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Summer
Books Meditations inspire but dont stretch
WINGING IT:
MEDITATIONS OF A YOUNG ADULT By Therese Johnston Borchard Orbis,
157 pages, $12 |
REVIEWED By SUE BIRNIE
Inspiration can be tough to come by. Perhaps, once upon a time,
the world dripped with mysticism and faith, but nowadays our lives are far from
divine. Cell phones ring during Mass. Long ATM line-ups spark fistfights.
Still, we remain spiritual people with a common need: peace and revelation, in
a day-to-day context. In Winging It: Meditations of a Young Adult,
Therese Johnston Borchard shares her youthful insights of everyday experiences
of God in 86 brief meditations.
Borchard approaches this task in a frank manner, writing readable
prose and discussing problems in a contemporary setting. From the
physical/emotional impact of too many Doritos to life beyond the black and
white of the film Pleasantville, the Notre Dame Theology graduate
finds meaning, clarity and questions about faith for readers to consider. The
personal becomes universal. Borchard uses her experience with mental illness
and alcoholism to connect with her audience in an immediate, intimate way.
Its modern stuff: Seinfeld and
Seinfeldisms appear often (she faces trouble with relatives whose
photos arent wall worthy). The plot of the film
Theres Something About Mary is used as an introduction to a
meditation about the Blessed Virgin. E-mail is bemoaned for its ability to
steal time. Reality is not ignored, and the result is a book of meditations
firmly based in the now.
Is it insightful, though? Admittedly, its difficult to
review a book of meditations. Ideally, a meditation should be read, then
meditated upon. One a day would be good. Unfortunately, book reviewing is not
an 86-day process, so each meditation had to be given short shrift. Still,
meditations are meditations, and I read through the first, Progress, Not
Perfection -- Borchards return to her alma mater and subsequent
realization that lifes challenges do not get easier with age, just
different -- slowly. When done, I put the book down, closed my eyes, pondered
and thought, No duh!
This feeling continued through the next meditation and then the
next. After much confusion, I reread the books introduction to remind
myself of its purpose: This book is a collection of Borchards
pearls of wisdom, not answers. And that saddened me. I had hoped to
read snippets of inspiration, short anecdotes that would domino my own opinions
into a cavalcade of thought. Instead, I found I agreed with most of what she
had to say. In short, the meditations in this book did not make me want to
meditate.
Does that mean the books not worth reading? No. It is
sincere, concise and, yes, contains pearls of wisdom about work, sex, marriage,
family and exercise. Clearly, Borchard has pondered, struggled and formed
enlightened conclusions. While the Seinfeld references grow tired
fast and a link drawn between coffeehouses and the underground railroad (and
their mutual contributions to freedom) absurd, the deep sense of faith
underlying each meditation is a nice change from the goofiness of inspirational
e-mail forwards and feel-good self-help paperbacks. Borchard is at her best
when she abandons excessive cultural clichés and attacks the topic at
hand (notable examples include The Sculpture of Marriage and the
post-Cameron Diaz discussion in Theres Something About
Mary).
Still, the book lacked challenge. I wanted to be provoked and
questioned. I wanted to read a meditation and feel my mind stretch --
uncomfortably, even. Borchard quotes Elizabeth Bowen at the start of
Friendships Like Edna: Intimacies between women often go
backwards, beginning in revelations and ending in small talk. Oddly
enough, what I wanted from Winging It was the reverse: an intimate
relationship with the writer, beginning in small talk and ending in revelation
-- a forward motion I never quite found.
Sue Birnie lives in Victoria, British Columbia.
National Catholic Reporter, May 11,
2001
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