Anne Lamott

You can probably guess how I feel today, exhausted, in despair, and like hiding from it all. But my Good Dog Lady Bird and I are about to go hiking, and nature will heal us, sustain and renew us--for at least an hour. I'll take it! Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote, "The world is charged with the grandeur of God," and the divine electrical field of love and beauty will all but leave my mouth hanging open in awe. I've said before that if birdsong were the only pooof that there is another, deeper, wider reality, it would be proof enough for me.

Then I'll go hang out with some sober women, many of whom have had decades of sobriety and slow jerky-jerky resurrection; some of whom will only have a few weeks. All of them know exactly what the end of the world feels like, and maybe feel it in different form, but for every one of us, the end of the world was where new life began. Hitting bottom was the beginning of everything beautiful and true and full of integrity in our lives. We'll stick together, get each other lovely cups of tea or bad coffee, eat our body weight in cookies, and get through another hour in gratitude. Someone will be sure to remind us that we thought we were hotshots when we first got sober, but we helped each work our way up to servants. And that is the path of joy.

Then I'll go see the oldest woman in my galaxy, who is 93, and beginning to show it. I will sit with her and share the Grace of not not spouting platitudes or bumper sticker thoughts. I'll just listen. I'll tell her how much I love her. No one can make her laugh like I do. Ram Dass said that ultimately, we are all just walking each other home, and this is what she and and I do together. In two Sundays, she will become the newest member of St. Andrew Presbyterian Church in Marin City. I will go crazy with happiness that day. You can come too!

Then I'll pick up two short crazy banshees from school, and my house will become monkey island. For three hours, I will be under constant threat of severe Lego injury. We'll over-eat, because God came by earlier and told me that this was Her will for me: "Strengthen me with raisin cakes, comfort me with apples. And M&M's."

Then my son and the man I love will arrive, and I'll bet you hundreds of thousands of dollars that there will be delicious, nourishing food tonight. Wow. That is just not true for much of the world, so before they get here, I am going to send money to Oxfam, and Tyranny Watch*, and Doctors Without Borders, designated for poor Americans. On my honor. This is the Drive Through ATM way to feel hope again, because you are providing it.

Molly Ivins said that freedom fighters don't always win, but they're always right. I'm going to write that on the mirror. It is written on my sad old heart. We don't know what the future holds--we really, really don't. During the Vietnam War, Zhou Enlai was asked what he thought about about the French Revolution, and after inhaling on his Gauloise said, "Too Soon to Tell." We think we know what the future holds, but we are a tense and irritable people. However, we DO know who holds the future. So buckle up, practice radical self care, serve the poor, and rest up for what awaits us. We are up to this moment.

-Anne Lamott
*I meant Human Rights Watch, not Tyranny Watch, on this Facebook post.