As we roll into the weekend, I’m reflecting: What is the Sabbath?
I’m reading a great book right now, Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, by Peter Scazzero. I suspect it’ll get mentioned in a few more posts, including one of its own. For now, I’m thinking about the section I’m reading about observing the Sabbath. It talks about the importance of this observance, and the need for it in our lives.
Scazzero promotes flexibility when it comes to applying his book to real life. In the case of this principle, all you have to do, he says, is take a 24-hour Sabbath one day a week. It doesn’t even matter which day. (If you think you detect a wee bit of sarcasm in the last sentence, you’re right.)
Until this year, every fall brought a feeling of anticipation. Crisp air, cool evenings, new school supplies.
As long as I didn’t linger on nostalgic thoughts of easy friendships, endless potential, and running with my college cross country team – a couple of aspects of younger me that I sometimes wish I had back – I could dive into the possibilities of a new school year. I would try not to pay too much attention to the darker mornings and the briefer evenings. As summer closed, I would frenetically finish house projects so they wouldn’t tempt me once I started the homeschool year.
Then came this year. This summer, the Chaplain and I poured so much into our relationship. I estimate we covered about 270 miles this summer walking together in the evenings. We wore out the Chaplain’s shoes and got into shape. We finally, finally got some ease back into our relationship.
We went on adventures this summer. A trip to the beach. Trips to Grafton Lakes. A camping trip. All these little moments of family time, all the time outside, had put me in touch with the world in a way I haven’t been in a long time. As the days were getting shorter, I noticed.
One thing that was on my Summer Bucket List that we hadn’t done yet was go bathing at the beach.
I remember what a big deal it was to go to the beach as a kid. We lived on the bank of a river, so we regularly got a water fix, but there is something you get at the ocean that you can’t get anywhere else. It’s like synchronizing your heartbeat with God’s as the rhythm of the waves moves through you.
I was working myself up to writing about shame when my three-year-old, Six, came in the house howling. He was covered in dirt, with the epicenter somewhere near his face. I heaved him up over the edge of the kitchen sink, trying to rinse the dirt out of his eyes, but quickly realized a more extreme approach would be called for.
Taking him under my arm in a football hold, I charged into the bathroom and started the water running while Six screamed, begging me not to use the sprayer. But this was a job for the sprayer. A bath just wasn’t going to do it. His scalp was covered in dirt, and it was stuck to his neck and all over his face. Five did it, he claimed angrily.
I soaped him up and came after him with the sprayer, trying to avoid his face. Six is a fan of only one type of bathing – the type that doesn’t involve getting his face or hair wet. I braced myself, and his screaming reached a crescendo.
This morning got off to a rough start. It began with a contingent of kids who were up at the crack of dawn.
Based on the level of clamor, I was surprised and unhappy when I came downstairs to find it was barely seven. An all-out fight was in progress, the kitchen had been trashed, and a batch of pancakes was steaming on the stovetop.
