Living – Page 22 – sethlewis.ie

An Irish Christmas Selection Box

It’s Christmas week, and we’ve already ended up with more chocolate selection boxes than is good for us, which is traditional. I can’t share those with you, but I would like to share a selection box of some of the things I’ve enjoyed online from Ireland this Christmas season…

Snapchats, Stories, Fleets, and Glories

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Snapchat is drowning in it. Twitter’s recent addition of “Fleets” to the top of their feed looks like what Instagram, Facebook, and Linkedin call “Stories,” and all of them work off the same principle that launched Snapchat to prominence: impermanence. It can be daunting to think that what goes up online never comes down, and the solution from every social app is now to offer a way to post temporarily. Now you can say what you like and dance how you please, knowing that after 24 hours the evidence will be gone and no one will be able to cancel you for it in twenty years. Usually the strings of temporary stories at the top of my news feeds are filled with simple pictures or short videos of everyday moments like stencilled coffees, beautiful sunsets, and random complaints. Sometimes they are encouraging thoughts or recommendations. Whatever they are, if you don’t look at them in their allotted time, you’ll miss them.

If You’re Easy To Please, You’ll Be Pleased More Often

“You’re easy to please” should be a compliment. That’s what I think, even though I know it isn’t used that way. I know the people saying it usually mean that you’re undiscerning, childish, and too quick to give approval where it isn’t warranted. What I want to know is: What are you supposed to be waiting for, before you let yourself be pleased?

The Plot Twists In My Own Story

I recently finished my first Agatha Christie novel, after hearing my whole life about how good her mysteries are. Yes, it was good. At one point or another I thought almost every character was the murderer. The plot kept twisting through the pages in such unexpected ways that I had no choice but to check out of reality for the rest of the day in order to find out what happened. Good thing it was my day off.

One of the wonderfully frustrating things that I love and hate about books is that they take a long time to get through. A movie is fast—the action carries me along to a conclusion in a matter of hours. A book is slow (compounded for me by my slow reading pace), leaving me in suspense for ages while I wade through details and conversations and descriptions to find the next big revelation. In that sense, a book is a little more like real life, where the action doesn’t happen in a quick succession that always ties up neatly just before the credits. Real life is full of pauses—evenings and mornings and dirty dishes. A book that takes multiple days to read allows me to live inside the story longer, to enter further into the feelings of the characters who are living through the unknown. For a few days, I’m living there with them. And while a movie is always viewed from a third-person perspective, in a book I can think the characters’ thoughts with them. I can see the plot twists unfold through their eyes. Which feels familiar, because it’s how I see the plot twists unfold in my own life.

We Get Used To Things

When we moved to Ireland, we were cold all the time. Our bodies were used to heat, and for all the truly wonderful things Ireland has to offer, it simply doesn’t come with that feature. There’s a reason the Romans called this island “Hibernia”, the “land of winter”. But unlike the Romans, we stuck around. At first, we got funny looks from our neighbours because we wore coats even when they were breaking out their shorts. Over time, though, we acclimatised. Now we say “It’s roasting”, and mean it, on days we used to describe as chilly. Our temperature scale really is different. Once, when we visited America, one of our young children asked me, greatly concerned: “Dad—I’m getting wet? On my forehead..?” He didn’t know about sweat yet. He didn’t know that I grew up in sweat. When he walks out the door into an Irish summer, he doesn’t hit a wall of heat and humidity, and neither do I anymore. We’re Hibernians now.

Strong Trees Don’t Grow Overnight

A few weeks ago, I posted a poem about an oak tree. In the poem, and in my mind, oak trees are big, spreading trees with thick trunks and impressive reach. They are a picture of solid stability, untouched by passing storms. Which sounds nice, doesn’t it? With Ireland now entering another full lockdown for at least the next six weeks, the ability of oak trees to stand unshaken in a turbulent world is enviable. Right now things look awfully unsteady, from where I’m sitting.

Well Done > Well Said

A man said to his two sons, “I need you to do a job for me”. One son said “no”, the other son said “yes”—but that’s not how it happened. In fact, the son who said “no” changed his mind and did the job, while the son who said “yes” got involved in something else and never followed through.

It’s a simple story, told by Jesus in Matthew 21, and the point is clear: making the right noises is good, but doing the right thing is better. It’s a point our human hearts need reminding of, and often. Our world is obsessed with words, impressed by words, drowning in words. As someone who enjoys writing, I take great delight in finding the right phrase and spinning it around until I find just the right way to turn it. But no matter how hard I work at this, I have to admit: it’s always easier to find words for ideas than it is to act on them. It’s easier to write a love song than it is to genuinely give yourself for the good of another person. It’s easier to rail against the proud and greedy than it is to stop being those things myself. It’s easier to say “consistency is key in raising children” than it is to be consistent while raising actual children. In almost every area of life, it’s easier to say the right thing than it is to do the right thing.

the ruins of the future // spoken word poetry

I’ve always loved poetry as a medium, always felt that somehow the structure and rhythm of it helps me feel the impact of the meaning of the words more deeply. Maybe that’s why there is so much poetry in the Bible. This year I’ve enjoyed trying out the added layer of doing poetry as spoken word. It’s obviously homemade, but here’s my attempt at capturing a few thoughts about legacy:

The Importance Of Creating Things That Don’t Last

Birthday cakes are hard work. First there’s the planning, the choosing of flavours and decorations to match the one being celebrated. Then the time comes and there’s the baking, decorating, lighting, singing, and finally eating. Hopefully someone remembered to snap a photo, because once the knife goes in, the culinary work of art is quickly dispersed to paper plates and plastic forks that were created to be used just once, before going to fill the rubbish bin.

If I’m Proud Of Doing My Duty, I Probably Don’t Do It Enough

I didn’t wash many dishes in our first years of marriage, but I felt quite proud of every one of them. I could scrub one pot in a week and bask in the glory of my goodness. For some reason, my wife didn’t feel the same awe at my occasional fits of kindness. For some reason, I didn’t understand why.

These days, I do dishes. I don’t keep track of how many, and I no longer feel the same way about them. They need to be done—it’s only fair. Even though I’m doing more, I feel less proud of it. This summer, I read a story by George MacDonald that helped me understand why: