The Last Long Day

Right now, I’m sitting in a rehearsal. Moments ago, I met with some seminarians from as far away as Provo and Sedona and Des Moines and Denver for a chat about vulnerability and a quick Compline. The day started with Morning Prayer at a church waiting for the internet guy to show up. After that, two seniors and two classes of acting and directing students needed feedback. Then theatre major portfolio reviews.

Couple weeks back, for a show, a couple colleagues and I pulled 160 hours in the span of about eleven days.

Y’all, I’m wiped. Loads of us are. A seminary friend reported to a bunch of knowing, nodding heads that he couldn’t remember the last month.

There is a weariness that comes at the end of all seasons and semesters and shows.
Sometimes we just need a little hope is all. To put the burnout to bed.

For me, hope comes in the form of watching a little girl whose mom is in this little Advent and Christmas concert we’re playing later this week. The little one likes to dance and sing along with us. Hope also comes in the form of watching a work colleague play the piano for us. And another work colleague, a Jewish fellow who blessedly corrects our pronunciation of Jesus’s ancestors and offers good-spirited theological jabs, but who keeps showing the hell up to play a mean fiddle for songs about baby saviors. And longtime friends whose thoughts I know and who know mine. We don’t have to talk. We just have to breathe together and tap feet.

Hope is in bodies and breath. Little lullabies we sing to each other, decades after being children.