A typical, pastor speak, opening line for this essay might be: “This Lent I have been daily thanking God for the black Labrador who was delivered to us in late January via the Guide Dogs for the Blind Puppy Truck.” But to begin with an expression of what I actually feel, it's more accurate to simply say: “I am hopelessly in love with Tifah.”
It’s hard not to love a puppy. But I would have to say that my relationship with this puppy is markedly different than with any of the six previous Guide Dog puppies our family has raised. I imagine this is a combination of my awareness and Tifah’s uniqueness, and to be sure, she does remind me of Pilaf, dog number three. But she has one trait that is especially endearing and affirming. She is a contemplative. She loves to pay attention, watch and listen. When we head down to the bottom of the driveway before and after her breakfast, she almost always pauses, sits and listens. The birds are out in force, singing away; Tifah clearly notices and seems to enjoy their song.
Projection? Perhaps. But if you saw her do this, I think you would agree with me. She seems to understand that she has a job to do so that we can return to the house, but in her choice to sit and wait, I also hear her saying: “Don’t rush me. I’ll get around to it. But do you hear that? Take a moment to take it in. You won’t be sorry.” I do. And I’m never sorry I did.
In this world of goal setting and to do lists, it is so easy to turn life into nothing more than the accomplishment of the tasks that we have carefully laid out the day before. Success is gauged in terms how good we are at management by objective. Wake up, review the list, attack each bullet point, and at the end of the day make tomorrow’s list. But here’s the thing about these lists: they aren’t simply an end in themselves; they can take us to places where we discover things that we had not expected or imagined. There at the end of the driveway I get a gift as I wait and listen with Tifah. I hear an invitation to life that I would not have heard but for her choice and my willingness to join her in it.
As I have previously mentioned, Wendell Berry’s poetry has been another thing that has been saving my life this Lent. In one poem in particular he paints a picture of the lesson Tifah has been teaching me:
Off in the woods in the quiet
morning a redbird is singing
and his song around him
greater than its purpose,
a welcoming room of song
in which the trees stand,
through which the creek runs.
(This Day, 2011 --- VII)
Like Tifah, the redbird is involved in a work he does not know about. He is creating a “welcoming room of song,” and so inviting all in his hearing to listen and perhaps join in the song. When I pay attention to and accept those invitations, my life is fuller. Suddenly I am about much more than my goals. I am a participant in something that I could not have created by myself or achieved merely through the accomplishment of my stated objectives. And that’s a lot of fun.
In Luke’s telling of the Palm Sunday story (Luke 19), the Pharisees are uncomfortable with all the adulation Jesus is receiving and tell him to tell the crowds to be quiet. Jesus’ reply to them is priceless: “I tell you if these were silent, the stones would shout out.” The invitation to that room of song is sounding. In fact, it can’t be silenced. The question before us is whether or not we pause long enough to hear it and then take the step of entering the room to join in the song. It means the sacrifice of laying aside some of our urgency and humbly recognizing the limits of our lists. But it’s a heck of a lot more fulfilling than coming to the end of the day with nothing more than the anticipation of tomorrow’s list.
Dave Rohrer
4/3/2020