♪ I Hope You Dance

     I dunno if you saw this, but today when I saw 'Where in The World is Matt Lauer?' and his piece about a tribe of Namibians who live the same way their ancestors did thousands of years ago, in dung huts and with little water, living on goat milk and goats' meat -- I got a little wistful.
    Wistful?? <she has definitely gone over the edge, you say>. Wistful. These people are herders.They have no phones, no computers, no electricity. The men wear western dress now, but the women still wear goatskins garments and use a mixture of ocher, ash, and grease to protect and beautify themselves. To make of for lack of water, the women cleanse themselves with smoke from burning a local herb, so they smell pretty.  
     Every evening they sing and dance in front of the holy fire, as the sun goes down, thankful for another day. The sheer joy on all faces is what made me wistful.
   There is an undercurrent of malaise among us these days. Nothing seems right, like when you are a little kid and one of your parents goes away on a business trip or an extended visit, and the house isn't the same until they come home. We have fleeting happiness, but rarely know that sheer joy.
    Most of us Westerners certainly would not  in front of a small fire -- before retiring to a dung-covered hut to sleep on the ground for the night.
    That is all they know, and ergo, all they need.
    I am looking at my laptop, a TV remote, my 3G cell phone, a flat-screen TV, XBOX 360, DVD player, and a cozy living room full of stuff that I have acquired, arranged, and adored for quite some time. Not saying that I wanna go live in a dung-covered hut anytime soon, but the pang of near envy I felt for that thankful face in a desert sunset near a fire really grabbed my consciousness.
    Similarly, yesterday morning in church, I had that same longing for simplicity and peace, and it was answered in a manner most removed from the Namibians' day-to-day existence. I sing in a church with great gleaming organ pipes above each side of the chancel where the choir sits, and we face each other instead of looking out to the pews. Every Sunday, the organist plays the prelude while people straggle in from the parking lot, the restroom, the classrooms, wherever. My section sits and chats about the events and folks listed in the bulletin, and there is a pleasant buzz of fellowship and conversation throughout the sanctuary.  I tuned out yesterday, and just listened to the music.
    The combination of the soaring rich notes of the organ emitting from those gleaming pipes, the sight of 10-foot stained glass windows arching high above warm stone walls, and the intricately carved woodwork gracing the tops of the pipes like a mahogany curtain somehow removed me from the chatter and the crowd. I didn't move, didn't consciously tune out, but the glory of what I was seeing and hearing took me to a place where sheer beauty and I existed alone for just a few moments.
   I struggle with what I don't have. I can't point to a long and lucrative career, my body has been attacked by cancer and cancer-related surgeries, I haven't had the same 'regular' life as my peers, and have yet to 'catch up' with the ones I deem successful. I struggle with the fact that I feel the same way I did in high school, present but not really part of the scene. LOL
   God has a way of yanking me out of the doldrums. The wondrous sight and sound of the prelude yesterday evenly matched the wonder of the joyful faces of those simple people this morning, and then a friend posted this from Ralph Waldo Emerson.
      "To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
    Joy can be found in rich, sumptuous experiences -- and in sparse simplicity. Your spirit can dance beneath mahogany woodwork in a cathedral, or on a desert floor. We are all minutiae in the story of the universe, but we can dance while we are here.


I hope you never lose your sense of wonder 
You get your fill to eat 
But always keep that hunger 
May you never take one single breath for granted 
God forbid love ever leave you empty handed 
I hope you still feel small 
When you stand by the ocean 
Whenever one door closes, I hope one more opens 
Promise me you'll give faith a fighting chance 

And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance 
I hope you dance 
I hope you dance 


Lee Ann Womack