On Wandering // Bamidbar
Bamidbar feels SO RELEVANT right now. Wandering aimlessly in the desert for forty years. This is kind of my life. Aimless wandering.
I have a few things on the calendar. A few long trail runs. A holiday weekend at a mountain cabin. Chicago in the fall. But other than that… I am doing a lot of wandering. A lot of running. A lot of holding my baby so she is off the ground where she is 100% likely to put a choking hazard in her mouth. A lot of imaginary play with my three year old. Man, that boy is creative.
My planner is full of park dates and running dates. Our Subaru has become our tabernacle. I feel the pull to drive the 100 miles north more and more with a baby nephew I’m eager to hold and love and bond with. The car requires a minimum 10 minute tidy every day. We really live in that thing. The back of the car has exploded with stickers lately. We’re those people now. I’ve always been secretly a little jealous of those people.
The people who don’t care if a sticker technically lessens the value of a vehicle. The people who march to the beat of their own drum. The people who unabashedly like what they like.
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Each of the families and tribes have roles and a camping formation delineated in Bamidbar as they wander in the desert. I’m thinking maybe I am a descendant of the Gershonites, one of the three Levite families. The ones responsible for the roof coverings and tapestries of the Mishkan.
Lately I am the purveyor of picnic blankets. I load up the trunk with a jogger, a big woven basket of blankets and toys and food, my ukulele in its hippie soft case with back straps, occasionally even my acoustic guitar in the hard case I’m borrowing. I wear romper play clothes or my one pair of paint splattered shortalls. As Ben runs ahead to the slide, I unload my trunk haul on the park sidewalk. It takes three trips to set up camp under a shade tree with Leah hoisted on my hip. I feel as close to Fraulein Maria as I ever will. When I look at it this way, I would say I am doing very well right now. However mindless or chaotic or purposeless or meaningful any given moment may feel.
Shabbat Shalom, friend. Consider this your permission slip to wander aimlessly a little more this week :)
P. S. It is 7:39 am and both kids are still sleeping! Goal is to mix the challah dough before I hear stirrage… Wish me luck!