Friday, January 13, 2012

Unknown Lives

I wake up without an alarm at about 5:45 each morning, and, in the few moments that I lie awake in the dark before swinging my feet to the floor, I ask God to abundantly bless every person I see that day, every person whose voice I hear, every person I hear about, and every person I think of, and especially those whom I do not think of, who make up by far the largest group in my general supplication -- all those forgotten or unknown not just by me, but by even those in their physical midst.

Perhaps we are all such forgotten and unknown ones. Each person is a profound mystery, containing worlds upon worlds that no one else will ever enter.

Recently a trove of photographs was found, most of them images of people now forgotten and unknown, taken by Vivian Maier, above, a nanny in Chicago. Maier died in obscurity herself, and never told anyone about her luminous art. The photographs are stunning and beautiful, the kind of thing I could look at for hours.

Read more here.

As Caryll Houselander wrote in The Passion of the Infant Christ:

There is no outward sign of the miracle that is taking place. Office workers are bending over their desks, mothers working in their kitchens, patients lying quietly in hospital wards, nurses carrying out the exacting routine of their work of mercy, craftsmen at their benches, factory workers riveted to their machines, prisoners in their cells, children in their schools. . . . Everywhere an unceasing rhythm of toil, monotonous in its repetition, goes on.

To those inside the pattern of love that it is weaving, it seems monotonous in its repetition; it seems to achieve very little. 

In the almshouses and the workhouses, old people, who are out of the world's work altogether at last, sit quietly with folded hands. It seems to them that their lives add up to very little too.

Nowhere is there any visible sign of glory. But, because in every town and village and hamlet of the world there are those who have surrendered their lives, who have made their offering daily, from the small grains of the common life, a miracle of Love is happening all the time, everywhere. The Holy Spirit is descending upon the world.

Upon the world that seems so cruel, mercy falls like summer rain. . . . The heart of humanity that seems so hard is sifted, irrigated, warmed; the water of life floods it.

10 comments:

ex-new yorker said...

Like those 18 million lives in Angola and 16 million in Burkina Faso that I mentioned. I look at Wikipedia for the same reasons you look at these photos. I'm not looking at them now though because this blog break is enough...

I prefer to take candid photos, save a few meant to remember what somebody or some place looked like at a specific time. Looking at old photographs, aside from the people, I tend to zero in on the mundane details to try to imagine what it was really like.

Pentimento said...

Look at the photos when you can, Ex-New Yorker. They are stunning. They were shot in Chicago, but it looks so much like NYC in photos from the 1940s.

JMB said...

I just read about her in the WSJ, fascinating story. What's even more fascinating is how they found her subjects- the family of boys that she worked for.

Lizzie said...

I have a sneaking feeling it was from your blog that I originally discovered Caryll Houselander and for that I must thank you! She's become a companion of mine for the last couple of years...
This is just beautiful - your writing, the photos, the Caryll Houselander quote.
We never know the impact of our thoughts, words and actions do we?
Happy New Year Pentimento!

ps I loved the choral videos you posted recently - Jesus Christ the Apple Tree is one of my favourites. A very good friend is training for the Anglican priesthood in Cambridge at the moment - the video is a good reminder to make the most of my visits and to go to evensong at one of the colleges...

Pentimento said...

Happy New Year, Lizzie!

I have a secret project, which is praying for the canonization of Caryll Houselander. Perhaps you'd like to join me. : )

Lizzie said...

Oh yes - I've been praying for that too! Let's pray together...

Pentimento said...

Excellent! We will!

Really Rosie said...

Many of them ARE from NYC, actually. She travelled a lot. I discovered her photos last year and just pored over them.

Pentimento said...

That explains a lot. I don't know Chicago, and they looked so much like New York.

MrsDarwin said...

Thank you for telling us about your morning routine. I've been thinking a lot about that these past few mornings when I wake up (NOT at 5:45, though I really should).