One Wild and Precious Life

Ahhhh, Vacation!

Just popping in for a hello with no photos to post -- they're on my phone and no way to download them here in Buffalo.  My last nine days were spent camping on the very shore of Lake Erie, sunning, swimming, reading, writing, eating, talking to my very best friend in the world.  It has been lovely, amazing, restorative.  I feel like a new woman.  I've seen sunsets and sunrises that are to die for, and grilled some mean dinners.  I've sat around a few campfires, and have drunk a few too many gins & tonic (gin & tonics?).  Just now I'm due for a nice, hot shower and a dinner that someone else is cooking!  My friend Tom (Cheryl's partner) is cooking his own birthday dinner tonight, because he's a guy and nobody else can manage the grill (ahem).  I arrive home in 4 more days, and will have much more to say and show then.  But I've finished the new Barbara Kingsolver, along with 2 other books, written pages and pages and pages each morning, sketched and painted and played to my heart's content.  I'm taking a minute now to read just a few blog entries from my blogging friends, and to write and let you know I haven't disappeared, and will be back in the blink of an eye!

Great Weekend!

What a great weekend it has been!  Friday I went to yoga and then drove the hour to go see my spiritual director in Oak Ridge.  As I spoke to her, I realized that this is one of the best periods I've ever had in my whole life. I love being me, right here, right now!  I'm happier and more "in the moment" than I've ever been in my life, and I feel the presence of God everywhere.  I'm doing my job well, but more importantly, I love the life that I'm living -- the whole life.  That doesn't mean everything's perfect -- it never is.  But gosh, I'm happy!  During savasana at yoga I opened my eyes and looked at the tin ceiling of the yoga studio and thought, "This is what bliss feels like."  Wow!  And the whole weekend has felt that way, though perhaps less intense than those hours on Friday.

Yesterday I "rearranged the furniture" in my garden.  My one strawberry bed is overcrowded, and for two years has sent out runners into the paths.  Between the Easter freeze and the dry weather (and also, perhaps, due to that overcrowding), it hasn't been a very productive year in the strawberry patch.  So yesterday I took out the side boards from the long inside edges of two beds (one of which went unplanted and weed-filled this year), and combined them to make one bed.  Now my strawberry bed is twice the size!

You can see how overgrown it is on the right hand side -- I'll need to do some thinning out and transplanting.  You can also see the strawberries in the path at the bottom and top of the beds, and the small gap near the lower center (there's one in the back, too) which will need to be filled by small pieces of board.  I've already done some transplanting, but have much more to do.  I've also offered the plants in the path on my freecycle list, the catch being that people have to dig them up themselves.  So far I've only had one taker.  I can't believe it!  When I started this bed, I know I paid at least $2.50 each for 6-8 plants, and I'm offering as many as people want for free.  And it's easy digging in my little garden.  I called a friend with a strawberry bed to see if she wanted more, and she insisted that "It's the wrong time of year for transplanting strawberries."  Huh?  They're sending out runners and transplanting themselves right now, it seems to me.  And I find it nearly impossible to kill strawberries, they're so hardy.  So I don't get it.  And yesterday was so cool and dry, great for digging in the garden.

Having my sermon done on Thursday also left me with a sense of complete freedom the last two days.  There was no writing or editing hanging over my head, and I could open it up this morning, make a few last minute changes (I don't know why, since I never read from my completed manuscript anymore), make a few notes for myself, and print it out.  Church also went well -- no complaints, nobody in the hospital -- as far as I know now, I'm finished with work for today.

And oh, all weekend I've been deliciously anticipating my vacation, packing my carry-on bag, making sure my toiletry bottles and supplies are all filled and ready to go, doing laundry, talking to Cheryl about last-minute arrangements.  Can you tell I'm excited?  Not many people get this excited about a trip to Buffalo, I bet -- but I am!  It's Cheryl who always says there are three parts to any event:  anticipation, the event itself, and reminiscing when it's over.  It makes the whole experience last three times as long.  I sure have had fun with the anticipation part.

Look at these Roma tomatoes from my garden:

The photograph doesn't convey how thick these babies are growing this year!  They're of a nice size, too.  This is only one of the four plants in this bed.  Oh, I'll have an abundance of frozen tomatoes for soups and sauces this year, as well as being able to make several batches of sauce to freeze!  I like to cook it down for hours, and it gets so thick and rich!

Oops, I forgot to pick that cucumber that's ready -- the last one I'll get from the garden before I leave.  I've asked the guys who mow the lawns at the church, the office annex, and at my house (parishioner volunteers, God love 'em) to keep the cukes and ripe tomatoes picked while I'm gone so the plants don't stop producing.  I may not get another entry made here until after vacation, because I'm not likely to have much computer access.  So it may be 2 weeks before you hear from me.  So here I go, out the door to pick that cucumber.  Bye.... <waving>

Memories

Last night and tonight have been cool and clear, with very little humidity.  Today was only in the high 70s and sunny.  Beautiful weather, perfect weather.  I've had the air conditioning off and windows open for over 24 hours now.  I'm not sure why, given my allergies and the noise from the highway in front of my house, I prefer to sleep with open windows (the box fan in the bedroom window mutes the traffic sounds), but I do.  There's something about fresh air moving through the house that feels somehow healthier and more...well, more refreshing.

Tonight I sit in my study with my windows open, and tree frogs and a variety of other noisy nighttime peepers are serenading me.  Just a year ago I was at a yoga retreat in Costa Rica, staying in a guest house "tucked into a sweet little rain forest valley" (which meant not one current of air stirred down there!), and the noises tonight somehow bring that memory back to me.  The sounds there were very different than here, tree frogs much louder, howler monkeys calling through the rain forest at dusk and dawn, and the occasional cat-like scream that I was convinced was a jaguar on the prowl.  I didn't walk outside in the dark much, unless I was with a noisy group.  That trip was such a disappointment.  I made a considerable investment in fees and travel costs, and so many things just weren't fun for me, from the heat (about 99 degrees and 99% humidity -- nothing ever dried out, and all you had to do was move to be drenched in sweat) to the vegetarian cuisine (Costa Rica is famous for its beef and its seafood, and we got neither) to the lack of fans (I was told there would be ceiling fans in every room, and I was fine with that, because I tolerate heat fairly well), to the giant spiders that insisted on exploring our room from time to time.  The yoga was too hard, the excursions too expensive -- you get the idea -- whine, whine, whine.  I was never so glad to get back home in my life, and it certainly did not feel like much R&R.  And nothing like Italy, which I adored the year before.

Now, a year later, I'm really glad I went.  I wish I'd been a better sport.  It's great fun to know what the rain forest is really like.  I can still almost smell it.  I loved the rainforest canopy tour on zip lines.  I wish I'd spent more time at the beach and in the Caribbean, as beach and ocean are my true loves.  When I read about the howler monkeys, I can still hear their eerie calls.  The toucans, capuchin monkeys, and little lizards that were everywhere were enchanting.  I didn't once get hurt in any way.  Floating on my back in the hot tub (heat off, of course) on the pretty patio cooled me delightfully, and I enjoyed sitting in the open-air dining hall, reading my books or making sketches of the rainforest and distant ocean view.  But I'm really glad to be going to dear old Buffalo and dear old Lake Erie this year!

These were just a few of the shots I got in Costa Rica.  If you move your cursor over the photo, a description of what they are will appear.

These nighttime sounds bring back one more memory.  I remember sitting at my desk in my tiny apartment at Yale Divinity School, early September, listening to the night creatures right outside my open window.  I remember hearing the clock in the chapel building chime the quarter, half, three-quarter, and full hour.  I remember being amazed, disbelieving really, that I could actually be at Yale, and be on the track for ordination to the priesthood.  On the one hand, I kept waiting for someone to call me into an office and say, "I'm sorry, there's been a terrible mistake.  You'll have to go home now."  When I first told my mother that I felt called to the priesthood, she said, "I think your whole life has been getting you ready for this."  That's how I felt that night, all alone and a little scared, at Yale.  Like that was where I was born and bred to be just at that particular time.

And finally -- what made today extraordinary?  Two things.  First, driving by my house on the way to somewhere else, and seeing a fawn with the spots still on, running alongside the highway in my front yard.  I was afraid she would run into the road, but she turned and ran back toward the house, and I suspect, on into the woods behind my back yard.  The other thing:  getting my sermon done!  Now I have two full days off coming up, God willin' and the creek don't rise!

Wonders

Ok, I'm not posting as often as I'd like.  My friend Fran manages to post something interesting nearly every day.  Other blog friends do the same.  But I'm doing the best I can.

Today was a festival, an orgy of reading, for the 3 different book groups I'm in.  Yesterday I caught up on the Peter Gomes (name rhymes with "homes") book:  The Good Book.  I love it.  For us more liberal readers of scripture, it's a wonderful "how to, and why" type book.  It really makes scripture accessible to a modern readership.  It's the first book about scripture that my bible study group has done, but I think it's so appropriate to our Anglican way of reading scripture (even though Gomes is a Baptist!).

There's a strange confluence happening for me, between reading Ladner's The Lost Art of Compassion, Hanh's Living Buddha, Living Christ, Jung's autobiography, and the selected readings done by my yoga teacher, Rebecca Dennis.  A bunch of ideas are getting poured into the hopper of my brain all at once, and currently they're churning around like pesto in the food processor.  I'm not sure what will come of it, but I'm fairly sure something is happening in there.  It's exciting.  I like it.  I'm learning to live with uncertainty, while I wait to see what it is that is trying to fit together.  It's better than being in school (graduate or undergraduate) where we just had to stuff books into the hopper.  I'm reading quite a bit, but it's actually synthesizing (but not quite yet), and something is stirring around that will be completely new for me. I can't wait!

One of the scary parts is that I wonder if the doctrine and teaching of the church (which it is my obligation and duty to teach and preach) are in some way "less than," or even antithetical to my discoveries that mystical, spiritual contact with God transcend doctrinal and denominational boundaries.  I don't think you have to be Episcopalian, or even Christian, to know about or even dwell within the Kingdom of Heaven.  That's bound to be displeasing to those who want to draw circles and boundaries, and keep some folks out.

So are my days extraordinary?  You bet.  Today I tried to take some more pictures of my dogs getting acquainted with the cows while we were on our early morning run (I like to be home by 7 am, if possible).  Several weeks ago I delighted in the sight of my dogs touching nose-to-nose with some very shy cows that occasionally appear in a nearby field when we take our run.  I was upset that I didn't take pictures, being so caught up in the sight of them.  But today it happened again -- I had my phone (which I carry with me on my run, in case I get hurt, and which also takes pictures), and I tried to take pictures.  Apparently I had a setting wrong, because nothing came out.  Oh, well.  Next time.  Each time it happens, I'm more reassured that there will be a next time!  But if the cows and dogs keep looking so cute together, I may eventually have to give up beef, just as I have had to give up pork, now that I know pigs are as smart as 3 year olds.  Someone tried to reassure me, saying, "But pigs go feral if they're loose for a day or 2."  My thought is, "Wouldn't you???"  Given the choice between the fate of a captive pig, and the freedom of a wild pig (not to mention the trust level with humans!), I'd much prefer to become a wild, free pig, rather than someone's dinner.

My garden is producing.  Today I ate dinner exclusively from my garden:  a cucumber (just ate it like a banana, but without peeling it), several grape tomatoes, and 6 strawberries for dessert.  Later I had mashed turnips(but the turnips were from a parishioner's garden).  Yum.  I've also had two (count 'em -- two!) ripe golden raspberries from my garden.  I've done some weeding and mulching.  But my new motto for gardening is:  "Only do it as long as it's fun."  If I'm pulling weeds and I start getting overheated and cranky, I stop.  I take a shower and recover.  No, nothing is ever completely "finished."  But if truth be told, nothing is ever "completely finished" in a garden anyway.

The books I ordered for my vacation have both arrived (Barbara Kingsolver's newest and "The Diary of a Country Lady").  I keep throwing things into my open suitcase, and contemplating whether I should pack a bigger bag (I do have a HUGE one).  Sometime I will have to tell you of my personal experience of Costa Rica last year, which was so stressful that it didn't feel like a vacation at all.  But this year I will only say that I need this vacation badly, and am so excited to spend two (fully expense paid) weeks on the lake near Buffalo with Cheryl!  Speaking of which, the new blue flipflops are not great with wet feet.  Live and learn.  They're still cute.

So it's a fairly quiet week ahead of me (God willing).  I've got reading and writing to do before the weekend.  And a week from now I'll be in Buffalo.  God is good.

Friday Five

This is my first shot at these.  I'm glad it was a fast and easy one this time.

1.  What are you wearing?  New shorts, top, and pretty blue plastic flipflops on sale from Walmart.  I'm getting ready for a 2-week vacation where laundry facilities are uncertain (we're camping on Lake Erie).  I bought more clothes, including undies, today.  I also discovered on the 4th that I do not own an article of red clothing, except for a sweater (not the thing for July in Tennessee).  So now I have a shirt to wear next year (as well as the rest of this summer), God willin' and the creek don't rise.

2.  What are you reading?  I keep pressing on toward the end of Jung's autobiography, "Memories, Dreams, Reflections."  It's a re-read, but the first time was probably 1975.  So I'm due to review it.  It's a required book for my spiritual direction program (for the 1st semester; I'm now a 4th semester student), and it seems much more difficult than it did when I was 23.  Hmmm.  "The Good Book" by Peter Gomes, for my Wednesday morning Bible Study.  First time we've studied a book about the Bible, rather than the Bible itself.  It's a really good (though admittedly biased) read -- very much in line with the Anglican way of reading and interpreting scripture.  The folks are loving it.  "Living Buddha, Living Christ" by Thich Nat Hanh, for my study group.  It's also an option to read and review for my Spiritual Direction course, so I'm killing two birds with one stone.  Again, I read this one much earlier, early 1990s, and am now re-reading. He gets so much Christian theology wrong, but the sentiment is so right.  I'm also trying to read Alice Hoffman's "Here on Earth," given to me years ago by a friend.  I say "trying" because it's on my bedside table, and I'm usually asleep before I get through a page or two.  I love Alice Hoffman.  She uses that sort of "supernaturalism" that I find often in Latin American writers -- that sense of the supernatural as a perfectly natural occurrence, and layered over completely normal, everyday life.  I'm also listening in my car to an audiobook called "The Emperor's Children" that is an odd little novel about a group of college graduates coming of age in New York around the time of 9/11.  A lot of my "reading" is audiobooks, which I listen to while I'm driving thither and yon.

3.  What are you eating?  This minute?  Almonds -- one of my favorite snacks.  In general I'm really working on eating more fresh food (including grilled meats and garden produce, as well as a salad a day).  I do this imperfectly.  But I keep working on it.

4.  Doing?  Well, what I'm doing right now is obvious.  Making a blog entry.  More generally, I'm "doing" an effort to keep the "infrastructure" parts of my life in order -- a task that still seems incredibly hard for me, even beyond middle age.  Keeping my house clean, my work life in order, my dietary and exercise practices, and my bills paid, all at the same time, seems near-impossible for me.  And there are other things:  medical/dental/optical care, car maintenance, living within my budget -- etc.  I think I made a list of about 18 things that I consider basic tasks of living, the "infrastructure" on which to build my life.  Some of them are daily (housekeeping, diet, & exercise), some monthly (paying bills), some annual or semi-annual (car registration, filing income taxes, veterinary care for the dogs, car maintenance, medical/dental care for me).  But I still struggle to get all these things, that seem to me to be the basics of living life as an adult, done and in order.  Somehow I seem to be missing the "basic adult responsibilities" gene.  As my mom would say, "I was standing behind the door when God passed that one out."

5.  Pondering?  See #4, above.  Also:  what it really means to be on this Christian pilgrimage, and how to get my parishioners excited about that.  How to get people to think about what "The Good News" is in each of their individual lives.  Whether or not I make one single bit of difference in the life of anyone but my dogs; and whether that really matters.  What I am going to pack to take on vacation.

And finally, the bonus question:  describe a favorite July 4th.  Sitting on a blanket on a hillside of the city park in Terre Haute, my mother watching me like a hawk.  Mosquito repellant (6-12 -- my birthday, now that I think of it!) in place, probably rubbed into my eyes, which stung incredibly.  Very hot.  I'm sure I wasn't 8 years old yet.  Where was my father?  Perhaps at the Masonic Lodge, doing some kind of fancy ritual.  Waiting for the fireworks to start.  I don't even remember the fireworks themselves, though they were always a wonder to me.  It's being with lots of other people, on a blanket on the grass, under my mother's loving, watchful gaze that I remember most.  Perhaps I had sparklers.

Happy Fourth!

It's a quiet day at the rectory; after our 9:30 service (The Fourth is a Holy Day in the Episcopal Church) I came home and spent a while reading blogs.  This article inspired me to go up to my studio and do a little play, so I spent a pleasant time there working on a couple of projects, including preparing some pages in my sketchbook journal to take with me on vacation.  Then I went to the garden for a while.  I ate my third grape tomato (the first two yesterday).  Here you see some more ripening:

Maybe tomorrow I'll have a couple more!  The Romas are also coming along, and the yellow cherry tomatoes (Husky Gold) have blooms now.  I love the way my plants sequenced themselves this year; just about the time one set is petering out, another group will be ripening up.  The lazier I get, the better my garden seems to get -- go figure.

The volunteer plants from my compost heap have fruit on them now.  The mystery plant (I knew it was some sort of squash-family plant, but didn't know what!) has revealed itself:

Ta Da!  Acorn squash!  I had ONE acorn squash last year, given to me by a friend.  It looked so pretty on my counter that I left it there too long, and had to consign it to the compost heap.  That compost, of course, got spread on my garden this spring, and voila!  Now I'm not a huge squash fan, but this year will be the year of acorn squash.

And look at this other little volunteer:

I currently have two watermelons on this vine, with lots of blossoms.  Ignore the ragweed intermingled there, okay?  And my herbs are thriving (I've already made one batch of pesto), I have teeny little cucumbers (those plants went into the garden the latest of all), and my asparagus is spreading.  The beans are growing, though way too small for beans yet.  And I'm still getting the occasional strawberry from that bed (this afternoon I had four).  I can't ask for more abundance than this.  But I do wish I had got some corn in.  My neighbor's (he has about a quarter-acre garden) has tassles now.  I'll have to rely on the farmer's market for my sweet corn this year.

And now I just had a call from a friend, inviting me over later for a hamburger.  That takes care of the little tinge of loneliness that has been curling around the edges of my day.  I hope you all are having a delicious time, whatever you're doing.