smelly, slimy waiting room

Almost six years ago, my then-colleague, the Senior Pastor of the congregation, was diagnosed with a malignant, inoperable brain tumor. He was 45 years old at the time. He had been having a bit of trouble remembering names and words, and I think he went in for tests because his mother had a disease much like early-onset Alzheimer's, and he was worried about that. A tumor was not on anyone's radar screen.

A few days before he went in for his biopsy surgery, the bishop came and prayed with him. The day before his surgery, my colleague told me that the bishop had given him an image to consider as he prepared for the anesthetic: to think of himself as entering the belly of the whale. To think of himself as Jonah, being carried safely through the waters - in a less-than desirable waiting area, to be sure, but nevertheless safe. Waiting, said the bishop, rarely happens in comfort. Think of the Israelites wandering in the wilderness, or Noah on the ark, or Jesus in the desert - or Jonah in the belly of the whale, on hold in his smelly, slimy waiting room.

The truth is, I hate waiting. Unless the object of my so-called patience is something guaranteed to happen, like Christmas or the opening of an anticipated movie, waiting is no fun. Having been to the doctor a few times lately, it occurs to me that we like to dress up our waiting areas to make the actual reason we are there less anxiety-producing: we fill them with magazines and semi-comfortable chairs, toys for kids and coffee for the adults, piped-in, soothing music and muted colors. But waiting sucks, no matter how comfortable the room is. No matter how well-decorated and visually soothing, no matter how crisp the magazines are and how good the coffee is, it always feels like a slimy, smelly whale belly in there. It might be that you have to hang out there for awhile to get to where you're going, but let's at least stop pretending that it's anything more than a big whale gut.

Today's episode of The Writer's Almanac featured a great poem by Dan Albergotti, called "Things to Do in the Belly of the Whale." You can find it here (I'm linking rather than quoting in full since I'm not sure if there are some copyright issues here and I'd much rather use any extra money I have for lattes rather than paying fines).

The line I needed to hear today was this one:

Be thankful that you are here, swallowed with all hope,
where you can rest and wait.

"Swallowed with all hope." Because the belly of the whale can feel so discouraging, so dark and sometimes nauseating, because you can't see where you're going from in there, it's easy to forget that the reason for being swallowed in the first place was to save you from the storm. Sometimes waiting is like this. It's not a cool, calm, professional office where you can sip your drink and wait for your name to be called; it's not always wandering around where you can at least see the sand dunes and have a bit of warning before the clouds close in on you.

Sometimes you just have to hang out in the whale's belly, swallowed with all hope, where you can rest and wait. Thanks, Poet Albergotti, for the reminder.