"I figure if they don't come home with scrapes and bruises,
then they are not learning anything."

I enjoyed a walk with a certain young man, all of 20 months old, and his parents yesterday. The day was lovely in the way that summer-to-fall transition days often are, simultaneously warm and golden, yet still somehow cool and foggy. We walked among hills burnished with dry grasses and small-leaved members of the sage family, in a sea of feathery pampas grass waving over our heads. By our feet, the blackberry leaves were starting to shift from green to reddish-brown.

Our climb to the top of a hill was steep; the child, riding in the most complicated frame pack I've ever seen, was distressed. Once we'd achieved the summit and freed him from his buckles, straps and portable shade, his disposition returned to its usual sunny state. While Mom caught her breath, he explored the hill top with Dad, the blonde-brown of his thickening curls appearing and disappearing over the tops of the dried grasses. I watched the grasshoppers flee in droves before his wandering feet.

He refused to ride back down the hill, insisting instead on his independence, tugging his hand away from the assistance of his parents and taking off at a rapid wobbling walk. (Interesting that we manage to learn to walk with diapers bunched between our legs. Suddenly, I understand why we call them "toddlers.") The ground was dry and slick with loose pebbles, and our toddling companion didn't yet know how to recognize and respond to this potentially dangerous footing. But try to carry him over the uneven terrain, and he'd cry and ask for "down." Leave him on the ground, and he'd slip and fall, scraping an elbow or his forehead, dissolving into tears; pick him up to comfort him and, sure enough, he would insist again on "down."

He settled on a compromise after he'd fallen twice and would reach for his mother's hand when he felt the ground was not quite baby-friendly. Thus protected, he'd look a little closer at the gullies carved in the path by the winter rains and the berry leaves changing colors. This walking thing, this exploration, was pretty cool.

What a balance to keep! The parents' instinct to protect, a child's urge to explore and desire for independence. How difficult it must be to stand back and allow your child to suffer the injuries of discovery and self-determination. How do you know when to step in to prevent major harm? How do you know when life's little lessons are about to become major accidents? A misstep could scrape a knee or break a leg... At what point do you step back and pray for the former?

"My name is Moby, and I have a dirty little secret to confess...
I like to go out to raves and dance until 7:00 a.m.!"

We enjoyed Moby's third (!) sold out San Francisco concert on Monday. The genius behind the amazing Play (more than one year among the top five bestsellers) is obviously in love with sound: making it, layering it, exploring it, bathing in it, reveling in it.

From our balcony seats, I watched the audience reactions as much as the performance. The main floor was so completely packed that the inclination to dance translated itself to a limited up-down bounce, like some large, gelatinous sea creature regularly rippling its surface area in a quest for movement. Dancing in the balcony area was easier, confined as we were in narrow rows and squeezed between overheating individuals on either side. The smart few made it into the aisles, dancing there in flagrant disregard for any fire marshal who might have been present.

I watched one individual sway gently to the rhythms, watched as he raised his hands, palms open, above his head. And suddenly, I was younger, transported to another musical gathering, to a space with better ventilation. I am at a sing-along with the youth group, I am at Christian Music Night at Great America, I am at Westmont Vespers. Rather than the technology which layers Moby's compositions, the music is simpler, carrying a roomful of voices in a repeated chorus. Eyes are closed, hands are raised, bodies gently sway, and one lone person in the back of the room has started to sing the harmony.

I haven't given "worship" much thought lately, especially since I stopped attending church and discovered I could appreciate the holy on my terms, outside rituals so formulaic they felt dead. But watching the raised hands of the audience at Moby's last show, I found myself wondering, were these people dancing or was this worship? If it was worship, what was being worshiped? Moby? Music? Dance? God? Being under 35 and technocentric? Flashing lights? Endorphins?

Is it a one time worship, sort of an instinctual, gut-level reaction to the situation here: the community, the rhythm, the flashing lights? Is it a worship that is manifest elsewhere? Does the worshiping Moby concert attender go to church on Sunday or to Friday night raves? Or both?

Or perhaps I read too much into casual observances. Perhaps what reminded me of worship was simply no more than an overflowing of warm, buzzy feelings brought on by good friends, a good music, and a great show.