This last week has given me a lot to sit with over the course of my JVC experience. Things about myself have come to light that, while I knew them to be true, I probably did not fully understand how intensely the manifested in my daily life and interactions. Most of this weeks reflections have had to do with me-in-relation, also known as, community.
Let me fill you in here.
I am living in a community of 3. Normally, JVC does not allow for communities to be any less than 4 people, but we live in St. Francis, South Dakota, where your standard rules do not really apply - ever. All three of us (Mike and Jessica are my housemates names, for the record), work for the same organization, the St. Francis Mission. Again. In most JVC communities, each person has their own unique work placement that they go off to during the day, and then return to their house/apartment to live out community life. In my community, we wake up to each other, we eat breakfast with each other, we say goodbye, only to meet at the door and walk to work together, spend the whole day together, eat lunch together, eat dinner together, hang out in our house together (get the rhythm here?). The majority of communities in the Midwest provence (my home provence), are located in big cities - Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Nashville, Atlanta, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Kansas City, St. Louis - in other words, fairly large metropolitan areas, many of which have public transportation (in other words, some sort of possibility for autonomy).
St. Francis. Oh St. Francis. With a minimum of 40 minutes between anything that even has a grocery store, travel is somewhat difficult. Rapid City, the nearest thing that can be considered a "city" (though by NYC standards, I'm being generous here), is a 3 and a half hour drive. All three of us share a car, so whenever we do something, it is almost always as a group. Weekend time? There is no exploring the city, visiting museums, enjoying the adventure of venturing in city canyons, alone, with wide eyes and open hearts, whisked away by the L or other modern conveniences. In other words, the farthest I can go on my own is as far as I can go on my bike, and generally, the most I see are cows and horses, occasionally a wild pack of feral dogs that will try and rip my legs off.
What does this all boil down to? Close. Proximity. It means that I spend nearly every single waking minute with these two people who I have just hardly met.
Well. I do not do small. If you've seen me eat, I don't do small portions. I don't do small inside voices. I don't do small personality. It just isn't me. I am a large person, with large feet, large hair, and large dreams. And as far as I can remember, small groups of people who I spend every moment of time with has never been a part of my life either. Quite the contrary. It was something I avoided as much as possible. I was always afraid of cliques. I hate being boxed in and contained. In high school, I played on the soccer team, I played in the jazz and concert bands, I wrote for the school newspaper, I acted in the plays and musicals, did service work, went on retreats - this isn't a list of achievement as much as it is an indication of how diverse the circles I ran in were. Different people, different experiences, different places - new, exciting, different. That is how I operate, same deal in college. Walking across campus with a friend, they asked if there was anyone in the whole damn college who I didn't know. I budgeted an extra 15 minutes on the way to class in order to stop and say hi to people. This is not an appeal to some imagined popularity, but just pointing to the fact that I have always have had a large heart, one that wants to fit as many people as possible.
So what has it been like for me to live with Mike and Jessica? To spend every damn minute with the same people over and over again.
Frustrating. I wonder how I'm going to survive in such a claustrophobic environment. The sheer repetitiveness of it is enough to drive me up the wall (for the record, I would like to note that I have showed tremendous restraint throughout this piece in using expletives as adjectives, though that may better reflect my mindframe). Challenging. It is really pushing my boundaries as far as what is comfortable for me as a person in relation with others.
Life-giving. I guess that's really the only word for it. It's life giving. To be honest, just today at lunch I told both of my housemates that I would normally not seek out their personality types to be good friends, to be my release as far as having a close relation goes. But over these last three weeks, I have really felt supported by these people. They have put up with all my crap, all my crankiness, moodiness, weirdness, quirkiness, brashness - everything. They ask me if I'm all right when it's obvious I'm not, because they genuinely want to know and hear why I'm struggling. They ask me if I'm all right even when I'm fine, because they care about how I'm doing. They listen to me when I rant about spirituality and cosmic injustice. They help with my laundry, help clean up, help me wake up on time.
They piss me off, just because we are so different. But that's the beauty, right there. Playing music with Jessica is tough. We come from completely different musical backgrounds and mindsets. But that's the beauty. It's the challenge of allowing two completely unique and beautiful entities to come together in harmony and make something work. Still separate, still unique, but now in relation, necessarily molded and shaped to work with one another. It has been so life giving. Talking faith with Mike can be extremely challenging, because we come from totally different experiences, with a different set of assumptions and beliefs. But, ironically enough, we have become one another's "spiritual directors," taking more from each other in our late night conversations than I have from many of my actual spiritual guides. We come from completely different spiritual backgrounds, and to try and find ways for all of us to be authentic, respectful, and open to growing, has been and will be a challenge, but a challenge I welcome with a smile. When there is real laughter in this community, it is real. With such different humor and personalities, genuine laughter and enjoyment is genuine. It's real. And I appreciate it so much more because I know how many differences and boundaries that laughter, that understanding, that willingness had to overcome to be incarnate.
It's a challenge, issued by the universe, to a small minded, ignorant, and hard hearted individual (me!). "Can you love these ones enough to let them be themselves, in all their differences and quirks, frustrating habits and beautiful talents. And can you let them love you with all of yours?" Who am I to reject what has been made and shaped by the Universe, by Love?
I love this place. I love these people. Hopefully enough to let them stand in all their unique, dysfunctional, awesome glory, while I just look on in wonder and admiration. It doesn't mean it isn't hard. Love doesn't make things any easier, just worth it. And so far, I am happy to say that this experience has been well worth it.
No comments:
Post a Comment