Pageantry Plus

If you really want to know who does pomp and circumstances best, look no further than the British!

Between Queen Elizabeth's dead and her funeral today, it has been non-stop pageantry plus.

All the processions and ceremonies have been exhaustion for non-British folks like me.

But they know how to do it, you've got to give them that.

All in good--no 'great'--taste, for days on end.

Waiting 14 hours for 10's of thousands to merely walk by her coffin.

The slow and winding road from her death place to London.

The incredible pageantry of the trip to the church and then to the chapel where she will join Prince Philip is side by side tombs.

Of course she did reign for 70 years.

Something big and splendid had to be done.

And they really did it!

I was sore impressed--and I don't even like or agree with monarchies. 

 

What comes next?

The former president (who's name I won't mention) is in a lot of trouble.

Jan. 6, Georgia, NYC, illegally having government documents and some other things.

So, what will happen next?

I want him to go to jail for the damage he did to our country!

I don't care who does it--just do it.

Justice for America.

We still need to clean up the mess he left behind and is still continuing.

MAGA folks planted a bomb at Brigham's Children Hospital in Boston,.

Luckily it was found and someone has been arrested.

What are these people thinking?

A children's hospital, one of the best in the nation.

Why does that upset them?

And have they no respect for truth, justice and the American way?

Probably not.

Alas.

 

Cold all day

            Today, I felt cold all day.

        I hate the cold and Bern hates the heat.

        During the winter we play thermostat bingo most of the day and night.

        Last night, with three layers of sheets and blankets, I was cold.

        I'll find an additional cover  for tonight.

        No reason I should be cold today--but I was.

        Right now I have on a tee shirt, a sweatshirt and a coat as I type.

        It's no fun to be cold.

        Not at all.

 

This week's sermon

WHEN PEOPLE DIE

Intellectually, we all know that we will someday die.

          But I don’t think we know that emotionally.

          Sometimes, I feel eternal, though I know that’s self-delusion.

          So, when someone we admire or love dies, it digs a crater in our hearts and mind.

          When my mother died, on the way from the service to the cemetery, my father said to the mortician who was driving us, “With my wife dead, I have nothing to live for.”

          I was about to ask, “how about living for me?”

          But the driver said the perfect response, “You can’t imagine how many people have said that to me.”

          Death is universal and so is grieving.

          My father lived 12 more years and he did, indeed, lose interest in life. He paid very little attention to his grandchildren when they came to be.

          When I moved him to CT, I discovered all my mother’s clothes were still in his house.

          Most people survive from the loss of loved one. But it takes time and effort.

          I was with him in the hospital the day he died. We had had the most cogent conversation we’d had in several years. After an hour by his bed, I said, “OK, Dad, I’m going home now.”

          And he replied, “so am I”.

          If he had been a parishioner, I would have sat down and held his hand. But he was my father and I assumed he’d slipped back into his dementia.

          By the time I got home, 15 minutes later, the Hospital had already called.

          I turned around and went back to sit by his deathbed.

          The nurse’s aide who had been shaving him when he died, told me he sat up, nearly making her cut him, and said, “I gotta get out of here!”

          Not bad last words.

          I have a poem to share, written by a college classmate of mine. She wrote it for a friend who had died in Viet Nam.

          I was the editor of the student magazine and published it.

          I think it is full of truth.

WHEN PEOPLE DIE

          When people die

          It’s like a bird flying into a window

                   On the coldest morning of the year.

          When people die

          It’s like the bear’s have escaped from the zoo

                   And are eating children on the street.

          When people die

          It’s like a maniac has taken over the power station

                   And the lights go off and on and off

                   And on and off.

          When people die.

 

Now, some other folks have some things to share….    

 

Falling

 (Yankees won last night--in case you're interested.)

The first 4 people to show up at my Bible class today are my age or older and we talked about falling.

All of us have episodes and stories to tell about falling.

As you get older, beloved, all of us have a falling risk.

Some of the stories were horrible and some funny.

My friend M. who was going to help me lead a distinction at a Making a Difference reunion tomorrow on zoom, fell and damaged her face going up stairs.

So, S. is going to take her place. S. has falling stories too.

Falling is awful. It happens without warning and can result in injury.

But as you get older the risk of falling increases.

It just does.

Just hope you fall safely....

Yankees vs. Red Sox

 It doesn't get anymore heated than this: the Yankees will be in Fenway tonight to play the Red Sox.

When I was at Harvard, I went to several Yankee/Red Sox game.

I was putting my well-being at risk!

I've been a Yankees fan my whole life.

When my father was in NYC getting ready to ship out to Europe for WW II, some people gave him and a couple of buddies tickets to a Yankee/Dodger World Series game.

My dad decided which ever team won would be 'his' team.

Needless to say, the Yankees won.

So I grew up in Southern West Virginia rooting for the Yankees.

Ironic, huh?

When I went to Fenway and rooted for the Yankees, people gave me looks that could have been murderous....

Tonight they play.

Go, Yankees!

When People Die

Next Sunday we're going to have a service to honor the memory of a man I never met who was a long-time and faithful member of Trinity.

Others will be speaking.

I'm only going to read a poem by a friend in college who wrote it for her friend who died in Viet Nam.

It goes like this:

WHEN PEOPLE DIE

When people die

It's like a bird flying into a window

    On the coldest day of the year.

When people die

It's like the bears have escaped from the zoo

     And are eating children on the street.

When people die

It's like a maniac has taken over the power station

    And the lights go off and on and off

    And on and off.

When people die.

 

I'm also going to read the Prayer of St. Francis, which is probably my favorite prayer.

It goes like this:

"Lord, make us instruments of your peace. When their is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may  not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen"

Not much more to say.