The beginning of the end

What with it being the start of December I am tempted to say: "what happened to the last 6 months?" The first half went crazy slow but since about mid-June it has whizzed by in a blur. Not a particularly nice blur but I suppose if it's hard you want it to hurry out of the way. However, I will do no 'reviewing the year' until the actual end.

I started this post yesterday and filled it up with loads of babble and excuses about things I wasn’t going to say. Then I found a point and decided that, in my new incarnation as Editor, I would cut the crap and deliver.

It started when I put on my ipod – to block out the sound of inane Starbucks babble – and 'All good things come to an end'(link) by Nelly Furtado came on.

This year, with all its horror that I praise God for (sometimes joyfully, sometimes begrudgingly, sometimes blatantly failingly) I still see Good things (and by Good I mean the kind that I can appreciate as good and not just take on faith) that have happened. And lots of those have come, or are coming, to an end. I suppose friendship and community and what my life in Bristol is about are all obvious examples. I’m writing in Starbucks Borders - my city centre living room/office with so much history and familiarity - and it is closing in as little as 2 weeks. One less piece of contact with the world as I knew it. So much ending. I have been in semi-stasis these past couple of months but actually a lot is now properly finishing. For good. Finito. Or at least, I am at last noticing it clearly.

I find myself asking all sorts of question, for example: what is the fate of this blog when I spend most of my new life writing other things; when I have an aspiration to pursue actual “careers”; when I get bored and restless 'cause I have a terrible attention span and can be quite fickle with where I give my heart to? I'm not saying I’m quitting again, just thinking out loud.

But as I started 'Analogise That!' with a post about life from death(link), then very soon saw a whole lot of death - both the negativity of "death" in circumstances and the real deal - I have come to see that endings really are a part of life. But not the end of life, because all the good that comes as a result is real and apparent and full of redemption. Like my ‘Cat of Redemption’(link), who has gone from hiding out on our neighbour's shed roof to being the most affectionate darling creature ever.

[Aside: I learned a new word – ‘Bathos’ – and it means the ‘unintentional lapse in mood from the sublime to the trivial or ridiculous’. It is just me or is this blog sometimes a bit like that? Not that I think it matters. In fact, I kinda think that’s the point…]

I fully don't know what is coming next today, this month, in 2010 and beyond... but I know that for all the things that finish there will be something of life that springs from it; something bigger and better. Which does remind me of this thing Jesus said once:

"I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone. But its death will produce many new kernels—a plentiful harvest of new lives." John 12:24 (NLT)

Plus, if you believe his death leads to our redemption, it is an even greater (nay greatest) example of the idea that every time something dies, something better comes along and the world ends up being better overall; ever-increasing in glory.

‘The good being the enemy of the best’ is a philosophy I hold strongly to. It has to be when I have so many choices available to me. One thing I've learned this year is that I can cope with the Goods dying if the Best is the end result.

So I suppose these changes, this ending and even the despair that 2009 contained can all be chalked up to a plentiful harvest of new life. That's a faith thing. But a true thing as well... says Kat(i)e in her latest incarnation...

The Cat of Redemption

I'm in London for one night only (well, probably two now actually, extended by popular demand) to visit some friends who were passing through, raid the folk's fridge and do my laundry. It's thus far proven successful on the first two accounts already and I only arrived last night.

When I got in about 11pm I saw my cat Tilly standing in the hallway. She is a shy thing, all black and half feral, who had only slightly begun to be sociable just before we got our psychotic dog four years ago. Since then her feral side had come out in full force as she spent all her time in the neighbour's shed, only coming in to eat and skulking round the house on person alert if it was cold outside. Yesterday she stood there for ages and looked at me.

The first thing I though was how lovely it was to see her there, sort of greeting me.

The second thing I thought was how very sad that the reason she was is that my psychotic dog got put down since I was last here (see this link), for (not surprisingly) being psychotic. At the time it was an analogy for things going horribly wrong in the world from the bad choices people make (though I didn't mean Wendy necessarily had a choice... but people do, however small it seems). Since that post I have experienced close at hand a shocking real example of this (see this link if you don't know what I mean but be prepared for sadness). I said no analogy befitted it but, since I really do believe in the premise of my blog that everything points towards something bigger, this tragedy too has proved to be an analogy for many things. One of which is, it turns out, unexpected life.

Sam's death brought new life. We have seen so much of it in the way communities have rallied round, friendships have deepened and God's comforting presence has been known. One woman I've heard of who turned her back on the idea of God many years ago, after the untimely death of her husband, was so impressed by the way that his parents have reacted that she became a Christian and got baptised last weekend. I acknowledge that this story only means something for Christians but it means a heck of a lot for us. No-one can deny the love that has been grown out of this darkness and, from our perspective, eternal life too. Wow.

Now, it sounds really clinical to say it's worth it. That's because it isn't. The effects of death can't be undone just like that, his family are heartbroken and will grieve for the rest of their lives. Their earthly lives. Yet being a both/and world it also is, even if we can't truly mean that in our hearts now, 'cause Sam isn't really dead. Once we get free from the now there will be no more grieving, and when that woman gets to heaven and meets him oh my will it be beautiful.

Anyway. This is a tricky conversation and I defy anyone to really know how to say that, particularly given half (made up statistic) my readers aren't Christians so won't agree at all. Back to the animals...

I am more of a dog person really and had just spent the evening with three delightful ones at Chris and Katherine's. [Actually, a another redemptive story about a dead dog is that his parent's puppy got tragically killed by a car about 6 months ago and when they did get a new one recently she was already named Grace. Isn't that lovely?] Wendy was magic (when she wasn't psychotic) and nothing can or ever will replace her but I love my cats too and we have three in the house, all of whom are experiencing a new lease of life with the death of a canine. Tilly came up to me in the kitchen this morning and was both scared of and desperate for attention... she let me "smooth" (as the Bristolians would say) her a while before she ran away. I can't wait to see how things will yet change.

[EDIT: She is SO different, even to how she was before the dog. I had a proper cuddle with her this morning for a good few minutes :-D]

The cat of redemption has reminded me that out of all things there can be brought forth good - light after the dark, sunshine after the rain, love after heartbreak, "life" after "death"... Life after Death...

I couldn't find a pic of Tilly quick to hand but this is Kitty and the shot is very cool... Analogise That!