shalom.

The past few days have looked a lot like this .... 

some ah-mazing ladies. 

chicago natives are strong and sassy.

most of our weekend? stu and the ladies. 

remake of a picture from this post.

so. much. air.

The past few days have been filled with good food, lots of laughter, ample dancing, adventuring, remembering, and spending quality time with some of the most amazing people I know - the second seshhh Castaway summer staff family. The only word I can use to describe our reunion together is shalom.

"There is a way of living, a way of harmonizing and hitting a balance point, a converging of a thousand balance points and voices, layering together, twisting together, and there are moments when it all clicks into place just for a split second - God and marriage and forgiveness and something deep inside that feels like peace - and that's the place I'm trying to get to. 


I have glimpses every once in a while of this achingly beautiful way of living that comes when the plates stop spinning and the masks fall off and the apologies come from the deepest places and so do the prayers, and I am fighting, elbowing to make more of my life that life. I want that spirit or force of happiness that is so much deeper than happy - peace that comes from your toes, that makes you want to live forever, that makes you gulp back sobs because you remember so many moments of so much un-peace. I search for those moments the way I search for beach glass, bits of glitter along a desolate expanse of sand, and I want those moments to stretch into hours, into days.


The word I use for it is shalom. It is the physical, sense-oriented, relational, communal, personal, ideological posture that arches God-ward. That's the best way I can describe it. It's equilibrium and free-fall, balance and shake. It's a new dance, a new taste, the feeling of falling in love, the knowledge of being set free. It's that split-second cross between a fact and a feeling, something you would swear on in a court of law but couldn't find words for if you tried." - Shauna Niequist, Cold Tangerines




Thank you Regan. Thank you Molly. Thank you Amy. Thank you Emily. Thank you Grace. Thank you Heather. Thank you Stu. Thank you Peter. Thank you Dan. Thank you Mike. Thank you Kelli. Thank you everyone who was with us in spirit. Thank you for this weekend. Thank you for laughter and dance parties and adventures. Thank you for spontaneous togetherness. Thank you for honest conversation that points upward. Thank you for building up. Thank you for the sweet, sweet glimpse of shalom - for the minutes and hours and days of peace and celebration and life together, pulling one other up toward something bigger.