The Impetus to See the Good
In recent days I’ve seen several people writing about the good things they’re still seeing in the world. What an affirming desire indeed. When there are so many forces and faces of destruction in the world, the human desire toward the preservation of life remains. I, too, have starting feeling this nudge, to not forget the AND in the whole of life. A long time favorite quote from comedian Gracie Allen comes back to me: “Never place a period where God has placed a comma.”
Every time I recall this quote, I imagine that the whole of life might be one big comma, just an ongoing and reminding me that what I see in one direction doesn’t ever show me a complete or whole picture. This is a truth beyond logic really—that life can continue to reveal itself and be redeemed and live again, not in some faraway day, but in the today that is right now.
I never really thought, though, of all that might have been part of the woman writing this to her husband, George Burns, in a final love letter shortly before she died, or so the myth of the quote goes.
Allen was born sometime around the turn of the 19th century, either slightly before or after is up for debate. She became a comedienne in the 1920’s alongside George Burns. Their comedy show was very popular, with Burns asking Allen questions, like, “Gracie, what are you doing to help conserve electricity?” And Allen responding, “I shortened the cord on the electric iron!” The ineffectual answers were seen as cute and charming, a typical role for a woman in show-biz. All the while, she must have been brilliant.
Allen grew up during a time when women didn’t have the right to vote, came of age and into her career and marriage throughout the Great Depression and into World War one, lived through World War two, and claimed her place in the world of comedy and movies in a way that women could—by acting ditzy and second in wits to her male counterpart. I find myself imagining all that she must have heard about herself and told to do in that industry.
What must have prompted this woman to write such a thing? With all she saw and must surely have experienced? That she could still lift her eyes to see there were commas, not periods, in this adventure of life?
I admit the winter wrapped a kind of heaviness around me I’ve not experienced in a longtime. It’s been easy to cast my eyes downward, to guard my heart from everything, including joy. In the midst of it all, I’ve been part of a course on deeply reading the Bible, and have spent time in a book therein called Hebrews. For weeks, this line wouldn’t let me go: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”
And then, as if hearing the prod of a voice greater than the sound of the monkey in my mind, Allen’s quote came back to me. I stepped outside, and remembered: I can choose some of the things that get taken away from and seeing beauty doesn’t have to be one of them.
And what is still beautiful? Plenty. To name even one, the daffodils that bloom each year right outside my bathroom window that someone planted before me moving here in 2009. Isn’t that something? Some past human planted future me a gift. Though we will never know one another, that person’s decision affects my every spring with beauty and delight, yellow magic in a time of a still mostly brown and withered looking world.
Days into illness this week, Thursday greeted with me with some energy and I made it outside. I stood feeling the solid earth beneath me. The wind had subsided since I’d last been out and the sky was clear and blue. Though the air was cool, the sun was clearly warmer. And all around me signs of life—buds on my lilac, my roses, and my beloved cherry tree, tiny purple flowers that have no name for me but are like a miniature choir singing out from their sea of green grass, it’s spring, it’s spring! Spring can’t be taken away, I thought. All comma, no period. Every bit of it perfectly real.
And you, friend? What beauty are you noticing? What can’t be taken away from you? Share in the comments if you’d like. Perhaps there’s inspiration for us all.
Tough week here in my world with a sickness that rocked me for a few days. No new yoga this week, but I remembered that I have a YouTube Library of practices. Speaking of joy, I found this little gem of a long-time ago practice with my teens before they were teens. This is a quick one that can be done with or without kids of your own and could be modified with a Sun Salutation using a chair. Hope you enjoy these two past cuties! Yoga for After School (or Work) with Ava and Michael
I love the idea of “some past human left future me a gift“. 💕💕💕