WHAT THE BODY CARRIES

WHAT THE BODY CARRIES

I am a supporter of a local art museum and therefore receive beautiful, printed announcements of upcoming exhibitions. They are upcycled into bookmarks etc. A recent exhibition was entitled, “What the body carries.” Looking at the images on the announcement, I tried to imagine the content of the exhibit. The work of the two Haitian American artists was described as “a multimedia exhibition of figurative paintings, collages, and sculptures.” I was more intrigued by the title of the exhibit than the images on the announcement and made plans to see the body of work. Adding fuel to that interest was the fact that a photocopy of the only known baby picture of me had piqued my interest as well.

Although I didn’t know what the artist, Demosthene and Didier were attempting to convey with their artwork, the title of the work spoke volumes to me. What my body carries is everything that I have experienced from before and after the shutter snapped capturing the cherub likeness of me in the photograph. What the body carries is a total of life experiences. That total changes every moment if you take in oxygen and expel carbon dioxide.

Stop reading for a moment to reflect on what your body carries.

A trip to Ghana in 2019 that marked the 400th anniversary of the beginning of the Africa to the Americas slave trade, clarified for me that I was chosen. Standing in the threshold of the “Door of no return,” inside the fort used to corral the captured, and having returned as a descendant of an enslaved person, was my personal proof of chosen-ness. I am the 12th offspring of beyond forty-year-old parents. I choose to believe that they chose to have me. After eleven pregnancies, I am sure they knew how babies were made and chose to forgo the precautions necessary to prevent another… another proof of my chosen-ness that my body carries.

My body has supported the trauma of childbirth. The same body endured the rigors of training for five half-marathons after the age of fifty. This body carries the memory of an emergency room visit for double pneumonia in the middle of the Covid pandemic and a prolonged bout of vertigo. Grief had to find a comfortable place to reside and one of my greatest fears, cancer, came for a visit and lingers in the crevices of my psyche. This vessel of muscle, bone, and nerves has sampled the food and experienced the culture of six of the seven continents. Love, laughter and life have never been sweeter because of what the body carries.

My body consistently shows me through its faithfulness and my experiences that I can go further than I think.

After seeing the exhibition, I am no closer to knowing the intent of the art collection. I didn’t get it. But guess what? My body carries that experience too.

Phil. 4:9

PONDER THIS THOUGHT--- Experiences are treasures that remain with the owner forever.