No One is Exempt

There is a collective suffering in the world right now. We can’t ignore it like we have conveniently done in the past—when the suffering didn’t affect us or threaten us or kill us or shut down our businesses or make us lose our jobs or change the way we lived our lives. But now…now all of those things are possible or happening. No one is exempt. Some are better off than others, but no one is exempt.

Suffering is personal, even as we do this together as a world. It hurts our bodies, our spirits, our resolve, our bank accounts, our hearts. In the throes of our personal suffering, we slip into survival mode—we become less social, more focused on ourselves. We may lash out at those around us—the very ones we love and adore who are standing up in the shaky boat with us. Or we may project our pain and suffering onto ‘them,’ the ‘others’—the ones making the ‘rules’ to try to keep us from dying, the media who are informing us, our neighbors who aren’t following the ‘rules,’ the ones who think, act, look, or believe differently than we do. ‘They’ are to blame for the pain.

Personal suffering feels like living all alone in a hermit hut in the wilderness—and the roof leaks when it rains—and the cold wind blows in through the cracks—and there’s barely room to lay down—and the food is scarce—and there are creatures lurking about outside and inside the tiny hut….

…and looking out, the world looks bleak and bare.

Chris and I hiked at Saint John’s Arboretum last weekend. We were not very far into our walk before I saw a sight that made my heart so happy—a cluster of Pasque flowers! Lavender sepals with delicate stripes, bright yellow stamens, soft, fuzzy stems to insulate them from the still-cold nights. Pasque flowers are the first prairie flowers to bloom; they signal the end of Winter, as they can bloom surrounded by snow. They are a sign of Spring and hope. (The word Pasque is derived from the Hebrew word for Passover.) So lovely!

Yellow and red-twigged Willows with yellow-flowering catkins burst into life around the lakes.

Red-winged blackbirds sang their joyous melody from their precarious perches on old Cattail stems.

Another early-blooming grassland plant is Prairie Smoke. I scarcely caught sight of the pinkish-red flower buds in the old and new growth of the prairie grasses.

The waterfowl birds were in the predictable, peaceful process of nest-building, mating, and raising a family. The seasonable cycle, the circle of Life. New life among the remains of last season’s life.

Trees at the Arboretum had just begun to bloom—the pinkish-red cloud of Maple tree blossoms…

…and the delicate yellow blooms on my favorite flexible little tree, Leatherwood!

No matter the length or harshness of Winter, when the warming sun of early Spring hits the bare, leaf-covered ground in the forest, the Spring Ephemerals burst into bloom! They grow, flower, and fade away quickly, but they are an important part of the ecosystem being the first food for pollinators.

Life was coming to life again after a cold, seemingly lifeless Winter. It is the way of Mother Nature. The bleak and bare world was an illusion—the life force was hidden for a while, resting, quiet, gathering nutrients and strength, preparing itself for the growth and renewal of Spring.

Mother Nature brokers in miracles.

What if no one was to blame for the pain and suffering of this virus? Not China or Trump or Democrats or Republicans or immigrants or Pelosi or that woman governor or fill-in-the-blank. That’s not to say that no one has responsibility or that no one has made mistakes or even that no one hasn’t purposely tried to injure or subject another group of people to hardship. In leadership there is accountability, responsibility, and consequences. Blame is a useless act of projection based on trying to get rid of our own very real pain. Suffering is the illusion of a bleak and bare world. It is the winter of our lives. It is living in a hermit hut and hating every minute of our existence. It is lashing out at those we love and those we oppose. What if pain and suffering are actually harnessing our virtuous qualities to pull us away from the perils in the old life? What if we are resting, a needed rest, in order to burst into new growth? What if right beyond our suffering is a blooming, melodious, life-creating world? Nature is the harbinger of miracles. No one is exempt from the Grace.