junkmail for blankets

holding on for dear life

My dear friend Casey is making vows tomorrow. The man she's marrying, Colton, an Okie, has become my friend in the last week. Colton talked excitedly to me the other day about noodling. This is what I wrote them for the rehearsal dinner:

Nine years ago, I spent a summer in New Orleans working, sweating, drinking, and ministering alongside Casey. I hadn’t really known her before then. I know this because my journal from the time records the following bit of monologue: “Dang you, Casey Coleman.” Had I known her before then, that wouldn’t have been the first time I wrote or said that. “Dang you, Casey Coleman,” the journal continues, “because when I think I’ve been generous with people, I look at you and feel absolutely stingy in relation; when I think I’ve been hospitable, your open arms make me look like I’ve been walking around hugging myself; as soon as I feel proud of how well I think I’ve been listening, I get annoyed with all the people talking about how much they love you, and I want to tell them to shut up.” Well, and Casey turned the tables on me, as always: I was the one who was danged, not she. And in many ways, without her, I was the one who would have been damn-ed: When God has needed to convince me of his generosity, of his open arms, of an open door, he has done so through his people, and in ways that she will never know, he’s done so through Casey.

Just a few days ago, I found this on someone’s website: “She’s been pretty influential in a lot of my friends’ lives. And her recognizing me always gives me a warm glow.” I’m not making this up; Casey helps to keep me grounded in reality; she knows that I need this; she always has one hand stuck down my throat and wrapped around my heart; she listens to me; she has a thousand ears.

After tomorrow, I won’t know Casey anymore, but I will know Casey and Colton. God knows I don’t know much about couples, but I do know something about talking and listening, about reaching out, and much of that I know because of Casey, so don’t hear what I’m about to say as exhortation or charge; rather, hear it as a reminder of what you already know to be true; I suspect that married people need reminders as much as anyone else.

Some of us prefer the ancient ways, the tried methods, eschew technology and safety and sterility for mystery and risk and the thrill of being grounded in clay and water. In Oklahoma, those people are called noodlers. What they do, in other regions, is called “hogging” or “dogging” or “stumping,” “graveling,” or “grabbling.” Such proximity to your honeymoon clears me of the need to provide any exposition here.

Noodling is, I’ve read, the most ancient form of catching catfish. Perhaps “catching” isn’t the best word. In certain rivers, inexplicably weighty catfish hide under rock ledges and in holes, waiting out the scorching sun, waiting out a feast that might happen by unawares. Noodlers, however, are perfectly aware of what they’re doing, though that awareness does nothing to steady the pulse, salve the fear, soften the question “How in the world did I get myself into this” as the noodler submerges himself in the water, sticks his hand into a hole, and waits for a 60-pound fish to swallow his arm. As the noodler reaches out, he knows that he has no other means at his disposal For all the other devices and methods on the market, he knows deep down that this is the only way to do it. And when I remind you that the word “noodle” also refers to a “fool,” you are not surprised.

There is that moment, I imagine, as you reach in to the unknown, the dark waters, when you’re forced to acknowledge the risks: moccasins, turtles, biting and snapping, a creature that won’t conform to your imagining peeling off layers of skin. Onlookers might say, “Well, if you’re gonna do it, at least wear gloves,” but you know that to do so would be to kill the sense of touch you need to understand what, exactly, you’ve gotten into, as your fingers become your ears, listening for movement and mood and “My God, this thing goes deeper than I could have known”; would be to kill the possibility of reaching in so far that you could grab a hold of that cat’s heart and not let go until you’ve either drowned or emerged from the water, having listened and risked til-death-you-do-part.

Fingers or ears, is there anything rawer, older, deeper, or more necessary than to risk listening well? Maybe, but it’s not something you can do. It’s already been done. Two arms, one pointing east and one west, reached out once into time and space, their hands big enough to reach into the darkness and to risk and wrap around a million hearts. Then the arms sagged, the life spent, a drowning in water like fire, and days later, an emerging, and a commission to the fish themselves to go out and noodle even when it hurts. And as much as you, then, reach out, as much as you listen, you will hesitate, your breath won’t hold out long enough, you’ll wonder with them all, “How in the world did I get myself into this?” The thing is, what you’ll need to remember over and over is that you died already, baptized, and were raised to life, and there is nothing, not the deepest, coldest, darkest hole, that can separate you from that life. Is there anything more important to daily tell each other, more necessary to daily hear? If so, Casey, if so, Colton, I’ll be danged, not because I trust you or love you, but because I trust God through you, and through you, arms open and listening, we can know that we are loved.

Posted by ghetto monk at August 19, 2005 09:39 PM | TrackBack