Terminal // Liminal

Dust to dust.
Beat to beat.
A time to sow.
A time to reap.

One heartbeat begins..
Beats..
Ends.

Another heartbeat begins.
Beats..
Ends.

Repeat.
Repeat.
Repeat..

Life became fascinating in unexpected ways on March 21st, 2014.
From (near) terminal, to liminal. 

Liminal

“… when you have left the tried and true, but have not yet been able to replace it with anything else.  It is when you are between your old comfort zone and any possible new answer. If you are not trained in how to hold anxiety, how to live with ambiguity, how to entrust and wait, you will run…anything to flee this terrible cloud of unknowing.”
- Richard Rohr

When the cardiothoracic team strapped me with my arms wide open on that cold, metal table, numbed me to sleep, froze my body, and sawed my chest open only to sever the broken heart valve inside of me, I entered a state of living and reality that few people have the blessing to experience.

Most people live in the "life to death" arrow direction. 

I entered what would be an M.C. Escher'esque mobius strip of life to death.. to life again.

From terminal; signing wills and putting signatures on handwritten letters to loved-ones if the Lord takes me home to liminal.. the in-between, a place to live and learn life's threshold again.

Learn to breathe again.
Learn to walk again.
Learn to feel again.
Learn to move again.  

The great unknown.
The gray space in the spectrum of white to black.
The uncomfortable silence between life, and death.. and death, to life. 

Beauty, from ashes.

What I have learned in these years..

What I have come to appreciate in these years..

What I have approached with complete and utter uncertainty and nothing but hope, and faith and awareness of the supernatural reality deep inside the sinews of the chamber that beats life throughout my body..

Priceless.

Cardiovascular/respiratory endurance, stamina, strength, flexibility, power, speed, coordination, agility, balance, accuracy.. sound familiar?

Going from 100% to hovering near 0.. and working through the liminal to get to 103% one day.

Embrace the uncertain.

Sit in the disquiet between definite and definite.

Welcome the questions. 

Ask better questions. 

Absorb the good. The bad. The black. The white. 

Taste the liminal and shear off the artifice that you once held dear.

Terminal?

No way; there's a heart beating in my chest.

Liminal. 

Ready Still Ready

We have seen a single drop of sweat float weightless from our face to the ground below.

We have felt a beat pulsate into our forehead as we prepare.

We have heard our heart drum through our ears.

Ready.
Still.
Ready.

We have held the weight on our shoulders.

We have gripped the cold steel waiting for us.

Ready.
Still.
Ready.

We have tightened up and focused.

We have zeroed out the noise.

We have traveled into darkness.

We have been raptured into white.

We have seen God.

We move.

We keep going.

Ready.
Still.
Ready.

Old Souls (Fishermen)

Moon in sky, and sun not fully risen.
Each travelled from his own home, his own way. 
Two men, perhaps older than expected, yet young at heart.
Organizing, setting up gear.
Seated here. Seated there.
Fog of silence broken with the spark of conversation. 
Reminiscing. 
Remembering.
Describing what felt how, and how what felt.
Time's hourglass paused its sand from sifting.
Time stood still. There was no one around.
"Do you remember when..."
Agreement. 
Wise considerations.
Revelry in the reverie. 

Christo and Paul discussed Nokia's.
Flip-phones. And how the iPhone 5 felt.

Blood Sky At Morning

Whether the weather
Man the sails
Man the sails
Man the sails

Perspective is everything. 
Before. 
During.
After it all. 

Will the boat make it.
Dark waves. Tumultuous sky.
Of this I don't know.
Perspective is everything.
For an origami sailboat on the snow.