. I was raised to politely decline reading the subtext of life. Actually it was sort of beaten out of me by people concerned for the health of my soul and the privacy of their insecurities and evils. This festival Laura Maria Censabella brought my personal subtext right up front for me to get a good hard look at, and I've been acting like a sad drunk ever since. I suppose I should feel bad about this, but the Wholly Spirit has been so present with me in my distress, well, who cares as long as He is willing to stick so close and be so kind.

He had me crying when someone named Calvin requested a song on WCSG about people being so wrapped up in their own dreams they didn't notice other's struggles. I felt so noticed and loved by "Calvin" that it seemed God was there in that. I was a bit late for the prayer service, but I thought it was going until 8:30 so I rushed to get there for the close, only to realize that it was over and the sessions were starting at 8:30 not 9:00. I had officially crossed off Michael Card's session on lament because it was such a commercial fan geek thing to do. But the Spirit said, "you're right here and I want you to go." So, I went. Man.

Grace entered me and blessed my obedience. I began to see the people around me so clearly all of the sudden that I had to capture them quickly like a sketch artist. I hadn't quite outgrown being afraid of them yet, so I scribbled my thoughts down in mirror writing like Da Vinci. Then Who Is Like God's Clown began speaking and the light grew stronger and I felt so recycled and purposed. I wanted to share some of the grace of presence I was experiencing so I pulled out a piece of gray oragami paper I'd brought along for a childish project I'd abandoned thirty seconds after arriving yesterday and scribbled my name forwards and backwards. I thought my secret might fit into the secrets he'd smuggled back to us from Romania and China. I thought he might feel a little of my joy, and I thought that was a good way to say thank you for the lecture. I am too fragile for face to face sometimes, so I slipped it to his assistant. I don't think he got it. The assistant froze with such distate that I felt I'd handed him used toilet paper not my name. I was so ashamed of my childishness. How else is the grace of God to be greeted but with haughty disdain?

I fled and God provided me with Jan, and sent me off to Grace and Fire--another seminar I'd crossed off. Jon Sweeney was going to be talking about leaving fundamentalism and I've had it with fundamentalism. The session was full of surprising gifts, the good design of John Terpstra's book, John Terpstra's subject which will be helpful to me as I work on my novel. Richard Lischer's lovely vintage masculinity, which was refreshingly tinted by all the good parts of classic chauvenism and absent the bad.

I was still too overstimulated to keep going with festival, but when I tried to slog on the seminary maze wouldn't let me out. It had a detour just for me. Last festival I'd been saddened by the seminary chapel's disrepair. It seemed that seminary students would need that chapel the most as they prepared for the fearsome future of pastoral ministry and the tiles were falling and the carpet was torn and it was so forlorn in there. Somehow I wound up there, it is so lovely now,
thankfully, it was also empty. God said, pull up my lap and rest, kid. So I did and had such a refreshing time of prayer. If God didn't feel ashamed of me, then I really shouldn't either. If God still loved me, then I should still love me too.

Lunch was good, they remembered the mustard today. Rye bread seemed particularly appropo. I wanted a place of privacy with people, so I headed to the overpass and parked in the window to watch the world go by. The world obligingly went by until Lara settled in with her turkey wrap for our own personal lunch gathering about motherhood and writing. Motherhood is my solace, so sharing about our children and our attempts to enrich them consoled me. We exchanged cards and I ran off for the official lunch break discussion in which I hoped to discover reasons why this blog is a terrible idea. Dave, however, was not nearly as helpful as I had hoped. He was very encouraging and interesting. So were all my other lunch buddies, even when I got a little weepy--sorry guys.

I ran to Mary Karr's session, breathless to hear from such an amazing poet. She started by answering a bunch of memoir questions--God, what is the deal with all this memoir stuff? She got to poetry eventually. I like her crispy fire. I applauded her when she said she knew she was called to write a book, but that didn't mean the book wasn't meant to fail. Of course, I prefer failure, it's so much easier.

I then misread the schedule and ran off to hear Nikki Grimes, who wasn't speaking right then. Instead I ended up in, you guessed it, another memoir session with Kristen Ohlsen and Patricia Raybon. It was a surprising choice since the official topic was journalism and I am not a journalist, but I'd given up questioning God. I fetched water from my car and sat down. The session was a wake up call to the practicality of the work God keeps insisting that I do. I was gently, but firmly admonished to write a page a day and to pray before I started. I was pushed to quit playing and get real.

I went to the music and poetry experiment and I found it luminously soothing. I just let those beautiful young voices and the newly ancient words seep into me. My thanks to all the poets present and absent who contributed.

There were other things, but this is getting long. I have a festival to soak up. See you tomorrow.