Smuggling Grace

— Photos by Renee Roederer

My workplace hosts five Call and Connect support group. Four of them meet over Zoom, but one of them — the OG group — started many years ago as a conference call.

And this particular community of adults who live with epilepsy still like that format. Once a week, they call the same phone number and love to be on the same line all together. You might be surprised how a once-per-week phone call could turn into a robust sense of community.

These folks playfully grumble if anyone calls them a “group.” “We’re a family!” they say. And they are. They call each other throughout the week outside of the group time to check in on each other. They’ve gotten together in person to do fun things. They’ve gone over to each other’s houses to fix each other’s appliances. I’ve witnessed all of this in my six years with them.

They also love to give verbal hugs.

When someone is having a difficult week or if someone has a special celebration, someone will eventually say, “Let’s give [name] a family hug.”

“Okay, one, two, three!”

“Mmmmmmmm!”
“Squeeeeeze!”
“Eeeeeeeeee!”

they all say verbally over a phone line.

I’m about to go to go on a trip for a while (more about that soon) and as I was about to end the call today, I heard,

“Hey, let’s give Renee a family hug!”

“One, two, three!”

“Mmmmmmmm!”
“Squeeeeeze!”
“Eeeeeeeeee!”

I felt it too. A lovely send off.

Community Care is the Best.

— Renee Roederer

1) Whew, it takes a lot of work to step away… This isn’t a new thought, but it’s one that I’m living and thinking about all over again. This week, my whole life has transformed into a to-do list. (Not totally healthy).

“It shouldn’t be this hard take yourself off the grid temporarily,” I’ve thought many times. A lot goes into that preparation. And I’m also not going to be totally off of the grid. It’s not as if I’m packing a tent and rations or something. I’m just getting myself ready to disconnect from work and additional, typical rhythms to take some time off with lovely plans. (Very healthy).

2) Wow, a lot of life passes around and through us… This isn’t a new thought, but it’s one that I’m living and thinking about all over again. This week, my life has been connected to a lot of other lives and activities as I make these preparations.

I’m not so central. All of this stuff currently hustling and bustling through my lists, doesn’t live on a list. It’s just life. It’s people with names. It’s community. It keeps moving. I need not over-give or merely ration my time. I am a part.

Responsibility and life — two sides of the same coin.

— Renee Roederer

A colleague and I lead a monthly Zoom meeting called “Mindfulness Moments.” My role in this exercise is very easy — remarkably relaxing, in fact. My colleague, a tremendous therapist, leads us in a twenty minute mindfulness exercise. I get to start the Zoom meeting and take it all in. Then I lead us in a ten minute discussion.

Last night, during this mindfulness exercise, we did a body scan, checking in with parts of our body and inviting these parts of ourselves to experience relaxation.

“Now, rest your nose,” she said. Rather than feeling a change in my nose, I smiled. I don’t know that I’ve ever tried to relax my nose. I was surprised by the challenge. But you know what? I tried it, and it can be done.

A relaxed nose, like any relaxed part of ourselves, is pretty delightful.

So if you need some relaxation, rejuvenation, and repose, just remember a serene schnoz is a satisfied nose.

— Renee Roederer

Cosmos, by Krystyna Dabrowska (translated by Karen Kovacik)
Until recently the universe was expanding
with new suns, nebulas, constellations,
vibrating waves, the breath of galaxies.
Now it’s contracting to satellite
images depicting Earth:
not even the whole planet, just one country,
not even each region, just one city,
a single street, gray pavement. On it are strewn
“dark objects of similar size
to human bodies,” writes the New York Times.
Not buried for weeks,
their grave the satellite’s synthetic eye
and the black holes of our pupils,
surrounded by life.

My friend calls them “the Grief Ninjas.” I think it’s the perfect description.

She’s talking about those moments when you’re in the middle of a run-of-the-mill day or routine task, and all of the sudden, seemingly out of nowhere, feelings of grief come on very strongly. A wave of grief quickly emerges and interrupts whatever you’re doing.

Of course, the Grief Ninjas can also dance around with Love because that’s often how grief works. Grief is love that longs. Grief is love that misses or prepares itself for missing.

As Jamie Anderson says,

“Grief, I’ve learned is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”

Those Grief Ninjas show up whenever they will.
So will Love.

— Renee Roederer

— Photos by Renee Roederer

I love this quote from Elizabeth Barrett Browning:

“Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.”

This weekend, I hope we’ll take off our shoes.