Living – Page 8 – sethlewis.ie

Slow Happiness

As I look out the window at the sunshine on my garden, I remember the many days that I saw the same view differently—when the glass was streaked with rain, when the ground was hard with frost, and the plants that are budding and growing so beautifully today were nothing but tiny seeds or bare sticks. It all changed so slowly, but it changed so much. And as good as it looks today, I know that there are even better things ahead—the apple blossoms will ripen into apples, the rose stems will bloom with their own unique colours and fill the air with their intoxicating aromas, there will be blueberries and strawberries and maybe this year we’ll finally get some grapes from the grape vine, now that it’s more established. It takes time, establishing. Our blueberry bushes give us a lot more now than they used to, and the apple tree is a little bigger every year. Life is like that, too, isn’t it?

To Welcome A Stain (a poem)

I had more than an hour to wait for my flight, so I was happy when I found a corner with armchairs in Manchester airport. The seats were comfortable, but after I sat down I noticed that they were at least as tired as I was. The colour was faded, the edges were dirty, and there was a stain on the armrest.

How long have those chairs been there, in that corner? How many strangers have they welcomed and provided comfort for? Over time, it has made them tired and stained, and I understand that. People can be hard to hold up. Messy. But the chairs are still there, still welcoming new travellers anyway. My hour in one of them reminded me that it’s better to wear out by accepting stains than collecting dust. That’s what this poem is about:

The Same Person In Every Room

I was sitting in a meeting this week when a thought randomly crossed my mind about how odd it would be if I had come in wearing the clothes I had on earlier that same day, when I went to swim laps at the pool. My goggles and togs didn’t raise any eyebrows at the pool, but they would have at the meeting. And if I had shown up at the pool with my meeting clothes on, that would have drawn a bit of attention, as well.

Normal Life

The Monday after Easter Sunday is a bank holiday in Ireland, so I slept in. That may not seem very remarkable to you, but I remember when it was impossible. I remember when our children were small, and always woke up at the crack of dawn with bright eyes and boundless energy, ready for me to be the bad guy they could fight or the jungle gym they could climb or the narrator for their books. I remember before those mornings, back to the seemingly endless nights when they fit easily in my arms and I walked countless miles back and forth in their little bedrooms and put them down so gently and carefully and their eyes popped open and we started walking all over again. It didn’t seem possible at the time, but those endless nights ended. Sleeping through the whole night is normal for me now, and when a bank holiday comes, I can stay in bed even longer if I want to. When did that happen?

Tea And The Sous-Chef (two poems)

It was my wife Jessica’s birthday yesterday, and these two poems are in honour of her and the many ordinary moments we share together.

Tea

Do you want a cuppa tea?
She said to me
And I said yes—
Because
I always want a tea
If she is drinking it
With me

The Sous-Chef

Jessica works magic
With the chicken
On the hob
While I stand by
And peel the spuds
Because that is a job
That requires little magic
But I like to be
Nearby
In proximity to her
I think that any job will do—
Being with her is the magic,
So now you can call me Sous

Patrick Loved Ireland Before Ireland Loved Patrick

On the 17th of March, people around the world will celebrate Ireland’s national holiday, St. Patrick’s Day. Is there any other national holiday in the world that is celebrated as internationally as Ireland’s? It is truly unique. So as the bunting goes up and the landmarks turn green and the parades are organised, it’s worth remembering the man who inspired this global celebration.

Like the holiday named after him, Patrick’s life was truly unique. He did not consider himself a great man, and would likely be uncomfortable with the extravagance of the yearly honours we bestow on him. In his autobiography, he calls himself “a simple country person, a refugee, and unlearned.” The reason he calls himself a “refugee” is because his connection with Ireland, which is how everyone remembers him today, only began when he was sixteen—and it wasn’t a good start at all. The first Irish people that Patrick met were the people who raided his hometown (probably in Wales) and carried off thousands of prisoners—including Patrick—to be sold into slavery in Ireland. Our patron saint’s first sighting of Ireland’s beautiful shores came while he was in the chains of human traffickers. In Ireland, Patrick tells us that he was “brought low by hunger and nakedness daily.” His slavery continued until he was twenty-two years old. This is not the part of the story we celebrate on March 17th.

Pause (a poem)

Another day, another week, another year. Sometimes it can feel like time blurs together, like life is stuck on repeat and everything keeps happening all over again and the only difference is that I’m more tired this time around but I have to keep going anyway because otherwise things will get ahead of me. This is one of the reasons it’s so important for me to stop everything, every morning, long enough to reconnect with God and remember what life is, where it comes from, and why it matters so much. That’s what this poem is about.

On The Origin Of Humanity’s Superpower

I originally wrote this post in 2018, and I’m reposting it today because it’s Valentine’s Day—a very good day to think about where our shared superpower comes from.

“You’d think that people would have had enough of silly love songs
But I look around me and I see it isn’t so
Some people wanna fill the world with silly love songs
And what’s wrong with that?”

So sang Sir Paul McCartney, and all it takes is a few minutes listening to the radio to prove him right. Same goes for silly rom-coms and royal weddings. For some reason, we humans get a bit silly over love. No matter how scientific our philosophy or cold and calculated our theory of existence, there’s nearly always someone in our lives who holds a mysterious power to break through our rigid shell into the gooey centre of our humanity where love is the unrivalled (and often unruly) ruler.

The Challenge Of Choosing Between Bitter And Better

There may only be one letter between bitter and better, but like street signs on the same post, the two words point us in opposite directions. And these signposts are planted firmly, with the same two arrows, at every difficult junction we face on the road of life. No matter how well we may have chosen in the past, or how poorly, the same choice always presents itself all over again: will we let the difficulties of life make us better? Or bitter?

It’s obvious, isn’t it? One choice is literally named “better.” So that’s clearly the choice we’ll always make. Right? Why would we willingly choose to travel a bitter road when a better option is always available to us? The answer is this: we don’t always believe the signposts.

Stop Looking For Friends, And Start Making Them

The treasure of true friendship is some of the richest, most valuable wealth in the whole world. If financial poverty eventually makes life unsustainable, friendship poverty makes it unbearable. By true friendship, of course, I don’t just mean acquaintances you enjoy a laugh with every once in a while, or online “friends” you can share pictures of your dinners with. I mean the real thing. The deep thing. The close thing. The uninhibited, understanding, unhurried and unbreakable thing. I mean the people who stick even when other people let go, the people who love you even after you’ve done wrong—and too much to let you get away with it. I mean the people who laugh with you about stupid inside jokes and cry with you about losses and disappointments and who know exactly what you’re thinking just by the faces you make. I mean the people you can trust enough to share life with—not just the social media highlight reel life, but the really real life, in all the mess and joy and shame of it. Friendships like these are more valuable than Blackbeard’s buried treasure (which is still buried, by the way). If we discovered his treasure hoard without ever developing true friendships, our lives would still be impoverished. Which raises the question: how do we find the treasure of true friendship?