November 2, 2005

Stoned

Our backyard came up out of the ocean around 500 million years ago in what is now called the Ordovician age. The first place these deposits were mapped, analyzed, and labeled is in northern Wales where some ancient folk named the Ordovices once lived. That’s the way geologists usually keep track of things

A few years later, some not-quite-so-ancient, but old-enough-to-know-better folk called the Confederates took advantage of our hill and built a redoubt, “secret place,” from which they could take potshots at the Yankees whenever they had a chance. As it turned out, they didn’t do so well, but the way they stacked the rocks to protect themselves is still noticeable, albeit rearranged from time to time by CP, our resident gardener and builder of more recent redoubts.

The Ordovices and the Confederates along with the Ordovician limestones are all made out of the same atoms and quarks and stuff that we are, but none of us humans are so efficiently composed or last anywhere nearly so long as has our back yard. On the other hand, sacrificing efficiency for mobility, we’ve a lot more freedom to move around wherever we please, depending on the venue, more or less, and, of course, how we use it. Freedom of choice is apparently not all it’s cracked up to be, however, considering how attractive it seems to some rather than to use it just to go out and get stoned, instead.

November 1, 2005

Jazz

The spontaneity of a jazz band is what makes it so exciting. There’s the melody that supplies the rhythm, ie, the pattern the melody follows. There’re the chord changes around which the melody is wrapped. There’s the tempo, the pace, the pulse, that, whenever it is exactly right, is said by musicians to be “in the pocket.”

Coupled with and weaving through all this liturgy are the players and their improvising, in their turn creating new melodies in the instant of their playing. But perhaps most importantly, there’s the mutual appreciation and interdependence for one another’s skills and limits and ideas and interpretations. And then, there’s the listening, not only by the audience, but by the players, themselves.

We churchers would profit so from such listening, listening carefully to all on this All Saints Day. For without this, there is no jazz, there are no saints marching in.

[Visit Episcopal Relief and Development at http://www.er-d.org/ to make a donation to hurricane relief or Episcopal Migration Ministries at emm@episcopalchurch.org to volunteer to assist displaced people with housing.]