Finding Beautiful: A Whimsy Watch
Today I'm joining the gang over at Five Minute Friday to write on the topic of Beautiful.***I recently read an article about embracing whimsy in Darling Magazine (which is fabulous, btdubs). So I went on a whimsy walk, a whimsy watch. Sometimes I spend so much time missing my friends and family and “home,” that I forget this place, this country, Guatemala, is so beautiful, magical, delightful.On my whimsy walk I see all things beautiful. All things magnificent.-Flowers sprouting out of tiled rooftops--thin stems bursting into star-shaped clusters.-A girl in a Cinderella gown, glittering tiara, white silk gloves up to her elbows, a white feather wand framing her face and up-done hair on a photo shoot around town. She’s posing by the fountain, in front of the arch. And then, peaking below the lace of her dress, ordinary flip-flops on an ordinary 15-year-old girl’s dusty feet.-Faded tiles on out-cropping windows, trapped behind wrought iron bars. Faded beauty behind the barrier.-A pug puppy, black snouted and snuggled into the armpit of a young girl-A toddler with a full, black bowl cut chasing and tumbling after bubbles blown by his giggling mother.-A baby being pushed in a red car stroller.
-A chocolate lab splashing after a yellow ball in the fountain. Shakes off as a water flies from his Hershey fur.-Clouds swirling the top of the volcano like whipped cream on a sundae.-A flash of bow tie as a man drives by in a red Jetta and I dodge a disheveled drunk clambering towards me on the sidewalk.-Two boys, 8 or so, competing to hand me a restaurant flyer. "You cheated, you ran!" complained the one. "You never said I couldn't," says the other, smugly. I fold the flyer into my pocket, smiling as I go.-Paint peeling off old buildings in a splatter paint pattern.-A crowd watching a clown juggle sticks aflame.-A pouting girl tucked into a doorway, exasperated parents try to coax her and her protruding lip to keep walking.This place is magical. The ice cream, the sliced fruits. The two seasons in one—clear skies in morning, rainstorms at night. It's beautiful.Not just because it's foreign. The mix of people. The diversity of families--not just the tourist families with white, chunky ankles above their Teva sandals or the slim European girls in the wildly patterned leggings. But even among the Guatemalans. The indigenous families in their traje. The mom showcasing a variety of colorful scarves on her forearm. Tiny girls with skirts cinched around their miniscule waists. Dads in slacks with slick hair. Then the capitalinos--the families that came from the city to spend the day walking in the park. Trendy skinny jeans, pointy leather shoes for men and perilous high heels for women, faux hawks and chunky necklaces. The barefoot gringos with dreadlocks and braided bracelets.Magic all around. Beauty all around. Whimsy all around.
It’s beautiful to sit in the park and smirk to myself as the middle aged American woman stutters broken Spanish to the middle aged Guatemalan tour guide who's always sitting on the same bench in the park, khaki tour guide vest, always talking to a different middle aged foreign woman about the weather, the city, the people. Indiscriminately commenting that "your Spanish is so good." And she replies with a beam of pride and downcast eyes and slight shake of the head and the Spanish equivalent of "No, I know only little.”I know only little, too, but it’s dazzlingly beautiful.***
This post is part of Lisa Jo Baker’s Five Minute Friday prompt, Beautiful. Every Friday, we turn off our inner critics and perfectionists and just write for five minutes straight. Zero editing. Just a stream of conscious free for all. And then we all link up and encourage each other. To learn more about Five Minute Friday and how you can participate click here.
T.S. Tuesday: Be Here
"Time present and time pastAre both perhaps present in time futureAnd time future contained in time past.If all time is eternally presentAll time is unredeemable.What might have been is an abstractionRemaining a perpetual possibilityOnly in a world of speculation.What might have been and what has beenPoint to one end, which is always present."--Burnt Norton, Four Quartets, T.S. Eliot
Birds called in the distance as I panted my way up the hill, hiking one foot in front of the other to my favorite spot in Antigua, El Cerro de La Cruz. It's my favorite because there are trees and the hill curves upward and it reminds me of the foothills of Northern California where I grew up, where I first learned to pray in the hushed quiet of a forest blanketed with pine needles and smelling of Christmas. A soft haze hung over the city and my lungs burned and my legs burned and my rear end will not be happy with me tomorrow (although hopefully the stair steps will yield some perky results in the long run.) And I can't explain why, but it even looked like a better day.A day when God would speak. A day when light would pour in to the lonely places and the sad places and the hum drum and homesick places.A good friend of mine was just telling me that she misses doing things with people--active things like walking or dancing or making food. It's one of the deepest ways she connects and she feels she doesn't get enough of it.And it got me to thinking about how I connect. Not just with people, but with God. And it made me miss the salt and the spray and the startling beauty of the cliffs where I used to run in San Diego. Where I would pound and pant and start to pray again after a very long time of silence.
Somehow God always seemed to show up there, at the edge of the cliff, on the edge of the world, in my quiet morning workouts before the work day. He was in the lapping waves and vertical cliffs and smell of sulfur. He was in my lungs as I ran. He met me when I stopped.
I know I connect with God in nature, in movement, but I haven't really done it here. Not in this town where the streets are ankle-twisting cobblestone and people say it's not safe to run alone. Where the cat calls abound and I know women who've had their butts slapped and their dignity degraded on an afternoon jog.
But I'm sick of staying inside. I'm sick of treadmills and spraying down work out machines.But more than that, I miss hearing God speak.So today I ran up to the cross. Lungs burning and legs burning and heart wide awake.And you know what? God spoke. I've been wrestling with the temptation to focus on the AFTER, to stew in my discontent. Lately I've let myself get bogged down in missing my friends and my life in San Diego. In missing my church and holding hands across the aisle to pray at the end of the service. In missing my routine and my car and the relationships that give my life such fullness, grace, and color.I wrote it on Friday and it's a daily surrender: Be here. Be present. Don't miss this life here.And as the birds called to one another and the haze began to lift and my labored breathing began to slow, I looked out at the city I have chosen to call home for now, and He whispered,"Be here--because I am here."And today didn't just look like a better day. It was a better day.
Carpet Diem and the Upside Down Kingdom
Shew. For the last week my life has been turned upside down. You see Holy Week, or Semana Santa, is a pretty big deal here in La Antigua, Guatemala—and for all of Latin America for that matter.Life turned upside down. Hundreds of thousands of people poured into the city to take part in the veneration, adoration, and celebration.Cars choked out black exhaust as they lined up in the narrow streets that resembled more of a parking lot than any kind of thoroughfare. For days, my attic bedroom shook with the rumble of every passing truck, car, and moto. The sidewalks were bloated with people, with families, with little girls in tiny woven skirts, and with the faithful donning purple, black, or white cloaks as they marched in the many processions commemorating the passion of Christ.It was a bit like living in Disneyland for an entire week: the crowds, the lines, the noise, the street vendors calling out assorted fried and fattening foods.
Since the beginning of Lent, there were processions in every town and village and aldea. And not only every town had a procession, but every church in every town had at least a couple of processions. Sometimes, especially when I was trying to find my bus route amidst the chaos, it felt like there was literally a procession on Every. Single Street. To my foreign, non-Catholic eye, it seemed over the top—what more could they possibly be celebrating?How much incense is just enough for the prayers of the faithful to reach the ears of God in heaven without burning his nostrils too?Stores and banks closed from midday-Wednesday on. Families stayed up all night Thursday night to watch processions and participate in making alfombras. Alfombras (or carpets) are beautiful works of art that cover the streets or floors of churches before a procession passes by. They can be made out of flowers or colored sawdust or chalk, and are absolutely stunning to see. The time and care and creativity that goes into each alfombra is truly remarkable, especially considering that they’re literally trampled in minutes when the procession marches over. (My friend and housemate wrote a beautiful post on these works of art here.)
I started the week with a great admiration for these faithful street artists and procession participants, but as the streets filled to bursting and my introverted self cursed my broken noise-canceling headphones, I found myself falling out of the Lenten spirit. I found myself caving to annoyance and silently praying that everyone would just go home already. I didn’t like having my life turned upside down.But as I think about it now (granted from my quiet, crowd-free bedroom), I start to wonder if maybe that’s the point. This turned-upside-down-ness. This break from the status quo.If we're really celebrating how Jesus is God-with-us and how everything has changed with his life and death and resurrection, then maybe a life-stopping celebration is a little more appropriate than pastel eggs and tales of an Easter bunny with jelly bean treats.Maybe we’re meant to be turned upside down. The Kingdom of God is an upside down kingdom, after all. A place where celebration trumps personal space. Where the sick are healed, the captives set free, and the blind can see.And the best part is, this kingdom is here, now. In the Gospels we can see “a new set of signposts, Jesus-shaped signposts, indicating what is to come: a whole new creation, starting with Jesus himself as the seed that is sown in the earth and then rises to become the beginning of that new world.” (Simply Jesus, N.T. Wright)And we are called to be a part of this new world. To be kingdom-bringers, signposts of hope, sowers of healing and pillars of peace in this new upside world where Jesus is alive.And that is a life-stopping celebration I can get behind.Happy Easter, everyone! 
