Leaving the Flint Hills

When we left the Flint Hills on Saturday, it was getting ready to thunderstorm - big time! As we packed and scurried to hightail it out in the big, red truck, glimpses of my five days drifted in and out of my mind.

I had an amazingly intense week in my Sociodrama class and met some incredible people. It was a huge extra plus that I had time to practice Aikido with old friends and meet some of the new dojo members. I biked to class and I biked to Aikido in the City Park - too fun! Biking all over Manhattan was like old home week as I zoomed here and there taking all the old short cuts and alleys like it was in my DNA. Then it got HOT! Geez-louise - it was wicked hot and killer-sticky humid...sweat, sweat, sweat. Drip.

I biked most days with my backpack chocked full of my computer and lots of books. Biking back to Stacy and Jon's up the College Heights hill (sometimes several times a day) became an exercise in sheer physical endurance and peddling through the burn in my legs. Yeow. I loved it - you know, pushing the limits of training, doing it for the sake of just doing it and being able to say that you did it is especially fun when people think you're a little nuts - which I readily admit and am proud to claim. I biked during break times in the afternoon because I was so super sick of sitting in the old-school wooden classroom chairs with their groovy little paisley-shaped tops. Some of us were amused at the ancient graffiti determinedly or absentmindedly inscribed on the tops and the petrified globs of gum stuck under the chairs - ick.

I gave up trying to keep track of where I would ride each day and that became a good thing. I had been making a map of my biking every day of my independent study. If I scribbled on a map of my Manhattan biking for you, it would look all criss-crossy and scribble-scrabbled. That's how it was when I lived in Manhattan as the bike-Campus-Pastor traversing all over town. I never thought about keeping track of where I went, I just did it. It was a different time and a different place. While it was glorious to return and ride, I know that I need to go home.

I'd like to think that when I return to Saint Cloud, that I'll keep up my biking-revival. It's almost 7 miles from my house to my church. I could ride there and I have but not consistently. Perhaps my bike-buddies and you readers will chime in with encouragement to ride. That would be lovely. But much change is needed in so many ways...ways that are difficult to articulate and that have just been forming in this complex, intriguing and wacky mind of mine.

There is so much need in the world for art, creativity, beauty and delight. Simultaneously there is so much resistance to such art in a world obsessed with expediency, efficiency, logic, rationality and workaholism. This obsession spills over in the realm of the church. While church folks love music and the like, there is resistance to actually doing and participating in making art. Art has the power to heal heart, mind and body. I believe this is so because art and creativity have as their grounding source, their essence in the Creator of the universe who has created us and all that exists. Art is spiritual at its core. Art nourishes and sustains our souls. Thus, art - in all of its multitudinous facets - is essential for faith and our life as the Church.

I like the guiding principles from the Heart of the Beast Theatre in Minneapolis. Heart of the Beast Theatre centers its art in puppetry. About themselves, they say, "Puppetry’s power lies in the act of transformation - of bringing something inanimate to life. This act in itself speaks to our lives, which rise and fall and rise again."

GUIDING PRINCIPLES From Heart of the beast Theatre:

1. We believe in the transformative power of art to heal and grow individuals, communities, societies, and the world.
2. We provide a positive, creative learning environment to encourage confidence, self-esteem, and “finding your voice” through puppetry arts.
3. We listen to our youth community, respond to their needs, and involve them as decision-makers and leaders.
4. We practice, preach, and provide art that is accessible and inclusive of people of all incomes, ages, races, orientations, abilities, and cultures.
5. We honor the deep cultural, spiritual, and ritual roots of puppetry that provide youth with reflections of deep community values, personal meaning and individual identity.
6. We excel at providing opportunities for people to create and expand community through the act of making puppet theatre.
7. We empower youth to take leadership in telling their innately valuable stories through puppetry and masks.
8. We believe youth are capable of professional standards of excellence in puppet theatre and strive to create high quality processes and productions with youth.
9. We create opportunities for youth to present their creative work and educate the community about their perspectives.
10. We recognize the folk-arts apprenticeship tradition of learning that puppetry stems from, and honor the commitment to train new generations in the craft of puppetry.
11. We facilitate the creation of meaningful peer community to reduce isolation of youth from each other and their communities.

I left the Flint Hills of my beloved Manhattan, Kansas with a renewed hope and enthusiasm for engaging and inviting others into the joy of a creative life in the Church. I've been doing art in the Church since I was a wee tiny little girl. Art resides in my heart and soul and I love inviting others into this life of mystery, joy, contemplation and wonder. As I watched the lightning bolts flash across the northern sky, I was in awe. The wind buffeted the big, red truck as we crossed the Tuttle Creek Lake Dam. The reservoir was roiling and the waves rolled up in about 3-4 foot swells. It was the lake upon which I had spent over twelve years of my life sailing summer after summer. We took our kids, the LCM and Aikido students, colleagues, friends and Sea Scouts sailing on the Sun Dolphin. But, more about the sensational Sun Dolphin in another post.

I was wistful peering out my window and a bit misty-eyed as I left a place that gave me solace and freedom, one that cradled my children and nurtured all of our spirits. It was fun to be - and will always be in my heart - a K-State Wildcat.

I sometimes wonder myself how feasible it is to commit one's life of creative purpose and living a life immersed in art in the midst of our hyper-drive culture. I wonder a lot about life and the world. I wonder about my place in it and where God needs me the most. I trust and pray that all will be well and that the gifts of my life will be received in grace.

Blessed be and may grace abound!