Dearest Harry

I've been trying to write, but every time I think I'm ready to leave something here I read something else that turns it all upside down and leaves me speechless. Harry has done that several times the last week or two over at Jake's place. This morning it was more than a pause -- it was Harry's turn to Stop the World.

The occasion was Harry's Dinner with Katharine. It brought me laughter and tears. The laughter came from his masterful account of what it's like to attend clergy functions as the Quirky Other and Love of His Life. I've done very little of that but boy does he capture it all -- everyone talking about how great things are in their parishes, the Anglophilia, the elegance, and the ease with which a non-clergy person can provoke silence and quizzical looks. I, for one, often feel like I'm one of those sea monsters in the film Harry described, walking around dripping on the hotel floor with people wondering what I'm doing there.

And the toes! How can I ever stop for a moment of reflection now without first thinking of toes? Wiggling, dancing, right out in your face ugly, pink, white, and fleshy toes, glorious toes.

Of course there was so much more, those deep, odd moments of synchronicity: planes and mothers and fathers and death and reconciliation. Tough honest talk about bishops and archbishops, primates, cabbages and kings. Sleepless nights. And then.........the World Stopped at a school in Central Tanganyika.

Maybe we don't need another hero, but I must confess that Harry is mine.

And I wonder when we are ever gonna change it
Living under the fear till nothing else remains
All the children say

We don't need another hero
We don't need to know the way home
All we want is life beyond the thunderdome

What do we do with our lives
We leave only a mark
Will our story shine like a life
Or end in the dark
Give it all or nothing

We sang and danced and paused to look at our toes. The World Stopped.... and went on. Thank you God for Harry.