Practice

I think about my mother, about the things I admired. I remember being in awe of the ease with which she moved, accomplished tasks. I was envious of the way she could make a bed. Sheets flat with nary a wrinkle in sight. Tucked in at corners, the comforter pulled back to welcome sleepy heads, pillows fluffed. I would try to make my bed without getting out of it. I couldn't do it. I could never get the blanket centered, I wouldn't take the time to smooth out the creases, pull back the sheets, start at the beginning.

I remember watching her swing a rubber spatula around the edge of the mixing bowl, pushing mashed potatoes or cake batter or cream cheese frosting towards the spinning beaters. It eluded me, the grace of cooking with ease. How she could measure out ingredients with an eyeball instead of a cup.

I remember being so frustrated with getting myself ready in the mornings. I tried to roll my hair up into hot rollers, but the rogue ends stuck out like feathers in a cap all over my head. I didn't pull it tight. I had no confidence. I burned the back of my neck. I would drop the metal clasps. But my mom--she could pull the hair taught, roll it up, every piece. All accounted for. She could brandish a curling iron the same way, she wasn't scared of being burned. She had done it too often.

My mother did all of these things countless times. My mother was good at these things because she had practiced. My envy or admiration or frustration with myself was really just the start of the novice. The beginnings of motivation. My mother made countless dinners, all delicious. She hated sleeping in a messy bed, and so she had learned, by doing it, the skills to make the layers crisp, clean, smooth. She got herself ready every morning, did her hair, her makeup, until it was immaculate. She had practice. She had practiced.

I think about the things I want to be practiced in. I can now cook with ease; I have done it so often. I can make a good bed. I can curl my hair. The things I desire are to be patient with interruptions, to have grace for others, to depend less on what other people think of me.

I think about my grandmother whom I don't see often anymore. I think about how I didn't appreciate her during childhood. She was content with her simple life. She stayed home, did the same routines over and over. She would wake up at 4:30, make coffee, breakfast, kiss my grandpa goodbye. She would do the dishes in the sink, even though she had a dishwasher. She would watch the Today show, maybe do the ironing, pressing everything until it was perfectly starched, hung on the hangers in the laundry room.  Her house was so clean, so neat, decorated with antiques and grandfather clocks and Aladdin lamps and sometimes I would count the doilies just to have something else to be cynical about. My grandmother was always so gracious with her time. She was never too busy to sit down at the table and have a cup of coffee, to watch Anne of Green Gables and fall asleep in her chair in the middle of the afternoon. When we came to visit, there was forethought-- prizes on our bed, our favorite snacks in the pantry. She got down on the floor and played with my brother and sister, with my children too, letting them lead. Doing what they wanted. I thought she was simple. I thought her rote routines so boring, so unfulfilling. My grandmother, who never complained to me, who always gave people the benefit of the doubt, who lived her simple life in her beautiful house and made lots of room for lots of love. She knew something I didn't.

This is why we practice liturgy. This is why we do things over and over again, practice rituals, speak truth, pray at certain times, repeat scripture. This is why--so we can learn to believe it. So it can transform us. The doing of it, is what makes us. It is not the end in itself, but a means to an end. When I am faithful in praying the liturgy of the hours, the words of truth are more readily at hand. I can recall them.  It is only by the practice of turning to God as our refuge that we become more inclined to keep turning that way. It is only by practice that we can live out our hope.

I think of the song--Tune my heart to sing thy grace. Tuning. Tuning an instrument. It doesn't seem to be a particularly pleasant experience, to be tuned. To have strings tightened, taught, loosened again. To feel things shifted and moved, to be plucked and tried and tested. The tuning is one thing, but to be tuned, that is another.

How can we allow God to tune our hearts this Advent? How can we allow him to reorient ourselves to him? How can we practice making time and space for God and for one another?