Look Closer

I received the text below from a good friend of mine, Fr. H. A quick search of the internet shows that it’s not a new email by any means, just one of the rare ones that hadn’t found its way into one of my inboxes yet. Something about this one struck me today and reminded me somewhat of conversations I’d had with my grandmother of her youth. Conversations that worked there way into the eulogy I delivered at her funeral just a few short years later.

There is a wonderful message and reminder within and I won’t lecture or belabor that point here so that you all may read for yourself and hopefully take a few minutes or more to meditate on what she was trying to say.

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When an old lady died in the geriatric ward of a small hospital near Dundee, Scotland, it was believed that she had nothing left of any value. Later, when the nurses were going through her meager possessions, they found this poem. It’s quality and content so impressed the staff that copies were made and distributed to every nurse in the hospital. One nurse took her copy to Ireland.

The old lady’s sole bequest to posterity has since appeared in the Christmas edition of the News Magazine of the North Ireland Association for Mental Health. A slide presentation has also been made based on her simple, but eloquent, poem. And this little old Scottish lady, with nothing left to give to the world, is now the author of this “anonymous” poem winging across the internet entitled “Crabby Old Woman”.

What do you see nurses?
What do you see?
What are you thinking when
you’re looking at me?

A crabby old woman,
Not very wise.
Uncertain of habit,
With faraway eyes?

Who dribbles her food
and makes no reply,
When you say in a loud voice
“I do wish you’d try!”

Who seems not to notice
The things that you do.
And forever is losing
A stocking or shoe?

Who, resisting or not,
Lets you do as you will.
With bathing and feeding,
The long day to fill?

Is that what you’re thinking?
Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurses,
You’re not looking at me.

I’ll tell you who I am
As I sit here so still.
As I do at your bidding,
As I eat at your will.

I’m a small child of ten
With a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters,
Who love one another.

A young girl of sixteen
With wings on her feet.
Dreaming that soon now
A lover she’ll meet.

A bride soon at twenty,
my heart gives a leap.
Remembering the vows
that I promised to keep. 

At twenty-five now,
I have young of my own,
Who need me to guide
And a secure happy home.

A woman of thirty,
My young grown fast,
Bound to each other,
With ties that should last.

At forty my young sons
have grown and gone.
But my man’s beside me
To see I don’t mourn.

At fifty, once more
Babies play around my knee.
Again we know children,
My loved one and me.

Dark days are upon me,
My husband is dead.
I look at the future,
I shudder with dread.

For my young are all rearing
young of their own.
And I think of the years
And the love that I’ve known.

I’m now an old woman
And nature is cruel;
‘Tis jest to make old age
Look like a fool.

The body it crumbles,
Grace and vigor depart.
There is now a stone
Where I once had a heart.

But inside this old carcass
A young girl still dwells,
And now and again,
My battered heart swells.

I remember the joys,
I remember the pain,
And I’m loving and living
Life over again.

I think of the years
All too few, gone too fast,
And accept the stark fact
That nothing can last.

So open your eyes people,
Open and see.
Not a crabby old woman;
Look closer… see ME !!!

Remember this poem when you next meet an old person who you might brush aside without looking at the young soul within…..we will all, one day, be there, too!

I’m personally opposed, but…

Jeff Miller provided the idea and Paul Nichols drew it up perfectly.

As Nichols wrote in his comments: Silence in the face of evil implies assent.

Songs of Sadness

Almost a year ago, and for reasons I do not recall, I started drafting a post about songs that made me cry. Hearing this morning on the radio that a list of the top ten songs that made men cry had been published, I decided to give it another go. None of the songs on that survey made it to my final list as you’ll see.

#10. Life By The Drop – Stevie Ray Vaughan
The last song on SRV’s final album (The Sky Is Cryin’). It was as if Stevie was giving us the words to say as we said goodbye to him. “You went your way, I stayed behind…”

#9. Cryin’ – Roy Orbison
She’s moved on. You thought you had. You haven’t.

#8. Hurt – Johnny Cash
The song is  enough, but when coupled with the images in the video they leave an indelible mark.

#7. Cinderella – Steven Curtis Chapman
Poignant in that at the time of it’s release, Steven’s five year old daughter was tragically killed in a car-related accident. Better than the overwrought “Butterfly Kisses”, a reminder that time passes too fast, and “…all too soon the clock will strike midnight and she’ll be gone…”

#6. Don’t Give Up – Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush
In these tough economic times this song remains relevant. Kate Bush provides the perfect response to Peter Gabriel’s despair.

#5. This Is Your Time – Michael W. Smith
Dedicated to Cassie Bernall who was murdered at Columbine in 1999. Beautiful song, and the bagpipes at the end do me in. I read a few years ago that when Smith presented this song to Cassie’s parents he was unsure about the bagpipes. They smiled and said that Cassie had loved the instrument. Smitty decided to keep them in the song.

#4. The Cat’s In The Cradle – Harry Chapin
Obligatory, is it not? The song that rips the heart out of every son…every father. No matter how much you do heed the song’s message you will always find yourself asking “Am I doing enough?”

#3. Concrete Angel – Martina McBride
I still can’t watch the video for this song. I’m a wreck by the time it’s 90 seconds in.

#2. Jacob’s Dream – Alison Krauss
Krauss called this “the saddest song I’ve ever heard.” I agree. A parent’s worst nightmare, it’s based upon a true story.

#1. Desperado – Eagles
Illspent time with your kids, child abuse, death of a child. And #1? Not allowing yourself to be loved. Let somebody love you, before it’s too late…

There are 20 more songs that I wrote down that didn’t make the top ten cut. All of them great songs that I may list one day. But at the moment I have a real need to listen to something cheerful and upbeat. Sammy Davis Jr., anyone?

Contradictions

Brendan Manning said it best in his book The Ragamuffin Gospel. But I’ve adapted it for myself years ago:

When I get honest, I admit I am a bundle of paradoxes. I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty. I am trusting and suspicious. I am honest and I still play games. Aristotle said I am a rational animal; I say I am an angel with an incredible capacity for beer. To live by grace means to acknowledge my whole life story, the light side and the dark. In admitting my shadow side, I learn who I am and what God’s grace means. As Thomas Merton put it, “A saint is not someone who is good but who experiences the goodness of God.”

As for me, I am a walking paradox. A contradiction. This is what makes it so hard for me to focus sometimes. I love philosophy and deep theological discussions. And in the next sentence will talk about how Batman is my favorite superhero and how annoyingly funny Foghorn Leghorn can be.

I love the complexities and beauty involved in classical music, and the seemingly simple but moving refrains that are the chant of the ancient Church. Both will reduce me to tears. But the next selection on my iPod is in-your-face rock ‘n roll. Beethoven to Benatar. Bach to BoDeans.

I love dramas exploring deep and profound areas regarding the human condition. Movies such as The Mission, Life Is Beautiful, I Am David, and on and on. But I also love B movie classics like Plan 9 From Outer Space, Abbot & Costello Meet Frankenstein or anything covered by Mystery Science Theater 3000. And a good horror film also reveals much about the human condition, in my opinion.

I will pray the rosary with someone who is hurting, tenderly offering up prayers of intercession. An hour later I will cuss like a sailor in heavy traffic.

I want the world. But I long for heaven.