The Detritus of Life

(Photo by me)

I have a confession to make, and it is pretty horrible…some of you should stop reading now. This really happened. Karen and I and her Aunt Faith were staying the night in Fenton, Missouri after spending the whole day moving Faith out of her home. The next day we would fly to Dallas where Faith would move in with us. We were hungry and tired. I called a local bar and ordered wings and fries, etc. I brought the food back to the motel. While Karen went to get Faith, I opened up the wings. Someone had eaten one of the wings and thrown the bones back on top of the stack. And it was my fault. I paid for the order at the bar before it was ready, and I didn’t leave a tip. I figured, take-out. Stupid. So here’s my dilemma: if Karen, certainly, and Faith, absolutely, see the eaten wing, I have to throw the whole thing out and go back and get something else or starve. So I pick up the bones and hide them in a napkin in the trash. My only defense for my action: detritus.

The dictionary defines detritus as: waste or debris of any kind. Chomped-on chicken bones qualify as debris. In a sense, as we stroll through life, we are basically making our way through past, present and future debris all the time. Detritus is a by-product of life—it cannot be ignored or avoided.

For clarity’s sake, let’s examine daily detritus. It starts in the bathroom. The morning elimination, the ablution, the tooth-brushing, the meds, the grooming, the make-up—all of them defenses against or accessions to detritus. Move on to the kitchen—the coffee, the dishes, the leftovers, the garbage, the failed diet. Disintegration. Detritus. The detritus of my life—the regrets, the blunders, the wrong choices, the selfishness, the consistent inclination to choose for me rather than for others. Finally, the detritus of my mind—but I leave that to Him. The Bible promises that believing in Him will cause the transforming of my mind. I trust Him for that. There is too much detritus in there for me to deal with.

Okay, a sad example of daily detritus: my whole teaching career I trained myself to do my business in the morning. An agony that I am sure most teachers have experienced is having to go in the middle of a class period. I asserted a level of control over my bodily functions—we would go before we left for school. This seemed like an intensely personal struggle…and then somehow my brother and I got on that subject and I learned he trained himself the very same way. I’ve come to the realization that we try to find dignified ways to manage our detritus.

I believe detritus has a strong role to play in our lives as a spiritual teacher. Foremost, it demonstrates to us that we are a fallen race. Angels don’t have to do floors. Muck and mess are real words that we have created on this planet. Acknowledge our fallenness. Secondly, detritus keeps us humble. I occasionally think of supermodels on the toilet. Detritus doesn’t see rich or poor or white or black or male or female or any distinction you can make among us. Some people are better at covering up their detritus than others, and I’m not sure if that’s a blessing or not. (A friend told me recently that his wife gets annoyed when he farts.) Detritus is universal. Another benefit: it challenges us to be honest. Going deeper in a relationship means sharing detritus. It can get complex. (Haha, but I guess I’m being hypocritical—the only way my wife is going to find out about those contaminated wings is when she reads this essay. Aunt Faith will never find out!) And finally, detritus breeds faith. There are so many things out there that can kill me. Germs to parasites to hurricanes. I will do what I can do, but I need a big blanket of detritus protection from the One who can and will protect me.

I was talking with my wife awhile back. “Do you think we’ll poop in heaven?” Her: “Nope. No poop, no pee, no marriage.” An unreadable smile. Should I be worried?

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