The lights dimmed and darkness brought silence to the chatty crowd. The dark quiet cloaked each of the soon to be kindred spirits. It took them quietly away and into a moment of solitude and reflection. Each was now alone. All senses were diminished in the darkness; only allowed to exist in the darkness was that of smell and the air filled with the scent of the thick, heavy, old velvet curtains that served as a soft barrier between the performer and her audience. The feeling of solitude was short lived.
Anticipation swelled.
It created its own reality. It was a thirst for the pending union that teased with the quiet and the darkness. Nothing else exists in this moment of waiting. The mind and heart are emptied. Emptiness allows for fulfillment. The emptiness is a cleansing. It takes the paint from the canvass and offers the artist a pure white form to create and express. It is exactly that emptiness that creates the anticipation; more of a wanting or need perhaps. “Fill me up with your essence” is the unspoken desire of the audience. They are now ready; minds free, hearts open, spirits ready, the moment has come; the silence crescendos… and the curtain slowly ascends.
A singular figure is revealed.
Nothing adorns her stage; no sets or lights, backdrops or props. The stage is naked. It offers no hope of distraction or place for surrender. Her only accompaniment comes from a single spot light that beams from above. It pierces the darkness and makes more apparent the starkness of the stage.
She stands alone.
She is exposed.
Motionless and without words, the silent introduction is made and she is exposed and vulnerable. In her vulnerability is beauty, for it is pure. It is raw. The power of her vulnerability pulls her audience; pulls them next to her.
Time stops.
The silence is momentary.
She moves.
In her movement is every tear that she has ever shed and every smile ever had by her. Her greatest dreams and most tragic nightmares are offered to those that she has captivated. Her love, her pain, her soul and her very essence radiates throughout her world.
She is brilliant.
Her brethren are overwhelmed. Her brilliance pours over them and through them. Her tears flow from their eyes. Her smile caresses their lips. Her happiness lifts their hearts and her sadness moves them.
They now are exposed too.
She cares not for what they think. Her performance is not compelled by their acceptance. It is drawn from her passion. Her passion can no longer be contained.
The moment is real. It is not contrived. The moment transcends performance. It is as real as the hearts that share it and the bond that it creates.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Lost Faith Found
“Jim from Santa Monica, you’re on the air with David Price.”
There was a brief moment of dead air. Then the voice on the other end of the line came to life. With a slight cough and clearing of his throat Jim spoke.
“You’ve stolen God, David. “
The caller sounded helpless and as if he’d either been crying or was about to. His tone wasn’t threatening or challenging like most of those that called into David Price’s daily drive-time talk radio show. His voice carried despair and loss.
David Price’s talk show was syndicated nationally. He had well over two million listeners. For the most part, his shtick was political commentary. David was a well read, intelligent and articulate man. Although sarcastic, he had a kind of charm that disarmed most callers quickly and kept his following engaged. This was one of the reasons he’d become so popular and captured the top time slot for an AM radio talk show. Put a provocative political position on the radio that is delivered in a smart, articulate and quick witted way and the result is a number one radio talk show. David’s show was based upon compelling disagreement, provocation and confrontation. It’s what sells soap and David sold lots of soap.
“I beg your pardon, Jim.” David said.
This was the only response David Price could muster. He waved at his call screener that was sitting behind the large pane of glass separating the two. Once David had his screener’s attention he mouthed the words, “What the hell?” and he pointed at the phone console in front of him. It was the screener’s job to feed David with calls that made for good radio. His screener quickly shrugged his shoulders and pointed to the computer monitor on David’s desk. There, David read the comment that the screener had placed just moments before transferring the call to David. Nothing had changed. It simply read, “Jim. Cell call- Santa Monica. Christmas w/o God.” While Price welcomed dissent and enjoyed a good back and forth with a caller, he knew that emotional callers were unpredictable and often times made for bad radio.
The caller’s voice filled David’s headset again. This time there was more despair. “Why did you take God out of Christmas?”
David thought carefully about his response. Listeners are not generally crazy about a host who aggressively confronts someone that is clearly upset. He decided to be gentle with his manner, but not be a pushover.
“I didn’t take God out of Christmas, Jim. I just don’t think God has anything to do with Christmas.”
Although his talk show focused on political issues and current events, it was no secret that David Price was an outspoken atheist. At times he was very verbal about his belief… or lack thereof. Ironically, he’d spent his academic youth in catholic school. It was there, David often said, where he learned that there was no God or Supreme Being. He often opined that, while filled with good hearted people, organized religion had subverted the true meaning of humanity with its selfish desires, greed and ego. Religion, he’d say, was made by man and for the sake of man.
“I was in the card store at the mall just now” Jim continued “I needed a Christmas card for my wife.” His voice cracked yet again, “There were no Christmas cards in the entire store. Not one.”
“What are you talking about, Jim. There are thousands of Christmas cards in the card stores at this time of year?”
Price wasn’t sure what the caller was talking about and began to wonder if the guy was a crack pot and maybe he should just hang up; something that is almost forbidden in the world of talk radio. It’s a radio host’s version of throwing in the towel or surrendering.
“No you don’t understand.” Jim pleaded, “Yes, there are thousands of cards. I saw all of them; cards with Christmas trees, cards with ornaments, ones with lights, and ribbons and packages. There are cards with Santa Clause and elves and reindeer. They have cards with wintery scenes of snow covered houses and snowmen… but no Christmas cards.” Jim almost sounded as if he were on the verge of panic; like a little lost boy searching for his mother
Dumbfounded Price responded, “Jim, you’re losing me here. I’m not following you at all. You just described a store full of Christmas cards.”
“No David, I didn’t. After searching for over 20 minutes, I finally found a single Christmas card. It was in the back corner of the store. It depicted a nativity scene. There were only four or five like it. Four or five Christmas cards, that’s it.” Jim could not hold his tears back any longer. He began to cry.
David was a bit perplexed about the Jim’s emotional trek. However, this didn’t prevent him from ceasing the opportunity to dispatch with yet another religious zealot who’d cluttered his airwaves. David smiled and rolled his eyes and in a somewhat sarcastic tone said, “Ohhhhhhhhhhh you mean religious cards.”
“I mean cards that portray what Christmas is really about.” Jim retorted.
“Ahhhhhh so you must be a Christian?” David asked with a smug tone, almost as if the man on the other end of had stepped foot into a snare that had been set by David.
“I try to be”, came Jim’s humble reply.
“So let me ask you this Jim from Santa Monica” David’s voice sounded like that of a trial attorney that was about to verbally dismember a poor unsuspecting witness on the stand.
“How is it that a good Christian, such as you, requires a card with a picture of Jesus on it to know that God is still in Christmas?”David looked up over his readers and gave his screener a confident wink as if to say check. “Shouldn’t your faith give you that reassurance, my good Christian friend?” Another wink followed as if to say mate.
There was a silence on the other end of the line and it was only broken with a sigh. Jim finally spoke again. “I’ve lost my faith, David.” Again there was silence.
“And a card would give you back your faith?” David quipped.
“Knowing that the world felt it was important enough to acknowledge that Christmas was about God would help me with my faith, David.” Jim’s voice was weaker than before. His tears had emptied from his eyes and were replaced with a profound sadness. He continued, “It’s not just you, David. It’s people like you. You are winning the battle. Slowly but surely you are taking God out of everything. Now even Christmas is losing God. No more nativity scenes, no more crosses, no more prayers, no more wishing Merry Christmas… I can’t find God anywhere.”
“Well your inability to find God in the shopping mall is hardly my fault. And I certainly am not responsible for your loss of faith.” David was ready to end this call with a quick thank you and sarcastic Merry Christmas, that is until Jim spoke again.
“No David, losing my wife is what has shaken my faith.”
---There is a singular moment of mercy that is born from time to time. It is that moment, when we look into the eyes of the homeless person and not at the stains on his clothes. It is the moment when we hear the loneliness in a cry and not the nuisance of its volume; when we feel the hand that tugs at us as a need for human touch and not an unwanted burden. It is those moments when the unifying fabric of love that connects us all, from the greatest celestial bodies of the universe to the tiniest particle of nothingness, allows us to embrace and realize that universal love creates truth, light and reason; or it is love that is created by them. The moment when we humbly acknowledge that love is truly universal and everlasting. It is healing. It is light. It is light that is shared with equal brilliance and righteousness whether it bathes the most insignificant morsel or the most Supreme Being. It is the revelation that to give our love is to embolden us and to offer our mercy, humbles us. It is what makes us capable of humanity.--- This moment was upon David and Jim.
Across the land there was silence. It stretched from one coast to the other. People paused. They gathered family, friends, coworkers and strangers to pause and listen too. At once, two million listeners became 5 million. No longer were these listeners who were just waiting to hear the sarcastic one liner from a quick witted host, though. No, now they were participants. They cared not for the traffic jam that lay ahead or the roast that needed to be pulled from the oven. They were participants in a human drama that was unfolding before them. Inasmuch as millions of souls across the country were listening, David and Jim became the only two souls on the face of the earth. Their sacred moment had arrived.
David rubbed his forehead and leaned back in his seat. He took a breath and swallowed. With a sincere sigh he broke the silence, “I’m sorry for your loss, Jim.” He remembered that Jim had mentioned that the Christmas card he’d purchased was for his wife. The thought made David’s throat tight and Jim’s sadness ebbed into David’s being.
“Losing her has shaken my faith and it’s so hard to find now” Jim sounded as if he were talking to himself, almost as if he’d forgotten he was on the phone at all.
The sound of rubber peeling off the tires of car that has slammed on its breaks is unmistakable. Whether it’s heard from the street, over the phone or through the speaker of the radio it is an awful sound and it brings worse tidings because it is a sound that is almost always followed by the sound of a car being smashed. Such was the sound that suddenly came blaring though David’s headset. It startled David to the point of almost falling from his chair. His listeners, all of them, shook in unison. Then, just as abruptly, and in stark contrast to the screech, came dead silence.
David was shocked. It took him a several moments to gather himself. His ability to cope with this call without becoming emotionally involved had become difficult. Now, it was futile. He whispered in a cautious voice that was soft, like that of a man who feared waking an infant from the innocence of sound sleep, “Jim. Jim are you ok?”
He looked up from his microphone to his screener whose mouth was half agape. David looked as if he was searching for mercy more than a response from Jim.
“Jim!!”
“Jim are you o.k.”
Several agonizing moments past and Jim’s groggy, half conscience voice was heard, “I’m hurt… bad I think.”
“Jim, it will be ok. I’m sure someone has called 911 by now!” David’s voice was starting to race. The reality of the moment pushed David into panic. He pressed his headset against his ears with both hands. The screener didn’t bother signaling David of the upcoming commercial break. This moment was beyond ratings and selling soap or a can of beer.
“Jim, can you hear me” pleaded David.
This time the pause was longer. Finally Jim could reply, “I’m hurt bad I think, David. I’m not sure I’m going to…” Jim’s voice was weak now and it trailed off at the end so that David could not hear the last words of Jim’s sentence.
“It’s o.k. Jim. You hang in there help is on the way.” Sirens howled across the airwaves. Help had been summoned and was, indeed, on the way.
Jim softly spoke again, “I don’t want to die alone.”
“Oh dear God” David mumbled to himself. “Hang in there my friend. They’re almost there. I can hear them. Hold on.” With great determination David’s pleading continued.
“I’m not going to… I don’t want to die alone.”
David looked at his screener whose hands were pressed against the window that separated them. David threw his hands in the air and shook his head. He didn’t know what to do. He was at a complete loss. Helpless overcame him. It was made worse by his desperate need to do something to help.
Jim’s next words came in a hushed tone and were delivered with intimacy and need. He whispered, “Pray with me.”
David’s eyes left the window where his screener stood. His hands slowly descended to his desk and he stared at his microphone. His screener had never seen such a look on David’s face; profound indecision. He almost looked afraid. He was being invited to a place that he had left long ago. It was a place that he remembered, but it had been so long since he’d left, he feared he might not remember the way back or what to do when he got there. It mattered not.
Jim began to pray, “Our Father, who art in heaven…”
David closed his eyes, found peace and he joined Jim, “hallowed be thy name and kingdom…”
As the prayer finished, David’s was the only voice that could be heard, “Amen” he proclaimed.
Tears streamed down David’s face. His heart filled by the moment of peace. He wiped the tears from his eyes and took several deep breaths. He paused for several moments and then he cleared his throat, crossed his arms over his chest in a self embrace and he spoke.
“You’re not alone, my friend. You’re not alone.”
There was a brief moment of dead air. Then the voice on the other end of the line came to life. With a slight cough and clearing of his throat Jim spoke.
“You’ve stolen God, David. “
The caller sounded helpless and as if he’d either been crying or was about to. His tone wasn’t threatening or challenging like most of those that called into David Price’s daily drive-time talk radio show. His voice carried despair and loss.
David Price’s talk show was syndicated nationally. He had well over two million listeners. For the most part, his shtick was political commentary. David was a well read, intelligent and articulate man. Although sarcastic, he had a kind of charm that disarmed most callers quickly and kept his following engaged. This was one of the reasons he’d become so popular and captured the top time slot for an AM radio talk show. Put a provocative political position on the radio that is delivered in a smart, articulate and quick witted way and the result is a number one radio talk show. David’s show was based upon compelling disagreement, provocation and confrontation. It’s what sells soap and David sold lots of soap.
“I beg your pardon, Jim.” David said.
This was the only response David Price could muster. He waved at his call screener that was sitting behind the large pane of glass separating the two. Once David had his screener’s attention he mouthed the words, “What the hell?” and he pointed at the phone console in front of him. It was the screener’s job to feed David with calls that made for good radio. His screener quickly shrugged his shoulders and pointed to the computer monitor on David’s desk. There, David read the comment that the screener had placed just moments before transferring the call to David. Nothing had changed. It simply read, “Jim. Cell call- Santa Monica. Christmas w/o God.” While Price welcomed dissent and enjoyed a good back and forth with a caller, he knew that emotional callers were unpredictable and often times made for bad radio.
The caller’s voice filled David’s headset again. This time there was more despair. “Why did you take God out of Christmas?”
David thought carefully about his response. Listeners are not generally crazy about a host who aggressively confronts someone that is clearly upset. He decided to be gentle with his manner, but not be a pushover.
“I didn’t take God out of Christmas, Jim. I just don’t think God has anything to do with Christmas.”
Although his talk show focused on political issues and current events, it was no secret that David Price was an outspoken atheist. At times he was very verbal about his belief… or lack thereof. Ironically, he’d spent his academic youth in catholic school. It was there, David often said, where he learned that there was no God or Supreme Being. He often opined that, while filled with good hearted people, organized religion had subverted the true meaning of humanity with its selfish desires, greed and ego. Religion, he’d say, was made by man and for the sake of man.
“I was in the card store at the mall just now” Jim continued “I needed a Christmas card for my wife.” His voice cracked yet again, “There were no Christmas cards in the entire store. Not one.”
“What are you talking about, Jim. There are thousands of Christmas cards in the card stores at this time of year?”
Price wasn’t sure what the caller was talking about and began to wonder if the guy was a crack pot and maybe he should just hang up; something that is almost forbidden in the world of talk radio. It’s a radio host’s version of throwing in the towel or surrendering.
“No you don’t understand.” Jim pleaded, “Yes, there are thousands of cards. I saw all of them; cards with Christmas trees, cards with ornaments, ones with lights, and ribbons and packages. There are cards with Santa Clause and elves and reindeer. They have cards with wintery scenes of snow covered houses and snowmen… but no Christmas cards.” Jim almost sounded as if he were on the verge of panic; like a little lost boy searching for his mother
Dumbfounded Price responded, “Jim, you’re losing me here. I’m not following you at all. You just described a store full of Christmas cards.”
“No David, I didn’t. After searching for over 20 minutes, I finally found a single Christmas card. It was in the back corner of the store. It depicted a nativity scene. There were only four or five like it. Four or five Christmas cards, that’s it.” Jim could not hold his tears back any longer. He began to cry.
David was a bit perplexed about the Jim’s emotional trek. However, this didn’t prevent him from ceasing the opportunity to dispatch with yet another religious zealot who’d cluttered his airwaves. David smiled and rolled his eyes and in a somewhat sarcastic tone said, “Ohhhhhhhhhhh you mean religious cards.”
“I mean cards that portray what Christmas is really about.” Jim retorted.
“Ahhhhhh so you must be a Christian?” David asked with a smug tone, almost as if the man on the other end of had stepped foot into a snare that had been set by David.
“I try to be”, came Jim’s humble reply.
“So let me ask you this Jim from Santa Monica” David’s voice sounded like that of a trial attorney that was about to verbally dismember a poor unsuspecting witness on the stand.
“How is it that a good Christian, such as you, requires a card with a picture of Jesus on it to know that God is still in Christmas?”David looked up over his readers and gave his screener a confident wink as if to say check. “Shouldn’t your faith give you that reassurance, my good Christian friend?” Another wink followed as if to say mate.
There was a silence on the other end of the line and it was only broken with a sigh. Jim finally spoke again. “I’ve lost my faith, David.” Again there was silence.
“And a card would give you back your faith?” David quipped.
“Knowing that the world felt it was important enough to acknowledge that Christmas was about God would help me with my faith, David.” Jim’s voice was weaker than before. His tears had emptied from his eyes and were replaced with a profound sadness. He continued, “It’s not just you, David. It’s people like you. You are winning the battle. Slowly but surely you are taking God out of everything. Now even Christmas is losing God. No more nativity scenes, no more crosses, no more prayers, no more wishing Merry Christmas… I can’t find God anywhere.”
“Well your inability to find God in the shopping mall is hardly my fault. And I certainly am not responsible for your loss of faith.” David was ready to end this call with a quick thank you and sarcastic Merry Christmas, that is until Jim spoke again.
“No David, losing my wife is what has shaken my faith.”
---There is a singular moment of mercy that is born from time to time. It is that moment, when we look into the eyes of the homeless person and not at the stains on his clothes. It is the moment when we hear the loneliness in a cry and not the nuisance of its volume; when we feel the hand that tugs at us as a need for human touch and not an unwanted burden. It is those moments when the unifying fabric of love that connects us all, from the greatest celestial bodies of the universe to the tiniest particle of nothingness, allows us to embrace and realize that universal love creates truth, light and reason; or it is love that is created by them. The moment when we humbly acknowledge that love is truly universal and everlasting. It is healing. It is light. It is light that is shared with equal brilliance and righteousness whether it bathes the most insignificant morsel or the most Supreme Being. It is the revelation that to give our love is to embolden us and to offer our mercy, humbles us. It is what makes us capable of humanity.--- This moment was upon David and Jim.
Across the land there was silence. It stretched from one coast to the other. People paused. They gathered family, friends, coworkers and strangers to pause and listen too. At once, two million listeners became 5 million. No longer were these listeners who were just waiting to hear the sarcastic one liner from a quick witted host, though. No, now they were participants. They cared not for the traffic jam that lay ahead or the roast that needed to be pulled from the oven. They were participants in a human drama that was unfolding before them. Inasmuch as millions of souls across the country were listening, David and Jim became the only two souls on the face of the earth. Their sacred moment had arrived.
David rubbed his forehead and leaned back in his seat. He took a breath and swallowed. With a sincere sigh he broke the silence, “I’m sorry for your loss, Jim.” He remembered that Jim had mentioned that the Christmas card he’d purchased was for his wife. The thought made David’s throat tight and Jim’s sadness ebbed into David’s being.
“Losing her has shaken my faith and it’s so hard to find now” Jim sounded as if he were talking to himself, almost as if he’d forgotten he was on the phone at all.
The sound of rubber peeling off the tires of car that has slammed on its breaks is unmistakable. Whether it’s heard from the street, over the phone or through the speaker of the radio it is an awful sound and it brings worse tidings because it is a sound that is almost always followed by the sound of a car being smashed. Such was the sound that suddenly came blaring though David’s headset. It startled David to the point of almost falling from his chair. His listeners, all of them, shook in unison. Then, just as abruptly, and in stark contrast to the screech, came dead silence.
David was shocked. It took him a several moments to gather himself. His ability to cope with this call without becoming emotionally involved had become difficult. Now, it was futile. He whispered in a cautious voice that was soft, like that of a man who feared waking an infant from the innocence of sound sleep, “Jim. Jim are you ok?”
He looked up from his microphone to his screener whose mouth was half agape. David looked as if he was searching for mercy more than a response from Jim.
“Jim!!”
“Jim are you o.k.”
Several agonizing moments past and Jim’s groggy, half conscience voice was heard, “I’m hurt… bad I think.”
“Jim, it will be ok. I’m sure someone has called 911 by now!” David’s voice was starting to race. The reality of the moment pushed David into panic. He pressed his headset against his ears with both hands. The screener didn’t bother signaling David of the upcoming commercial break. This moment was beyond ratings and selling soap or a can of beer.
“Jim, can you hear me” pleaded David.
This time the pause was longer. Finally Jim could reply, “I’m hurt bad I think, David. I’m not sure I’m going to…” Jim’s voice was weak now and it trailed off at the end so that David could not hear the last words of Jim’s sentence.
“It’s o.k. Jim. You hang in there help is on the way.” Sirens howled across the airwaves. Help had been summoned and was, indeed, on the way.
Jim softly spoke again, “I don’t want to die alone.”
“Oh dear God” David mumbled to himself. “Hang in there my friend. They’re almost there. I can hear them. Hold on.” With great determination David’s pleading continued.
“I’m not going to… I don’t want to die alone.”
David looked at his screener whose hands were pressed against the window that separated them. David threw his hands in the air and shook his head. He didn’t know what to do. He was at a complete loss. Helpless overcame him. It was made worse by his desperate need to do something to help.
Jim’s next words came in a hushed tone and were delivered with intimacy and need. He whispered, “Pray with me.”
David’s eyes left the window where his screener stood. His hands slowly descended to his desk and he stared at his microphone. His screener had never seen such a look on David’s face; profound indecision. He almost looked afraid. He was being invited to a place that he had left long ago. It was a place that he remembered, but it had been so long since he’d left, he feared he might not remember the way back or what to do when he got there. It mattered not.
Jim began to pray, “Our Father, who art in heaven…”
David closed his eyes, found peace and he joined Jim, “hallowed be thy name and kingdom…”
As the prayer finished, David’s was the only voice that could be heard, “Amen” he proclaimed.
Tears streamed down David’s face. His heart filled by the moment of peace. He wiped the tears from his eyes and took several deep breaths. He paused for several moments and then he cleared his throat, crossed his arms over his chest in a self embrace and he spoke.
“You’re not alone, my friend. You’re not alone.”
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