Skip to main content

The focal point

   

       Thomas Moran, a fantastic painter and my favorite, has a running theme in his art: a single focal point of light. In most of his paintings, there is a scene of crashing waves, either on themselves or a rocky crag of sorts. The waves are always dark and foreboding, and present a sense of inevitable or impending death.
       But, where the horizon meets the ocean there is always a focal point of light. I heard it once said that a good painter always puts their darkest colour next to the brightest to accentuate both. The light lends credence to the dark and vice versa. So Moran does in his art. He blends perfectly the harsh blacks, grays, and blues with the bright whites, yellows, and oranges. And he creates beauty.
       So it is in life. This week, today, two people left this earth. It seems that when we slowly gain back our ground from the few moments before that shifted our paradigm, we experience the shattering again. A week or so ago, I was with my best friend and we were talking about death. I simply said, "I hate death." Her response blew me away: "It's just beginning." And she was right. At 29, everyone that I have known or grown up with or is part of my family will die. 
       So, why do I talk about Moran and death? Because of these two souls that left the darkness of the crashing waves for the subtle pastel of the sky. They left this delirious earth for the peace of heaven. They experienced in one moment a perfect Moran painting. The dark against the light. The hopeless against the hope. The imperfect for the perfect. They became immortal like Moran.
       And as we think of them and praise them and remember all the good that happened in our lives because of them we experience a little more of the focal point of life. See, I don't think that life is about the pain or the struggle or the shit we watch about on the news. No, it is about that little glimmer of hope that we find in the small things. It is the uncomplicated joy =) It is about the focal point. That's what this life is about, not the the other. 
       I did not know these two people well, but I met them and smiled because of them...Their families are my family. And I am honored to be apart of the bigger family of which they were apart. 
       RIP: Steven Rojo
               Angie's mom

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Beneath the Weeping Willow

  "The willow submits to the wind and prospers until one day it is many willows—a wall against the wind. This is the willow's purpose." —  Frank Herbert, Dune   Time, although a very evasive concept, is in each moment a gift. And most often, I don't stop to look back at the road I have traveled on. Even more so, the road Justin and I have travelled together. But today it is warranted. Today marks 9 years as husband and wife, and 9 years of truly some amazing and adverse moments. We have lost the most cherished and birthed the most loved all the while interwoven with each other.    I will be the first to admit that our day to day appears to some: mundane. However, inside the ordinary he and I together have understood the profundity of love. It is brash and loud, but it is also cautious and quiet.  "Love is a many splendored thing."  It is the true basis of community, and I am proud of the community we have built.   The  willow  is the t...
Post a Comment
Read more

A human mirror

  I look at myself, a lot. I think it has something to do with the fact that I didn't think myself attractive for a long time. Now, I can look at myself even when someone else is in the bathroom. Before, I entered with head bowed and left the same. There are times when I look at myself 3 times before I leave. Most of the time, I focus on one aspect of myself: my eyes, my hair, my waist line, my clothes...something. I can see how this seems egotistical, but perhaps I am making up for lost mirror time.   However, I can only remember one time that I actually looked into the mirror to see something deeper than my outward appearance. And it scared me. I honestly didn't think it was possible to look into the mirror and truly see oneself. It always seemed so cliché. Until I did it.   That was 4 months ago. The moment I decided to walk away from a "relationship" that was nothing more than a confusing drag. It held me bound and clipped the wings I knew God had given me to f...
Post a Comment
Read more

It's the underlying peace...

For some reason, dating my first boyfriend was hard. I was 21; he was 18. We were together for maybe 2 months. I am even reluctant to call him my boyfriend. Classic story of he wanted me; I was bored...voila. And not too long before I broke it off, I found myself in the sacristy talking to my then pastor. I was confused and hurt. I honestly can't even remember why. But he changed me that day.   He told me this: when he was discerning the priesthood two weeks prior to ordination, he struggled. He struggled so much he was beginning to believe his choice of vocation was wrong. His spiritual director at the time told him to pray. He told him to spend one solid week praying as though he was going to leave formation. Leaning all prayer toward that thought. Then, he told him to pray the next solid week as though he was going to stay and become the priest that he believed, at one point, he was supposed to be.   And as he prayed, he struggled. His mind wanted to wander and his desire...
Post a Comment
Read more