Adventures in Grace
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My mother tells how when I was in grade school I wanted to take dance lessons, so she enrolled me in ballet. Although I approached the activity with forceful energy and my typical incorrigible enthusiasm, I lacked grace. In fact, it became so clear I was not meant to be a dancer that she eventually took me out of the class.
If grace is a quality of elegance, of effortless beauty and charm of movement, I don’t have it. My husband suggests I might have developed grace had I stayed in the class. My mother, and perhaps the teacher, thought otherwise.
I don’t remember caring. I had enough to do: playing kickball with the neighbors, roaming through the woods, picking blackberries, exploring the swamp, climbing trees, writing, reading, playing the piano, and learning from my grandfather how to cook.
I may not have been graceful myself, but my childhood was full of grace.
Not that it was perfect. I had my share of loneliness, death, uncertainty, anger. I was abused, betrayed, and confused. More than some, less than others.
I survived my childhood in part because of a kind of grace I did have: a delight in the overflowing gifts of life. This kind of grace doesn’t keep us from experiencing pain or even evil, but it comforts us in the face of our suffering. Some days, I was more reflective than busy. I would sit in a tree and think about the universe, or spend half an hour staring at a nest of ants. At ten, I started writing poetry that expressed the anxiety of a broken home and of an older brother whose paranoia was starting to show.
And still, there was grace, coming at me from all directions. My friends’ mothers, for example, would watch me while my own mother worked, teaching me some of the social skills she lacked. Whenever I thought life was too hard for me, a friend would appear, or a teacher, or an unexpected interaction with a stranger would give me hope and renewed energy to tackle life.
Helen Keller said, “Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it.”
Life is meant to be lived, and if our lives are adventures, where better to seek grace than in dark cubbies and corners and inhospitable regions of the world? Grace in the face of a head-on collision; grace in losing a job; grace in moments of panic or rage. Grace also in the sight of a star, the nuzzle of a cat, the birth of a child, the love of a spouse, the kindness of strangers, the comfort of friends. Life hits us hard, yet if we let it, grace softens our landing.
To benefit from grace, however, we must let it in.
If we are active in addictions, or caught up in fears about time or money or relationships, or if we are over-whelmed at work, we may miss the pieces of grace that touch our lives: a co-worker’s smile, the warm kiss of the wind, a bit of food, a place to sleep, a friend who calls to see if we’re okay. It’s not that we deserve a reprieve, or have earned something good to happen to us. That’s the cool thing about grace. We can’t earn it; we already deserve it. We all get it, though some may seem to be blessed with more grace than others. Like God’s love (which they say falls equally onto you, me and the people we despise), grace touches all of us, want only, randomly.
I imagine grace is like A.A. Milne’s Tigger, bouncing around with a fairy godmother’s wand, blessing this, tapping that, spinning, singing, dancing in an ungainly way and laughing. Grace surprises us with a sudden peace, a sigh, a longing to reach out and a friend who will reach back.
Grace reminds us that no matter how clumsy we are, no matter how sick we feel, how ugly our home, how angry our family—life is ultimately sacred, clean, and holy. Grace reminds us that serendipity happens. So…listen, watch, let go. Grace will come when you’re not expecting it. But sometimes it comes like a whisper, so you have to pay attention.
Helen Keller also said, “The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.” Grace is what we feel with the heart.
So keep your heart open. Oh, I get anxious, annoyed, scared, weary of being alive. But if I breathe and open up, grace always shows her face. It may not happen right away, but it happens soon enough to keep me going.
As you read these words and as you make your way through rain, storm and sunshine, may you too be blessed by grace.
- Adventures in Grace - June 1, 2015
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