George Foreman was a big man. A huge man. Mohammed Ali was a fool to fight someone that big and powerful. Ali had never been big for a heavyweight and Foreman was always big, even for a heavyweight. After 5 rounds of absorbing all the punishment Foreman could dish out, and inventing the rope-a-dope strategy in the process, Ali finally poured on all the retribution he had built up. When the lumbering Foreman was finally on his way to the mat, Ali had the opportunity to take one more shot of payback. He just let the big man fall. There was enormous grace in what Ali did not do.
Charlie Watts is not a boxer, but he hits some pretty mean licks himself. As the “old man” in the Rolling Stones, Watts has provided the rock to Keith Richards’ roll for more that 50 years. There’s a lot of rocking in a typical Stones song, yet I’ve been entranced by “Beast of Burden” for weeks now not because of the beats Charlie Watts hits but because of the beats he refrains from hitting. That first verse especially. It draws me in because of the space that Watts allows to remain around his rhythm.
It occurs to me that this is the reason we have Lent: to allow some space. When it comes to Christmas and Easter, to Epiphany and Pentecost, I think more is more. I dig a liturgical church, so I’ve made my preference for pageantry clear. But it can be hard to enter in to the middle of all those rubrics. Where does one begin? For centuries, the answer has been Lent, a quiet time and a space around the rhythm of the liturgical year. It’s a time when we, having exhausted ourselves in the effort to strike life a body blow, are let to fall under our own weight. Lying on the mat, I hope I don’t forget to listen to that space between the digits in the ten count.