language and linguistics

Philoxenia: Greek-Rooted Reflections on the Art of Welcome & World Refugee Day 2025

~ Georgia Coats ~ Leave a comment
* My Signature Blend: As a Language & Culture Empowerment Specialist, I weave stories in Diaspora spaces. How to consume my words: They pair well with a comfort beverage and a reflective space. They are crafted with wholesome, layered complexity, freshly selected thoughtfulness, rhythmic repetitions, punctuated with a unique blend of precious perspective found in diverse and often marginalized corners of the globe and of human hearts.  Each ingredient is prayed through, wrestled with, & marinated in hope. I invite you to savor my signature blend of detail like a delicately prepared dish made for you to taste and share. I pray that it may satisfy the souls of those who choose to break bread with me. Welcome!

Philo—love;  xenos—stranger, foreigner, or guest.  

Philoxenia is a brilliant Greek word that has no synonym in English.  My proud Greek father will tell you there are a litany of words borrowed from the Greek because the ancient language excels in nuance and precision.

Philoxenia embodies the profound and ancient Greek concept of hospitality. An important cultural and moral value in Greek culture, it emphasizes generosity and welcome towards visitors, particularly those who are from foreign lands.

Principle #1: Greeks not only excel at nuanced language, but also at the nuances of hosting others. 

I’ve lived among overwhelmingly amazing Greek hosts my whole life.  Cultivated in diaspora—on the fringes of my Greek-immigrant community, I never dared to live up to the quality of hosting that has lived on in generations of Greek homes and legends since the beginning of time.

Principle #2: A good Greek hostess always remembers her guests by what they like and dislike.  

I married a xeno. My non-Greek husband was first welcomed into my extended Greek family with a message that pre-circulated his arrival at every Greek dinner table: he will not eat tomatoes. Noted. Everyone knew his waywardness with village salads—that he more than made up for with eager seconds on every other homemade delight.

Phobia—an intense, irrational fear. Xenophobia is the fear or hatred of strangers, and quite literally the opposite of philoxenia.

Xenophobia is a present reality for so many foreigners who flee from one place to another. There are messages of hatred and distrust that pre-circulate their arrival before they ever have a chance to come to the table.

World Refugee Day Preparations

As an Empowerment Coordinator at our local Immigrant and Refugee Center, I was appointed by our strategic and fun-loving Mexican Directora to be the hostess of our World Refugee Day event. We wanted to host a party for our clients—a day to really celebrate them and prepare a place for them to feel at home. Our clients come from a myriad of nations that are currently on a travel ban list in 2025. Others face insurmountable walls and seek temporary protections from life-threatening dangers.  

I didn’t realize I possessed any of the hostessing prowess of my ancestors until my boss invited me into that role. My goal? To make our clients from every language group feel welcome and that this event was for them.   

Applying Greek Hostessing Principle #1: The best way to express safe, welcoming spaces for everyone was to start with the nuanced details of good music, carefully selected cuisine, and familiar faces.

Applying Greek Hostessing Principle #2: I made my list of what I knew people liked and didn’t like from previous mental notes: 

  • Halal and vegetarian food markers for our Muslim friends
  • A carefully selected variety of cultural music that moves people to dance or sing or smile
  • A space where the children feel free to dance and play.

Will my Eritrean friends feel like this event is for them?  

The unique sounds of ancient Eritrean instruments and rhythms were first to burst forth from the borrowed sound system.  With a glint in her eye, one of my regular Eritrean clients stepped forward and then back.  As I moved in to greet her, I discovered myself joining her dance.  Tiny steps forward and tiny steps back.  Then shoulder shrugs and head leans. I wasn’t in it for mastery; I simply received the invitation to join something wonderful.  Before I knew it many more familiar faces appeared on either side of me.  Women and their babies I had often sipped tea and broke bread—hembasha bread—with. My Eritrean friends gleamed as they savored a small feeling of home in a culture so far from it. 

Will my Rohingya, Somali, and other Muslim friends have food to eat, and know it’s for them?

I handed over the halal and vegetarian labels that I had carefully prepared to our Somali intern. She was delighted as we discussed the importance of our Muslim guests knowing that food was thoughtfully prepared with them in mind. We had even figured out a way to hire one of our local Rohingya chefs to make 300 spicy, halal meat and potato sambusas for our event.  I found myself doing a little Eritrean-inspired shoulder shrug happy dance as I bit into one.

How can I support my brave Haitian friend in her big stage performance? 

I gave my beautiful friend a warm introduction as she courageously climbed the stairs of the 4-foot stage anticipating her solo in Haitian Creole. I explained to the gathering crowd that her song expressed a prayer for her beloved Haiti.  She rose up—her voice, her body, her words—as did the Haitians in the crowd, with their cameras and connection to their language, their homeland, and the words of her song. Another dear Haitian friend spontaneously leapt onto the stage, grabbing the singer by the hand and twisting her in his arms while she boldly belted out her tune. I felt honored to share in that brief moment with the singer—and to witness the spark in her spontaneous dance partner’s eyes that joyfully lit up his whole face.

Our staff, volunteers, and community partners extended invitations. People ate well and danced well and smiled as their little ones played. We worked hard to serve each other well. It wasn’t just about Eritrean music, Somali friends, Rohingya cuisine, Haitian inspiration, and our interactive Mexican mercadito.  It was about sharing moments of connection among friends in community. It just happened that our community is gloriously diverse in all its expressions. 

~There is a time to mourn and a time to dance.~

Flourishing and struggling are not strangers—to love is to grieve and to welcome the stranger and walk alongside them on their journey means we also see the challenges they’re up against. We took the time to dance with friends from a myriad of ethnolinguistic groups.  A few days later we mourned the realities of how much harder it will be for them to live and work and flourish in this country they are trying so hard to call home.

Inflammation occurs in the body when one part becomes reddened, hot, swollen, and painful as a reaction to an injury or infection.

Our world is inflamed. Conflicts are harder to resolve peaceably. Bodies are increasingly broken. Homes, communities, and families are forcibly uprooted and displaced. Rubble and bombs inflame the earth. The casualties tend to be the ones who are already the most vulnerable. Everything around the xenos feels more inflamed. 

When we know what is inflamed, we can pay attention to it.  Then we can diagnose it and move forward as healers in hurting spaces. Until then, we mourn. My deep faith compels me to mourn with those who mourn, and to acknowledge the inflammation around the bodies, minds, and spirits of those who are vulnerable.

But we also dance. We danced that day because most days at our Immigrant and Refugee Center we face challenges. We dance to share in each other’s joy and release some of our pain. The privilege of the dance is also the honor to hold another’s grief—that is what makes the dance so beholden.  

We celebrate philoxenia because xenophobia is palpable.  

I had a new sense of my Greek-rootedness—cultivated in a beloved diaspora community. In our small corner of the world that welcomes foreigners as honored guests, philoxenia abounds. As I marinate on the manifold experience of World Refugee Day 2025, I realize that I was the strange one being generously welcomed into the joy-filled spaces among friendly faces of our wonderfully diverse community. 

Let us be relentlessly hopeful as we receive the sacred invitations of a loving God to His attentive children. Welcome! Walk with me. Join the unforced rhythms of my grace—the treasures and the smiles and the symphonic beauty of it all. Philoxenia—you are welcome here, with me—in welcoming others.

RISE UP: Women’s Empowerment Lesson 3

~ Georgia Coats ~ 6 Comments

I have been on a significant journey towards understanding Women’s Empowerment within me:

🌀 Lesson 1: the self discipline to GET UP—even when it’s hard

🌀 Lesson 2: the love to LIFT UP

🌀 Lesson 3: the power to RISE UP

This is my third lesson…

Over the years I have found great inner strength from incredible people who have lifted me upwards.  Afterall, lifting each other up is a privilege of loving and being loved.  But even with all the inner and outer strength of many hands, some things must rise up—beyond what we are capable of lifting.

Em-Power-Ment Requires a Power Source

And I’ll rise up, I’ll rise like the day

I’ll rise up, I’ll rise unafraid,

I’ll rise up, And I’ll do it a thousand times again…

Andra Day

This song has been a quarantine anthem.  It played during multiple montages of nurses and doctors relentlessly fighting for the lives of others when the pandemic began.  It was playing when I fell off my ripstick and decided to get back up again.  It played as I walked my neighborhood during cloudy times, wondering why I was hesitant to start up Women’s Empowerment again, after potentially putting women at risk of COVID-19.  

It played during Lent of 2021 as I thought of Jesus rising up and doing it again every Easter—thousands of times—as we celebrate such empowerment.  He claimed agency over laying down and raising up his own life—a divine power source.

RISE UP:

My third lesson in being empowered is learning to imagine things that are beyond us.  Daring to speak our dreams out loud.  This requires external power sources. 

I’ll rise like the day… Semantically speaking, a day can’t rise itself.  It’s not the agent of rising. It needs to be risen up.

As Easter 2022 gets closer, I’m pondering an empowered Jesus who conquered the impossible barrier of death. Though in myself I am limited, I don’t have to accept a timid spirit.  Rather, I’m growing in my embrace of a Spirit that has the power to rise up, the love to lift up, and the self-discipline to get up—a thousand times again for the things that matter.

The whisper to my spirit is clear…

Get back up and invite the women you know.  Don’t give up on this important journey of Women’s Empowerment.

Be lifted up.  Invite these sisters courageously into your vulnerable spaces of fear and falling and failure. Sip tea together and talk about the dreams we had as little girls, and the goals we persist in, and the visions we have of our futures.  

Rise up.  Dare to form bonds of friendship and speak impossible dreams out loud.

Women’s Empowerment has been resurrected.  I invited my friends of varying languages and religious backgrounds—women who have invited me into their vulnerable places where I’ve had the privilege of lifting them up towards their goals.  This was a vulnerable place for me.  I can’t succeed at Women’s Empowerment without women who show up.  I needed my sisters to come. And they did. And it has been so worth the risk of failing and trying again.

We must continually get ourselves up and lift each other up in order to imagine collectively rising up.  I shift often between reliable running shoes for persevering towards things that are important, to cozy slippers in merciful spaces, to badass boots for fighting injustice.  Because getting up, lifting up and rising up all require different things—and as empowered women, we learn, some more awkwardly than others, to wear them all.

LIFT UP: Women’s Empowerment Lesson 2

~ Georgia Coats ~ 5 Comments

I have been on a significant journey towards understanding Women’s Empowerment within me:

🌀 Lesson 1: the self discipline to GET UP—even when it’s hard

🌀 Lesson 2: the love to LIFT UP

🌀 Lesson 3: the power to RISE UP

This is my second lesson…

If humility is learning to live for the sake of others, then I needed to move on from my preoccupation with falling and failing—and the differences between them—and focus on the art of lifting.

Empowered Women Lift Each Other Up

I was still sore about potentially putting women at risk of COVID-19 instead of figuring out how to empower them.  So, I dove into another challenge with just the right amount of overwhelming and satisfying.  I was learning to be a Community Navigator at our local Immigrant and Refugee Center. 

I loved those words.  I really wanted to grasp the essence of community.  And I was already a horrible navigator of physical streets, but the thought of learning how to help resettling refugees navigate my beloved community felt like the perfect challenge.

Turns out Part Time Community Navigator is the perfect journey of learning to live for the sake of others.  Hours of filling out forms that will hopefully remove just one of a gazillion impossible barriers that newcomers face as they bravely transition to a new world, in a new language, with limited resources.  Turns out delving into the vulnerable circumstances of people’s lives, loved ones, and longings in order to fill out spaces on a form felt something like washing other people’s feet.

As a person who slips comfortably into a place of mercy, justice feels difficult to maneuver around in. This is precisely why I owned sparkly combat boots—to embrace a new aspect of myself.  In this new navigator role I was barely scratching the surface of understanding injustice and privilege as I listened repeatedly to the monotonous melodies of WAITING ON HOLD with one government office or another on behalf of a client and their specific need.  And every time a client got one step closer to their goal, I would lift my hands up in a celebratory cheer.  Turns out that mercy, grace, and kindness towards someone facing injustice can really split a heart wide open.  And when that happens, boundaries and zoning areas of comfort and capacity explode into beautiful chaos.  

Turns out that:

Mercy pairs with justice.

Gentleness is a form of harnessed power.

Grace pours out of abundance.

I was learning to lift others up.  I was learning to celebrate the big and small wins of many courageous people who welcomed me into their vulnerable spaces.

LIFT UP:  

My second lesson in being empowered is learning to help someone else reach their goals.  And… inviting others into reaching my own—the things we can’t do just on our own.  Carrying each other’s heavy loads, together.

I love grammar and words and the linguistic study of Semantics.  Some verbs require an agent:

Example: My friends and I carried the couch up the stairs.  

My friends and I are the agents in this sentence.  The couch was acted upon.  My friends and I used our strength and decision-making skills to complete a goal together.  That’s agency, and heavy lifting.  That involves me putting down my own important stuff for a moment so I can put all my strength into lifting something that requires many hands.

Strength is limited. We can’t do heavy lifting alone or for long.  We need to know that lifting is getting us somewhere—that there’s an end goal. 

So many dear people have lifted me upwards over the years.  And lifting others up is a privilege of loving and being loved.

GET UP: Women’s Empowerment Lesson 1

~ Georgia Coats ~ 6 Comments

I have been on a significant journey towards understanding Women’s Empowerment within me:

🌀 Lesson 1: the self discipline to GET UP—even when it’s hard

🌀 Lesson 2: the love to LIFT UP

🌀 Lesson 3: the power to RISE UP

This is my first lesson…

“Will you consider heading up our Women’s Empowerment group?”  

That was the question the Director of our local Immigrant and Refugee Center asked me, at a safe distance across her office, during the unprecedented pandemical summer of 2020.  

YES! and That’s CRAZY! and I have no idea what that means… all mixed into my teary-eyed, masked-face, foggy-glasses response.  What an awkward impression to make in an important work meeting—I couldn’t see clearly.  Feeling isolated during quarantine, my heart craved significance and being a part of things that are bigger than me, so I agreed to ponder her proposal. Contemplation for me usually involves key words, root words, related words—word clouds storming around in my brain.  I went home and scribbled empower across a blank page in my imagination and began to storm.

Empowered Women are Power-full

I don’t see myself as powerless, but I haven’t yet embraced powerful as one of the things that I am either. Attempting badass, I decided to lace up my thick-soled combat boots, and I’m still trying to break in the stiff fit.  I waffle between confident and clumsy, especially with a face mask and fogged up glasses.  

How badass can an already awkward, middle-aged mother of 3 even be?  

Mercy, grace, and gentle kindness.  I gravitate to these cozy words like I do towards a cup of chamomile tea at home in my fleece-lined slippers.  These are the soft places where I want to come alongside others.  But power, justice, and especially women’s empowerment—those words feel outside my zoning laws of comfort.  

Girls with Dreams Become Women of Vision

In the Fall of 2020, I eagerly gathered my first Women’s Empowerment group together.  I offered each woman flowers that uniquely reflected their presence in the group.  Collectively, we represented four distinct ethnolinguistic groups.  We spent time expressing our dreams with each other in our shared language of simple English.  Some women had home businesses, some were thinking about fleeing unsafe environments, and some longed to see loved ones they had been separated from for decades. In that precious space together, we soared.

The next day, I came down with a significant, positive case of COVID-19.  It felt like a slap down.  

How can I lift anyone up if I am inadvertently sharing a virus that could land them down and out?

Empowered Women Don’t Give Up on Important Things

When I get nervous about things in life I can’t control, I take on a physical challenge that is the right amount of impossible and achievable to suit the situation—like climbing a 14,000-foot Rocky Mountain or learning how to ride a ripstick.  Women’s Empowerment felt like a ripstick-kind of challenge.  Rip-sticking made me feel young and tenacious, but it also terrified me a little.  I needed suitable attire for such a venture—a safety helmet with spunk and my reliable running shoes. 

Sunday afternoons I would take my ripstick and my most inspiring playlist and head for the river trail.  I feared falling.  But I feared failing even more. All this was on my mind as I went speeding down a subtle slope.  And then I fell.  Ouch!  My wounded spirit immediately looked around to make sure no one saw that.  My wounded knee wasn’t so bad.

I get knocked down, but I get up again…

Chumbawamba

Note to self: Add this song to my playlist.

GET UP:

My first lesson in being empowered is being persistent and not giving up on things that are important.  Even when I’m scared.  And even when it hurts.  I got back on my ripstick with my bruised areas and finished out my Sunday adventure.

Humility is learning to live for the sake of others.  I have been both haunted and inspired by this definition.  I couldn’t fully grasp what this meant in my life.  I was more preoccupied with falling and failing and the differences between them, that I was not learning the art of lifting.

Lifted: Thanksgiving Rock 2021

~ Georgia Coats ~ 3 Comments

Each of you is to take up a stone…

to serve as a sign among you.

In the future, when your children ask you, 

‘What do these stones mean?’

Tell them that…

These stones are to be a memorial to the people forever.

Joshua 4:5-7

I paced up and down the gated driveway.  I felt trapped inside the iron gate as cars whizzed by in this unfamiliar corner of the world.  Even if I did venture beyond the gate, there was nowhere for me to go.  A smaller mission would have to suffice. I continued to pace up and down the drive looking for the perfect stone.  Nothing too ostentatious.  I did have to fly home with it in my little orange suitcase.  Flat, paintable, able to be cradled in the palm of my hand. The fascinating flora in our enclosed community felt like a lush green oasis.  But in reality, we were on the outskirts of the ginormous city of Bogota—the wiles of concrete and winding roads.

In order to complete my mission, my precious stone would have to be plucked out of the driveway.  I found a less-used corner of the drive that was made up of dirt, concrete, and a variety of rocks packed down by busses full of human cargo regularly deposited at the oasis.  Would anyone notice one small rock dug out of the drive?  I was willing to take that risk.  I curled my fingernails around the underside of a small grey stone and popped it out of its firm dirt casing.  I looked around nervously as I brushed off the dirt, wondering if I had triggered the alarms to sound.  I slipped the rock into my pocket and went in search of my new friends for tinto–a Colombian coffee break between seminary classes. 

Each of you is to take up a stone…  Part 1 of the mission accomplished.

Part 2 of the Mission: In the Future…

It sounds easy, but from decades of rock collecting, I knew that keeping track of my stone from June until November amidst the bustle of normal life was no easy task.  The goal:

Don’t lose the rock.

Don’t forget which small, grey, unexceptional stone came from that risky mission in that specific faraway corner of the world.

Part 3 of the Mission: To Serve as a Sign

The idea is to encapsulate the essence of 2021 in a word, in a sacred Scripture, and within the boundaries of a small stone and a limited array of paint markers. 

Humility was something my husband Steve and I were growing more familiar with this year—learning to live for the sake of others. Learning to offer our whole selves. Learning to delight in the offerings of others. Learning to let God do the heavy lifting, in the privileged places alongside some of His most precious children—Zoe, our oldest daughter, and her steps towards leaving our nest; Ella, our middle girl, as she navigates the wild world of a huge high school; Jamin, our middle schooler, and his newly kindled motivation to understand grammar and poetry and success in learning; 

Khalid* the translator and his very real struggles of translating holy Scriptures for his own people in another part of the world; 

Cesar* the young linguist who settled on the far side of the sea, learning a language no outsider has yet studied;  

Hortensia*, the 15 year old who has worked her way into my heart, and her big, beautiful family learning to thrive as newcomers in our neighborhood; 

Naya*, the bright teen I hope doesn’t slip through any cracks; 

Yendra and the gift of deepening friendship; 

The unique personalities and intense stories that come out of my interactions as a Community Navigator at our local Immigrant and Refugee Center; 

The sometimes overwhelming gift of being a good listener;

The adventure of sitting on the Council of Elders—the heartbeat of our church—pondering and praying for the deeper complexities of a thriving church family. 

Touring college campuses. Sitting through countless doctor, dentist and vaccination appointments in service to others. The small, daily work of dropping off and picking up precious preschool cargo. Travels to Colombia, Kenya, and Germany—and all the wonderful and difficult places Steve and I connect with virtually as an International Media Consultant and a Language Learning Coach, respectively.  

The year has been full. Our position in the lives of others is privileged. Access to people’s hearts is always accompanied by joy and sorrow–the practice of rejoicing with those who rejoice and mourning with those who mourn, our emotions trying to keep up with the quick tempos of life. 2021 has been full of struggle and victory and pain and celebration and barrier and clarity. The rhythm slows just long enough for a deep breath and a moment of beautiful surrender.

Our 2021 Stone:

Location: Colombia

Word: Lifted

Scripture: 1 Peter 5:6

Humble yourselves under God’s mighty hand,
that He may lift you up in due time.

I don’t know who God will lift, or when.  But He will.  In due time.  

And if we are in the privileged space to see Him do any of the heavy lifting or launching—then we too are lifted up.

The Greater Mission: What Do These Stones Mean?

After a lifetime of this familiar rhythm of rock painting as a family—Zoe, Ella, and Jamin know how to join in.  They tell their own stories of remembrance and listen to ours.

Steve and I lifted each of them up with specific promises painted on their stones:

Zoe—prosper—Jeremiah 29:11

Ella—belonging—John 14:23

Jamin—focus—Ephesians 2:10

Lifted, belonging, and focus were all placed in the medley of rocks that tell the stories of God’s faithfulness over 22 years of Thanks-giving together.  A few stray rocks have gotten in the mix.  No one is sure who painted them, or when.

As for prosper—that sits on a smaller shelf of rocks painted by Zoe over the last 10 years of her young life. The rhythm has become her own.  She’s building her own altar of thanks and remembrance.  Who knows where the rocks in her future will be lifted out of—gated driveways on the outskirts of Bogota? Southern California? Khulna, Bangladesh? Near a French castle or along an Italian riverbank?

To Be Discovered… in due time.

And to be part of a memorial… forever.

on my mind, Georgia

* some of the names of my precious friends are pseudonyms

NY2020: Happy to Dis-appoint

~ Georgia Coats ~ 2 Comments

Dear Disappointment,

I’ve spent way too much time thinking about you.  But don’t flatter yourself.  We’re not becoming friends.  In fact, I’ve acknowledged you, unwelcomed, inside the kingdom walls of my heart.  I just needed a moment to reset, refocus, breathe. I guess I also needed to spend way too much time in the shower on a Wednesday morning.  Rest my thoughts.

Now I’m ready to take some action.

Here’s what I know about you:  You work from within to kick down little appointments.  You damper dares and infect healthy fear.  You friend frustration and fiend innocence about it all.  Your M.O—If you can frustrate small fulfillments of goals and longings, you can make room for your older, stronger relative—discouragement.  But discouragement is harder to go unnoticed, like you.

Your goal is to impede me from moving forward with mine.

You see, my 3 words for 2020 are…

small…

…..daring…

………… worthy.

It’s a tremendous trio.  It’s diamond strength I’m learning to weild.

Just in the first few weeks of 2020, I have seen what you do to daring. I’m on to you.  And small—that’s my word, and you can’t claim it.  Thanks to MLK Jr., I’m committed to figuring out how to do small in great ways.  Wouldn’t you just love to dis-appoint all that, in your small ways?

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But then there’s worthy—I have intrinsic value and this is my heart space, not yours.  I have authority to appoint.  All you can do is kick down edifications and expectations that others have built up.  You exist to make us fret the small stuff; you are right there when the cold, full glass of milk spills, and you lie in wait to see what we’ll do about it.

Well, I’m here to dis-appoint you.  Because I can.

In the little kingdom of my heart, I appoint hope to reign, which means despair is not welcome in my kingdom.  I appoint encouragement as ministry of defense, and offense.  Discouragement will meet defeat… outside my kingdom walls.

Thanks to you, I’m taking back my appointment power.

Thanks to you, I’m reassessing what I long for, and what I hope is fulfilled in my schedule of daily life.

Thanks to you, I’m reminded that even the greatest of greats in history faced you.  But the ones I aspire to be like looked past their unfilled dreams to fulfill their greater destiny.

You and I are both small.  But I have the power to appoint, and you don’t.

You don’t belong here.  I can acknowledge when you show up, but I don’t have to let you stay.  I don’t have to let you decide who gets to make my heart home.

I don’t have to let your disses make me feel smaller or less worthy, or even less daring.  You may have damper power, but I have a fire that goes before me.

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NY2020: Feeling Small

~ Georgia Coats ~ 6 Comments

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Dear Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,

I’m feeling pretty small.  Things are kind of crazy at the onset of 2020.  Injustice. Intolerance. Mean words. In 2020 people are angry and feel like they have the right to take it out on others.

I used to feel bad for the time in the history that you had to face.  I was content to just be inspired by your legacy, that even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, we can still have a dream… that this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed… that all humans are created equal.

Your dreams and accomplishments made me thankful for how you made our nation a better place for everyone to live peacefully and safely.

What Went Wrong?

I’m not sure what went wrong, or if I just opened my eyes a little bit wider.  When I read, in 2020, your convicting words against racism, I feel like I could never live up to your standards.  I’ve never been discriminated by the color of my skin as you have.  I’ve never been as outspoken as you are.

You are our civil rights hero.  And we celebrate that.

But, in order to even fathom your dreams in this new decade, I’m realizing that it’s not always about being big and strong and fiercely outspoken.  It’s not about excusing myself from an impossible calling for more gifted people.

It’s about the small stuff. 

It’s about scooching over to make room on my bench for one more weary human to sit.  It’s about knowing my neighbor, looking into her determined eyes and seeing her very great smile of grit and gratitude.  It’s about being so amazed by the content of her character that I have nothing but respect for her.  It’s about sharing our humanity.

You see, I have some amazing friends.  And they have been judged by their ethnicity, religion, immigration status, and the color of their skin.  They have faced and overcome tremendous odds to get where they are today.  And they still have So. Far. To. Go.

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Pompa had been in this country for 9 years before she realized her husband had filed no immigration paperwork for her.  So, when he filed for a divorce, he figured she would have to disappear back into the bustle of Bangladesh.  With nothing.

He didn’t account for her courage, her fortitude.  Or for her faith in the God of the impossible.  He didn’t account for the kindness of others—both Muslim and Christian—who provided for her legal fees and her housing needs.  He didn’t imagine she had anything to offer that would inspire the faith and courage of others.  He was so wrong.

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And Zuzu.  She has never let her refugee status conquer or even dampen her spirit.  Instead, she embraced the opportunity of a fresh start in a new country.  As a mother of 3, she also manages the family finances and cares for her aging in-laws while pursuing her education in her 4th language.  Her husband also works tirelessly so she can go to school and together they can achieve in this country what hasn’t been possible for them back in war-torn Syria.

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My newest neighbor is a Gentle Soul with the brightest smile I have ever seen.  She met and married her husband and gave birth to their 10 kids in a refugee camp in Rwanda.  Now, as a widow, she braves a strange new community as a single mom with NO English language.  She works nights at a meat packing plant and relies on the kindness of others, her deep faith, and the services our great country has to offer to help her kids thrive.

I feel so small. 

I have so little to offer.  But I also know that every little offering is something.  I have held hands in prayer with Pompa.  I have celebrated Zuzu’s achievements over little cups of tea.  And I have connected deeply—mother to mother, woman to woman, human to human—far beyond words with my Gentle-Souled neighbor.

Dr. King, thank you for these words:

If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.

I can’t tell you how relieved I am that you actually said this.  I have seen my three beautiful friends move forward and cross insurmountable barriers with hope and grit.  My friends have been incredibly patient and grateful and gracious.  They have taught me to never waste a moment—to live, to learn, to move forward, to love others, to dare greatly.  They have shown me equality in our pursuits of happiness.

I feel so small in a big, scary 2020 world.  But, I’m learning that I can do the small stuff.  I can move forward, even if my steps feel ever so insignificant.  I can scooch over.  I can give my neighbor’s kids a ride home from school.  I can help her understand the electric bill.

I can take on small… I could even be great at the small things.

If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.  -MLK, Jr.

Dr. King, did you really ever start out small?

BEAUTY IN THE PATTERNS

~ Georgia Coats ~ 8 Comments

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Tears streamed from the corners of my eyes and dripped boldly onto the sterile paper that covered the examination table.   As I lay in fetal position whispering a desperate prayer, I could feel the numbed pressure and intense inner pain of the thick metal needle probing deep into my hipbone.  I had stopped counting bone marrow biopsies after a dozen. They had become routine over the years of chronic leukemia treatments. With a thick layer of gauze under an over-sized Band-Aid, the doctor patched up my tiny yet deep bone wound and sent me on my way.

My husband hugged me tight, handed me my coat, and ushered me out the door.  I still had time to make it to my absolutely favorite graduate Spanish linguistics class.  Being an already awkward, over-achieving, non-traditional grad student, I decided limping in late with tearstains and a bandaged backside was still worth it.  I slipped into my front row seat and began to copiously copy the tree diagrams sprawled all over the whiteboards in the room. Syntax. I couldn’t decide if I loved syntax or morphology more.  Good thing I didn’t have to choose—I just love the one I’m with.

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My profesora gave me a sympathetic look and proceeded with her lecture. Compassionately, she had offered that I could take an Incomplete for her class if I needed to during this uncertain time of changing leukemia treatments.  That was unthinkable.  It wasn’t that I needed to “stay busy” during a difficult time, it’s that I needed to be part of something meaningful.

Who knew that la lingüística could provide such purpose?

Within the field of linguistics, the goal is to discover patterns in language.  Once the patterns are discovered, linguists search out evidence found in natural speech to describe the rules and identify the boundaries of such defined patterns.  I find comfort in the certainty of patterns that allow us to explore deep mysteries of minds and cultures.

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Did you know that there are universal principles found in all the world’s languages that set human language apart from animal communication?  This is where geeky meets inspirational.

According to my favorite textbook, Introducción a la lingüística hispánica, creativity in a linguistic sense is the ability to take a finite number of items (a set of sounds, letters, morphemes, or words) and to produce an utterance that has never been said before.  We have the power to create.  This creativity allows us to make friend a verb, and to invent novel combinations like un-Google-able and stay-cation.

Prevarication reflects our human ability to fabricate, that is, both to deceive and imagine other possible worlds.

Recursion is how we use a finite number of language structures and patterns to produce infinite possibilities:

This is the house that Jack built.  This is the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.  This is the rat that ate the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.  This is the cat that killed the rat that…

Patterns help our finite human minds fathom infinity.  

We can ponder impossible things.  We can process the past and hope for the future.  Our language capacity allows us to imagine, to weave together a story—whether it is to fabricate a brilliant excuse or invent a fantastical new dimension.

Patterns are discernable and predictable structures that repeat and could potentially go on forever.  They are God’s eternal fingerprint on our temporal world. He set eternity in our hearts and gave us the tools to process and express His everlasting essence.  He has wired us to marvel at divine mystery and to comprehend great and unsearchable things.

In the midst of life’s unknowns, I have learned to cry out to the One who knows me.  To seek the One who penetrates marrow and searches souls. To search for His beauty in patterns.  And not just in language. God has scattered discernable patterns all over this world for us to discover and describe and fathom and imagine.

Meal:

Maybe you have Taco Tuesday.  We have omelets on Fridays.  Embrace the rhythm of routine, but pause to savor it.  Make your favorite omelet, but tweak the ingredients just enough to stir your culinary imagination.  Add smoked Gouda or sundried tomatoes. Top with sautéed mushrooms and onions. Try a side of roasted sweet potatoes drizzled with olive oil.

Song:

I love patterns in music—both the tune and the lyrics.  With hands opened towards heaven, listen, notice, and discover; surrender to His design.

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Prayer:

Lord, you are infinitely loving.  You set eternity in our hearts that we may comprehend unsearchable things.  I call out to you today. Reveal yourself to me through the patterns in this world.  Transform me out of the rut of life-depleting routine and into the unforced rhythm of your grace.  Thank you, Jesus.

Time:

Take time to play with words and play on words.  Marvel at the morphemes that make un-fathom-able possible.  Listen closely to the whispered words God has for you. Try to keep track of unsearchable things.  Get lost in a pattern and imagine new possible worlds. Share a good word from His Word with a friend. Screen Shot 2019-03-18 at 10.29.52 AMhttps://www.thecommonyear.com/blog/2019/3/16/beauty-in-the-patterns-georgia-coats

 

 

HOME: Somewhere between John Denver and Eminem

~ Georgia Coats ~ 6 Comments

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It was midnight sometime B.C.E (Before Children Era) and I was walking the aisles of a nearly empty grocery store at Christmastime in east Dearborn. I had a breakdown in the canned food aisle as I became keenly aware of John Denver’s voice piping through the store…

And the Colorado Rocky Mountain high,
I’ve seen it raining fire in the sky,
You can talk to God and listen to the casual reply,
Rocky Mountain high, Colorado…

Home of 20+ years came rushing back as I imagined a Colorado sunset while selecting a can of beans.  My husband and I were alone in a new city, and our budget allowed us to go home for Christmas only in our dreams.

I didn’t even like John Denver. But in that moment, the power of a song lyric perfectly positioned in time and context stirred something deep in my heart.

There were countless dark days when I wanted to go running back to familiar and safe foods, friendships, traditions, scenery…

Home Sweet Home

It was my chronic leukemia treatments that routed us to the heart of Motown. One by one, each of our miracle Michiganders grounded us here.  Much of our tight budget was reserved for paying off three miracle pregnancies, treatments, and births—no regrets. It meant, though, that our young family of five embraced cozy Christmases in our little Dearborn home.

It was the adventure of diversity in east Dearborn that kept us persevering through grey skies and bone-chillingly cold winters.  It was the landscape of learning to love our neighbors and learning to be loved by them that made home here real.

It was in Motown I had learned about motherhood. Priority, ingenuity, perseverance, gratitude. The power of compelling song lyrics to draw depths of strength from a human heart. GRIT. It was driving into Detroit, scrounging for parking money at Wayne State as I pushed through five years of grad school that I knew the shift of “home” was real.

I was working towards a Master’s Degree in Language Learning.  My passion and research were in the heart of authentic song lyrics. Song lyrics are a great resource for gaining cultural perspectives and memorizing new language forms–the perfect blend of geeky and inspirational.

I was stuck in traffic heading east on the 94. Eminem came on the radio…

 Maybe that’s why I can’t leave Detroit
It’s the motivation that keeps me going
This is the inspiration I need.

Eminem’s rapped intensity stirred something in me. I had joined a collective of people struggling to survive, to push through, to succeed when the odds are against them.

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There’s No Place Like Home

Now, our sense of home is shaken.  We will say good-bye to Motown and imagine a Rocky Mountain high.  We will establish a new home.  Home—where loved ones are waiting for us—exuberantly.  There is nothing like having people you belong to… those who long for your homecoming.  aaeb3621-71f2-4989-a9b1-da8b760fe2c1In the craziness of moving, I crave the beauty of the Rockies—quiet solitude, the forest and the streams, seeking grace in every step (J.Denver).  A place where we will continue to follow Jesus’ compelling example of loving God and loving our neighbors.

Maybe that’s why I feel so strange,
Got it all, but I still won’t change. (Eminem)

I do have it all. My heart is expanded across thousands of miles.  Grief is real because love is abundant—17 years of cultivated relationships—birthdays, funerals, Thanksgivings, play dates, countless Eid celebrations.

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I could never turn my back on a city that made me.
And “life’s been good to me so far” (Eminem)

I don’t have to select an anthem. Instead I will make a crazy summer playlist—one where John Denver and Eminem are back to back. I’ll add a splash of Simon and Garfunkel, some Fiddler on the Roof, Kutless, Crowder, and probably Lady Gaga.

I will laugh, cry, dance, and stare off in the distance on that epic, one-way road trip at the end of July.

Home is the center of our hearts—the place where the presence of God is real. Even in the mess of my mixed emotions, chaotic packing, and our crazy summer playlist of 2018…  He makes His home with us.de86863c-499c-4dc4-89fb-a8ef53b71e24.jpg

What’s on your summer playlist?