All That Remains the Same

Touching hands with our younger selves

I asked Eric if, for Valentine’s Day, he would add some more photos to our digital photo frame. It’s well-populated with the kids’ baby pictures, gorgeous shots from our wedding, and a smattering of favorites from more recent days. (I’m sure I could figure out how to do this myself, but I generally prefer not to truck with technology and instead leave such details to people who speak its language more fluently.)

I figured Eric would add in more photos of hikes with the kids, gleeful Christmas mornings decorated with shreds of wrapping paper, first days of school, the hilarious poses our kindergartener is always striking in the middle of the living room.

The photos he put into the carousel completely surprised me.

They were pictures of us. Photos we took on our first trips together, at dinners with friends, on all our many adventures, a decade and a half ago.

They kind of took my breath away. Because I can’t say that I think too often about those kids, about how deliriously happy they were. (We are still deliriously happy, but the delirium has become rather more literal after a decade of parenting, which is to say, we are a lot more tired now.) I was so touched that when I asked Eric to load up some photos, those are the ones he thought of first. So many happy memories. So many very questionable “fashion” choices by yours truly.

Last week, we had the opportunity to visit those kids in their old stomping ground. Our boys had the week off school, and we flew down to the Bay area to visit my brother and his family. We hit up every science museum in the metropolitan area, the kids had a great time playing together, and we even miraculously lucked into a sunny day in February, so clear that we could see the Golden Gate Bridge (which one of our kids kept hilariously calling “the Golden Grate (Great?) Bridge.”)

Eric and I met in Berkeley in 2008, when we were both working on our doctorates in wildly different fields (Russian lit, astrophysics: opposites attract!) The seven years I spent at the altar of higher education held plenty of stress and pain, but all that remains for me in Berkeley is the unmitigated joy of those early years with Eric. We moved away in 2011 after we got married, but every time I go back, I can hold the past in my hands, or at least catch its scent in the eucalyptus groves.

I didn’t tell anyone I was coming, since I find it highly stressful to make plans that my, ahem, traveling companions are unable or unwilling to comply with. I just sailed through Sather Gate and right up the steps of the building I entered daily for the better part of a decade. We got to take the kids up to the top of the campanile and over to the cafe where Eric and I had our first date (the coffee is still exceptional, perfect every single time).

So much has changed in my life since that time. But I found myself thinking with gratitude about all that remains the same. I’m still the same woman fumbling for God and filling notebook after notebook with journal entries. I still live for books and coffee and travel. I still spend most of my days reading on the couch and then occasionally moving to the dining room table to write.

It was a comfort to encounter my younger self. It was a comfort to realize that I’m still her. It is a comfort to think that if I can touch hands with my younger self, maybe I can touch hands with my older self, too. I hope she’ll still be reading. Still be writing. Still be fumbling for God.

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A Few Hopeful Things:

-As I’m continuing to take steps forward in my career, I keep trying to plumb the depths of my creative and spiritual desire, to mine down to the central core of what I most want to do, where the deepest callings lie. It’s an idea that won’t let go of me, and I loved fleshing it out for Jesuit Media Lab this month.

-Spiritually minded Star Wars fans, did you know that my friend Eric Clayton wrote a book for you?! It’s out this week!

-Well, this isn’t exactly a hopeful situation, but I am nonetheless filled with hope by the people who continue to put flesh on their faith in service of others. My friend Pauline Hovey wrote for NCR about her experience with Annunciation House in Texas, which is currently under threat. Last week at mass I clung to several words from the opening hymn “Tree of Life”: “though you die in all of history, still you rise with every morn.” Even the lightest perusal of the news is evidence of Christ crucified all around us. It’s enough to make me feel like I am wearing my skin inside out. But if there is suffering all around us, then there are also endless opportunities for mercy, for compassion, for justice. May we all reach out to shoulder the cross.

Fumbling for God with you,
Cameron