wings, crooks, straw

These are the draft texts for the three stories I'm going to tell tonight at the First Baptist Church of Berwyn Christmas Eve Service. So, if you're coming, don't read them.

Merry Christmas, internet.

wings

tone: regal, bold, ancient, majestic. Stand tall, move gracefully.

I've been an angel since the dawn of time, but I don't pretend to understand the mind of God.

Look: being an angel is pretty simple: you adore the throne of God, and you deliver messages for God.

I was good at it, I guess, as good as you can be at something that's just in your nature. Are you good at breathing? Then, I guess I'm good at delivering messages for God.

Most of the time the messages were pretty straight-forward; You, So and so, daughter of such and such. Go to this appointed place and do this appointed thing.

Other times, it was giving someone a message to pass on from God. Tell Pharoah to let my people go, that sort of thing. Big things and little things, scary things and hopeful things. Since the dawn of time, as I said, I've been delivering messages from God.

Things were always straight-forward: people were people, God was God, and I was an angel. You could tell I wasn't one of the people, because I had wings. You've seen them in paintings, but mortal paintings don't do angel wings justice. They are pure reflections of the glory of God. You can tell when you're seeing an angel, because of those wings.

Then came that night. That terrible, holy night. For the first time, since the dawn of time, I didn't know what to do when I got the message. It didn't make sense. It's not like I always know why God wants so and so to go do such and such, but this!

God was becoming incarnate. God was going to have a body. God was going to be a human being, a person.

I would have argued with God, but such is not in my nature.

And there was more- the people I was supposed to tell about it! Sure, God talks to all kinds of people, and I've delivered some messages to all kinds of people, but this! The most momentous event since the dawn of time, and I wasn't supposed to tell the rulers- the kings, the emperor. I wasn't supposed to tell the priests in the temple, and I wasn't even supposed to tell that many people. Just some homeless shepherds, out in the fields.

But I went. Because I am an angel of the Lord, and I've been delivering messages from God since the dawn of time.

Look. I should mention this other thing.

I like being an angel, I do. But it's often kind of lonely work. You're delivering messages to people, you see, you know, once. And you're adoring the throne. And there are other angels, but you don't ever see them, really- it only takes one of you to deliver a message, after all.

So the first thing that night, was what I was proclaiming.

And the second thing, that night, was who I was proclaiming it to.

And the third thing, that night, was that after I gave my message, I looked and saw another angel, there in the sky, and another and another until the sky was full.

...

So... After that night, after that child, things have been different.

I don't know about the wings thing, anymore. Used to be there were clear differences: God and human beings, angels with wings and people without them.

But now...

On that night, heaven and earth kissed one another. And they haven't stopped embracing since.

And now, whenever I see people: all people, any people: I see them all with wings.

Crooks

tone: almost broken, tired, world-weary, unflinchingly tough. Shrug a lot.

I suppose I shouldn't have been suprised. It's been happening this way for hundreds of years. When I was a kid, things were okay for us. I was the only daughter. We had a little farm. But the Romans said my parents owed too much in taxes, and they sold the farm to a big landowner. Whether they actually owed the money or not, what could we do?

So, with no land there was no money, and with no money there was no dowry, and with no dowry, I didn't have a lot of options. I'm grateful for how it worked out, I guess. The shepherd job I got, for that same big landowner, is much better than what some women in my situation have had to do.

But it's not a great job. The pay is lousy, just enough to scrape by, and you're deeper in debt every year. The conditions are bad, too: sleeping out every night. It gets cold, even this time of year. You can never really sleep when you're looking after sheep- you never know when one will get attacked or injured or sick. And there are other dangers, for a woman shepherd, in the wilderness. It got to the point where I was a little bit cold all the time, and tired all the time, too.

The other shepherds were alright, some of them, but they didn't really think women should be shepherds so they were allies at best. When I was a kid I would have laughed at what shepherds thought: dirty, poor, foul-smelling shepherds. But now, here I am.

And this is all to say nothing of the sheep. Dirty, stupid, mean. Just as soon bite you as look at you, these sheep anyway. So, I was surviving, but...

And then that night. I don't know whether it was more miraculous that God became a human being or that God wanted to tell me about it. Me and my shepherd friends. Angels came. To us. To us!

So we went, to see the child. What else could we do?

When I went to see the child, I didn't feel tired. I didn't feel outcast, I didn't feel poor, I didn't feel foul-smelling.

Instead I felt faithful. I felt joyful. I felt triumphant.

And it's how I feel now. (shrug.)

Straw

tone: nervous, anxious. Excited, a little bit. Until the end. Wring your hands and scratch, awkwardly. Talk kind of fast.

I guess the funny thing is that I was feeling like everything was coming together for me. I was starting off in my father's business, and like, I finally had some money coming in, and my family set me up with this girl, that everybody said would be, would be a good wife.

But then, the girl- Mary- she got pregnant, and it wasn't my baby, I knew that much, and people were saying all kinds of things about what I should do, but I decided that I should just you know, break things off quietly, not make a big deal about it, not get her into trouble. I was just trying to do the right thing, you know? And she had enough problems without me adding to it.

So that's what I was going to do, and I was all set to do it...

when...

I had this dream or this vision or I don't even really know what it was, but after that it seemed like I should stay with her, like I should still marry her.

But then, right away, she left for three months to visit her relative, and I don't blame her, but it was just hard to be on my own in all of that, and people in the village were talking about her, and us, and they were talking about me. And I was worried that it would hurt my business, hurt my family, and everything...

So when she came back, and then things looked like they were going to get easier, then of course the romans decide they haven't been keeping us under control efficiently enough, so there's this whole census thing and I have to go back to where my family is, and of course Mary is just so pregnant, and I don't have to tell you it was a difficult trip for her.

And through it all she was just remarkably calm, you know, even when we got to Bethlehem and I couldn't find anybody who knew where I was, and nobody would let us stay in their inn because I think they were waiting for somebody with more money because it was crowded there from the census and anything. And pretty soon we were desperate just to find a place out of the noise and cold and awful of the streets. Nobody wants to sleep on the street, and definitely nobody wants to give birth on the street and Mary was pretty sure it was her time.

And the way she looked at me, when we walked into the stable, as it was becoming apparent that it was this stable or the streets, and the way she looked at me, the way we looked at each other. It was like, “well, here we are, and we sure as hell didn't plan it to happen this way, but this is what's happening, so hey, here we are.”

Because there were animals everywhere, and it was out of the wind, sure, but it wasn't all that warm, and it was a stable, you know, which is to say it was filthy, and there was straw on the ground that was matted with dirt and muck, and that was going to be our bed, that was where she was going to give birth. Not a bed, or even a mat, but just dirty, smelly straw!

And all through that night, while she was in birth pain I was just worrying. I mean, I was trying to help, but there was only so much I could do, and so there was a lot of time just to worry.

And I worried about my business.

And I worried about my family.

And I worried about Mary.

And I worried about the Romans and their census and their taxes and their soldiers.

And I worried about this child, this baby, I worried about whose it was, whether what the people said about it was true, whether what I dreamed about it was true, and I just worried, all night long.

But.

After the baby came, there was a moment. There was a moment that seemed like it was going to be brief, but truth be told, it has continued. When I saw the baby, when I held the child still covered in blood from the birth.

I knew that things were going to be different. That all of the things that I had been worried about- my job and my family and the Romans and who the father was. All of that didn't matter. This child, this baby scattered all of those worries to the wind. He scattered them like straw.

Apocalyptic Love Song Stop-Motion Animation

Lisa made a killer (ha ha) stop-motion animation of the love song that Corrigan and I wrote.

dispatches from the bad-ass side of the family

My sister started a blog. Lately, she's been talking about her trip to Greece for climbing. If you want to see pictures of her halfway up a cliff looking totally badass, and/or read a story about cute kittens, see below:

http://katemcginnis.blogspot.com/

yes we can: my forehead is in the new york times

The New York Times published a photo of an action I attended last night in Chicago. You can see my eyes and my forehead. The hotel management in Chicago is trying to cut health insurance for many of their workers, and the workers are fighting. Some of us from the seminary went downtown to get in on that. The article (and photo) are here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/25/us/25boston.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=chicago%20hotel%20workers&st=cse

anniversary powerm

so, i definitely counted wrong when i wrote this. but what's a month between friends? or maybe it's just almost a month late, i don't know.

three months feels appropriate.

like the rule of threes the law of threes, the one that echoes so resoundingly in jokes, in legends, in mediocre sermons.

the city clicks and whirs like a great machine starting up. the pieces of my life shuffle and blur a little bit at the edges, but maybe it's just the coffee they have downtown, downtown where I can see the ley lines, which is to say the el lines, start to come together in the city of chicago.

the lay lines which are the el lines, the great veins of mystical elven power which are the great waves of people power, political power, “power for social movements,” a force more powerful.

and here we are in the midst of it. you are starting seminary, and i am starting whatever this thing is that comes after seminary. things shuffle and grow.

you married trickster energy, and so did i. adam kotsko messaged me on gchat:

did you know

he said

did you know that your new chosen name can be read as “weasel-like.”

“Yes.”

I gchatted back to him.

that was entirely on purpose.

and i sent him a link to the wikipedia article on the least weasel, and gchatted back to him:

“as wise as weasels, as innocent as least weasels” etc.

so, the city whirs and clicks, kind of like my camera when you first turn it on, and you should hold the button down halfway before you take the picture

so that things can come into focus

and you should turn off the flash.

And you're written everywhere I go in this city, as the Holy Spirit inscribes her name way down low in the edges of planters, in the edges of dying rhododendron leaves, in the edges and sides of towering skyscrapers, towering libraries, towering academies and seminaries, that take the script like paper drinks up ink when you leave the pen on the paper, until it is a great dark well.

and when i turn my head right, catch the light on the harold washington library

on the rockefeller chapel

on the trump tower and the business school and lowly old demolishable haymarket

i can read the script

it's three months we've been married, and three months i've been in chicago, and things are starting to whir and click, or I'm hearing them whir and click a little more clearly. loudly. brilliantly.

and every step i've taken in this city has been holding your hand. the places i walk, the great lines of bus and train, you've been sitting next to me, or your absence which is also your presence has been sitting next to me.

in some ways, when i go to the public library, to my favorite spot on the literature and language floor, by the microfiche machine that i've only seen used the once, where they have the outlet, where i can teka teka teka and the only people who smile at me are also working on their own projects, their work projects, their school of drama projects their filling the homeless hours projects their grinding the mental illness gears projects- in some ways, when i go to this place, and others like it, i am by myself.

and in other ways, there you are next to me, reading jerry spinelli or psalms or that ruth duck book you haven't read yet or anne.

because you're on every page, and you're in every sermon, and you're in every book i read. even the crappy superhero comics that i'm not sure why i read, and maybe there especially.

am i forcing this into a love poem when it's just more of an ecstasy, a prophesy?

(because, just so you know, i've been reading this dnd book about the eberron campaign setting, and they've got this draconic prophesy, you know, and sometimes the words of the prophesy are inscribed on human beings and elves, and sometimes they're foretold in the movements of fabric or the stars, but sometimes they're written “in no human hand,” in actual ancient script, in tiny or giant letters on rocks and bushes and cliffs, and boy howdy shazam motherfucker is that a cool idea, and also one that is true.)

but this is true about you, whether this is a love poem or not.

but you're on every page of my constructive-ordination-novel, and when will tanzman came to my room last night and we were talking about hope, and i started to give the book tour to someone else, and will tanzman asked if i knew any hopeful novels, i flailed at the bookshelf for some time, and i gave him stargirl, and secret life of bees, but i wasn't really happy with it until i remembered, and my eyes got wide, and i said, “o will,” and i went to my closet and pulled down my butterfly-clipped folio of my novel, with notes in blue ink, and every page has you on it, and that is true about you.

so i could start calling you hope, and that would be true.

and i believe in buying a gallon of paint, and you help me trust that. i believe in planting jeremiah's field, and you help me dig there. make the furrows from wounds into fertile places, in all that complexity and problematicness and aw and awe.

so i could start calling you ruach, and that would be true.

and that tattoo, which i drew on your back: yes, it's important that the mustard tree is a home for all the birds of the air, but it's also important that it's a home. for. me.

and so that's an appropriate thing for you to have on your belly. because i could start calling you home, and that would be true.

i don't know what our ven diagram looks like, but the fact that we have half (or a third or whatever) the same name now, that's alright. that's all right. which is what i say at the end of men's group when i don't want to say 'amen.' i hold hands with my siblings, and look around at each one of them. and things whir and click like holy batteries, like holly batteries, like visions and bus cards and the kind of dancin that looks like lying on the floor. and i say:

“alright?”

alright.

honeymoon photos

Hey,

I just posted a bunch of photos from our honeymoon. It was a pretty great trip. Included in the photos are: a week at the Glasco family cabin (most of the photos), visiting the Arbogasts, falling water, and the Fayette County Fair. Not included in the photos are Wii bowling against my grandmother, an awesome exhibit at the Contemporary Art Museum in Chicago (free on Tuesdays!), Oberlin, the new Harry Potter movie (so many weasleys!) and Poseidon!: An Upside-Down Musical.

David

ps- For some reason, I had trouble posting more than four at a time.

Honeymoon Photos 4