Field Notes

How do we belong to eternity? I think of this while surfacing in the water, which is delightfully wavy in the wind. I dive down again, let my body be suspended between the lake bed and the air, and relax for a moment. I feel almost weightless in the motion of the water. I come up, look to the horizon. Only lake and waves meet my eyes, stretching as far as perceptible. I feel vividly alive.

This is a ritual for me – every summer I need to submerge myself in the majesty of Lake Erie at least one, let the water fully surround me, and let myself feel very small. The year doesn’t feel complete without it. It’s a great lake: both pun and fact. Lake Erie is beautiful. Its hues of blue, the waves or lack there of, and the size are a consistent marvel to the eye. Even when frozen, it still delivers awe. We drink it, it brings us snow and rain, buffers the temperature, and provides habitat for nature because it is nature.

This ritual overwhelms my senses and forces me to pay attention exclusively to the joy of being alive. In these moments I lose my sense of grief or the shadows of fear of whatever is troubling me. Opening the NY Times app is an exercise in frustration. My friends are impacted by changes to our society that none of us want. Most of my time is spent with people who want to structure our world with the value of caring; we’re losing to people who want to structure the world through domination.

I want to hold tight to that I care about, making sure they can’t slip through my grasp. I cannot prevent the passage of time nor the changes of the world and circumstances beyond my control. This weighs on my heart. I have build my world on certain things. I aggressively want to keep them.

My religion (Unitarian Universalism) does not require me to choose to believe what cannot be proven. As the Rev. Dr. Forrest Church is known for saying, religion is about “being alive and having to die.” Religion gives a framework to structure meaning about both. My faith includes respect for nature, understood as an interdependent web of life that includes us too. Milder than death, I use my faith to cope with impermanence.

In the chaos of the world, I find grounding in the blooming flowers of my garden, the warm light emanating from the windows of the pool my daughter’s practicing artistic swim in, the sparkling fire flies surrounding me when I walk the nature preserve at night. Nature’s beauty, in so many ways, reaches out and grabs my attention, as if to remind me to stop getting lost in my head and notice that I am here.

How do I belong to eternity? The same way all things do: as a piece of a greater whole. Nothing is meant to linger forever. We are here now, in a moment that is never meant to exist again. Existence warrants our full submersion in getting to be alive. Lake Erie will outlast me and everyone I know. Everyone I love is someone I could potentially grieve – be with them here now. But in some moments, I can let go and occupy this piece of eternity without worrying about what was before or what will be next.

Everything is ephemeral, and everything is change because it is supposed to be. But right now? This? This is lovely.