musings on surviving May

or how I learned to pray in the car

The silent early mornings of slipping upstairs to our prayer space have sizzled out. Not for lack of desire! Lord knows I recall 2023 as the year of prayer with great, great fondness. Not for lack of room! Our oldest gets up at 5:45 for his prayer time, but I could certainly go up earlier than that and have my own space. For lack of . . . I don’t rightly know.

It’s ironing shirts and pants for school, sorting out who is getting hot lunch and who isn’t, cuddling with a semi-lost middle child, sorting the occupational therapy toys for the youngest (and the dense appointment schedule), catching the teens to help wash their faces in a nightly ritual that also involves hearing glimmers of their day, hopping on a work call and then doing deep thinking about a logistics issue, paying the babysitter, scheduling the PT appointments, and thawing something for dinner.

My life is very May-ish. It’s last concerts (3? 4?), graduation gifts and teacher thank-yous, helping kids study for finals on subjects that are over my head (math, science), tri-fold poster boards and then presentations with costumes (2), a new parent initiative, a new event to plan, I need to stop caffeine and sugar, summer swim schedule, two working kids’ schedules, 2 camps, 3 trips, one aunt in a recovery unit of the nursing home.

Your life is probably May-ish too. Even if it’s older children or young adults, a job that soaks up the last sips of energy, pushing through until retirement and sorting out your evenings after an exhausting work day, if it’s three kids under four (been there), if it’s longing for the next season while trying to appreciate being “free” and single (been there)—you also feel the lub-DUB of movement, perpetual, unrelenting.

+ + +

The rain swept across his hair, my face, the car’s side. The unexpected Minnesota mid-afternoon dump of a storm meant going into the building to fetch kids instead of them being on the hot, cracked sidewalk outside the 120 year old school, the last parochial school prek-12 in the archdiocese. We had rain coats. We made our way indoors.

I’m not saying that every act outside of silent & solitary prayer time is the same as that within it. It isn’t. I’m not saying that we can skip past the discomfort of our own belabored thoughts slowing down to fix on just Him by murmuring a Rosary in the heavy afternoon rainfall. But is my heart a ground ready to be soaked either way?

May’s the excuse this time. Then it’s June, so hot! so free from school! so busy dreaming up house projects. And July with its proud 4th and travel, rushing towards August, the month that reminds us school will not be long now. Of course, there’s never time. And there’s never enough room for Love to drip in.

So in the rush, in the rainfall, let the heart be porous and soft. Let the commute be a recitation of lovely, rote prayer. Let the dishes be an act of love for the God who is our guest. Let the stacks of bills, the jammed closets, the crammed drawers being sorted in the basement be a moment to pause in gratitude of the Giver of all gifts.

Let every marking of life in our lives be a nod back to He who keeps us in the suspension of life.

+ + +

I rushed through clean-up after sandwiches on hot sourdough to get to the bedtime chapter two of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, my 8 year old’s favorite read-aloud. We made a nest in our big soft bed whose loose linens show their decades of stretching. We dug in and laughed and paused and giggled. I did one thing, clearly present, just one thing.

And later after I kissed foreheards and tucked in errant limbs, a big “guh-night” of a night to the kiddos, I silenced my head and dropped into my heart. I sat in stillness. I fought the urge to check my phone. I sipped warm water to soak my tongue and cheek, salty from the earlier dentist trip. I sat and listened to the silence, my perpetual companion. I sat and the silence sat with me.

May your May be the time you’re fully present, finding prayer in the busy but also in the quiet. I’m praying with and for you.

Love,

Nell

ps. Video out next week with Anthony about his beard: why he shaved his head, why he grew a beard, and what the heck happened to it—for paid subscribers along with the monthly personal update. Thanks for supporting the ole substack-y if you like. But longer essays always free for you!