I FELT LIKE DANCING
[I
put this up quite some time ago, and before my Ethel died. Thinking back on
some of the loveliest things I've been blest with reminded me of this isolated
event in a stream of lovely moments—a moment that led me to write this. I can
only ask you to trust me that it still "works".]
I’ve tried
to persuade Ethel down the years that I’m not worth much and God knows I’ve
behaved badly enough to have made my point in the view of a host of others.
She’s not buying it—seems she’s heard that God thinks I’m worth dying for.
Still, what
I’m about to say is risky and those who have known the worst side of me on
occasions (should they by some remote chance ever read anything I write) will curl their lip at the
next few remarks because they’ll make me sound like Mr. Wonderful—fat chance of
that being true!
If I
weren’t already in love with Ethel, listening to Rod Stewart’s version of the
old classic Long Ago & Far
Away would make we want to be in love. I who have never danced
feel like dancing when I listened to it just now.
I’ve never
forgotten the power of romance—I’m not built to be able to do that—but I
haven’t always remembered just how warming and enriching and sustaining a
lovely romance can be.
Many
Christians tend to think—so I judge—that everyone has an equal chance to live
life in the celebration mode. I know better; and so should they! Loneliness,
social isolation, the sense of being unwanted, the absence of tenderness,
tender words, touches and kisses and glances—how could life not be tough in the
absence of these? Those who have a profound need for such gifts but don't
experience them wage an uphill battle and those who are in a happy and
honorable and fulfilling romance should take that into account rather than
assuming that their own religious devotion would be as real and deep if they
were without a lovely companion.
[It makes
no sense for us to rejoice in a gift God has given us and at the same time
begrudge it to the entire human family. Instead of berating people for
enjoying romance maybe we should remind them that it’s God’s gift to them.]
I accept
the fact that we as a society are excessively interested in sex and all the so
called “liberties” that go with it but that truth shouldn’t lead us to idiotic
conclusions that deny the richness of the gift God has offered to us as humans
in offering us romance. And I’m aware that there are those who are in
relationships that are crushing them—a tragic circumstance; but none of that is
what I wish to deal with here. I just feel the need to express my pleasure at
the sound of music and the warmth of romance.
To dismiss
the sheer pleasure in a love relationship between two people is to do more than
God would do. He uses the metaphors of marriage and romance, of human lovers
and happy brides and bridegrooms to express his own joy and when he came to us
in and as Jesus he was no stranger to the happy mystery of a wedding.
As it is, I
have a difficult enough time trying to please God and be like him; but if I
were without the joys of a loving relationship—I’m talking about me—I don’t think I could make it.
I
think my Ethel used to dance when she was a girl and I wish she could get out
of her wheelchair and show me how. Oh well. Think I’ll put Rod Stewart on,
twirl the wheelchair around as dancing and mime the words to her.
Set her
little heart all aflutter, don’t you know.