One Wild and Precious Life

One Wild and Precious Day (Well, Two, Actually)

Two beautiful weekends of Indian Summer just past; last weekend I thought of all the shoulds and oughts first:  I could weed a badly overgrown veggie garden, and put it to bed for winter:

Or maybe I should clear the windfall tree that fell onto my labyrinth in the last big storm:

Nah.  I didn't want to do either one of those things.  I'd have had to go get my chain saw back from the sharpening shop to clear the tree, and I just didn't feel like weeding and mulching on such a gorgeous day.  But then there's the brush pile that needs burning -- I love a bonfire!

Or there's the brush pile behind the church -- even bigger and more in need of a burn!

But really, you can see by the light even in these pictures, that the day was calling me -- calling me to something way beyond work.  This day wanted to be admired and adored, savored and enjoyed.  The day called me to do what I wanted to do -- asked me how best to make use of this one wild and precious day. 

So I started out with a bike ride that made me feel wild and free, like a kid again, really, exploring roads I'd never taken, panting my way up small hills (hey, I do live in the mountains here!), scaring myself a little bit with the speed of the downhill coasts.  What fun!  I was having too much fun (and too out of breath) to take pictures of my ride.  But when I got home, the day still beckoned, and I went for a solitary walk in the woods behind the church.

Our church is blessed with 18.8 acres of property, only about 3 acres of which is cleared.  The other 15 acres or so is woodland, complete with a rough, overgrown gravel roadbed-path laid by a previous owner.  So I set off down the path, through the woods, across the creek:

And on back through that particularly beautiul slant of light that only comes in the fall.  First I checked on the tumble-down A-frame that used to be someone's fishing cabin:

Then I took a look at what I think was once a hunting blind -- someone told me it looks like the top to a silo -- but I always fancied it to be a flying saucer:

Ah, what fun I would have had with this, when I was a kid!  It would have been the ultimate clubhouse, spaceship, playhouse, fort, teepee, whatever my iimagination could have conjured!

Finally, I came to the pond.  Please don't tell my dogs I came here without them!

Ah, the light was so perfect and round, the sky so blue that I sat down right there for a time to watch some small fish, listen to the breeze, and puzzle out why trees seem to like to lean right out over the water, as this one has.  Slowly, slowly, in the silence broken only by woods noises, I began to feel my soul fill up again.  Then I could head back out, re-crossing the creek and walking uphill to get back out to the church parking lot -- and this is what I saw as I left the woods:

It's hard to see that tiny, tiny moon in the very center of that blue, blue sky -- but it's there!  And it looked much bigger when I actually saw it last week!  Of course, tomorrow that moon will be full -- but last week it was just a plump crescent, hanging there in that late afternoon sky.

This weekend -- last Friday on my day off, actually, I went on another adventure -- with the dogs this time!  I finally decided to explore Fall Creek Falls State Park, one of the several that are fairly near to me, this one being only about 45 minutes from my home.  Other people have encouraged me to explore it, saying it's "really nice," and the park's own PR says that Southern Living Magazine called it "the best state park in the south."    So Mapquest was my friend, giving me great driving directions, and off I went.  Yes, it was/is spectacular.  I can only show you these pictures to prove my point:

I got down there to the base of the falls (maybe 300 feet?) by way of a heavily-traveled, but steep and rather treacherous path.  The dogs loved it, but they wore me out, trying to keep them from greeting every fellow-traveler, not pull me down the path too quickly, not explore every nook and cranny, like this one:

And then, once we got to the bottom, a fairly steep half-mile -- well, then we had to come back up!  Whew!  I was beat by the time we made it back to the car -- but I felt glorious, at the same time.  And I don't think I could have done it before I lost this 68 pounds in the last 18 months!  And the view from the top was deinitely worth it:

Why didn't I find this park sooner?  Why did I have to live here for nearly 9 years before I got around to exploring here?  There are lots of other features and vistas that I didn't have time to explore yet, and the campgrounds look really fine.  It makes me want to get a pickup truck with a camper cap and just take off for a few days -- or the rest of my life!

The Weather Here, and Thus, More Travelogue

Well, in two days, the weather has gone from this:

...sunny, lovely, warm enough to go out and play on my front porch, rearranging and adding toys -- though the odd-looking white thing on the right is actually an "ice bowl" from a pot I left outside...

To this:

And this little guy:

...buried up to his catunkus in Christmas ornaments (the hanging ones are so much fun -- they sway and sparkle in the slightest breeze), looks like this, this morning:

"Glub, glub, help, save me!"  Yes, we have not only snow here, but ice.  It looks like a silver-gray fairyland out there (no sunshine to make it twinkle, though).  Thank God we still have power and are warm and dry in here, with another day off (my third in a row, oh, happy day!) ahead of me.  But you can see why I'm going to heartlessly leave this poor little guy to thaw out on his own, and go back to my sunny Italian pilgrimage.

Sunny, yes.  It didn't rain a single day of my 3-week trip.  Here I will inject a travel tip:  If you are a heavy person, prone to overheating and uncomfortable sweating in temperatures that others find "comfortable," or even "a little cool," don't take a lot of easy-wash, easy-dry nylon/spandex clothing with you.  It's lovely to carry fewer clothes, and clothes that don't wrinkle, and that can be washed out and dried overnight in your hotel room.  It was so very convenient.  But I was so damned hot all the time!  Had I been demurely sitting and sketching, like a refined 19th century madamoiselle on her Grand Tour, I would have been fine.  But hiking up hills and running after trains, hauling a rolling knapsack over cobblestones and wearing a heavy backpack with journals, tripods, and travel guides -- next time I'll take light cotton, and seek out laundromats.

So here I am in Livorno, pretty miserable with a cold, ensconced at the Hotel Citta.  I'm planning to head back north and east, to Bologna, Padua, and Venice.  I'm seriously re-examining my itinerary.  It's Tuesday, September 29, the 8th day of my trip, and I'm realizing that I simply can't see and do all I'd intended.  The more northerly locations could easily consume another week of my trip.  It's clear that if I stick to my original plan, I'll probably not get anywhere south of Rome, and certainly not to Sicily.  I'm determined to get to Sicily!  So it's here in Livorno that I start slicing and dicing my itinerary.  I'd love to return to Venezia; I'd love to visit Santa Maria Salute.  But it's clear that everything is taking longer than I thought.  And that's fine.  This is a pilgrimage and a study trip, but it's also a vacation after a long period of illness, and right now I'm still sick.  I'm not willing to haul myself out of bed at the crack of dawn in order to race to see three madonnas before lunch (well, that's an exaggeration, but still).  As it is, I'm having great adventures, seeing lots of beautiful sights that I didn't see in 2005, and getting lots of writing and reflection done.  I have no one to speak to, so I find myself speaking a lot to myself, on the pages of my journal.  I'm already halfway through the small journal that I brought with me!

So I decide to travel across the width of the country and go to Loreto, because I certainly don't want to miss that -- probably the most famous religious shrine in Italy.  So off I go.  I changed trains in Florence, and even in the station, you could feel the atmosphere of that beautiful city.  I actually heard other people speaking English!  It felt warm and gracious and honeyed, and I longed to stay, but pushed on -- I didn't even have enough time to walk out onto the streets.  I didn't even take any pictures.  No, I continued on, bound for Loreto.

Getting off the train in Loreto, I find myself in a pretty little town, but I'm still miles from the shrine itself.  It's about 2:00, and the bus driver (who's sitting there on his bus) tells me he's not going anywhere till 4:00 (16:00 in Italy).  So I walk around a bit, find a grocery store, buy myself some lunch and a bottle of red wine, and wander a bit more.  Eventually the bus takes me to the shrine: up, up, up the mountain.  Funny, after two millennia of Christianity, we're still "worshipping in the high places."  In the Old Testament, God doesn't seem to like that very much -- but we humans just keep striving to get a little closer to heaven, I guess.

When I get to the shrine, I find another whole little town, built up around the church itself.  There are lots of hotels for pilgrims in all price ranges, souvenir shops, groceries, and the usual pharmacias and tobacco stands (that sell everything from postcards to playing cards, and especially bus tickets).  I find a suitable hotel, right next door to the tourist office.  The hotelkeepers are rude, but I don't care.  I get a room with 3 twin beds, and go exploring.

You know, I told you last night that this photo was Montenero.  I don't know what happened to all my photos (at least the ones I thought I took) of Montenero.  I may have them on a flash drive somewhere.  But I thought this looked like Loreto, and now in the light of day, yes, it is Loreto.  See the pretty shops along the right, including a sidewalk cafe.  And directly ahead is the Loreto shrine itself, which fully contains a small structure that is, legend has it, the house of the Virgin Mary, transported by angels from the Holy Land at the end of the Crusades.  Modern scholarship confirms that the stone structure is identical in composition and workmanship to the grotto that remains in Nazareth, that is also reputed to be the home of the Virgin Mary.  Modern scholarship also found a deed of transfer for the structure, made out to someone named "Angelis," thus the confusion with the angels.

Anyway, within that structure is the little black madonna that is Our Lady of Loreto, probably one of the most famous black madonnas in the world.  I do not have photographs of her, since I was able to buy reproductions in the souvenir shops.  But here is a picture that I took in Rome, in a shrine dedicated to her there:

 

I truly am sorry about the blurriness.  I promise that the next time I go I will take better equipment and use it more professionally.  The rough brick wall at the left of this photo is reminiscent of the rough stone of the actual shrine in Loreto.  I did learn that the actual statue of Our Lady was carved after a fire destroyed the original in 1921.  That was a great disappointment.  My next quest is to try to find photos of the original statue.  Without her dalmatic (the liturgical clothing in which she is dressed), the newer statue really has an art-deco look about her -- I wonder what the earlier one looked like?

The thing that struck me about the shrines I visited was the devotion of the pilgrims.  In Loreto there were people of all colors, kneeling devoutly on the stone steps inside the shrine.  There were people at lots of levels of physical ability, of course -- because the Loreto shrine is renowned for its healing properties.  Despite the commercialism, despite the hype, these shrines all feel like very holy places.  Someone told me Thursday that the prayers and devotion of every pilgrim who ever visits a shrine remains there, and I believe it.

So I bought some prosciutto, fruit, bread and cheese for my dinner, and retired to my room.  I was just recovering from my cold, and so I needed my rest.  I ate, I drank half my wine, and I retired early.  The street outside my room was very noisy, and it was only the antihistamine and ibuprofin that allowed me to sleep.  The next morning I was off to Rome.  I met a very nice German man who spoke excellent English, and so we had a nice conversation while we waited for the bus back to the train station.  Rome will have to await another entry.  But thanks for the chance to revisit warmth and light and adventure.

Long Time Gone

Well,  now that I check back, it has been a really long time -- more than a month -- since I've posted here.  Unlike lots of you whom I read, it isn't about spending more time on Facebook.  For me, it's about summer, travel, and being sick.  This could be fairly long, and I have lots of pictures.  Be prepared.  Here are only a couple that were from General Convention in California:

The convention center was huge, though I'll admit I didn't venture above the ground floor.  There was a huge escalator that looked four stories high, but I admit I was halfway intimidated by a recent television show I watched when a large escalator fell, a woman was trapped in a mob of falling people, and nearly had herself shredded.  Think giant, multi-story shredder of humans.  Now I'm sure I would have ridden it, or found an elevator, if I had been sufficiently motivated.  But it seemed there was more than I could handle on the  first floor.  I loved our sign, though -- so typical of the Episcopal Church -- our shield, which is recognized by all Episcopalians, and the words, "welcomes you," which embodies what we're about as Episcopalians, I hope.  Then there was this shot: 

This was the Hilton, immediately perpendicular to one end of the Convention Center, where we were lucky enough to get to stay.  It was a very good place to stay, even though I was glad to get home to breathing real, outdoor air after two weeks of very little of that.  Still, I'm grateful for such luxurious and convenient accommodations, since most of the rest of our deputation were also in the Hilton, and most especially the Bishop, in whose suite we met each day for lunch.

It actually wasn't very hard to adjust to seeing palm trees everywhere -- I guess at home, here on the Cumberland Plateau, I'm not that far from South Carolina, where I also get to see palm trees.  The weather, though, was delightful.

Now I came home from Anaheim, and tried to catch up on all I missed in the 14 days I was gone.  I also had a sermon to write on the Saturday night I arrived home.  The sermon part wasn't hard, though, because I knew I could talk about what happened at General Convention.  People like to hear about the larger church, and also what I've been up to while I was gone from them.  But then there was (were?) two weeks' of mail and business to accomplish in a week, before I left again for a vacation in Buffalo.

Then I went to see my friend Cheryl's new house.  Well, it's new to her, but it was actually built right near the turn of the century.  It's a lovely double, with a luxurious first-floor flat (with reliable tenants), an even more beautiful second-floor flat, where Cheryl lives, after considerable work, and an unfinished third floor "servants' quarters" residence with plumbing already installed, where it's my fantasy that I'll live out the summers of my retirement.  It's a true classic, great neighborhood, well-preserved woodwork and fireplace, etc.  There's a huge front porch, wide as the house, and with sturdy awning framework in place (no canvas awning yet).  Here's a beautiful shot or two of the front porch:

  The leaves on the awning framework are fake -- and interspersed with tiny white lights.  When Cheryl explained it all to me, she said, "It reminded me of the rooftop patio in Naples, where we drank that bottle of wine and talked.  And yes, I could see it clearly.  I don't care what they look like to others (though my stubborn Sicilian friend, Cheryl's partner Tom, did grudgingly admit they were "nice"), darn it, when I sat out there with her, I could remember being in Naples (where I'll be again in 4 weeks!).  You see the three beautiful flower boxes -- this photo shows only half of the beautiful front deck.  We were aiming, in late Buffalo Summer, for the effect of Venice, where the flowerboxes were abundantly overflowing wherever we went.  I planted one, to help Cheryl get started, then she planted another FIVE all by herself, and they were all beautiful.  I am grateful for this vacation.  I loved seeing Cheryl, and her beautiful new house.  We even had a few days at the lake, which I also love.  What I didn't love was coming down with bronchitis while I was there.  I got to sit at that lovely table you see every morning, drinking coffee, writing in my journal, just enjoying the great outdoors of a city I love.  But within two days I had developed a cough (allergies, they said), and before long, I was awake at night, coughing my lungs out.  Whatever caused it, I managed to let it get bad enough to make me really sick.  The vacation was a disappointment to both of us, I think, because usually I'm eager to go and see and do, or at least to stay up late enjoying one another's company.  But I spent a lot of this week in bed, or on the sofa.

The drive home was also miserable, and I'm a great lover of driving.  I was so sick that I felt absolutely unsafe.  When I came home I encountered a whole series of disappointments in a minor scale, and when I finally saw my doctor on the following Monday, she thought I had pneumonia.  Thank God she could see me.  Thank God I could get antibiotics and a cough syrup.  But here's where I've spent a goodly portion of the month of August:

Yeah.  Sigh.  I got home on the 8th,  saw the doc on the 10th, and have spent a goodly amount of time here.  Propped up, just like in the pic.  I finally realized (with the help of some parishioners) that if I prop myself up, I'm less likely to drown in mucous (sorry).  Even this past week, 2 weeks after I saw the doctor, I was still coughing and had post-nasal drip, which threatened to progress into more of the same.  And I have a trip to Italy in 3.5 weeks!  I have to be well.  My activity practices (running each morning with the dog, yoga 2-3 times a week) also ceased, so I'm more out of shape than I've been in 4 years.  But after a re-consultation with the doctor and some self-medication as well (I think I need a drying-up decongestant, as well as an allergy-treating antihistamine), I'm finally resembling something akin to health.  I've taken several 20-minute brisk walks (as opposed to my prior 30-40 minute runs), and today  I actually got some yard work done.

When I visited Buffalo, I also spent some time with my friend Janet, who is a gardener of great gifts.  She showed me and talked to me about her gardens, and I was re-inspired to attend to my own yard.  I won't even show you to gone-to-pot (not literally!) veggie garden, but here's what my front walk and steps have looked like for several weeks now:

Notice the overgrown condition of the spiderwort, especially.  Not only is it encroaching onto (and has rooted into) the front steps, but it has completely overgrown the two beds on either side.  I feel like I'm wading through a sea of weeds and chiggers each time I approach my house.  Yuck.

So I've been sick.  Which not only has let my weeds grow unimpeded, but makes me feel like a pile of crap, besides.  I spend time lying on the sofa, torn between episodes of "American Justice" and "Dr. Phil/Oprah" (aren't they really the same show?), and berating myself for all I'm not doing -- at the church, around the house, and everywhere else.  Anyway, as I began to feel better, and this entryway became the source of great annoyance to me, I decided to follow some good advice to set a timer for 15 minutes, and then again and again, if I felt like it, and see how much I could get done.  As always, we surprise ourselves; I surprised myself.  Here's what all that mess looked like after 15 minutes:

You see that the steps have been mostly cleared up.  The bushes to the right and left of the sidewalk are more clearly defined (by the removal of overgrowth).  There's still some growth on the steps themselves, and lots of scrap and debris on the sidewalk.  I set my timer for 15 minutes again, and of course, the timer went off, and I hadn't accomplished all I wanted.  So I kept going.  I didn't time myself, but I suspect the time I spent was about 45 minutes total.  Not bad for an old gal with residual allergies and/or bronchitis.  Here's what it looked like at the end:

All cleaned up, and 45-60 minutes total.  In this particular shot, I've even removed the HUGE pile of clippings and pullings -- enough to pile a wheelbarrow higher than is prudent.  Oh, I think it looks lovely.  I needed to spend a little time making things look nice out front again.  When I walked the dogs at 6:00, I enjoyed every second of approaching the porch.  I had also pulled the poison ivy that was growing over the front sidewalk.  When the men of the church had a workday, they didn't get it  out, so I finally had to, despite my fears of contamination.  But I don't seem to have contracted anything as yet, so I'm pretty sure I've got it made.

Anyway, I wanted to fill you all in on my comings and goings, my  ups and downs (mostly downs, unfortunately).  And why I haven't talked to you in ever so long.  But perhaps between now and when I leave for Italy, I can fill you in more about my trip, my preparations, and my expectations.  Love you all.

Remembering Mary (1913-1999)

Dear Mama:

I'll start with this one -- my smart-looking mother in her suit and hat, patiently tolerating her fool-for-love husband and the daughter that never smiled for the camera as she wished.

Today is your birthday, Mama; you would be 96.  And you died 10 years ago next month.  I miss you more than ever, you know.  How you would love this place that I've landed in my journey!  Actually, I believe you do see and love this place, and that you're so happy that I'm here; but I wish you were here to share it with me.  How you would love being "The Rector's Mother," the Queen Mother of this parish!

The longer you are gone, Mama, the easier it is to remember this mother, the one in this picture, who often treated me, as you always said, "like a hen with one chick," who tenderly nurtured this girl that you didn't really understand much at all.  You see, you were an extrovert, and I was always an introvert (Doesn't this picture show it?  I cared not at all for what the photographer and you wanted me to do) -- and became even more so after my daddy died, and then as I entered moody adolescence.  My withdrawn interiority left you baffled, I know.  And you didn't know much about raising girls.  Though you were a tomboy, grew up with four brothers, raised three boys before me (and I think you secretly preferred boys), you somehow expected me to be a "girly-girl."  But instead you got the same dirty little rough-houser that I'm sure you were.  But I do know that you continued to love me fiercely, and even admire me, yes I do know this now, more than you could ever say.

Here's another picture; I'm not sure you'd like this one of yourself, but I love it as a family shot (I've posted it before, but I can't resist):
I'm seeing for the first time that, despite your extroversion, you really did not like to have your picture taken.  I know you never felt very good about your own looks, often called yourself "big and horsey," and always felt clumsy and overweight.  And yes, sure enough, you handed down those body image issues to me!  But you also gave me so much more, so much good stuff.  I can't even begin to say it all, won't even try, but we both know all the good stuff, and maybe someday I'll be able to sum it all up.

What I'm thinking of tonight, Mama, are a couple of things in particular.  I'm thinking of your love for the outdoors, nature, and time spent in the open air, which you also passed on to me.  I'm thinking in particular of my fire pit, which is ready for another burn:

I'm wishing that I had got it started tonight, in your honor.  I can't count the number of campfires we sat around in our plastic web and aluminum tube lawn chairs, Coleman lanterns hissing in the background, staring into the fire, adding one log, then another, to keep it burning after dinner, toasting marshmallows on sticks, singing silly camp songs, with you telling stories about your own childhood, or the early years of your marriage, before I came along, or about my brothers' escapades when they were my age.  Oh, those were good times, sitting around that fire.  Thank you for that.

Another thing I'm thinking about, Mama, is what a gardener you were.  Some of my earliest memories are of the African violets you nurtured in the windowsill on South Eighth Street, and how you carefully pinched off the brown leaves and watered only from below, so not to get water on the leaves.  I remember your hydrangea outside the dining room window, which you fed with coffee grounds and eggshells, and how it bloomed pink, though you wanted it blue.  I remember the armloads of tulips that you sent to school with me for my teacher, and the May baskets we made one year for me to hang on neighbors' doorknobs early in the morning.  I know you would love these perennial gardens around my house (though you'd want me to care for them better, or hire someone to do it), and you would also love my veggie garden, and would take an intense interest in my tomatoes, coaching me about how to encourage maximum fruit.  Some years I pinch out the suckers, Mama, just as you showed me, but I forgot to do it this year.  It's too late now; the fruit is already setting.  I know you'd laugh at the little herb bed I put in tonight against the potting shed:

Yeah, I know calling it a "herb bed" is a joke.  I know you're wondering about the lids from the cat litter buckets.  But I lost the little fence things that I used to have out by the garage, and I need something to warn the lawn people not to whack them down with the weed whacker.  Maybe tomorrow I'll go get some more of those little fence border thingies.  And I know it's only peppermint and dill.  The other herbs are back with the veggies, and the oregano's under the ornamental dogwood.  But the dill came up from last year in a small planter on the back porch (there's more!), and it re-seeds so nicely and smells so good.  And you'd appreciate the peppermint in your iced tea, now wouldn't you?  Mmmm, mmmm.  And if it gets too overgrown, the worst that will happen is that it will grow out into the lawn and the lawn people will mow it down, and then it will smell beautiful.

So that's all I'm going to write tonight, Mama.  Happy birthday.  I'm not sure how much birthdays mean over there where you are now, but I know that remembering and good memories and being loved all mean something.  I miss you.  I love you.  These two gifts, the outdoors and the gardening, are what I miss in particular tonight, though you know there is so much more.  I know that you're happy that I'm happy here on this beautiful Plateau.  And yes, I know you're proud of me, always were, even though you only learned to say that to me at the very end.

And now I'm going to bed.  Another gift you gave me, though I've only learned it so very late in life, is to get to bed at a decent hour so I can enjoy the cool beauty of the morning.  There's nothing like running with my dogs in the early morning, especially these next few days when the temperatures are gorgeous.  It's wonderful to see the bunnies and the chipmunks, as well as cats and dogs going about their morning business.  Everything is so fresh and new and holy.  Thank you for the early morning, too.  I hope your journey on the other side is going well, Mama.  I'm sure it is, as you're a worker, just like me.  G'night.

Back Home Again

Okay.  I've had an absolutely lovely time away.  The retreat was great.  All the presentations, including mine, were well-received.  The Mercy Center in St. Louis was probably the loveliest, most gracious retreat center I've ever attended (and I've attended quite a few of them).  I took a couple of pictures of my favorite parts: 

Yes, the Mercy Center has a lovely labyrinth, constructed, as I read the story, over landscape fabric.  It was initially built by a group of women, and mulched with wood chips (wisely salvaged from pruning and trimming on their own property -- oh, that I could get our church to do that!).  Now the dark black mulch is shredded rubber, an excellent choice, I think, and I wish I could get hold of some for my own labyrinth.  It was striking.  It is a 12-circuit, like the large one at Chartres Cathedral in France.  It also seems much like the one at Kanuga Camp and Conference Center, where I actually learned to appreciate the labyrinth.  It does seem longer than the one at Kanuga, though.

The outdoor stations of the cross also touched my heart, probably because I saw them so soon in the Easter Season!  I've longed for outdoor stations at our parish.  We have a beautiful and unique set inside our church, and we use them exactly once a year, during Holy Week.  I'd be happy, though, if others wanted to use them more often.  But in the church, to move from one station to another really only requires a shuffle, shuffle, shuffle.  I really wanted stations that you could actually walk a few steps between.  You might be able to see in this photo that the cross sits in the center of a very large circle that contains all 14 Stations of the Cross, each one sheltered in a small wooden "house-shaped" structure, mounted on a pole.  My idea, exactly!  And executed most beautifully, with great love and devotion.

I did not get any pictures of the presenters, but the Hindu woman (a social worker by day) appeared in a sari; the Muslim woman appeared with appropriate head covering, the Jewish woman wore a lovely yarmulke or kippah, and the Zen Buddhist wore traditional Japanese robes.

I didn't get pictures of them all, but I was so very pleased that they were so warmly received by the audience, a Christian religious order (some of whom, I was told, might be fairly conservative).  Everyone there seemed to want to know more about the worship and mystical practices of the world's great religions.  I was also very touched at the warmth with which my talk and my presence were received.  Though I was much too much of a newcomer to share in the rather intense emotional experience of the entire retreat, I certainly felt loved and welcomed, and that was a Good Thing!

During my presentation, I offered this quote, by Bede Griffiths, an English Roman Catholic Monk:  "If you look at religions as they present themselves to us, it is like five separate fingers.  But if you penetrate to their source -- to the palm of the hand -- you will find they all spring from the same source  and instead of being separate entities they are, at their base, sharing in one common, mystical tradition."  This quote was received with many nods and murmurs of assent.  It's what I believe, too.

I left the retreat warmed to my heart.  I was fed by all of the presentations (on interfaith approaches to prayer, worship, and meditation) and the people who were there; I slept a lot, signifying that I had allowed myself to relax into this time of grace and rest.  I was also installed as a Companion in this order, something requiring more of a commitment than my previous status as "Friend."  I wish I had also taken more photos of this gracious location, with its wide, spiral staircase spanning three levels (but also with elevator), its lovely grounds, and the delicious food we were fed with far too great regularity!  I loved this beautiful and holy place, and do hope to return.

And then I drove the three hours back to my family's home in the easternmost part of central Illinois.  Oh, how lovely that was!  I wish I had pictures, but I don't.  But my heart danced in the arms of my family.  I conversed and broke bread daily with the ones I love, and then also had a lovely dinner with my one remaining brother, who generously shared pictures of himself and others in my family.  He lost his wife 7 months ago, but is coping remarkably well.  I was so happy to see my loved ones doing well, and regretted missing the ones who were working in another part of the state.

This afternoon I arrived home.  I was so, so happy to be with my doggies again.  Mr. Buddy, who seemed to have a sore back when I left, is fully recovered.  My kennel lady was kind enough to text me and tell me of Buddy's return to dancing.  The kitty has taken up residency in a windowsill in my study, and I'm delighted that we can finally all be one family down here.  My  youngest dog, Ms. Clementine, has grown far gentler and more respectful, so the kitty need not live in terror any longer.

So I'm so happy to be here.  I was only gone a week, Wednesday-to-Wednesday, actually eight days, if you count them up on your fingers.  But meanwhile, things have gone wild in my garden!  Just look at a few of these!  I've often had the experience of being gone midsummer, and finding my garden gone wild upon my return.  But never have I had this experience so early in the spring.  Things are so much more lush and beautiful than when I left a week ago!

This tree peony never fails to knock my socks off.  I love the vibrancy of it.  This year it has more blooms than it ever has had.  I made the mistake early on in my time here of cutting it back severely, and it has bloomed ever-so-slowly and sparsely in the years since.  I love the blowsy sensuality of these blooms.

This is only the second year in my 7 springtimes here that I've seen these clustered purple wisteria blooms.  The wisteria is amazing, when it decides to happen.  The problem is that it doesn't like any severe cutting back, and if I actually trim back what has extended into the little tree next to it (see upper right), then it doesn't bloom again for ages.  Of course, two years ago we had a severe late frost -- but I'm ever so grateful for these blooms that occurred during my absence!  Now if I could only nurture back its twin, which was chopped to shreds -- twice -- by my ever-helpful lawn crew.  This year I will try once again to pick one perfect stem and nurture it into a small tree.

I could post a number of other photos I took today, including some dynamite columbine.  But  all of these sweet flowers do announce spring to me.  I love lilies of the valley.  I remember when I was a young teen my favorite cologne was "Muguet des Bois" (flowers of the woods, as I recall) -- the sweet scent of lilies of the valley.  They are such a pretty addition to my springtime.

I can't believe that I was gone only for a week, with nothing but the barest hints of these things when I left!  Now they are all in full flower.  Besides that, when I took my walk with the dogs tonight, I discovered many, many tiny bunches of grapes on my wild-as-can-be (though of a domestic variety -- only neglected) grapevines.  I have a parishioner of Italian extraction, who knows about these things, who insists that all these tiny buds will produce only tiny, tiny heads of grapes.  But it's too late to prune as he has instructed, this year.  And there are so many little bunches!  The very best I can do is to find ways to repel the deer, so that I can eventually see all that develops for myself.  Then I'll know better what I should do for next year.  I have shiny things to set blowing outside the garden to scare away the deer.  I can get some netting (though this is best in battling birds).  I might even surrender to the terrible prospect of "liquid fence" -- garlic and rotten eggs!  Oh, my.  But I'd love to save the grapes that have budded out (pictures another day).

How lovely to get away!  How lovely to visit a fine facility and also be part of a lovely retreat!  How truly heartwarming to visit old locales (including the gravesites of my parents and daughter), and to enjoy the love of my family for a few days!  And how wonderful to return home, especially to an abundant garden!  Thank you God, for all of this!

Happy Easter!

Well, we've passed through the glory and the agony of Holy Week, and now we're in the Great Fifty Days of Easter.  You've gotta love a holiday that lasts not just 12 days, like Christmas, but a full 50 days!  Yep, that's Christian Easter!  We get Easter clear up to the Day of Pentecost (May 31 this year)!  Yay!

This week has been a week of "normalcy" in my schedule, and also of holy rest.  I've slept deeply every single night, and also napped every day, I think.  Holy Week, if you really enter into it, can be an intense and exhausting experience for anyone.  If you're a priest, it's a lot of activity.  And if you're in a really good spiritual place and a priest, it's a lot of very intense activity.  And even though it doesn't seem like a lot of work at the time, because the spiritual energy is so intense -- afterward, a good rest is in order.  Most priests take the week after Easter off; I chose not to because I'm taking a week from this coming Wednesday to the following Wednesday (more about that later), and also because I will take time in the summer, as well as the 3 weeks in the fall to go to Italy (2 weeks of which will be continuing education time).  So I'm gently resting in the midst of a return to normal parish life.

On Monday, though, here's what I got done:

Yes, the labyrinth is completed!!  I'm not sure what drove me to do it on Easter Monday, except that it was a beautiful day, and there was only that one circuit to complete.  It did mean collecting and hauling two trunkloads of stone, but I did seem to have the energy and motivation!  I'm so very pleased with it, and will tell you about this evening's experience later.  I want to talk about two more things first.

I'm preparing for a retreat in St. Louis.  It's for an Anglican religious order called "The Worker Sisters of the Holy Spirit" (there are also Worker Brothers).  I'll be installed as a "companion" in this order at the retreat.  The theme this year is interfaith approaches to prayer and meditation.  We're leaving out all the theology, and skipping right to the heart -- the encounter with The Holy in each of the 5 major religious traditions:  Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam.  I get to make a presentation on Christian meditation (and contemplative prayer), and then engage in a dialogue with a Zen master.  I'm so excited.  What a wonderful opportunity for first-hand interchange and learning.  I've long loved Thich Nhat Hanh, and his writings about the intersections between Christianity and Buddhism.  Wish me well!

I will also get to see my family for a brief time on this trip, and I miss them.  I'm really, really looking forward to it.  I'll stay in my sister-in-law's home, and also get to see my wonderful grand-niece, Madeline Anne.  Yay!  And on the way back, I'll see my brother, too.  My last remaining brother, who was so very good to me when I was a little girl.

The second thing I want to talk to you about is this:  Susan Boyle.  I post the URL for the two people in the whole world who haven't seen this appearance on "Britain's Got Talent."  Why, you might ask, do I bother to post it, to mention it?  Why on earth would I possibly care about a plain, rather chubby, perhaps invisible middle-aged woman, who comes across a little bit ditsy at times, but who is, as Simon Cowell says, "a little tiger," and possesses a pearl of great price within her?  Gosh, I don't know.  Don't have a clue.  All I know is that I listen to this You-Tube broadcast over and over and over, and cry and laugh every time.

Now:  tonight's labyrinth walk.  I've been walking pretty much every day.  Having my own labyrinth is as great a privilege as, say, having my own swimming pool or hot tub (how I'd love those!)  As you may have gathered, this time in my life is incredibly spiritually rich for me.  So I quiet myself at the start, as I always do.  I have no particular question or problem as I begin, but I'm aware of being both incredibly grateful, and also that I need to ask so much for myself.  "Thank you" and "Please" are the words that I can articulate.  I begin to walk quietly and meditatively.  Almost immediately I notice sticks and dead vines (that I've pulled as I was building it) in the path.  I stoop each time to pick them up, and soon I have one hand nearly full.  Then I hear God's voice.  It's in my head, but I don't believe it's my own self-talk voice.  It says, "Take care of what I've given you."  And I know that voice is about taking care of the labyrinth (which was totally a God thing, as far as I'm concerned -- I couldn't have done that much work all on my own), but it's about so much more, too, in ever-widening circles.  It's about taking care of myself: my body, mind, and soul; my pets; my home; my family; my parish and all I encounter in the course of my work; this community, and yes, even the world, praying and advocating in whatever ways I can.  "Take care of what I've given you."  Yes, it's a call and a big job, but also a big gift, to hear this.  I'm not sure I deserve to have heard God's voice, but I have.

Now:  Have any of you heard God's voice?  I don't seem to hear it as some biblical characters do -- coming from the outside, like "hearing voices" (in our culture, that's a sign of mental illness).  No, my experience of this (I actually only have a few times when it has happened) is that it's a voice in my head, but it's not my voice.  If it were my voice, it would have said something like, "I must take care of everything that God has given me."  But this voice definitely said, "Take care of what I've given you."  It was a directive.  That's one of the Big Ways I've heard God's voice.  Often it has been much more subtle -- like an idea or a hunch.  Or a sermon.  Y'all don't possibly think that I just think up or make up my sermons every week, do you?  Nope.  I consider them gifts that are "given" to me, almost like dictation that I just copy down.

Anyhow.  When I hear God's voice, I always want to tell someone.  And I usually think maybe it's a message that's not just for me, but for other people, too.  So maybe there are things you all need to treasure more, and take better care of, too.  Well, if the shoe fits, is all I can say.

But I do hope you're rejoicing in the power of the Spirit, and in the power of true Resurrection!

Welcome to Holy Week!

Technically speaking, Holy Week starts on Palm Sunday.  We had a great Palm Sunday service, with warm temperatures, sunshine, and the usual blessing of the palms outside, at the gate to our Memorial Garden.  Once the palms are blessed and distributed, we process around the outside of the church to the big front doors (that are only open two days a year).  We chant Psalm 118 as we walk, and then go forward with the normal service, except a very long gospel reading -- the Passion reading (Palm Sunday is also called "Passion Sunday" because of this).  We have readers for the parts or characters in the reading.  I don't preach much of a sermon on Palm Sunday; there hardly seems anything one can add to that story.  I did encourage folks to reflect on the variety of meanings of the word "Passion," however:  passion as "passivity" (same Latin root word), as "suffering" (like com-passion, suffering-with), and as "ardent love" -- it was Christ's love for God that led him to obedience to what he perceived as God's will, regardless of the consequences.  At any rate, one fairly new parishioner said that ours was the most beautiful Palm Sunday service she had ever attended.  Now that felt good!

Here you see my little Holy Week wreath, with dark red ribbon (the liturgical color for Holy Week), hanging on my front door.  I also like it because the grapevine resembles a crown of thorns.

Holy week is seriously my favorite week of the year.  It's a really poignant juxtaposition of the beauty of springtime and the bleakness of the suffering and death of Jesus.  It's the one season of the Church year where I never fail to enter, at some level, into that liminal space that has one foot in the outer, material world, and one foot in the spiritual world, that place I call the kingdom of heaven, where everything is very real and all is present now.  I love it.  I especially love the culmination of Holy Week, the Great Vigil of Easter, which is held after sunset on Holy Saturday, or early, early, before sunrise on Easter Day.  It's a dark and mysterious service that begins in darkness (dusk, anyway) and then suddenly, there's the light of the new fire, the new Paschal candle, and the chanting procession into the church, where I chant, "The light of Christ," and the congregation, processing after me, responds, "Thanks be to God!"  Then, in the darkened church, I chant the Exsultet, the whole thing, which is a lovely, mystical sound.  We have a series of readings that describe salvation history, and then the lights come up on the newly beflowered church, and the first glorious "Alleluia!" of the Easter season is said.  We pass from darkness to light in that service, from slavery to freedom, from death to resurrection.    We have champagne in the communion chalice, and a celebratory champagne reception after the service.  Easter morning, while lovely, is truly an anticlimax to this glorious and dramatic service.  I guess there's a bit of "ham" in every priest, but the mystery of that night passage from death to life is palpable.

As for the weather:  Oh, my.  This is what I woke up to this morning: 

You can see that it's hardly more than a dusting, but still -- in April?  And get this -- tomorrow is forecast to be sunny and 58 degrees!  Go figure on the weather around here.  This is what spring is like on the Cumberland Plateau.  Two years ago this kind of weather killed a lot of plants, and we had hardly any apple harvest that fall.  But it was more days of cold, and a harder freeze -- at least I hope that's the case.  My apple trees haven't quite blossomed yet, but they're just about to.

And I want to get out in my garden!  My grapes need tying up and pruning, and the beds need weeding and mulching, and the paths need weeding and mulching, and I have peas, spinach, and lettuce to plant.  Sigh.  I'm longing to get out there.  Plus I'm so close to having the labyrinth finished, and I'd love to have it done by Easter Day.  Maybe two more loads of rocks is all it will take.

So I hope you all have a gloriously rich and meaningful Holy Week.  Our services start tonight (Evening Prayer and Stations of the Cross), and then go tomorrow (Tenebrae), Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  Holy Week is always a marathon, but it's a wonderful one.  I may not see you till I'm on the other side of it.

And don't forget that we celebrate Easter for fifty days!  Talk about a good, long holiday season!

The Mystified Gardener: Spring Fever

How can it be that I missed the first day of spring?  I'll tell you how -- I was outside, working hard, and didn't give the day a thought!  I love spring, love, love, LOVE.  Spring and fall are my two favorite seasons, and probably spring the most, though in this State (Tennessee) of hot, humid summers, seeing summer finally break is also a treat.  I've done my first gardening, and am seeing the results.  Look:

It's two of my first three rows of spinach, sprouting!  I've never had spinach sprout!  I think I always planted it too late -- it's definitely a cool-weather crop, and needs to be sown here very early.  I know, you can see that the soil is dry.  I thought I might hold out for rain, but I promise that tomorrow I will water it by hand, with tender loving care, even though it's supposed to rain on Wednesday.  I'm not going to risk it.  I should have done it sooner, even.  But I'm so thrilled to see it coming up!  While I'm out there, I'm going to till soil and plant 3 more short rows, as well as some lettuce and peas.  I'm planting things that don't grow high in the bed near the fence, because last year my green beans were decimated by deer!  I don't think they can reach in far enough to get to spinach and lettuce in this bed.  I'm also going to hang shiny CDs to startle them away.  People advocate smelly and even toxic repellants, but I just can't.  I'll try the old-fashioned stuff first.  I asked for those disposable aluminum pie tins on Freecycle, but nobody responded.  So I think shiny CDs (I have tons from AOL, otherwise known as AO-Hell) hung at frequent intervals might provide a deterrant.  We'll see.

Here's one more veggie garden shot: 

The rhubarb is up -- all 3 crowns of it!  I see some little pest has been at it already on one leaf -- but we don't eat the leaves anyway!  Now I've just got to get some compost and manure on it, as well as seeing to the grapevines, raspberries, strawberries, perennial herbs (rosemary and thyme, and sage in the front perennial bed), and especially the asparagus crowns.  The garden is way full of suspicious and menacing little holes in those beds -- maybe my fence didn't sink deep enough?  Hmmm.  Lots of work to be done there.

But this spring, I have a new love.  Yes, I've spent some time cutting brush and also thorny locust sprouts from the fencerow and the only growth that separates me from a fairly major highway.  And I've enjoyed that.  Some regular attention to these spaces could enhance my quality of life, seriously.  I'm very close to US (not Interstate) 70, which runs from who knows where to Nashville, and beyond.  Lots of traffic, except for the very wee hours of the morning (let's say from 2 till 5 am).  What I really would like is some kind of tall, soundproof barrier, like they use on the Interstates.  That's not going to happen.  So instead of the wild assortment of wild rose, locust suckers, hickory and oak starters from nuts the squirrels have buried, and those low plants with pointy leaves whose name currently escapes me (not agave -- what?), and poison ivy -- I'd like to cultivate a tall privet hedge from the privet that grows wild and invasively here.  The oak and hickory trees are fine, but I don't like the other stuff.  Some privet is coming up already, and all I need to do is let it grow.  Eventually someone could cut it down every 5 years or so, and it would grow tall and thick and give me privacy, at least, if not a bit of a sound barrier.  Also, out there in front, something is killing my hemlocks.  Since I refuse to use any kind of poison, my guess is that it's some pest, and they will all die eventually.  I'd love it if this strong and essentially evergreen privet would grow thick instead.

But I haven't told you about my new love yet.  It's a labyrinth.  For years, I've dreamed that this parish might fund and create a labyrinth on its grounds.  We have 18.8 acres, and about an acre of cleared space behind the church (partly for parking, partly just a clearing, but all underlaid with gravel, so not "getting stuck in mud" territory).  I dreamed of a labyrinth that might attract anyone on a spiritual journey in all of Cumberland County.  Well, no-go.  Before this year, people didn't have the knowledge, energy, or interest.  This year, nobody has the funds, either.  Within the last few months, I've walked a couple of simple, non-fussy labyrinths, one in the backyard of a colleague.  I've decided that I can do this.  I've researched patterns on-line.  I got an easy-to-construct, 7-circuit classical labyrinth.  Then, as I ran with my dogs one day, I found a nearly endless source of stone.  I have a clearing in my own backyard, in the wooded area behind the lawn, where I could construct this thing.  I decided to build myself a personal labyrinth, that I will happily share with all parishioners.  It's in my back yard -- well, in the woods right behind my back yard.  Here it is:

So far, so good.  It has really been fun.  I found the pattern from the internet, and I found a really good source of stone (a subdivision under development -- every time  you move earth on a mountaintop, you get lots of stone!).  You can see that I'm already running into "tree issues."  I'll eventually mulch the path with a variety of things -- wood chips, pine needles, whatever comes along.  But I've only laid out maybe half of it, maybe not even that, since the circuits get bigger each time around.  That's still lots of stone to gather and lay!  The paths are two feet wide, and I started out with an 8-foot diameter "seed pattern."  I'm loving it.

Other good spring news is that lots of things are in bloom around here.  Daffodils and hyancinths are in full bloom, and the earliest ones are fading already.  The cherry tree and quince are starting.  The viburnum by the front door is fading fast, as are the witch hazels and (plentiful) Lenten roses.  I have a pretty little star magnolia that got terribly damaged in our April freeze two years ago.  We had to cut back dead wood severely, but it did survive:
 
It's a little lopsided and considerably smaller than it was 2 years ago, but it has survived!  I like survivors (like me).  Behind it you can see the veggie garden, and behind that the woodsy-brushy screen that conceals the labyrinth.

I love having this much space.  I love it that the magnolia is in bloom.  Within a week or so the pink one behind the potting shed will bloom.  A few weeks later, I'll get something from the dark one (almost maroon) outside my back door.  I've been watching the courtship at my bird feeder  outside the dining room window.  It's all such a pleasure.  It's nearly time to fill the hummingbird feeders.

There's more gardening work than I can ever do by myself -- ever, ever, ever.  But I've decided once again to enjoy myself.  As long as it's fun and soul-satisfying, I'll do it.  I'll take little stabs at it here and there, time after time.  Nothing will ever be perfect, but in the gentle course of time, everything will be better than it is now.  Having my hands in the dirt is something I expect I'll need for as long as I live -- at least a bit.  Maybe eventually a raised bed or window box will be enough, but the dirt literally "grounds" me.  Gotta do it.

I hope you all know the satisfaction of tending living things.  I hope you can have the experience of feeding people with what you've grown with your own hands.  God does love a garden.

The Mystified Gardener (Outside)

There's something really mystical, mysterious, mystifying about being outside at night.  Early this evening, taking advantage of the extra hour of daylight, I decided to burn my brush pile.  It's in the fire pit way back behind the garage, the one that I dug myself and circled with stones.  The pile of brush was really, really huge, especially after Friday, when I cut brush and picked up fallen branches from the little clearing in the woods behind my house.  It was overflowing before that, and something like gigantic afterward.  I don't know what I'll do when I move to a town with real restrictions about burning.  The fire department tells me that my brush-burning is considered a "backyard campfire," and perfectly legal anytime (though I don't do it when there are drought conditions).

A little kerosene starts it.  Kerosene burns very hot and is not volatile like gasoline.  It's probably comparable in fire-starting to charcoal lighter fluid, but it burns hotter.  It's always a little scary right at first, when I let the pile get as high as I did.  Every time I do this, I promise that next time, I won't let it get so high.  But sometimes it's too cold to stand outside and watch it, and then it rains, etc. etc. etc.  Anyway, when that first flame burns so high, and the slightest breeze carries it toward the woods or the pine trees on the east -- I am very alert, I tell you, watching very carefully, and can have my hose out there within five minutes, if the need arises.  But it never does.  After that first burn-off, it settles down to a medium-size, but still very hot fire that can, with a little tending, get rid of a huge pile of brush in a half-hour or so.  Of course, to really burn down every bit of it, it takes a little longer, a little more tending, a little more gazing.

How I love a campfire.  It brings back memories of camping with my family (my mother always told me that  I camped from the time I was 16 days old), and more recent memories of campfires with friends, complete with homemade clam chowder, heated over driftwood coals, or staying in a friend's fishing cabin and laughing late into the night around the fire.  And there's nothing as compelling as gazing into a flame, and then the coals that remain; I find it hypnotic.  Tonight the moon was very nearly full (Wednesday is the "official" full-moon night, but it looked pretty full to me), and she played hide-and-seek in the clouds that skipped along in the lovely breeze that kept my fire burning.  It was magical to glimpse moon and a swatch of stars, then bright moon behind the edge of a cloud, then moon again.  It was a celebration, in and of itself.  Oh, and I forgot to mention that it was in the high 60s, and I didn't even need a jacket.  That's a treat, too.  Welcome, Spring!

And yesterday I bought 6 bags of compost and manure, a bale of yellow straw for the strawberry bed, and planted 3 short rows of spinach (after much robust weeding, including dandelions with those deep roots).  I'm planting the lettuce and spinach in the long bed furthest west in my garden; last year I had green beans there, and the deer ate them all.  I don't think they can reach far enough over the fence to get the spinach and lettuce; I'll plant the beans on an interior bed.  Yay!  Gardening season is here!

Lent

I love Lent.  It's the Church's time of "New Year's Resolutions," a time to examine oneself, and make a plan to address a shortcoming or two.  Shortcomings are those things that stand in the way of our fullest possible relationship with God, of course.  God absolutely longs to be in relationship with all of creation.  We humans erect barrier after barrier to that intimacy that is our true home.  Lent is a chance to live more fully into that relationship between creature and Creator.  It's less about sackcloth and ashes than it is about the mutual longing between Lover and beloved.

We had our usual Shrove Tuesday pancake dinner at church, and it was lovely -- 40 or so people gathered together to eat pancakes, celebrate Mardi Gras in our dignified, Episcopalian way (still with much laughter and fellowship), and just be "family" with this group of people who have chosen to worship and celebrate together on this mountain.  The men's group cooked; the women's group served.  I blessed the food, ate heartily, wandered around socializing (not the easiest thing for someone who's a classic introvert), and went home, satisfied in body and soul.

On Ash Wednesday we had two services, 10 am and 6 pm.  We had 45 people between the 2 services, which is extremely good for a weekday service, even a fairly momentous one, liturgically and ecclesiastically.  It's a big day in the Church, kind of like Good Friday in significance -- but for most of the world, it's really "just another day."  In between our services, I visited two parishioners who were hospitalized with heart problems -- I call these folks, with some humor, but certainly not to trivialize -- "broken hearts."  I've had a fair number of parishioners with broken hearts in the last few months, and it breaks my heart, as well.  Some weather their problems relatively easily, be they bypasses, stents, heart catheterizations, pacemaker implants, defibrillator implants, or whatever.  I see others grow more and more frail, recovering less and less quickly.  My parish is predominantly a retirement parish -- they don't get any younger.  People who were vital and active when I came here six years ago are, in some cases, quite frail, and several have died.  My people face the possibility of death on a regular basis.

But both of these Ash Wednesday hospital visits, one in town and the other in Cookeville (off the Plateau and 30 miles west of here) were delightful and precious, true gifts.  I can't tell details, of course, because of confidentiality -- but I will say that anointing people with oil and laying my hands on their heads for a prayer of healing is one of the greatest privileges I have as a priest.  And as my heart has broken right open in these last few weeks, I'm also privileged to be with people in a way that is holier than I ever could have asked or imagined.

As for me, I considered my own Lenten practice with due sobriety and reverence.  What I realized was that, rather than the typical season of quiet self-reflection, what I needed to do to honor God best, was to make this season a season of action, rather than inaction.  You can't imagine the amount of time I spend in relative inactivity:  sitting at my desk, meeting with people, reading, studying for church related things, or parked in front of the computer (like now!), the television, the Spider Solitaire game, or other mindless diversions.  I have discerned several very special calls from God (in my own view, at least), and also particular practices that make me the best person and priest that I can be.  I have tons of creative ideas that hardly ever come to fruition.  So I examined (there's the self-examination!) exactly which of all these things and ideas that I felt most passionate about, which things I felt most strongly called to do, which things would restore holy balance to my life.  I came up with six projects that I've dreamed of, written of, spoken of, and neglected to act upon.  Perhaps I'll tell you exactly what those six items are at another time -- just now they seem a little embarrassing in their simplicity.  I made a silly little chart, like we make for our children so they will do their chores.  I painted it Lenten purple and bought silly and pretty litle stickers.  I want to work on each of my six projects for at least 1/2 hour, at least 3 times a week.  That means 18 stickers a week for each of the weeks of Lent.  What fun!  I bought glittery shamrocks and chickies and bunnies and flowers.  I'm actually excited, in a silly sort of way.  I don't want to completely trivialize this -- project boards and progress stickers really seem to work for me.  They helped me do all the tasks I had to do for my spiritual direction program.  Today I did 2 things, and so I  now have 2 stickers on my chart (which is on a piece of poster board, 22x28 inches).  Who knows?  There might even be another sticker before I go to bed!

Today I also met with my spiritual director.  I drive an hour each way to see her -- it's a good thing that  I like to drive!  These monthly meetings are a chance to itemize all the times during the  month that I feel God has touched my life.  By the end of our meeting today, we were laughing, because I found myself saying, "Oh, and just one more thing -- just this one more thing, I promise....!"  There is great abundance in my life right now.  God is touching me often.  Sometimes it's the gift I receive from someone else.  Sometimes it's a creative idea (or two, or two dozen).  Sometimes it's a confluence of things that seem to all come at once, falling together, opening doors, making one or another path seem like it must be the true path for me.  Like another trip to Italy this year.  I haven't yet purchased my ticket, but I think it will happen.  O Happy Day.  O Happy Lent.  I'm so grateful.