Mary Oliver . . Tuesday - Messenger

Messenger

Lamb in pasture - Hawarden, Wales

by Mary Oliver from Thirst (Beacon Press)

My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird —
  equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me
   keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be
   astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all ingredients are here,

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
   and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
   to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
   that we live forever.

I've been having an issue with my work lately.  I've spent the past two years basically floating in the breeze as I finished my doctoral degree and all the work that entailed, while letting the work that pays the bills ebb and flow.  That cycle carried me through graduation in May, but then May became June, and June became December and there I was, still anchored in the same place. 

So come mid-February I decided it was time to get down to business-- to make a change, get organized, develop a plan, envision goals, create to do lists . . . basically get my act together.  I spent weeks on the project . . . dreaming, scheming, filling my walls with a festive patchwork of post-it notes and sheets of paper with headings like "Communications and Marketing" and "Potential Income Streams."  Eventually the post it notes and newsprint came unstuck, raining on my desk like a spring shower until I gathered them up and organized them into on-line notebooks via One Note.

My desk during the planning

At the end of the second week I double checked my  notes to make sure I'd captured everything electronically, put the paper out for recycling, and turned off my computer, breathing the sigh of satisfaction that comes from a job well done.  I had a plan, I had goals, I had tasks to do to achieve those goals. I'm not a very detail oriented person but I was beginning to understand why some people find making lists or adhering to directions comforting.  Seeing the storm of ideas that usually were swirling around in my head set concretely on paper, even virtual paper, was like settling into the eye of the storm. The energy was still there but I was able to gain some perspective on the maelstrom around me rather than being being caught up in the chaos.  On Monday morning, I told myself, I would get up early and get to work.

And then my computer crashed.  And then a family crisis took center stage.  And two external deadlines loomed large.  And life has yet to go back to "normal" . . . or has it?

At one point during the writing retreat I facilitated on St. Patrick's Day, we started talking about the phrase, "Life is what happens when you're making other plans."  And that's exactly what happened to me. 

By the start of April I had planned to have my website up and running, some future retreats penciled on the calendar, a few essays in the mail to potential publication venues.  Instead I've been running to the grocery store and pharmacy, have doctors' appointments for my parents scheduled, and a host of essays to still be edited (although I have managed to finish a new piece and a poem that needed very little editing appeared when I was in the shower one morning). 

I yearn for more than a couple hours here or there to delve into "my work" but as I read this familiar Mary Oliver poem on Monday morning, it brought back a conversation I had several years ago with my former boss/mentor/friend.  We were discussing vocation and he said that vocation isn't your job but rather your work.  For some people it's building things or fixing things, for others it's nurturing or teaching or encouraging, or loving the world. 

For me, my vocation came to me one night in the shower.  (A lot of good thinking happens when I'm bathing, and while a lot of vocations seem to be gerunds, I don't know if bathing is a vocation although I have no doubt thinking is.)

My vocation is feeding people.  All the jobs I've ever seriously considered making a career fall under this heading-- pastry chef, teacher, writer, retreat leader, combination book store/tea shop owner (one of my fantasy lives).  My work is giving people food for their mind/body/spirit. 

The question I've been asking myself is has my work really been interrupted these past few weeks?  Or am I just living out my vocation in a different way than I planned when life happened . .

What is your vocation and how are you living that out in your current circumstances?