Muffin Mondays

here in mission year, neighboring is doubtlessly the most important thing we do.

Jesus says, "love your neighbor as yourself."  Paul says, "the whole law is fulfilled in one statement: "love your neighbor as yourself."

and this is our chief exploration.

we knock on doors, bake plates of cookies, strap guitars to our necks and sing Christmas carols to strangers on the streets, sit and chat in people's lawn chairs (or lawn couches, as they may be), walk dogs with nearby friends, invite others over for pasta and nail-painting.  neighboring may be as creative or uncreative as we are, and it's just as good both ways, as long as we're remembering that our neighbors are just as ourselves.

one of my disappointments in the neighboring journey is the continuous realization that the days are just as short and busy when i'm hoping to make time for others.  no matter how busy my schedule gets, my call doesn't change.  indeed, the more my life interferes with my ability to interact with those outside of my comfort zone on a personable level, the more i question whether my life is, by nature, truly life.

well, on all of that, Cara and I've resolved to take better advantage of our mornings.  we work from 10:30-6:30, and, between scheduled activities, have virtually no time in the weekday evenings to hang with neighbors.  we do, however, have morning time.

bam!  and muffin mondays are born onto Winton Street, January 2013.

every monday, we bake [sweet] [delicious] [Cara's-a-great-cook] muffins, stack them onto our largest white dish, and trek the usual four blocks down Winton street, sharing a muffin and a smile with anybody we see.  neighbors are continually surprised by the fact that - on top of being a couple of white girls walking comfortably in a 3rd Ward neighborhood - we are offering free food, no catch.

unfortunately, there is often a shortage of people chillin' outside at 10am on a weekday morning.  in order to gain a few more 'followers' and make the acquaintance of a few new faces, I decided one Saturday afternoon to draw hand-made notes inviting each of our thirty-four neighboring houses to step outside for weekly muffin mondays. the lovely Kristin helped me make the invites, and the lively Abigail bounced door to door with me to hand them out ~ she's the only gal in the house besides myself who enjoys (maybe, or maybe I'm stretching her feelings a bit) the sometimes sheer awkwardness of the door-to-door introduction.

so far, thanks to muffin monday, we've made the acquaintance of 19+ new neighbors, some road-side workers in trucks, a pack of auto-mechanics in the parking lot we walk across, and a jumpy bunch of toddlers.  we've built trust.  we've brightened people's weeks.  perhaps, by the grace of God, we've helped some people believe in love a little better, believe in generosity a little more.

all it takes are a couple dozen muffins (well, less than that, most weeks).  hopefully, over the next few months of being consistent, more neighbors will step outside Monday mornings for a muffin.  maybe some of them will meet each other.  maybe they'll start stepping outside more often.  maybe somebody will start sitting in somebody else's lawn chair.  who knows, maybe somebody will even make their neighbors muffins when we're gone.

maybe not. maybe i'll gain my not-freshman-fifteen on the world's best muffins.

either way, this is a simple way of loving.  it's fun.  it's easy.  it may lead to deeper community.  and i am thrilled at the ordinariness of my life's most important calling: to be a neighbor.