Dan Beirne

Point of entry

Dirty hands and dusty faces speak more than the cleanliness of any good intention.  I have witnessed and translated the carrying out of many good intentions since being here, and I am coming to notice that what is appreciated most about these loving gestures has little to do with what is being offered, and everything to do with how far one goes to offer it. I learned this in the back of a rusty pick up truck, and I do believe that it will serve me for the rest of my time here, if not the rest of my life.

We were on our way back from our last community visit, and I remember admiring everyone in the group for not complaining about how uncomfortable the ride was.  We had abandoned the air conditioned charter bus on this particular trip, due to more the “rural” road conditions, and we took to the back of large pick up truck.  I was already rehearsing a few polite refrains that I would have said (while thinking “TOUGH IT UP!”) in response to the complaints that I expected, but again, I was very pleasantly surprised.  In fact, despite the noticeable decline in comfort and quality from bus to truck, this visit turned out to be one of the best.  It had not occurred to me why this may have been until someone from the group shared with me their thoughts.

“I think it has to do with how we entered the community,” he said. “In our previous visits, the people in the communities saw us all pile out of this luxurious air conditioned bus, and then come and sit with them.  But, this time, they saw us come in on the back of a pick up truck, traveling more like they would.  We entered like one of them.”  I had not thought about this until he mentioned it, but I could not agree with him more.  There was a significant difference in how the people of this last community had engaged the group.  For, in previous community visits, our bus stood in the background for nearly all of our interactions as a constant reminder of the different realities from which we came. The rusty pick up truck helped to bridge that gap.  This group abandoned their comfort to reach the people where they were, and so were welcomed into their hearts.

When we pulled up to that community, everyone was covered in dust, and a bit sun burnt, but spirits were high.  It was from this beautiful vantage point that the group engaged with the community.  Everything that there was to offer was given and received with such a greater sense of equality, sincerity and joy.  The same love and goodness that these people had been carrying in their hearts all along was now being offered from a new angle.  They had chosen solidarity over charity, compassion over comfort, pickup truck over bus, donkey over stallion.  Humble in their entry, the love that they came to share spread only with greater fervor.

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Then it occurred to me; God has done exactly the same for us.[1]

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[1] God, in all His greatness, entered the world in the weak humanity of a poor carpenter’s child.  Christ, in all His fame, entered Jerusalem on a donkey.  The Holy Spirit, in all its wonder, has been made available to us through Christ’s suffering pain, death and Hell.  Praise God for showing us what humble love can do, and opting for the pick up truck.

Simple words.

I translated for my first group ever a few weeks ago, and I noticed something.  Needing to pay such close attention to each spoken word as I did, I picked up on a steady theme that ran throughout the dialogue of that week.  As the trip progressed, the spoken words shifted from simple, to complex, to simple again.  Yet the character of the experience as a whole maintained a steady climb in profundity and intensity.  At the end of the week, the simple words had been reinstituted in order to carry the most significant messages.

As the week’s discussions began, all conversation was really pretty basic, and easy to translate.  “Welcome!”  “It is nice to meet you!”  “How many members of your family live here?”  This type of introductory vernacular was rather straight forward, and did not present much of a challenge for translation.  As the discussions progressed, however, they naturally increased in complexity.

After the initial greetings and a couple days of introduction, people began to form relationships.  I was tugged from one small conversation scenario to another, and found my syntactic archives running dry.  The people of the community and the people in the visiting group were excitedly sharing stories and swapping realities.  Beautiful things were said, and heart warming conversations were had, but my words were failing me.  I did not know how to translate some of the things that were being said.  Future hopes, expressive words from the heart, subjunctive scenario petitions and requests – I felt like holding up one of those signs that Wil-E-Coyote holds up when in the shadow of a falling boulder, only instead of  an exclamation point, it would have a question mark.  I could not keep up with the complexity of the things being communicated.

These are moments in life where even those speaking their native tongue fail to find the words to articulate their feelings, but it was soon after this that I noticed another change.  People became speechless.  They stumbled over their words, and became more expressive with their faces, and more engaged with their bodies when they spoke.  It was as if they too were approaching the limit of the efficacy of their words, and were forced to result to something else…Simplicity.  After a deep breath and a determined look, my friends began speaking simply again, but communicating a message that was far more profound than anything else that had been communicated up that point.

In the end, they were communicating nothing other than love itself.  There was no need for subjunctive tenses, or complex explanation; it was simply a truth that was being conveyed, a reality being imparted.  These were the words that were to carry on their relationships and kindred nature unto the years and distance ahead.  They were the most meaningful and significant words of this whole experience, and yet they were so very simple and basic at the same time.  It made me think (after I rested my mind a bit), Does this noticeable retreat to simplicity say anything about the nature of life’s greatest profundities? Are these seemingly complex things actually more simple than not?  Perhaps we need only to put less faith in our words, and more in what moves us to search for them in vain.  I wish love would take us over more often.

The joys of living alone.

While certain joys certainly do come with living alone, the above title is really intended sarcastically.  I have come to appreciate communal living so much, that every time I am reminded by some of the following subtleties that I am no longer in Kansas, I just chuckle to myself in feigned contentment and think, “Hah!  Well, that’s never happened before!”  Then, I go on with my day.

I was cooking earlier today, for instance, and I had forgotten that the pan I just pulled out of oven 10 seconds earlier was hot.  So, with every grain of intelligence I could gather, I picked up the pan to move it (without a hot-pot-holder).  I shouted, startled at its high temperature (how’d that happen?!), and dropped the plate back to the counter.  It was loud, and very clear that I was a doofus for burning my hand.  But, alas, there was no one to shout from another room, “And, for our next trick?” and, worse yet, there was no one to laugh at me.  I still looked around, instinctively, to make sure that none of the people who weren’t there saw me mess up. Then I laughed at myself…and felt better.

Also in the kitchen today, I experienced one of those instances in which Mother Nature mocks human kind with her power and persistence, and leaves man/woman feeling little and helpless.  I was sweeping, and much to my satisfaction, I had finished the job.  I swept the pile of dust and debris and to a very gratifying little pile, when I noticed something.  The pile was crawling away.  Almost every other dust particle, or apparent dust particle, was scurrying back to the nooks and crannies from which I swept it.  It appears that I’ve got more than a dust problem in the house.  Once again lacking someone to laugh with, I laughed to myself, saluted Mother Nature, and swept faster.

Perhaps one of the more difficult adjustments to living alone is that I’ve got no one to check in with.  Sure, more freedom to do what I wish and when, but I will trade that any day to have someone to say goodnight to.  For as long as I can remember, my routine for leaving the house, or departing to my room for the night, has always included a “God bless!” or a “Good night” shouted to someone.  But not here.  I even find myself leaving the dishes unwashed so that I get the feeling that I am irritating someone who doesn’t even live here.  At least then, I create a false sense of urgency that can keep me company.  Plus, I eventually cave under my own irritation, and clean the dishes.  So, if anything, it keeps the house clean.

Now, though it may sound it, I am not wallowing in loneliness. Nor am I developing schizophrenic characteristics; I am just learning the particularities of dwelling solo.  Living in any situation brings about rather odd circumstances that could use a laugh; this is just the first time that I have had to laugh on my own.  So, my solution for the time being is to simply bring more and more people into my life here through these stories, and to take in all I can of your lives wherever you may be.  I take so much pleasure, for example, from imagining you reading this at your desk with a roommate or family dog near by (or maybe in the library, during a little study break).  It is the mutual experience of life’s little details that provide our communities with fodder to grow.  So, with that, please know that next time you stub your toe or fill the entire house with the stench of burnt popcorn, I am there with you, snickering in the background, and its all because I love you.