I can’t help but think that yesterday’s classic Calvin and Hobbes is a nod to a new year. A new year the way that Calvin would handle it, at least.
A few things stand out as the year 2020 begins for me. The New Testament reading for yesterday, which I read just before midnight, is a great passage from James 5:
7 Be patient, therefore, brothers,until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. 8 You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.
Patience and heart-establishment. It’s a precursor to John’s call to “patiently endure” in the book of Revelation, I think. It has to do with a kind of strengthening, which is good for things beyond a simple turn of the year.
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The last few years have seen me attempt to maneuver what feels like a more complicated life-work reality. And while I’ve survived the experience, I’m not sure I’ve done as well with it as I could. And, at least as I write this, the complications aren’t over yet. In fact, the first two weeks of the new semester will be crazy for me.
I have a handful of words that I hope to use to frame some of how I work through these things this year (mostly this semester, I hope). A couple of them I’ll save for later. But for now, these two are at play: rooting and pruning. Rooting in a sense that echoes James’ command to have established hearts. A good kind of resilience comes from a good kind of rooting. And in a constant-quake culture like ours, well-rooted hearts can be key to survival. Pruning in the sense that this is a good year to simplify some things. Clean out some space, rethink some directions, attempt to discern what can grow next and what needs to be adjusted for that kind of growth to occur.
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This site will be a little more discursive than usual, I think. I’d hoped to get back into the habit of writing here regularly over the last month, but it just hasn’t happened. So it’s a hopeful habit for 2020. It’ll still be bits of everything: comics, TV and movie clips, music, book and article reflections, all hopefully a bit more consistent than in 2019.
Space Enough, and Time 