Eight years ago I went off on my first travel adventure to His Mansion in New Hampshire, a ministry assisting young adults who are in a spiritually vulnerable time of life and who are brave enough to reach out for a helping hand. I will always remember my six weeks in the fall of 2004, working among these beautiful people. A friend I met there is working through her FB list, writing essays honoring each friend. It was my turn today. Thank you, Wendy, for this sweet dessert.
#149 Heidi Johnson could say she brought her ministry to His Mansion, and she could say she found it already there. After she finished the Healing in Context of Community course, she continued on for the six-week practicum, adding the feat of producing her Joseph play to the full schedule of living with the women as an intern. I could say she was my first work-crew leader, but really she was my first artist in residence. Between the constructing and collaborating of her creative drama, and the woods where she'd disappear for hours climbing the mountains, she was revealing, showing, even signaling the importance of weaving together her love of nature, her love of people. Watching her between these two worlds, I remember the small comforts she treasured in the midst of long hours: the silk house slippers folded into her bag for indoors, the scarf her mother sent when the wind whipped up Wolf Hill Road, the cup of tea in her hand as she sat in a rocking chair near the window of the women's dayroom. And I remember the hardiness of embracing nature, work, activity, a core of resilience that bent without complaint. "Let's take a walk up to the cell tower before class!" she'd say. "We only have fifteen minutes! Can we?" Up and down, there and back again, we were dropped off to class out of breath and successfully flushed with oxygen. What was she teaching us, tromping along mountain streams, setting up stage practice in the few free hours? For me, the lesson remained a mystery, and for a long time it wasn't as important as Heidi herself, who is also a bit of a mystery. Perhaps biased by her poetic soul, and perhaps swayed by the fact that I still need these moments that she embraced among us, I have found a way to embody them for myself in a world of grasses on an inland ocean: it is the importance of remembering and forgetting. On the hill, Heidi risked remembering that each of us had talents, creativity, and skills, whether for drama or work crew, and she cared about us even more than about why we were there. Some had possibly forgotten that, in the midst of changing their life for a new place, new schedule, new living situation, they were still, well, people. Walking in the woods, Heidi helped us forget for a while that we were residents, that we were in New Hampshire for any other reason but the colors of fall, the sight of rushing water, the snaps and thuds of adventure. Forgetting made room for more remembering. Remembering grew stronger with supportive kindness. Forgetting took more forms--telling, writing, praying--remembering took more forms--pausing mid-work for a drink, laughing at the meal, sending a letter, sharing a dream. Forgetting became letting go, the way a bent branch is released slowly to avoid hitting the next person on the trail; remembering became receiving and acting, a place to focus, a step of self-expression. Both of these look now like the warp and woof of faith, but I remember them mostly as Heidi's art form, especially the time we spent reading Robert Frost's "The Master Speed," remembering it over the years as the first time in a long time that I remembered what it was like to be me. Thank you Heidi! Blessings on your writing, travels, and love of nature. My deep admiration and love.
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