The Something of Nothing
“Every exhalation is propelled by an inhalation. […] Nothing comes forth without something doing nothing.”
Leonard Sweet, From Tablet to Table
The table has been cleared from dinner—only a few crumbs of baked spaghetti and garlic bread remain. That can wait, I surrender, ready to throw in the kitchen towel for the day. The oven clock’s red glow reveals a thirty-minute gap before we must begin hauling kids off to bed.
Ben is already sitting on the living room couch, so I join him. We’ve had that couch since we were newlyweds, and while still comfortable, its once-white fabric now bears the scars of a full life and a full house. The sound of four boys wrestling and laughing waft up from the basement, and I know the smell of sweat will soon follow. Baths will be a must. I sink into the corner opposite my husband, and we look at each other.
What now?
After running in opposite directions all day just to get kids places and show up for work, the full stop is jilting. We are not used to finding spare pockets of time, and if I’m honest, the nothingness is a bit unnerving.
Part of me feels the push toward efficiency. “Use your time wisely!” a voice whispers in my brain, the tone and timbre sounding somewhat familiar and parental. Perhaps an echo of the past. While Ben and I certainly have things to talk about—important things like paying medical bills and cutting the dog’s toenails—I am not compelled to mention them.
My phone is on the coffee table, just within reach, and a ping alerts me that someone or something wants my attention. My fingers move toward the device before I even realize it’s happening, but then I stop. Arm suspended in a Matrix-like trance, I realize that I have a choice to make: I can fill in these gaps of time, or I can embrace this gift of space.
I opt to sit and to linger in the nothing.
Minutes pass, and the clang and clamor of the day begins to settle. The tension I didn’t realize I was carrying in my neck and shoulders softens. We chit chat, sharing small anecdotes. Ben talks about a client meeting, and I relay something hilariously inappropriate our three-year-old said on the way home from preschool. It’s a bunch of nothing, really—and yet, it is something.
There is a sense that the un-rushed now unravels what has been left behind and girds us for what is ahead. Sitting still—that time void of measurable activity—is not lazy or useless. Rather, the nothingness becomes an invitation into more.
Less distraction, and more presence.
Less striving, and more rest.
Less isolation, and more communion.
Less of me, and more of Him.
There is always something to the nothing, to unexpectedly slow evenings or to a string of days that taste bland and insignificant. Someday, we will look back upon the miracles that happened in mundane moments such as these. But for now, we sit. We let our minds and bodies stay a little longer knowing, to let the nothing do its something. Whatever it is.
REFLECT:
What is your first response to moments of nothingness?
