To Hold On? To Let Go?

Michelangelo’s “Creation of Adam” on the Sistine Chapel ceiling sucks me in, the whole painting and the vastness of the ceiling it looks down from, but mostly, that small space between the finger of God and the finger of Adam.

As the story goes, the image depicts the moment of creation. I’m absorbed by the image. I ponder, not the second of imparted life and breath, but the seconds before and afterward.

Adam and God stretch toward to each other, God giving life, Adam receiving life.

Did God pause, just before that touch? Did both pause just afterward? The painting is frozen, with Created and Creator forever not quite touching.

Consider the instant after breath flowed into man, after the startling intensity of that life-touch. Adam, to me, seems to be already pulling away, leaving God and man each with his own realization of the distance between them . . . so close but so separate.

I want them to hold on to each other, but maybe they have to let go? Can they do both at the same time?

This blog post is part of a series of writing (May 31-June 2012) by Tammy Fletcher Bergland about holding on and letting go.   tbergland.blogspot.com

I’m holding on . . . 12 months later.

So I return to the outpouring of words. Quite a season it has been! “Ode to the Red Bird Who Slams into Our Window” was certainly a strong symbolic theme throughout the year, and I had to sing that song of hope through unexpected and powerfully dark places.

When I started this blog, I wanted to carry out the GenX in Midlife theme. Now, I guess I’ll just continue living as a GenXer through midlife, let God carry on with what He started in me and those around me, and see what comes through words as I return to some regular writing. I think I’ll focus on HOLDING ON AND LETTING GO for a while this time around.

I thank God for being light, life, strength, refuge, song, and hope.

And I wish that darned bird would stop slamming into my window . . . he’s still going, 14 months later.

“I will sing about your strength; every morning I will sing aloud of your constant love. You have been a refuge for me, a shelter in my time of trouble. I will praise you, my defender. My refuge is God, the God who loves me.” –Psalm 59: 16-17


This blog post is part of a series of writing (May 31-June 2012) by Tammy Fletcher Bergland about holding on and letting go.   tbergland.blogspot.com