Before I left St. John's I let some of the funeral directors know I'd be available for what are called 'trade funerals'. Those are funeral home services for people who have no affiliation with a church. I've done them in the past because it seems right to be present with people in their pain and confusion even if I have no other connection with them.
So, this week I got a call to do a funeral. The funeral director said he 'thought of me immediately' when the need for a clergy presence at this particular funeral came up with the family. I was proud about it and agreed before I realized what it was all about.
The deceased is a 16 year old girl who was raped and murdered by a friend of hers last Friday night. That horrible crime is made even worse because it occurred at the foot of the huge cross above the city of Waterbury in what used to be called Holy Land. It used to be a strange little recreation of the Holy Land, from all I can tell. I did visit it once and it is falling into ruin and is so overgrown it is hard to discern what the original must have looked like. Apparently, except for the illuminated cross, the whole thing is abandoned--though owned by a religious order--and has signs around it telling people not to trespass. Which makes it a magnet for young people to gather....
And there, a 19 year old boy ended the life of this young girl, brutally and, from all I've read in the newspapers at the library, without remorse. It is a chilling story of almost sociopathic violence. The statement of the boy read like something out of a second rate crime book. Even the judge was shocked by the young man's disregard for his victim...who he knew and who had gone to Holy Land willingly. After the rape, the man said he knew he'd have to go to prison so he might as well kill her. Then he defaced her corpse.
And I'm supposed to say something to those who will gather for her wake on Saturday night that will....what? Give them comfort? Provide hope? Ease their pain? Calm their anger? I just don't think that is possible. This is so horrendous a crime that all the pain there is in the universe can't absorb the pain of the girl's friends and family.
It seems to me the four kinds of death that are hardest to comprehend, much less deal with are the death of a child, a suicide, a murder and some sort of violent, painful death. This is two out of three. "Victim Fought Back" the headline in the newspaper screamed one of the days. Oh God, I can't imagine reading that about one of my children. And if I could 'imagine' it, I wouldn't....
I am a man of many words. I've yet to think of a single one for Saturday.
It is so painful to think about--even from an anonymous distance--that words fail. There is simply nothing to say. Words are like fireflies in a tornado....
If you pray, pray for that family, for the soul of that young girl and, if you can find it in your heart, for the one who brutalized and murdered her. But for me--even at a distance--that last prayer seems a lot to ask of myself....
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Sunday, July 18, 2010
old time's sake
I went to a reunion Saturday evening. It wasn't high school or college or even seminary (though this year is my 35th Seminary reunion). It was a reunion of some of the people who worked together 20 years or more ago at the Regional Council on Education for Employment (acronym RCEE).
I worked there as an English Teacher and then Center Manager from late 1985 until I went to St. John's, Waterbury in June 1989.
RCEE was jointly sponsored by Yale, IBM, Aetna and a couple of other corporations. IBM was the prime player--imagine me, an IBMer! We recuited and enrolled people with high school diplomas and some office skills and in 16 weeks they were ready for entry level word processing jobs in major corporations. Our placement rate was higher than anyone. It was a great program, but it only lasted 10 years because the laws about such training changed.
There seven of us there--one I didn't know because she came after I left--plus Bern and one of the employees teenage foster daughter (who must have thought we were all ancient and senile and silly. The oldest was 83 and Suzette, who organized it, was the youngest, in her 50's. It was an odd crew--4 Black, 3 white.
The great thing was how comfortable and fun it was to be with them though I haven't seen most of them since 1989. Something in the vision and mission we shared, something in the difference we made in people's lives, something about how we always liked each other greatly. How wondrous to find you can slip back into the same kind of relationship with people after so many years if only for 3 hours in a steak house in West Haven.
I've never been great at "keeping up" with people. I don't have a single friend from high school--except Bern and her cousin Tony--and only one from college (and we haven't seen each other for 5 years or so). I know where several of my seminary classmates ARE and what they're doing...but 'keeping in touch'...nah....
Sat. night convinced me I need to hone my 'keeping up' skills since it was a shame to lose these dear people for two decades. (One of them does live in Cheshire and I see her in Stop and Shop or Everybodies from time to time.)
Besides, it shouldn't be hard since there is, after all, a finite time I will have to 'keep up' with people now....Memento mori. One of the ones who should have been there was Willie Bradley, but he died back in the 90's. His funeral was one of the last times this group of people were in the same place at the same time....until Saturday.
Ponder getting in touch with someone from 20 years ago you really liked and enjoyed--if only for a meal together....it was a good thing....
I worked there as an English Teacher and then Center Manager from late 1985 until I went to St. John's, Waterbury in June 1989.
RCEE was jointly sponsored by Yale, IBM, Aetna and a couple of other corporations. IBM was the prime player--imagine me, an IBMer! We recuited and enrolled people with high school diplomas and some office skills and in 16 weeks they were ready for entry level word processing jobs in major corporations. Our placement rate was higher than anyone. It was a great program, but it only lasted 10 years because the laws about such training changed.
There seven of us there--one I didn't know because she came after I left--plus Bern and one of the employees teenage foster daughter (who must have thought we were all ancient and senile and silly. The oldest was 83 and Suzette, who organized it, was the youngest, in her 50's. It was an odd crew--4 Black, 3 white.
The great thing was how comfortable and fun it was to be with them though I haven't seen most of them since 1989. Something in the vision and mission we shared, something in the difference we made in people's lives, something about how we always liked each other greatly. How wondrous to find you can slip back into the same kind of relationship with people after so many years if only for 3 hours in a steak house in West Haven.
I've never been great at "keeping up" with people. I don't have a single friend from high school--except Bern and her cousin Tony--and only one from college (and we haven't seen each other for 5 years or so). I know where several of my seminary classmates ARE and what they're doing...but 'keeping in touch'...nah....
Sat. night convinced me I need to hone my 'keeping up' skills since it was a shame to lose these dear people for two decades. (One of them does live in Cheshire and I see her in Stop and Shop or Everybodies from time to time.)
Besides, it shouldn't be hard since there is, after all, a finite time I will have to 'keep up' with people now....Memento mori. One of the ones who should have been there was Willie Bradley, but he died back in the 90's. His funeral was one of the last times this group of people were in the same place at the same time....until Saturday.
Ponder getting in touch with someone from 20 years ago you really liked and enjoyed--if only for a meal together....it was a good thing....
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
cat s***
I had a friend in West Virginia while I was a priest there who looked, for all the world, like my imagination of Icabod Crane from The Headless Horseman and once said 'cat s***' in a sermon.
It was like this: he was preaching about the raising of Lazarus and he was trying to think of a way to describe how L. might have smelled after being dead for three days in the heat of Palestine. Unfortunately, he'd not prepared his sermon faithfully, having been visiting the sick, comforting the dying and doing the kind of pastoral work that is the bedrock of being a priest. So, on the spur of the moment the best he could do is "Cat S***".
Well, you might imagine that someone called the Bishop and the Bishop called Lowell (not my friend's real name since we must change the name to protect the Cat S*** sermon people) and warned him magisterially never, ever, not ever, never again to say Cat S*** in a sermon.
Can you imagine the pressure that put on Lowell? He was not the brightest globe in the chandelier and really wasn't a great preacher--though he was a marvelous priest. Once the Bishop put in his head that he couldn't say "Cat S***" ever again, every word that was about to come out of his mouth of a Sunday sermon began with Cat and ended with Shit.
We used to have four cats. Catherine, Millie, Chuck (or 'Fatty' as we called him in our good moments...in our bad moments it was "Fat F***") and Luke. They all died in the last year and a half or so except Luke. They actually died--the three that did--in adverse order of our love for them: Katherine (Millie's mother), then Millie (pitiful she was) and then Chuck (who in anyone's estimate, even devoted cat lovers, was mean, disgusting and awful.) But he died hard and suffered more than we should have let him.
So, we're left with Luke, who we call Puppy Cat because he comes when you call him and is a dog in cat's fur. He was our favorite always (BY THE WAY, HAVE I BLOGGED THIS BEFORE? I'M HAVING DEJA VU AND AM GROWING OLD AND FORGETFUL....)
But, going from 4 cats to 1 we've gotten lax about the litter box--we used to have two and cleaned them daily. Luke is fastidious and likes a clean box. When he sees me change it he goes right in and forces himself to expel waste, whether he needs to or not.
So, Luke has, several times now, left the waste product poor, benighted Lowell used in his sermon in places it doesn't belong. I believe he's become more fastidious without those other cats around and can't abide a moderately used litter box. So, since I'm retired and looking for stuff to do, I'm going to clean it everyday and pray he doesn't s*** on the couch again.
But Lowell, God love him, was right, something that's been dead for three days probably does smell as bad as Cat S***.
It was like this: he was preaching about the raising of Lazarus and he was trying to think of a way to describe how L. might have smelled after being dead for three days in the heat of Palestine. Unfortunately, he'd not prepared his sermon faithfully, having been visiting the sick, comforting the dying and doing the kind of pastoral work that is the bedrock of being a priest. So, on the spur of the moment the best he could do is "Cat S***".
Well, you might imagine that someone called the Bishop and the Bishop called Lowell (not my friend's real name since we must change the name to protect the Cat S*** sermon people) and warned him magisterially never, ever, not ever, never again to say Cat S*** in a sermon.
Can you imagine the pressure that put on Lowell? He was not the brightest globe in the chandelier and really wasn't a great preacher--though he was a marvelous priest. Once the Bishop put in his head that he couldn't say "Cat S***" ever again, every word that was about to come out of his mouth of a Sunday sermon began with Cat and ended with Shit.
We used to have four cats. Catherine, Millie, Chuck (or 'Fatty' as we called him in our good moments...in our bad moments it was "Fat F***") and Luke. They all died in the last year and a half or so except Luke. They actually died--the three that did--in adverse order of our love for them: Katherine (Millie's mother), then Millie (pitiful she was) and then Chuck (who in anyone's estimate, even devoted cat lovers, was mean, disgusting and awful.) But he died hard and suffered more than we should have let him.
So, we're left with Luke, who we call Puppy Cat because he comes when you call him and is a dog in cat's fur. He was our favorite always (BY THE WAY, HAVE I BLOGGED THIS BEFORE? I'M HAVING DEJA VU AND AM GROWING OLD AND FORGETFUL....)
But, going from 4 cats to 1 we've gotten lax about the litter box--we used to have two and cleaned them daily. Luke is fastidious and likes a clean box. When he sees me change it he goes right in and forces himself to expel waste, whether he needs to or not.
So, Luke has, several times now, left the waste product poor, benighted Lowell used in his sermon in places it doesn't belong. I believe he's become more fastidious without those other cats around and can't abide a moderately used litter box. So, since I'm retired and looking for stuff to do, I'm going to clean it everyday and pray he doesn't s*** on the couch again.
But Lowell, God love him, was right, something that's been dead for three days probably does smell as bad as Cat S***.
things I notice
I often view the posts I make and lament the spelling and grammar errors I didn't catch until I clicked on publish.
But, thought I've viewed the masthead dozens and dozens of time, I never noticed my name was "fr. jim bradley" before just now.
I wonder what the 'fr.' means? Is it a shortened form of 'from'?
Of course I know it means "Father"! I'm not that addled yet. I just am non-observant and never noticed it before.
But I'm pretty sure I've never once written my name with 'Father' or even 'Fr.' before my name.
And I don't use the little cross after my name that lots of priests do. In a hand written signature it sometimes looks interesting to make a cross after your name. But I sometimes get emails from priests that are signed "Don Priest +". That, I think (and it's obviously just me talking) looks silly as hell. But what do I know
Bishops get to put the cross in front of their name. +The Rt. Rev. Mostly Holy...like that.
Bishops, in my memory, though it is a small sampling since very few bishops ever email me...but in my memory bishops invariably put a '+' in front of their email 'signature'. Most priests who email me don't put a '+' after their name.
That's something to ponder, but I don't know where it would lead you....
But, thought I've viewed the masthead dozens and dozens of time, I never noticed my name was "fr. jim bradley" before just now.
I wonder what the 'fr.' means? Is it a shortened form of 'from'?
Of course I know it means "Father"! I'm not that addled yet. I just am non-observant and never noticed it before.
But I'm pretty sure I've never once written my name with 'Father' or even 'Fr.' before my name.
And I don't use the little cross after my name that lots of priests do. In a hand written signature it sometimes looks interesting to make a cross after your name. But I sometimes get emails from priests that are signed "Don Priest +". That, I think (and it's obviously just me talking) looks silly as hell. But what do I know
Bishops get to put the cross in front of their name. +The Rt. Rev. Mostly Holy...like that.
Bishops, in my memory, though it is a small sampling since very few bishops ever email me...but in my memory bishops invariably put a '+' in front of their email 'signature'. Most priests who email me don't put a '+' after their name.
That's something to ponder, but I don't know where it would lead you....
the things you learn
There have been lots of things I have learned since I stopped working full time and hang around the house more than in the past.
I've learned how very often there are things in the sink that either need washed by hand or rinsed and put in the dishwasher. Of course, there probably weren't as many then and now since I've settled into a pattern of 4 or 5 small meals rather than 3 big ones.
And I've learned how enormous our dishwasher really is. It's pretty new and has a great deal more capacity than our old one--not to mention that the top rack had broken in the old one and we could only load dishes and glasses and cups and bowls in the bottom rack. The current dishwasher holds almost all the dishes we use on a regular basis and even though I use many more than I used to it takes at least two and a half days to have enough packed in it to run it.
I've learned that their is a time-cost to energy saving appliances. Our clothes washer is as big as our dishwasher and both take an enormous amount of time to do dishes using less water. Go figure that. The dishwasher takes 3 hours and 4 minutes to cycle on 'heavy'. And though I always set the clothes washer on the 28 minute--fastest cycle--I timed it the other day and it took over an hour to clean my clothes and spin them to nearly dry using a cup and a half of water or whatever.
I used to wash clothes every other day or so since I usually have only one of two pairs of jeans and like to wear them a lot. The new clothes washer wants to be packed to the gills before it is started--actually, if you can believe the hype--cleans clothes better when fully packed....who knows.
I've learned how few clothes I have. I have two pairs of jeans, two pairs of khakis, two short sleep button up shirts and maybe two dozen or so tee shirts in many colors. I have maybe three long sleeve button up shirts but they aren't much use in this weather. I do have a lot of socks but they are all winter, bulky things and equally useless in July. I have two suits which I hardly ever wear. I used to wear them only for funerals.
Once I had on a suit and socks and real shoes (I only have one pair of those) at a funeral. A guy named Brian was kidding me about being dressed up. I told him, "Mary was suit worthy....You might consider whether in living your life you are being funeral suit worthy...." Not a bad moral standard, I'd say.
Anyhow, I don't have a paucity of clothes through any conscious choice. I simply don't like to buy clothes--the process of trying things on and such makes me anxious--so it is little wonder that the things I have most of (winter socks and tee shirts) are things that can be purchased without trying them on.
Since I like to wear the same things often--jeans and a red tee shirt and a denim short sleeve shirt or khakis and a black or blue tee shirt and a long-sleeve white shirt with the sleeves rolled up--I would wash clothes every other day or so in the old machine that took about 10 minutes to wash clothes in enough water to supply a village for a week. Progress has overtaken me and I usually run out of the clothes I like to wear before I have enough to fill the clothes washer as tightly as it wishes to be filled. I find myself wearing weird things by the time I gather up all the dirty towels to supplement my clothes and fill the washer for an hour wash cycle.
I am strangely unsatisfied by the advances (good for the environment certainly) in washing things.
(Every year or so--though I never kept track--I will wear out one or the other of my jeans and be forced to go buy some. I've been known to gather clothes at a place like Bob's, carry them to the fitting room and then be so overcome with ennui that I simply left them on their hangers and fled the store. One, a few years ago, I wore out both pairs of jeans at the same time--well, they weren't so much 'worn out' as torn in unfixable places. So I found two new pairs exactly alike and bought them. Those twin jeans were one of the minor joys of my life until Bern told me they weren't presentable any more.)
I actually wonder, from time to time, why we need such a variety of clothes choices. Rather than large stores I'd like to shop in a tiny store that carried jeans and khakis in different sizes but all the same design, long-sleeve and short-sleeve shirts in denim, white, blue and blue stripped and a bin load of winter socks. And I wish when a pair of shoes needed replacing you could mail them back to the manufacturer and they would send you a new pair exactly like the old ones. (I've worn the same style of Birkinstock sandals for 10 years or so. They're called "Arizona' for some reason and have all been tan. I kept the last box for about a year and a half now so I can get the exactly same thing when these wear out or start stinking to high heaven.)
But, I know, intellectually, that if everyone was like me houses wouldn't need walk in closets and Macy's--all those places--would go out of business throwing many people out of jobs and leaving gaping holes in shopping malls.
Oh, I do have a half-dozen sweaters--five of them some shade of blue or gray and one bright yellow one. Most of them used to belong to a friend of mine's father and she gave them to me when he died.
That's a bizarre thought: I could tell the funeral directors I know to call me when someone my approximate size dies (I actually like clothes larger than necessary) and I could contact their family....No that's too macabre even for me....
I've learned how very often there are things in the sink that either need washed by hand or rinsed and put in the dishwasher. Of course, there probably weren't as many then and now since I've settled into a pattern of 4 or 5 small meals rather than 3 big ones.
And I've learned how enormous our dishwasher really is. It's pretty new and has a great deal more capacity than our old one--not to mention that the top rack had broken in the old one and we could only load dishes and glasses and cups and bowls in the bottom rack. The current dishwasher holds almost all the dishes we use on a regular basis and even though I use many more than I used to it takes at least two and a half days to have enough packed in it to run it.
I've learned that their is a time-cost to energy saving appliances. Our clothes washer is as big as our dishwasher and both take an enormous amount of time to do dishes using less water. Go figure that. The dishwasher takes 3 hours and 4 minutes to cycle on 'heavy'. And though I always set the clothes washer on the 28 minute--fastest cycle--I timed it the other day and it took over an hour to clean my clothes and spin them to nearly dry using a cup and a half of water or whatever.
I used to wash clothes every other day or so since I usually have only one of two pairs of jeans and like to wear them a lot. The new clothes washer wants to be packed to the gills before it is started--actually, if you can believe the hype--cleans clothes better when fully packed....who knows.
I've learned how few clothes I have. I have two pairs of jeans, two pairs of khakis, two short sleep button up shirts and maybe two dozen or so tee shirts in many colors. I have maybe three long sleeve button up shirts but they aren't much use in this weather. I do have a lot of socks but they are all winter, bulky things and equally useless in July. I have two suits which I hardly ever wear. I used to wear them only for funerals.
Once I had on a suit and socks and real shoes (I only have one pair of those) at a funeral. A guy named Brian was kidding me about being dressed up. I told him, "Mary was suit worthy....You might consider whether in living your life you are being funeral suit worthy...." Not a bad moral standard, I'd say.
Anyhow, I don't have a paucity of clothes through any conscious choice. I simply don't like to buy clothes--the process of trying things on and such makes me anxious--so it is little wonder that the things I have most of (winter socks and tee shirts) are things that can be purchased without trying them on.
Since I like to wear the same things often--jeans and a red tee shirt and a denim short sleeve shirt or khakis and a black or blue tee shirt and a long-sleeve white shirt with the sleeves rolled up--I would wash clothes every other day or so in the old machine that took about 10 minutes to wash clothes in enough water to supply a village for a week. Progress has overtaken me and I usually run out of the clothes I like to wear before I have enough to fill the clothes washer as tightly as it wishes to be filled. I find myself wearing weird things by the time I gather up all the dirty towels to supplement my clothes and fill the washer for an hour wash cycle.
I am strangely unsatisfied by the advances (good for the environment certainly) in washing things.
(Every year or so--though I never kept track--I will wear out one or the other of my jeans and be forced to go buy some. I've been known to gather clothes at a place like Bob's, carry them to the fitting room and then be so overcome with ennui that I simply left them on their hangers and fled the store. One, a few years ago, I wore out both pairs of jeans at the same time--well, they weren't so much 'worn out' as torn in unfixable places. So I found two new pairs exactly alike and bought them. Those twin jeans were one of the minor joys of my life until Bern told me they weren't presentable any more.)
I actually wonder, from time to time, why we need such a variety of clothes choices. Rather than large stores I'd like to shop in a tiny store that carried jeans and khakis in different sizes but all the same design, long-sleeve and short-sleeve shirts in denim, white, blue and blue stripped and a bin load of winter socks. And I wish when a pair of shoes needed replacing you could mail them back to the manufacturer and they would send you a new pair exactly like the old ones. (I've worn the same style of Birkinstock sandals for 10 years or so. They're called "Arizona' for some reason and have all been tan. I kept the last box for about a year and a half now so I can get the exactly same thing when these wear out or start stinking to high heaven.)
But, I know, intellectually, that if everyone was like me houses wouldn't need walk in closets and Macy's--all those places--would go out of business throwing many people out of jobs and leaving gaping holes in shopping malls.
Oh, I do have a half-dozen sweaters--five of them some shade of blue or gray and one bright yellow one. Most of them used to belong to a friend of mine's father and she gave them to me when he died.
That's a bizarre thought: I could tell the funeral directors I know to call me when someone my approximate size dies (I actually like clothes larger than necessary) and I could contact their family....No that's too macabre even for me....
Monday, July 12, 2010
the longest four days of the year
We have now entered the twilight zone of days. For today and the next three days, nothing will make sense, feel right, add up, comfort or encourage. It is worse than the fiercest February, the hottest August, the rainiest May, the snowiest January. No four days on the calendar are more dreadful than these. And they come every year!
They suck away excitement and joy and wonder and hopefulness and even diminish pain and anxiety--though that is not a good thing in this case.
It is as if a total eclipse of the sun lasted 4 days. Four days of darkness, despair, loneliness, disconnection, ennui , depression, pointlessness, bitter emptiness--like staring into the abyss.
It is the Baseball All Star break. There is no baseball played, right in the midst of July, for four days. Oh, there is a game--but not a real game. Watching the All Star Game is like watching the Rose Parade on New Year's day. Vaguely interesting but what does it have to do with much of anything vital, alive, real, compelling.
I would like to be put into a 96 hour induced coma and wake up when baseball, for real, resumes.
After week after week of 6 games each week for every team. After that since early April--the All Star break is like going cold turkey off the Drug that is major league baseball. A withdrawal just after half the season. What to do for those four evenings. Does the radio and TV still work when there are no games???
So here I am, longing for the resumption of the season....the renewal of the joy...the rejuvenation of the time of hope, longing, imagination, beauty....
O, where are you, Yankees that I love?
Lots of you are in Anaheim, I know.
But where is the green, green grass of the Bronx?
Where is the crack of the bat that matters?
The inside pitch that makes me draw back along with A-Rod?
O, boys of summer, how can you desert me
for four whole days?
What will I do with myself?
How am I to behave with no yesterday's game
to relive
no today's game to anticipate,
no changes in the standings
or the statistics?
May God isn't dead....
but there is no baseball for four days....Alas....
They suck away excitement and joy and wonder and hopefulness and even diminish pain and anxiety--though that is not a good thing in this case.
It is as if a total eclipse of the sun lasted 4 days. Four days of darkness, despair, loneliness, disconnection, ennui , depression, pointlessness, bitter emptiness--like staring into the abyss.
It is the Baseball All Star break. There is no baseball played, right in the midst of July, for four days. Oh, there is a game--but not a real game. Watching the All Star Game is like watching the Rose Parade on New Year's day. Vaguely interesting but what does it have to do with much of anything vital, alive, real, compelling.
I would like to be put into a 96 hour induced coma and wake up when baseball, for real, resumes.
After week after week of 6 games each week for every team. After that since early April--the All Star break is like going cold turkey off the Drug that is major league baseball. A withdrawal just after half the season. What to do for those four evenings. Does the radio and TV still work when there are no games???
So here I am, longing for the resumption of the season....the renewal of the joy...the rejuvenation of the time of hope, longing, imagination, beauty....
O, where are you, Yankees that I love?
Lots of you are in Anaheim, I know.
But where is the green, green grass of the Bronx?
Where is the crack of the bat that matters?
The inside pitch that makes me draw back along with A-Rod?
O, boys of summer, how can you desert me
for four whole days?
What will I do with myself?
How am I to behave with no yesterday's game
to relive
no today's game to anticipate,
no changes in the standings
or the statistics?
May God isn't dead....
but there is no baseball for four days....Alas....
The first day
Funny, this is the first day I've gotten up in over two months and wished I had somewhere to go and something to do--like work! I don't think it will last long, it's just that I've finished with the several writing projects I took on after leaving St. John's and feel a bit out of sorts.
I've done the last draft of "The Igloo Factory", the novel I've been working on off and on for years. I haven't had the time to go through the whole thing one last time and 'polish the polish', so to speak. But not working gave me the time. I've also up dated two novellas that are quite new, unlike the IF. Plus I've gotten together all the bits and pieces of a manuscript about parish ministry called "Farther Along" and am not quite ready yet, having spent all this time in fiction, to start working on that. Soon though.
In going through several filing cabinets looking at that stuff and sermons and poems and such, I ran across an email I wrote to Malinda Johnson at 8:24 pm on August 24, 2004! I sent myself a copy, I told her in the first line, "to remember and grow from". A lot of the email is about a dream I had--one of the few 'church' dreams that was good and joyful. (Most 'church' dreams begin with the congregation packed into a huge space and then I do something like open my Prayer Book and realize it is full of pictures, not words!!! Unable to remember how to start the service, the people gradually drift away and I'm left in an empty church...or with one acolyte who is looking at me as if I am the biggest fool in the world....)
The dream is weird and strange about an outdoor baptism that is wonderful and crowded and full of lots of excitement. Malinda and Michael Spencer are in the dream helping with the crowds of people.
Then I wrote this--almost 6 years ago:
"Then there was this day--actually as I look back, there were many things that could have been thought of as 'negative'--people lying to me, Pauline falling and going to the hospital, painful stories I heard--but for some reason, it all felt like what I'm supposed to be doing with my days and, as I've said before, if anyone found out I got paid to spend days like this: simply being present to people in a multitude of ways (having a discussion with a soup kitchen volunteer about the relative merits of outdoor vs. indoor cats, for example)--well, they'd pass a law against having this much to be thankful for while getting paid!"
The truth is that for most of the years I was Rector of St. John's I did fear that if anyone figured out what percentage of my time was spent 'being' instead of 'doing' something, they would be astonished. So, since the 'work' (if you can call it that) was so much of my 'being', there is little wonder that I might wake up from time to time and feel a hollow place when all that used to be.
Like I wrote above, it won't last long, but the feeling did remind me of how extraordinarily blessed I was all those years at St. John's. And how thankful I am for them....
I've done the last draft of "The Igloo Factory", the novel I've been working on off and on for years. I haven't had the time to go through the whole thing one last time and 'polish the polish', so to speak. But not working gave me the time. I've also up dated two novellas that are quite new, unlike the IF. Plus I've gotten together all the bits and pieces of a manuscript about parish ministry called "Farther Along" and am not quite ready yet, having spent all this time in fiction, to start working on that. Soon though.
In going through several filing cabinets looking at that stuff and sermons and poems and such, I ran across an email I wrote to Malinda Johnson at 8:24 pm on August 24, 2004! I sent myself a copy, I told her in the first line, "to remember and grow from". A lot of the email is about a dream I had--one of the few 'church' dreams that was good and joyful. (Most 'church' dreams begin with the congregation packed into a huge space and then I do something like open my Prayer Book and realize it is full of pictures, not words!!! Unable to remember how to start the service, the people gradually drift away and I'm left in an empty church...or with one acolyte who is looking at me as if I am the biggest fool in the world....)
The dream is weird and strange about an outdoor baptism that is wonderful and crowded and full of lots of excitement. Malinda and Michael Spencer are in the dream helping with the crowds of people.
Then I wrote this--almost 6 years ago:
"Then there was this day--actually as I look back, there were many things that could have been thought of as 'negative'--people lying to me, Pauline falling and going to the hospital, painful stories I heard--but for some reason, it all felt like what I'm supposed to be doing with my days and, as I've said before, if anyone found out I got paid to spend days like this: simply being present to people in a multitude of ways (having a discussion with a soup kitchen volunteer about the relative merits of outdoor vs. indoor cats, for example)--well, they'd pass a law against having this much to be thankful for while getting paid!"
The truth is that for most of the years I was Rector of St. John's I did fear that if anyone figured out what percentage of my time was spent 'being' instead of 'doing' something, they would be astonished. So, since the 'work' (if you can call it that) was so much of my 'being', there is little wonder that I might wake up from time to time and feel a hollow place when all that used to be.
Like I wrote above, it won't last long, but the feeling did remind me of how extraordinarily blessed I was all those years at St. John's. And how thankful I am for them....
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