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No Strings Attached

April 17, 2012 by Heather Burdick

I just spent a wonderful weekend with a really great guy. We went out to a film festival and dinner, talked about all of the world’s problems over coffee in the morning, made dinner together the next night, and saw some of the beautiful sights of Durham. It was a delightful weekend.  Don’t be shocked, though, it’s not what you think.

We usually think of a “no strings attached” relationship as one of sex with no expectations.  But what if that was reversed and it was just a nice time with another human being without any expectation of sex or romance? What if we could spend time with someone without wondering where it was going, if he would call, or searching every conversation to determine whether or not he was “the one.” What if we were free, no strings attached, to simply enjoy the company of another human being, male or female, for a few days?

This is the joy of being part of the couch surfing community. The way it works, is that you join this online community – couch surfing.org and share a little bit about yourself and your ability to host – whether you have a couch available for travelers coming to your town or if you would rather just get together for coffee. If you are looking for a place to stay, you read the profiles of the people who live in the city of your travel destination, then send a couch request to someone that you choose based on their profile. Hosts can accept or reject any of the requests they get.  There is also a place to leave references for the couch surfer and the host, so you can see what kind of a guest or host the person is and what others have said about them.

I signed up on the site in 2010 when I had that exciting summer of travel, but I couldn’t get anyone to host me, maybe because I didn’t have any references or maybe I just seemed scary.  After all, I am outspoken about my faith – who wants a religious nut on their couch?!  When I got back home, I hosted some wonderful people – a nice young man from Germany who came and helped my church choir with their German pronunciation, a really sweet young couple from Australia, and two girls from Italy who were stranded in Orlando without a place to stay.

I have found the people in the couch surfing community to be just wonderful.  They are open and trusting, love to travel, and love to meet other people. I am hoping to break out of my role as a host and be a guest in my upcoming travels this summer.  Yes, I’ve seen the movie Taken and know that it is risky to invite strangers into my home and to stay in the homes of strangers.  But, it’s also risky to go to school, or walk in a gated community, or live anywhere that has weather.  If something happens, at least it would be in the act of being in community with others.

Stay tuned for more Couch Surfing adventures, and if you’re ever  in Durham…

Posted in Christian Life, Friendship, Religion | Tagged | Leave a Comment »

The Sucker Punch of Grief

April 10, 2012 by Heather Burdick

We were talking in one of my classes the other day about how they don’t really use the stages of grief as much anymore, mostly because people go through things at different times in different ways and it’s not a linear progression through them to healing. Grieving sometimes comes out of nowhere.  I was prepared for it with Christmas, but when I cried all through the Easter service, my favorite service of the year, it took me by surprise.

It started with the opening hymn, Christ the Lord Is Risen Today, a hymn that I have sung almost every Easter for as long as I can remember.  The 3rd verse, when the sopranos did a high descant and the brass came in, the waterworks started; tears of joy in being moved by the music. But, then they didn’t stop.  Oh how I wish I could be a pretty crier.   It took a moment to figure out what the heck was wrong with me – then BAM – I pictured me and my sister as little girls dressed up in our fancy Easter dresses and white gloves and I realized, this is the first Easter without my mom. We had a long history of Easter Sundays together from childhood Easters at our church in Kentucky, then the sunrise service on the beach in Cocoa Beach.  Even when I was on the road, if I was home for Easter, we would go to church together.  When I became the choir director at my church, mom never missed an Easter cantata that we usually performed on Palm Sunday.  She loved to hear the organist – on any Sunday – but especially on Easter.

I was looking through my saved email – a file I usually forget about – on Friday and found an email from my mom from 2005.  It’s the only one from her that I saved.  While a lot of times she was critical – true to her belief that loved ones provide “friction” for each other to make them better people – this one was different.  In it she says:

Thank you, thank you, Heather.  Your email was one of the most precious gifts I ever received   I was feeling refreshed when I woke, but you made my day.  You gave me the permission I need, but your affirmation of my caring over so many years touched me in a wonderful way…You are so stong, Heather.  I think I was for a time.  The physical impairments have made me vulnerable and aging certainly changes perspective.  I am wantinag to dance, to laugh more, worry less.  I hope your boundless energy does not diminish.  I envy your spiritual quest.  I admire your parenting.  No obstacles seem to weaken your resolve to live well each day.  Guess if I gave any advice, it wold be to stay in excellent health, continue your spiritual journey, keep your sanity, and don’t pass up opportunity to give a bit of yourself to others without losing your balance.  I am so proud of the adult you have become.  Love, Mom.

With all of this swirling in my head, Sam Wells, as usual, has a sermon that is right where I am titled,   “Why Are You Crying?”

We are supposed to be joyful on Easter.  I read somewhere this week that every day is Easter for Christians.  I think it’s truer that time is peppered with the cycle of Holy Week.  We have the triumphal entry of Palm Sunday, followed by the betrayal of Good Friday, the numbness of Holy Saturday (my mentor Steve Harper wrote about this in his blog Oboedire) and the joy of resurrection on Easter morning. While our personal life doesn’t always follow the liturgical calendar, it can be filled with hope, that even darkness doesn’t last forever and that joy and light is always just around the corner.

After the tears, I had the opportunity to walk in the woods with Grace and celebrate an Easter feast with one of my classmates and her wonderful family.  Her mom had the exact same experience during the exact same hymn and we shared how much we both missed our parents.  It turned out to be a beautiful day.

Posted in Religion | Tagged , , | 2 Comments »

No One Wants to Be Converted, But Everyone Wants to Be Transformed

April 7, 2012 by Heather Burdick

This was an interesting Holy Week.  In church history we have been learning about the Catholic/Protestant tensions in the Reformation and the Jewish/Christian tensions throughout church history.  So many of these different practices of faith have led to oppression, persecution, and destruction.  One of my friends posted on Facebook this week about having people in their door to door evangelism, telling her that her religion was wrong. I just finished reading the book Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe that is a story of the complexity of missionaries working with a totally different culture that they have made no effort to understand.

How can something like having a passionate life of faith go so wrong sometimes?

Our differences can enrich us, if we will quit trying to change each other and learn how to love each other. The time I felt most welcomed as a visitor was in a Jewish synagogue, when a member of the synagogue wrapped his prayer shawl over my shoulder and included me in prayer.  The time I have felt most moved by the liturgy was in a Catholic Mass, especially with the sensory experience of  incense, which I greatly enjoyed with a friend this week. I have felt the most  courage to lay down my worldly life for a life of following Jesus in a conservative, evangelical church. I have felt the most moved in spirit-filled expression in a black church setting.  While I have never experienced any kind of sacred Eastern religious service, I feel that there is sacred space in yoga class, recognized by saying “Namaste” which means “I bow to the divine in you.”

But where I have found my home is in the open hearts, open minds, and open doors of people  in my own church experience, who have seen the divine in me, looked past the rest, and loved me into transformation.

In my Christian faith, I believe that God is with us in the person of Jesus, who shows us how to love by healing and forgiving in many acts of unconditional love that free people from their sins to live in peace.  Jesus sees the worth in them and acknowledges it. When he says “go forth and sin no more” it’s not in a “straighten up and fly right” way, but instead a gift of freedom that shows them that they can live a full abundant life, instead of being bound by the sins of their past.  He shows us that we are to love and forgive each other, even if it kills us. His resurrection, that we joyfully celebrate tomorrow, shows us that whatever happens on earth, isn’t the final word. It shows us that God has a greater plan than what we can imagine or control.

Maybe one way of loving is recognizing the great potential for love in each other.  Maybe instead of focusing on converting people, we can simply acknowledge the divine in them and see what kind of transformation God will make through the act of love.

Posted in Christian Life, Religion | Tagged , , | Leave a Comment »

Searching for Home

April 1, 2012 by Heather Burdick

I think a lot of us are like the little bird in the children’s book, Are You My Mother?  We spend our lives searching for our true home, becoming disappointed time and time again when the place we thought could be our home, turns out to be not quite right.

Here are some place I looked for home:

As a teenager I wished for cute clothes (even though I totally rocked those Coca Cola pants, no matter what my junior high classmates thought) and thought that dressing pretty and having a boyfriend would be home.

In my twenties, I had cute clothes (well, it was the 80′s, so factor that in) and a boyfriend (and then a husband) but when I faced bouts of unemployment as a musician, I thought that if I just had a stable career, I would be home.

In my thirties, I had a stable career as a teacher, but was alone again.  I thought that if I found the man of my dreams, I would be home.

In my forties, I had all of these things that I had wanted, but it turned out to be a decade marked by many losses of loved ones.  I experienced the loss of several students, whose lives were just beginning.  I lost my brother, who was only 46. A series of pets also left the scene, Sammy the cat, Taylor the beagie beag, my mom’s cats that I was caring for, Charlie and Kika, Mr. Runaway the gentlemanly kitty, and Mr. Duke my sweet little basset hound.  I went through my second divorce and just when I had recovered from that, lost both of my parents, five weeks apart. A lot of loss and a lot of sadness.

But, my home was not in the loved ones, or in the jobs, or in the boyfriends or husbands, or in the cute clothes.  It was in God, all along. While there has been loss there have also been many beautiful blessings along the way.  No matter what I have, or don’t have, if I am with God, I have everything.

Posted in Christian Life, Religion | Tagged , , | 2 Comments »

25 Years Ago Today

March 29, 2012 by Heather Burdick

25 years ago. I gave birth to my first baby and it changed my life forever. Brittany was about a week early and due to some complications (basically, she didn’t want to come out head first) I had to have an emergency caesarean. Since my doctor was away, I had to use the doctor on call, a guy from New York who didn’t pronounce his r’s and called me “Heathuh.”.  It was scary and difficult, but while I was prepared with the nursery, baby clothes, and volumes of literature about being a mom, I wasn’t prepared for how much I was going to love this precious child. In spite of the complications, she was just perfect, with an APGAR score of 10/10.  She could have modeled for Pampers or Gerber on the first day of her life. As the first grandchild on both sides of the family, she was welcomed into the world with enormous amounts of love.

While I had felt bits of love before – for my family and my husband (maybe a little for David Cassidy in 1969), this love was the biggest thing that I ever experienced. I brought her home from the hospital and for the first time in my life felt a real sense of purpose.  I was the only who knew what the different cries meant.  There was the hungry cry, the bored cry, the poopy cry, the tired cry, and  one that she had to go through to get to sleep, and any amount of trying to get around it only prolonged the process.  She needed me and love poured out of my heart in volumes that I never knew existed.

Now, she’s all grown up.  Today she is a quarter of a century old. People always tell you when you have little ones to enjoy them while they are young.  But what they don’t tell you is that you love them more every year as their life unfolds and they continue discovering who they are.  My momma bear heart is just bursting with love for the beautiful, kind, talented, creative, intelligent young woman she has turned out to be.

Brittany, all grown up!

Happy 25th Birthday, Brittany!!

Posted in Religion | Leave a Comment »

Liberals are from Mars, Conservatives are From Venus

March 24, 2012 by Heather Burdick

When John Gray came out with the book Men are From Mars, Women are From Venus, it gave us ways to have a better relationship with someone who has a whole different way of thinking from our own. It moved to solve the problem of wondering, “How could this person think this or say this?” Instead of arguing for who is right or wrong,  it gave couples a way to relate to each other in a more respectful manner and to understand our differences,.

We need this book to be written for our current political climate to get through this election year.  I have sort of an interesting perspective, as I have been all over the map politically.  I think most of us come to our political identities because of our experiences. My parents were both Republicans and my mom was very involved in politics.  I think she viewed the Republican party as the “respectable” party, much like a college girl would want to pledge the “right’ sorority. But she was true to her views.  When she disagreed, she spoke up about it.  As someone who valued family, she also valued women’s reproductive rights and was pro-choice most of her life.  She marched in support of the Equal Rights Amendment in Tallahassee in the 1970′s and campaigned for many state and local candidates.  When I was a teenager, I went with her to an event to hear Ronald Reagan speak.  My mom told me that he would be our next president. I got to meet him and shake hands with him.  I wasn’t old enough to vote the first time he ran, but the first time I voted for a president, it was to re-elect Ronald Reagan.  If you want an image of my political identity as a teenager, watch the TV show Family Ties and look at Michael J Fox’s character.

The first time I really listened to a different point of view was when my great Aunt Cora talked about President Reagan’s re-election.  She was one of my favorite older relatives, just as sweet as she could be, living very simply on social security.  She never engaged in the heated political discussions at family reunions between my mom and Aunt Dottie who were very outspoken Republicans, and my sister and Aunt Charlotte, who were very outspoken Democrats.  Aunt Cora just quietly said, “I’m not going to vote for him again, he nearly starved me to death.”

As my life unfolded, and I had my own experiences outside of the shelter of my parent’s house, I developed my own political identity, which has become just to the left of the center. I am an evangelical, patriotic, Bible following, Democrat.

I am not involved politically, like my mother was and my sister still is, but I feel that my participation in the political arena is meant to be one of peacemaking and reconciliation.  For some people, this is not possible. They are addicted to anger. Watching or listening to political commentary that fires up this anger is just, in my opinion, one of the worst things happening in our country right now.  I love to hear a smart, well informed person, with different views talk about their perspective.  Even better when they can admit the weaknesses of their view or candidate that they support.  When their view is only negative about the person who is currently in office or when they start quoting these angry political commentators and view everyone who disagrees as an idiot, it’s not a conversation that I want to have.

The other day, after chapel, I was talking to the chaplain and she pointed at this bird outside sitting on top of one of the tall trees.  I couldn’t see it from where I was standing.  She kept pointing at it, but I couldn’t see it. When I moved and stood where she was standing, I could finally see it from her perspective.  Ah!

Posted in Christmas, Politics, Religion | 2 Comments »

The Steeper the Steps, the Bigger the WHEEEE

March 20, 2012 by Heather Burdick

When I was little, there was big excitement when they assembled this big slide in the K Mart parking lot.  A few times a year it would come to town and people would buy tickets to this attraction, where you climbed up to the top and then slid down on a burlap sack.  I always got about halfway up the steps, when I chickened out and walked back down.  It’s probably a telling part of my personality that I was willing to do the work of climbing, but unwilling to enjoy the fun of sliding.  After seeing the adventurous ones in the neighborhood with bumps, bruises, and burns, getting hurt was too big a risk for me.

This was typical of me – I wasn’t afraid to  work hard, but when it came to enjoying life, I kept to myself and hid from adventure.  Too much potential pain.  As I got older, I chose friends, boyfriends, and husbands who could show me how to live a little and enjoy life.  I got some of those bumps and bruises along the way but my heart healed and it brought me into a whole new world without fear, ready to accept the risks and embrace the joy.

During orientation at Duke, they told us that we would get to a point in the school year where we would come to the end of ourselves and at that point, we would have to trust God to carry us forward.  That point came pretty early in my experience.  Last semester was one of the steepest climbs of my life, but in the death of my parents, tears flowing freely, I clung to God for dear life and God carried me straight up the side of that mountain.  When we got to the top,  I found peace with my parents’ passing and survived the semester, I felt an exhilaration that lasted for weeks, and rested in the peaceful assurance of God’s presence.

This semester, I’m experiencing a series of climbs and joys.  When I’m working on a paper, it’s like climbing the steps, hard and sometimes frustrating work.  I eat everything in sight, question my abilities, beat myself up over any amount of procrastinating, and experience the anxiety of not being as smart or as focused as I would like to be. I  take time everyday to sit quietly and connect with God’s presence.  Then I submit the paper and before it is even graded, feel the joy of what I learned and the accomplishment of completing a difficult task. I used to think that I had to do it all alone, but I have learned to use the resources around me for support and to stay focused on God.  The “Wheee” at the end of a challenging task is pretty amazing.

As I complete my next paper on Romans 5:1-11, the words of Paul are in my thoughts:

We boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.  –Romans 5:3-5

Posted in Christian Life, Religion | Tagged | 2 Comments »

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