I wrote this piece a year ago during the nuclear reactors crisis in Japan. Today, one day before the second anniversary of step-daughter Katherine’s death at the age of 33, I brought it out of mothballs for those who may be feeling weary.
“Don’t be weary, traveler, Come along home, come home. Don’t be weary traveler, come along home. Come home.”
“Weary Traveler” was a slave song that expresses what prose cannot say.
I am wearied by the news of homeless people in Japan. I am weary hearing of nuclear explosions and possible meltdowns. I am weary of what human ingenuity has done and is doing to the oceans, the wetlands, and the coastlands. I am weary of the things that lay beyond control. I feel helpless to help. I am preoccupied with sadness.
I fall down a flight of stairs at home carrying a flimsy box of books too heavy and too poorly packed. I’m not paying attention. Two days later I take the dogs for their morning walk and fall on the ice I did not see. I’m weary with bad news, not paying attention to my footing, not seeing the red ball sun rising over the white birch trees on the morning walk.
Like those weary travelers who had no control over their world, “my head is wet with the midnight dew,” even at sunrise. I slip on the ice. My dog licks my face, calling me back to where my body is – on the ground on a street corner two blocks from the home we share here in Minnesota.
Maggie knows nothing of what’s happening in Japan. All she knows is that she’s here, that her clumsy, preoccupied friend has fallen, that he needs some love… and that the sunrise is beautiful.
I’m a long way from the home I would like – a planetary home where tsunamis do not leave people homeless and where nuclear reactors do not explode or melt down –and I always will be. When my Japanese neighbors fall into chaos and horror, I can try to lick the faces with charitable giving and prayers but only from afar. But I cannot change what has happened.
I pray that those who sang the slave songs, the spirituals and the blues as they traveled with a great weariness may become my mentors, and that, in some way, their hopeful tones will rise from the coastal people of Japan. Our enslaved American forebears dug deep inside themselves to a richer, truer place that called them home to each other and to a dignity the world could not take away. They endured when the objective reasons for hope were in short supply. In the wake of a tsunami, they call a global generation to travel on even as we ache for each other from afar.
“Don’t be weary, traveler, Come along home, come home. Keep on goin’, traveler, Come along home, come home; Keep a singing all the way, Come along home, Come home.”
Listen to Odetta singing “I’ve been [re]buked and I’ve been scored.”
“Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give your rest.”
Views from the Edge 
And this morning I am feeling very weary…. Thank you for reposting this.
LikeLike
So sorry you’re feeling that way. “Momma said there’d be days like this” and she’s always right. But what my mother, RIP, also knew was that what we feel at the moment is not the sum or reality itself, and that there is always a way through to the light for those who wait patiently. I hope the rest of the day is better. I think you’ll identify with “The Calls of the Loons” – the calls are primal and primordial, calls that resonate with the deepest longing of the human soul but which we choke back because we muzzle the primal cry.
LikeLike
And sometimes it is just a straw that threatens the whole pile…. Thanks again, and I need to get to the loons, ….. they are hauntingly beautiful….
LikeLike
Karin. I hope you know you are surrounded by friends who care …
LikeLike
I want to say more about your topic of weariness:
I sometimes find myself in a place of low ebb, of feeling overwhelmed and without recourse – helpless. It is a terrible feeling for me. At such times I quit reading some of the more contentious political blogs and focus more on blogs of hopeful, loving, caring politics and gentle support. I try to free myself from feeling inadequate because I don’t do enough. I must remind myself that we all have different gifts and different capabilities. I do what I can, and I don’t think God expects me to do more than that.
It does help me to be reminded that I am not the only one who feels overwhelmed at times, not the only one who takes breaks, not the only one says, “I will try again tomorrow.” Thank you for this reminder, Gordon. It was timely.
LikeLike
You are in good company. Easy does it.
LikeLike
Odetta is wonderful and I find her very inspiring. She has a grace and courage about her that strengthens me. Thanks so much for including her music.
Odetta is one of the many women whom I look at and say to myself, “I want to be like her when I grow up.” I’m not there, but perhaps one day . . . . . .
LikeLike
I’ve always loved her voice. Very different. Very grounded and soulful.
LikeLike
What’s to add in the way of comment? Nothing. You’ve said it all, and so powerfully.
LikeLike
Maybe I will listen later over my lunch break.
LikeLike
That was very inspired. I am at work and cannot listen to the song, but you have a point that we should look to those who have survived far more suffering than we currently know and see how they coped. I also have noticed that when I am down and out that I tend to fall and hurt myself. Once, I dropped my favorite turquoise necklace, and then drove over it with my truck. Sometime later I found it and felt as if the whole thing symbolized what was wrong with my life at the time: I was out of harmony so had driven over my own mojo. Now, when I see myself tripping, I try to wake up because if I don’t, I am sure to take a header or worse. Thank goodness you have such wonderful dog friends to bring you back to harmony. What would we do without them? Besides, I have noticed that no matter how much they suffer, they never feel sorry for themselves. They just keep on going as if each moment were a new beginning. Oh that I were more like them.
LikeLike
I’ve concluded that my dogs are a LOT smarter than we are, in part, for the the very reason you state. They just live in the moment. The song on the blog is not Weary Traveler. I couldn’t find an uplifting rendition of it. Instead I posted another piece by Odetta, one my favorite vocal artists.
LikeLike