Coming to you cordless

When cordless phones first came out, my brother had a joke. Whenever he would call he would say "Coming to you cordless". He got it from some cheesy character in a movie I can't remember.

Boy have things changed! Now I can sit at my dining room table, or in the yard, if the weather is good, and actually read my email and surf the 'net. We are wired for wireless. I can even save a file to my laptop and access it from my desktop. What a world.

Cords are interesting. They connect things. When my babies were inside me, living off the oxygen and nutrients from my blood, they were connected by a cord that contained 1 vein, 2 arteries and a lot of wharton's jelly. In the old days, when kid was born, the doctor (and it was always a doctor, LOL) cut the cord first thing. They believed, erroneously, that early cord cutting would prevent bilirubin build-up, which caused jaundice. When my kids were born, though, the midwife knew that almost a third of their blood was still in the placenta, so she let the cord finish pulsating before she cut. The miracle is that the vein closes first, as soon as the baby is born, so that their blood cannot pass back to me. It is, from that moment, a one way street. Physiologically, that little infant is no longer sending anything back to mom... but emotionally it is a totally different story. We suck up their presence like drug, after a long, arduous journey through labor. They are our precious reward.

How does the cord with God work? Do we just take and take and take from him? Is it possible that even though we can offer him nothing at all in return, our mere presence, our love, our very dependence, is a joyful gift? I pray that is true, because at the end of the day, it is really all I can offer.

Ephiphany

More and more I find I am affected by the rhythms of the church year. How wonderful Epiphany is! It is sandwiched between Advent/Christmas and Lent. It is the breather between two penitential seasons of self reflection and self denial. And while self denial (denial of the self, really) should be a part of day to day Christian life, during Epiphany this year I feel almost giddy. Light. Free. (Is it the green on the altar? Promise of Spring? I don't know.)

I am in a joyful place.

Why I love Lent: Reason # 426

Because it is like having a 40 day retreat in the middle of your real life.

Am I nuts that I love Lent? Is it crazy to look forward to a penitential season that is designed to purify us? Perhaps. But somehow I have grown to love the quiet, simple, introspective time. I like that, unlike Advent, I never feel like I am wandering the desert alone. Instead, I feel like it is hard core one on one time with Jesus. He kind of coaches me through it.

I like giving stuff up. It always hard and I inevitably do it imperfectly, which helps me remember that striving for perfection is a form of spiritual hubris. Only God is perfect. My failure forces me to rely on God. At first, that seemed ironic, that I would ask God to help me with something that was meant to be a gift to him. But in the end, I realized that my asking him for help probably was the gift he most wanted.

I like that the material world takes a back seat to the spiritual. Emotions are close to the surface. Things take on a new significance. The world seems full of signs and wonders.

I don't feel lack. To me, being off in the desert with my Beloved never feels like sacrifice or punishment. It's emptiness is more a privilege. A joy. A gift. Even when it is painful and difficult.

This year, I haven't thought about what I will give up to God. I have already put down sugar and, for the most part, booze. I don't smoke. Maybe I should try giving up cussing! And I am going to read the New Testament. And abstain from meat on Fridays. All of these little intrusions into my day to day life will serve as reminders that I live for God. That I want to offer everything to him. That life in him is the greatest joy of all.

I love Lent.


So tell me, dear readers, what are you doing for Lent this year?

Fresh Delivery

Maybe it is cliche, but I have a crush on my milk man, Leo.

The truth is, I only see him a couple of times a year because he usually shows up long before we are awake. Every Monday morning we wake up to find fresh milk in glass bottles, juice, cheese, eggs and half and half in our metal milk box on the porch. Sometimes we go for the exotic like homemade grilled pizza with a white garlic sauce and roasted vegetables. Or perhaps I'll get a package of frozen ravioli and make a sauce in the crock pot.

Today Leo was late. He showed up at about 8:30. I met him at the door and he offered to carry my order into the kitchen.

We commiserated about the Patriots. Talked about the details of the game. I discovered that Leo normally gets up at 2 am but overslept this morning after staying up late watching the Pats choke.

Last year, the Munroe Dairy calendar had photos of all the milk men and I asked Leo to autograph it. This year, my family is in it, so maybe we'll autograph one for him!

By Him and with Him and in Him....

Most Sunday mornings begin with me in a state of sin: I lose my patience and yell at my kids as we are getting ready to go to church, then spend the rest of the morning in a state of contrition. Today, though, something remarkable happened. Instead of getting mad, we got out of the door with no casualties and had a good conversation in the car on the way to church. I was explaining the difference between a symbol (like the cross I wear around my neck) and the Real Presence of the Eucharist.

"The little cracker changes during the service and contains the actual presence of Jesus." I said.

"How?" the kids want to know.

"I don't know, exactly, but it is something the priest does. They are able to change it. That is one really cool part of being a priest."

"Could I do it?" Noah wants to know.

"Not unless you were a priest." I reply. (Although, truly, I am not actually sure about the mechanics of it.)

"Watch during the service" I said. "You'll see when the priest is changing it."

So later, during the mass, I invited Noah to stand with me and watch as our priest added water to the wine, then waved his hands over the chalice and the host, and finally lifted them into the air.

Later, as I was relating this to Fr. Rich, he corrected me. It is the Holy Spirit that transforms it, he said. Not us.

The priest, then, is more like the doorway through which the Holy Spirit acts, I explained to Noah and Emmett on the way home.

"I bet I could do it." Noah asserted. "I don't think you have to be a priest to be a doorway for God."

A mere shadow

of my former self.

Yup. I am groovin' with South Beach. Down about 10 lbs. and feeling extra fabulous. I told a girlfriend of mine that I feel like a movie star. And it isn't just the weight, obviously, but the fact that I am eating healthy, wonderful, food. I still have many more lbs. to go.... but slow and steady wins this particular race.

My mini goal for this year is to lose enough weight so that when I go to Vietnam this summer I won't keel over and die of heat stroke. Eventually I want to get down to around 150ish, which at my height makes me one frabulous babe. At that point I trade in the mini van and get the convertible and a lifetime membership to Apollo Fitness. Or maybe I should do that now? (Do they make a convertible mini van? I still need to carry the kids and kitchen stuff around!)

I am in a hugely grateful place. Grateful that God has given me this tool for change. Grateful that he gave me the willingness to make changes that are all to the good. Grateful that my sugar withdrawals only lasted a couple of days and I have been craving free since day one. And mostly grateful that I feel a million times more healthy now that the crap is out of my system.

Beloved God,
Let me be temperate and moderate in all things. Give me the strength to do what is right. Walk with me on this journey to physical health. Let me remember that it is for you that I do this. So I can be a better mother, better wife, better witness.

Amen.

It's not like that

I had lunch with a friend who is in seminary. She laughed when she told me that most of the students are middle aged women who wear sensible shoes and wool socks who could probably stand to surf by PeaceBang's site.

I found myself lumping all those women into a category:

Women who reached middle age and realized there was more to life. And unlike men, who get themselves a 20 year old girlfriend and a red convertable, these women began a romance with God.


I have felt lumped, too. I remember talking to the Rector of our local Anglo Catholic parish, at one point, and telling him that I was a Unitarian Universalist, but that I had become a Christian and thank you for letting me come to your church during Holy Week.

"Ah," He chuckled. "One of those high church Unitarians."

I don't think he meant to be disparaging. Or perhaps he did. But in any case, he was wrong. I wasn't just a Unitarian tourist with a flair for the dramatic. I was, in fact, a woman desperately in love with God and not quite sure what to do about it. I was, and am, a woman whose world tilted on it's axis with one dunk in a pond in western Rhode Island.

It is easy to discern 'types', but the truth is, none of us are that. We, each of us, are engaged in our own relationship with God. It might be simple, complex, easy going or intense. Funny or stunning, filled with boredom or Holy Spirit fire. But it is ours. Our very own story. Our story with God. And no matter how much our story might resemble someone else's... it is still a unique dance between us and God.

I feel uncomfortable being lumped.

I ought to know better than to do it to others.

Pulling your strings

I got a call on Tuesday from the woman who coordinates volunteers for the Warwick school department.

"We have a meeting on Thursday morning at the library. You signed up in September as a volunteer to do puppet shows at the elementary schools. You got a letter about it this week."

I did?

Uh. Ok. I don't remember signing up, or getting the letter, but what time is the meeting? I'll come and check it out.

When I got to the library, the room was empty, even though I was on time. I brought my coffee and sat down. Eventually the coordinator arrived, along with another woman named Helen, who is a veteran of the program. We chatted a bit. Time ticked by. We were waiting for a couple others, but they never showed up.

So I am, by default, a puppeteer for a program that goes around to the elementary schools teaching kids to be tolerant of folks with disabilities, brush their teeth, stay away from drugs. I don't have to talk... all I do is move the puppet's mouth to match a recorded script. I am probably going to be Mark, a puppet in a wheelchair. Roberto is the blind puppet, but Helen has been doing him for years now and I don't get the impression she wants to change.

My kids claim to be mortified at the thought that I am going to do puppets at their school, but I think they are secretly excited.

Call it what you want....

Things have been good for my brother lately.

He bought a wonderful house. Got himself a truck to go with it. Is learning to budget his money and pack his lunch. And during this whole process has come to appreciate family more than ever before. (Could it be the hours and hours of help we provided during the grueling move? LOL!)

So, after 16 years of dropping by our house for dinner, Jake called me and invited us over to his house for a weeknight meal. He made roasted chicken thighs and homemade mashed potatoes. I brought the salad fixings.

It is our custom, at my house, to say grace before meals. So as we sat down to eat, we looked expectantly at my atheist brother. "Are you going to say grace?" the kids asked.

For a second, Jake looked a little like a deer in the headlights. But then he grasped the hands of my husband and youngest son and said

"Big Bang. Energy of the Universe. Whatever you are... Thank you for my new home, this amazing year, and most of all, for my family."

Amen.

Real Life

I am funny.

In fact, I think I am one of the funniest people I know. I have a silly, self deprecating streak that I pull out at parties. I am a happy drunk. I never get morose or angry or ranty. Instead I tell everyone I love them and get maudlin and sillier.

What is weird is that that rarely comes across on this blog. (Which suggest maybe I should try blogging drunk sometime?)

So, what is the real me? The happy, funny, silly girl who can cuss a blue streak and laugh so hard she is required to change her drawers, or the breathlessly earnest Jesus freak you often find on the Big Dunk? Is it a double life? Or are they just different shades of the same chick?

I admit I try and avoid being funny on the 'dunk because too often on blogs, funny=snarky and that is not what this is about. Not that I don't appreciate snarky... I just think there is more than enough out there and this is a snark-free zone.

Some of my regular readers on the 'Dunk also know me in real life. They know my history, my nutty, artistic family, my embarrassing foibles and annoying faults. They know that I am silly and not just breathless all the time (unless I happen to be slogging on a beach.... see posts below).

So, my dear friends who know me in the flesh.... do you recognize this girl in the 'Dunk?

And for my other, dear, blogger friends.... are you who you are in your blogs?

A charmed life

My friends think I lead a charmed life. When I travel, especially, it just seems that everything comes up roses.

I was in Dallas, this week, for a kitchen tools convention. We were hosted by my friend's brother and his wife, who wined and dined us all week, put us up in their beautiful apartment and treated us like queens. I bought the obligatory cowboy boots (brown lizard skin) and didn't eat a single piece of red meat the whole time.

The convention's logistical team had screwed up: There was no food. No transportation. No organization. But we just sailed along under our own steam, taking cabs instead of waiting for 3000 people to squeeze onto the shuttles. Eating our packed snacks or grabbing salads instead of waiting in a line 200 people deep in the cafeteria. My friend's brother is pretty well off, so we were drinking expensive wine and eating great food and feeling grateful for every single bite.

Even on the last day, when I came down with the Norwalk virus and found myself unable to fly, vomiting my way out of the Dallas/Fort Worth airport, we were blessed by the kindness of strangers who went out of their way to assist a passenger (and her up-for-sainthood friend) in distress. We were given a free ride by a shuttle operator from a competing company. We were given a hotel room at a freakishly low rate. We got on a plane the next day and discovered it was nearly empty, so we could just lie down across three seats and sleep for the whole flight, making up for at least some of the sleep lost in the bathroom the night before.

And then, arriving in Boston, worried that our luggage had arrived 12 hours before us, we walked out of the arrivals and into the baggage claim to find all our bags lined up waiting for us.

A charmed life, I tell you.

And here's the thing: At the times of great joy, I read my bible. I read psalms of thanksgiving and praise. I pray prayers of thanks and love to God.

But at my worst, lying in a bed with a bucket at my side, in a dimly lit hotel room, 2000 miles from home, I pulled out the New King James that the Gideons had left, and read psalm 23, over and over. And then, just to put things in perspective, psalm 22.

And even though I was scared and alone and feeling very very sorry for myself, I also felt safe in the arms of my Beloved.

By the Grace of God. A charmed life.

Day 4 Sugar free

Part of my new 'clean living' regimen is that I am not eating any sugar. This is not such a huge deal for me. I gave it up for about 5 years at one point. But this last year has been one long sugar binge that has left me somewhat slightly dazed. And let me tell you, detox is a bitch. I spent the morning nauseated and the afternoon starving. And no. I am not pregnant, LOL.

Ok. So although this isn't going to become diet blog, I do want to say that other than the physical withdrawal symptoms, I am doing pretty well. I already feel more energy and am pretty sure I am starting to drop a couple pounds. I won't know that for sure until tomorrow because the battery in my scale pooped out after the second day of my new program. Is that a hint, God? Are you suggesting I stay away from obsessively weighing myself 63 times a day? I'll try.

By the way, for those of you who are just dying to know: South Beach.

I know, I know. Those of you have never had a real eating issue will be saying: Just cut down. Just exercise. Just moderate. Just whatever. But I know that for me, structure of some kind is absolutely critical or this Capricorn girl goes haywire. This one seems reasonable: complex carbs, healthy fats, veggies, fruits, lean meats, beans... it seems like something I can live with.

Which is the whole point, isn't it?

Germs

At 5:17 this morning I got a broadcast call from the Warwick Superintendent of Schools announcing that school will be closed for the rest of the week while the CDC and Department of Health investigate an encephalitis outbreak at a neighboring school.

One kid is dead. A 7 year old first grader was hospitalized in mid December and died on the 21st. Another couple of kids have the bacteria, but are in much better shape, recovering at home at this point. No one seems to know why this normally relatively harmless bacteria has gone berserk, so there are folks in hazmat suits taking samples from the affected elementary school and sending the results to Atlanta for analysis. It is like something out of a House episode. Except no Hugh Laurie. And even if there was a Hugh Laurie around, I doubt he would be much comfort to the parents of that 7 year old.

I was actually in complete denial about all this until the call this morning. Yes, I told my kids to be extra careful about washing their hands and covering their mouths when they cough. Yes I thought about what it must have been like during the polio outbreak, when kids weren't allowed to swim for a summer and parents must have been suspicious of all the other kids in the neighborhood. My dad's cousin has a lame leg to this day. But really, I was just going through the motions.

And I wasn't alone, evidently. No one was discussing this at school pick-up time this week. We talked about the weather, the holidays, our diets and travels. But not one parent could bear to mention the fact that a kid the same age as ours died not two miles away from where we stood. It is too close.

Psa 18:1	I love you, O Lord, my strength.
Psa 18:2	The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn* of my salvation, my stronghold.
Psa 18:3	I call to the Lord, who is worthy of praise, and I am saved from my enemies.

Resolutions

I am not a big New Year's resolution maker, but this year I came to the conclusion that I really need to drop the extra weight I am carrying around. It has gotten to the point where I am physically uncomfortable, so something's gotta change.

Weight has been an ongoing struggle for me for my entire life. Even in 3rd grade, I remember asking my friend Jill who was fatter: my classmate Wendy (who was morbidly obese) or me? I seriously couldn't tell what my body was like.

At 15 I went on the Scarsdale Diet because a friend's mother told me she lost a pound a day on it. For weeks I ate protein bread and clear broth with a teaspoon of parmesan. I brought my lunch to school and refused to eat anything that wasn't on the diet. In the course of a few months I lost about 30 lbs and got to 134 lbs. It was the last time I would ever see that number in my life.

I regained all that weight and then some, but managed all through high school to stay in the size 18 range, even with terrible eating habits.

During college, though, my eating was just a mess. I was very poor, so I ate cheap food, which unfortunately happens to be the worst kind: boxed mac and cheese, ramen noodles, english muffins with margarine. I ballooned up to about a size 22/24, which was where I was when I got married. (I have the dress to prove it.)

A couple of years after getting married, I was walking on a beach in Cape Cod, huffing and puffing because it was so hard to walk in the sand, when I finally had an epiphany: God did not want me to be unhealthy. He wanted me to be fit. Right then and there I determined to lose the extra weight. When I got home from the Cape, I signed up with Weight Watchers and did very well with the program, losing about 80 lbs in less than a year. I was something of a poster child, happily sharing with everyone how I managed to lose so much weight, exercising for fun for the first time in my life. (It was at this point that I started playing rollerblade hockey with my husband and some friends.) I looked good, even with the remaining 30 or so extra pounds. But eventually I stopped going to WW meetings because I got pregnant.

During my pregnancy, I gained back just about all the weight I'd lost. I was in total despair.... a new mom with a new baby, exhausted, out of shape, depressed. When my son was about a year old, I went back to weight watchers to try again, but for some reason, I was unable to lose even a few pounds. I was hugely discouraged.

After awhile, I began to believe that the only possible solution for me was God. I simply had to find a way that relied on God instead of my own, by this point weak, will power. So I decided to check out Overeaters Anonymous, a program modeled on the 12 steps of AA. I remember going to my first meeting and wondering why no one was clapping or talking about their weight loss. In fact, it seemed like a downer because everyone was complaining about their lives, instead. But I went back. And then again. And finally got myself a sponsor. Slowly some of the weight started to come off. I got down about 3o lbs. I was feeling better. I was convinced that I was sick and that the only cure was a spiritual solution. I learned to rely on God for both my eating and for other issues in my life.

When I got pregnant again, I wasn't as afraid that I would gain weight. I worked with my midwife to come up with a plan of eating that was healthy. I gained some weight, yes, but it wasn't the kind of out of control thing that I had done with my first pregnancy.

After my second child was born, it took a LONG time for the weight to start coming back off. I was back on my rigid, OA foodplan (3 weighed and measured meals a day, no snacks, no flour or sugar of any kind). I kept praying that God would relieve me of the obsession with food and teach me what he wanted me to do. Finally, one day, I had an epiphany while praying and realized that all I had to do was eat like a thin person. Eat when I am hungry and stop when I am satisfied. It was so simple. So simple, in fact, I thought I was 'cured' of my food obsession forever. I began to lose weight. I stopped going to OA meetings. For the first time in my life I could eat a 'little' of something and put the rest down. It really was a miracle. I was doing really well until last January, when I injured my knee. Suddenly my exercise was zero and my metabolism seemed to take a hit and I was gaining weight even with moderate amounts of food. By the time I was able to exercise again, I had gained back almost all the weight I had lost. If any of you have tried to start exercising when you are carrying a lot of extra weight, I can tell you right now, it is very discouraging. But I started small, with walking the kids to school.

So, here I am, at the highest weight I have ever been. I am not sure whether I am going to go back to OA, but I AM sure that it is time to start taking better care of my body. I am walking the kids to school several times a week. I am cutting out processed foods and am eating only well balanced, healthy choices in moderate amounts.

And I am asking God, once again, to help me with this.

Beloved,

In you, all things are possible.

Moose Breath

Sadie misses her hometown.

She lives 30 minutes away from Tickle Cove on a fairly busy road in Charleston. There are kids in the neighborhood, and some parents, but none she is as close to as her family.

In Newfoundland, even a half hour seems strangely far away. I think it might be a relic of outport life, when people were completely isolated from all but the nearest towns and villages and were accessible only when it was safe to sail because there were not any roads. As recently as 50 years ago, Sadie's hometown would have been the end of the world in winter. It sits on a peninsula, straddling a finger shaped inlet of water (called a tickle in Newfoundland dialect). On either side of the inlet, rugged cliffs rise towards the sky. Most of the town is snuggled between these two cliffs, which protect the houses from the full force of the wind.

For Sadie, marrying an Anglican and moving to his hometown a half hour away must have felt like leaving ones homeland for another country.

I sat in her kitchen and tried to carry on a conversation with constant interruption from her youngest daughter. We spoke of her aspirations to go back to college for a few courses, and her dream of getting a job once Anna starts school. We talked about how much she misses living in the rugged landscape of Tickle Cove, and how she doesn't get over there as often as she'd like.

When I first walked in the kitchen it smelled more like a Sunday dinner than a quick lunch with a friend. She made chicken fingers and smiley fries for the kids, but for us, she had made pot roasted moose and homemade mashed potatoes. These she served with pickled beets and a cup of hot tea. I had seconds.

I stayed for a couple of hours, realizing that I MUST be getting used to Newfoundland because I didn't try and clear my own plate and I could understand Sadie's accent much better than the first time I met her, 5 years ago.

In Newfoundland, it doesn't take long to become lifelong friends. This might very well be another artifact of outport life.

Letters from Newfoundland

Though we have only been here three times before, it is clear that we are part of the community. On Christmas Eve we went to church in Sweetbay and knew at least 4 or 5 folks in the congregation and were warmly welcomed by several more. Even the old priest seemed to recognize me from the mass for the dead held in the cemetary a year and a half ago.

So, when I heard that our friends, Kathy and Sam, had lost their 25 year old son unexpectedly in October, we sent a condolance card and our prayers. By return mail we received a mass card with his picture and a beautiful poem printed on the back. We stopped by Kathy and Sam's little store today when we were in Tickle Cove. After chatting in the store for a few minutes, Kathy invited us over to her house for tea. She pulled out cookies and cakes and candy for the children. From the refrigerator she retrieved a tray of sliced ham. She opened the oven door to reveal a shelf full of tinfoil wrapped parcels, one of which contained sliced turkey which she placed on the table with the ham. Meanwhile she heated up a brown sugar sauce into which we were to dip our ham.

She told us about her son's last day. She talked about the funeral. She laughed when she described the church at his mass. It was October 31st, and since one of his favorite days was Halloween, the priest let them give out their Halloween candy after the mass and decorate the church with pumpkins. Gregory was buried in the Catholic churchyard overlooking the bay on All Saints day. There is a decorated Christmas tree on his grave right now, as Christmas was his VERY favorite time of year.

Kathy and Sam have spent the last 25 years of their life caring for Gregory because he had autism and in Newfoundland, the nearest program for him was 3 1/2 hours away. They are having a hard time figuring out what to do with their time these days.

When I excused myself to use the bathroom, I noticed that there was no mirror on the wall.

On the bedside table: Prayer: Living with God

I have been reading a book that Fr. P gave me:

Prayer: Living with God, by Simon Tugwell.

Actually, when he handed it to me, Fr. P said

"If you like it, I am giving it to you. If you don't like it, I am lending it."

I hate to tell you, Fr. P, but I hope you have another copy kicking around somewhere, because I am loving it.

Since I was still in the midst of the Imitation of Christ, I didnt' start it until last week, but now that I am into it, I am having a hard time putting it down. I am finding it rich enough that I need to put it down, though, so I can digest what I am reading.

Tugwell's book is about building a relationship with God. It is not a how-to manual, as the title implies, but more of a description of the action of God in our lives and the ways that we can open ourselves to that action. He talks about the pitfalls we sometimes experience when we 'Live with God', as well as ways to help avoid them.

He also talks quite a bit about God's nature as it is revealed in scripture, especially as it relates to man's spiritual development. For example, in talking about God's mercy with regard to our fallen state, Tugwell believes that God's act of kicking Adam and Eve out of the Garden was an act of mercy and love. What would be worse than eating of the tree of eternal life after they had already experienced spiritual death? By sending them out, God offers the possibility of redemption. It was an act of mercy. This particular passage caught my attention because I had come to that very conclusion a couple of years ago when reading Genesis with my bible study group. (This, of course, convinces me that Tugwell is a genius! LOL)

I haven't finished the book yet, but can say that it is one that I will go back to again and again. It is great Advent reading.

Thanks, Fr. P!


What's on your bedside table these days?

It sneaks up on you

Early Advent is such a bleak, empty, place. Even with a confession and a wreath on the table, church activities and general cheer and goodwill, there is a distinct sense of darkness in the time before the light.

For me, it seems that Rose Sunday is the turning point. I begin to hear the lyrics of the Messiah differently. I begin to understand the daily psalms more clearly. I find connections in the books I read and the sermons I hear. Where before was blank, now my soul is beginning to feel filled with love.

In praise of mangers

I often hear about what a mean place our Lord was born in. People emphasize his humble beginnings by talking about the stink and cold of a manger in the middle of winter.

It wasn't the Taj Mahal, to be sure, but I can tell you from personal experience that a barn is a lovely place to be at any time of year. And having had two children in a hospital, I can say with all honesty that I wouldn't have minded birthing in a barn at all.

Barns are warm. The animals keep them that way. In fact, if there are a few sheep around, you can lie among them and they don't seem to mind a bit. And contrary to most reports, I have found that barns smell wonderful. They are earthy and sweet with hay and sweat and animal shit, which, unless you are dealing with pigs, doesn't tend to smell bad at all. (I am pretty sure the 1st century Jews were not keeping pigs.) As a child I grew up on a farm and spent quite a lot of time hanging out in the barns with the sheep and goats and cows and grew to love the sounds and smells of the animals. The cozy feel of the hay when I would lie down in it. The warmth of a sheep's breath in my face as she investigated this strange interloper. It is a peaceful place. A quiet place.

The perfect place.

D

Here's the game: A friend assigns a letter and you have to come up with ten things you are grateful for that begin with that letter. If you would like to play, let me know and I'll send you a letter! This game has a faintly Kabbalistic element to it. The ancient Hebrews believed that God imbued each letter with a nature of it's own... and that words that began or contained that letter were, by nature, connected.

Antony assigned me the letter "D" for Dunk, of course!

In doing this exercise, I found D a difficult and demanding letter. It can be somewhat dour by nature, but also disciplined and dedicated. Things I can use more of in my spiritual life. I am delighted to bring you: The letter D.


1. The Dunk. This was obvious, but truly I haven't been more grateful for anything in my life. The day I walked into that pond and got submerged was the day that God entered my heart and set up shop. So much has happened since then, I almost can't remember what life was like before. The biggest gift God gave me that day was to introduce me to his son, Jesus.

2. Dancing. I just love to feel music in my body. A couple months ago we went to a French Farmer's Market, complete with an Acadian band from Maine. They were singing in French and playing fiddles and concertinas and tapping shoes and I was all alone in front of their little stage, dancing away.

When Noah was younger, he used to dance all the time. Even now he moves so beautifully to music.

And today, Emmett went to see The Nutcracker Ballet and couldn't stop dancing this afternoon.

3. Daybreak. I am not normally an early riser, but dawn is a time of extraordinary beauty. When I lived in Hawaii, I woke up very early one morning and watched the purple clouds over the mountain, turn pink, then orange, then finally, white, as the sun rose. I'll never forget it.

4. Dwelling- I am grateful for my little, 1920's Dutch Colonial Revival with the terrible plumbing and abused wood floors, leaky French doors and decrepit cedar shingles. It is the home we have lived in for 12 years now. We were a young, childless couple here. We had babies here. Now we are raising two beautiful boys and a naughty rabbit here. My only regret is that we can't have a chicken (zoning laws) but that is a small thing compared to the delight I feel living in this great neighborhood with my lovely family.

5. Daily Office- I don't do the whole thing, but every day I read the evening psalms from the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer and follow it with a sort of a prayer meme: Sins I have committed or things I must apologize for, Praise and Thanks to God, Intercessions for others (this is where many of you wind up!) and finally, prayers for myself, which often revolve around not repeating what was in the first part....

6. Divina, Lectio- (snuck that one in!) A small group of us meet each week at Grace, for about 50 minutes, and read the gospel lesson and meditate on what God is saying to us through the reading. It is an ancient practice made fresh every week by the real engagement of everyone who attends. I am so grateful for this addition to my spiritual life. We are learning about each other and praying for each other and God is at the center of it all. How often does that happen on a regular basis in real life, I ask?

7. Depth- In water, prayer, relationships, self awareness, relationship with God. I am grateful for the ability to swim at the deep end of the spiritual pool and be fearless even when I am in over my head. God buoys me up when I am feeling afraid. He urges me back to the shallow end when I need comforting.

8. Doing- It is my nature to know things. I read books about stuff. I join online lists about things as varied as electric kitchen mixers and (in a past life) the history of tarot cards. I become an expert. But it is all too easy to be an egghead and never actually do anything. I am at a stage in my life, both with my family and with God, where the doing is everything. I can't be an expert at parenting. I can't be the smartest, most well read Christian. What I can do is do it, imperfectly, everyday. I can play with my kids. I can walk up to the altar and take communion. I can lay hands on a sick person and let the spirit of God rush through me. And I can cook and do dishes and grocery shop and make a comfortable and loving place for friends and family to gather.

9. Death- Not necessarily the physical kind. I am human enough to feel great pain at the death of a friend or relative. But spiritual death has been a blessing for me. A relationship with God invites us to die to our old selves. We let go of what we used to believe and think and do. We see everything in terms of our relationship with him. It becomes the compass point by which we navigate our lives. 'He shall break you like a potter's vessel' used to be such a terrifying concept. Now I joyfully offer myself to be broken, so that God can put me back together again as he sees fit.

10. Disciple- Oh God, For this I can never thank you enough. You have graciously accepted me as your disciple. You are my teacher and friend. You are my Beloved. You are my God. Grant that I may be a worthy disciple to you, always.