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    December 31, 2023

    Final Thoughts on 2023

    Sunset on top of Sandia Mountains in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

    Posted on December 31, 2023 by Jenn Zatopek

    The first time I meditated was freshman year in 1996 at the girls’ dorm on a warm autumn day. I gripped a packet of worksheets in my hands, which elucidated the benefits of meditation, encouraging me to relax and let go. Easy enough, I thought, as I sat on the soft quilt with warm spring colors, staring out the huge windows facing southward. Studious but impatient, I skimmed the first few pages and resolved to try myself, no one else around to offer support. After all, my counselor said I could handle it on my own, so why not try it?

    I’m sure you know where this is headed. Read more

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    December 6, 2023

    My Other Examen

    Posted on December 6, 2023 by Jenn Zatopek

    My Other Examen

    The father and I are one.
    – Jesus (John 10:30)

    He who experiences the unity of life sees his own self in all beings.
    – Buddha

     

    The religious often say:
    You live in these tired glorious bodies.

    But where? The lonely child in me wants
    more than words but a mountain to climb into.

    Where can I put my hands in yours, dear God?
    How to feel our belonging together?

    This heaviness is too much to carry,
    unutterably alone, lost within myself.

    Labyrinths of my past beckons
    as I stumble around in darkness but—

    In the seeming absence, Your silence speaks,
    reminds me tenderly in the deepest fissures of pain,

    I place one hand over the other,
    praising this ocean of breath and know:

    We cannot help but be one, You and I,
    in this dear body being breathed.

    Image: Unsplash

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    July 24, 2023

    In the Grips of Letting Go

    A solitary green tree on a green meadow against a cloudy blue sky.

    Posted on July 24, 3023 by Jenn Zatopek

    A few weeks before it happened I was with family at Book People in Austin where I felt drawn to read Joan Didion’s memoir The Year of Magical Thinking. The booksellers described the story in a small placard on the shelf where the book lay in an obscure corner upstairs. After reading how Didion lost her husband and almost lost her adult daughter within five months of each other, I was hooked. This is a woman who knows suffering and isn’t afraid of it, I thought to myself. She will be a good companion if the very worst happens.**

    Read more

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    June 30, 2023

    The Queer Joy of Belonging

    Posted on June 30, 2023 by Jenn Zatopek

    On the first weekend in June, my partner and I served communion at our friendly LGBTQIA+ church and my heart touched the marvelous love of God in our beloved community. As a queer Christian, I took great joy in serving alongside my husband, he breaking the bread while I held the cup of salvation for anyone to receive this life-changing meal: tall drag queens and kindhearted lesbians, smiling trans folx and earnest allies, bashful children and beautiful gender non-binary friends, and dearly beloveds all across the beautiful queer spectrum, all welcomed into the loving arms of God, including my cherished queer self. . .

    I’d love it if you clicked here and read the rest over at Red Letter Christians. 

    Image: My friends from Galileo Church, Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex.

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    May 23, 2023

    Leaving My Mother Behind

    The place where I marked the leaving. At the Crags trailhead with trees and granite amid a blue sky.

    GUEST POST FOR STORY SANCTUM

    Posted on May 22, 2023 by Jenn Zatopek

    At the height of summer in the pandemic, I went to the mountains to leave my mother behind. Sometimes with family there are things you have to let go. For years now, I’ve sought to release the toxic narratives of shame my mother gifted me with, and my time up in the mountains was the perfect occasion to mark the leaving.

    The day of leaving dawned cool and brilliant, the Colorado landscape experiencing a tiny respite from the hazy smoke blown in from wildfires as far north as Canada. My partner and I checked the air quality map and our hopes were confirmed: we would take our chances and drive up the picturesque mountain highway to the Crags trailhead and spend the day hiking the fertile wilderness, the northwestern shoulders of Pikes Peak always in our sight. . .

    Please click here to read more over at Story Sanctum. 

    Image: The place where I marked the leaving, Crags Trail, near Colorado Springs

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    April 20, 2023

    The Goodness We Hold

    A field of bluebonnets with towering trees at the back.

    Posted on April 20, 2023 by Jenn Zatopek

    I ended March in a luxurious way–working our tiny bit earth in our front-yard garden. I poured old potting soil over the narrow garden patch, taking dead plants from clay pots and cutting them into small bits for our compost bins. Afterwards, I swept our wrap-around porch and visited the nearby garden store, unsure of which plants to buy but trusting the unfolding process anyway.

    When I arrived, I walked around the garden center, gazing at all the riotous spring color, golden petunias, rosy impatiens, fiery marigolds, and newly green herbs. I was drawn to two kinds of flowers, a tall yellowy-orange variety and stunning violet petunias, but only after I sauntered around with appreciation and something akin to awe. On that day, everyone was cheerful, the shopkeepers greeted us gaily, and a few of us customers exchanged smiles and sighs of pleasure as we bathed in beauty. A wondrous communion of joy.  Read more

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