Still moonlighting

I hate to send you somewhere else again, but I finally responded to a request for my spiritual bio. You can check me out here. The woman who pulls these biographies together is pretty neat and I'm happy to contribute. It's interesting to see who else is out there. I love being amidst the same ranks as Arloa Sutter, Julie Clawson and Bruce Reyes-Chow. I had listed the first two as some of my favorite websites even before I knew they had already participated. It is also interesting to to acknowledge that almost all of us are selling something. Maybe not money but everyone seems to self-describe as a writer or speaker of some sort, which means we're trying to get folks to see the world through our eyes. I bet most of us do it because we have been changed in some way and want to offer that opportunity to others but still, we're selling something.

At synagogue yesterday, we were made a little uncomfortable because a man joined a conversation we were having, which was fine at first. Then, he shifted the conversation to the Leadership Institute that he is involved in and even went so far as to hand us brochures for an upcoming conference at the low, low price of $995. I was simply uncomfortable because he had clearly lost all perspective on interactions with other people except as a means to sell his viewpoint (literally) but Jacob was offended that the man would be selling at temple and on Shabbat. When the man followed up with Jacob asking again for his phone number instead of just his email, Jacob explained his feelings directly and I was really proud of him for that.

As an update, I have to tell you that I'm starting to feel some of the magic of marriage. Being home so much with Jacob is allowing us to work out a harmony of movement in our home with the chores. We have also had the opportunities to have some big fights that have gotten a good portion of my insecurities out into the open. Second marriages are hard because it has been difficult to believe that this one is for real. My pastor once said, "Sometimes we push against love to see if it is fragile." I have been pushing a lot and Jacob has been so good about proving that our love is not fragile by wrapping his arms around me and pushing back that way.

Last night, during the 10 minutes of silent meditation at church, I ran through a series of words to focus on for my centering prayer and settled comfortable onto "closeness." I sat with Jacob and felt closeness. I sat with my community and felt closeness. I sat with God reflected in the candles and the music and the icons and my husband and my community and felt closeness.

This is what everyone has been talking about.