Traveling Mercies: Meeting Anne Lamott

“Most of the time, all you have is the moment and the imperfect love of the people around you.” AL 

July has been a strange month. Most of it I have been out of the state. I spent a week on a road trip with Laurén. The other 3 weeks were spent working at a Young Life camp in Arizona.

I want to write down all that I have learned. The closer you stay to Jesus the more He can transform your heart and mind. This month He has done that… as He has been doing for years.

The trip started with a crazy idea as most things in my life do. If you know me at all you know how dear books are to my heart. I would die without them. My 3 favorites are Brennan Manning, Henri Nouwen, and Anne Lamott. Brennan and Henri have passed away. It’s been a dream of mine to meet one of the people whose words have brought so much healing to my life.

Naturally I decided to stalk Anne Lamott. So I may or may not have looked up her church. I didn’t even know if she would be there. We would have had to leave at 3:00am to get there on time. I was starting to think it was irrational and crazy. I was becoming unsure of this idea. I sent Bethy a text to get her opinion because she shares my love for Anne.  She told me I had to go. I had to thank her for all she had written.

With that I decided we were going. Who knows if she’d be there, but we had to try. I overslept my alarm (what’s new?), but we managed to get on the road at 3:30 am. Besides getting lost & pulled over we made it. Only 4 minutes late. As I was walking in I saw a car with a bumper sticker that said, “Who would Jesus bomb?” My inner hippie that I have kept hidden ever since I stopped smoking weed was delighted. (Later I saw it was her car- of course!) We walk in and get handed an African American hyms book. 

I walk in and see her lovely dreadlocks. There she was. I was so scared. I didn’t want to bug her. I was also terrified she’d be mean. There was a chance to greet people. Some people came up & asked what brought us there. I told them how I loved Anne’s books. “Oh Annie loves visitors.”

So I walked up to her, handed her a card, and simply thanked her. She was kind & loving. She wished us “traveling mercies.” I can’t put into words how rad it was to meet someone who has inspired me so much. She brought some light into very dark days this past year. The first time I read one of her books I literally couldn’t put it down. Her books are the kind of books you fall in love with. These books are the reason I don’t get enough sleep.  

I look up to her because she is just like me… bat shit crazy & in love with Jesus. She shows me I can do it, that there is a reason to have hope even on the worst days… especially on the worse days. I dream of being a writer. She has taught me to just write. It doesn't matter what my fears or insecurities are. Fear can not hold me back. I have to write. Simply put she inspires me for countless reasons. She is honest and real. She does not pretend to have her crap together. She admits her brokenness and clings to grace. We need more people like this. This is the essence of Christian Spirituality, not perfection but admitting your need for a Savoir.

I share this with you because the world needs more people like this. I believe we have it in each of us. She is brave enough to embrace her gifts no matter how scary that is. The world is a better place because of her. I think it’s time we all embrace our gifts and let the world become better.

Little did I know it was her 27 years sober on that very day. She shared about the one day at a time companionship of her best friend Jesus. I was such a special day to be there. She fills my heart with hope. She points me back to God again and again.

“We read to know we are not alone.” CS LEWIS

“Our preacher Veronica said recently that this is life’s nature: that lives and hearts get broken- those of people we love, those of people we’ll never meet. She said that the world sometimes feels like the waiting room of the emergency ward and that we who are more or less OK for now need to take the tenderest possible care of the more wounded people in the waiting room, until the healer comes. You sit with people, she said, you bring them juice and graham crackers.
And then she went on vacation.
“Traveling mercies,” the old people at our church said to her when she left. This is what they always say when one of us goes off for a while. Traveling mercies: love the journey, God is with you, come home safe and sound.”