The Mysteries of ... Radicchio.

OK, I've just got a whole THANG going on here about radicchio, this week.  Bear with me.

Almost the first thing I learned, reading  Jennifer McLagan's Bitter -- I'd seen Tweets, I'd heard her interviewed on the radio -- was that radicchio is like roses; it comes in a huge range of colours and forms and variegations.  But if your food-distribution server is like ours, the kind you see probably looks like the little guys in the picture up top, there -- not as big as a red cabbage, tighter and tougher than a red lettuce.  Maybe you know it well and like it, maybe not; whatever.  In our corner of the cosmos, you can expect to pay about five (deflated, Canadian) dollars for a head of it.

But I have to step back a bit. In recent weeks I have been taking up space (= "filling the position") in an Honorary way (no filthy lucre changes hands, that is) at a parish I shall call Our Lady of the Lost and Found (with apologies to Diane Schoemperlen; whom, if you have not read, you should.  But I digress).  Up at OLLF, there, we are one of the weekly drop-off points for grocery hampers from the city food bank.  Normally we see somewhere between ten and twenty recipients.  The food comes in standard big cardboard boxes; the recipients re-pack it in their own shopping bags, or bags we provide.  We then break down the boxes, with great flourishing of utility knives, and stack them for "next week's truck."

Now if you've ever worked at or been served by a foodbank, you probably know that the array of comestibles provided is often... eclectic?  So people are quite liable to receive food that they may not even recognize, let alone like, and their children after them.  Like for instance those little narrow needle-pointed red Thai hot chili peppers?  I mean, really?  I suppose if a financially-struggling homesick person of Thai origin showed up at the depot, he or she would be enraptured.  But most of the rest of us, well, no.

But last week, the Strange Thing du jour was -- drum roll -- RADICCHIO.  Great big beautiful fresh unblemished heads of it.  Now at OLLF in the hall where the food is sorted and packed, we also have a "give'n'take" table.  You don't like Thai hot chilis, you put your package on the GT table.  And you can take anything OFF that table that you DO like.  There's a pretty good rate of flow-through; although we did have a challenging surplus of Thai hot chilis there for a while.

And last week, we had radicchio TO SPARE.  So here's where it gets kind of sticky.  I happened to be looking just as the first client strode up to the GT table and whacked down his head of radicchio.  And I gasped.  "But ... that's GOOD" -- I don't know whether I said it out loud or not. I wasn't assigning blame.  I was just so sad to see somebody who needs food rejecting or relinquishing or refusing or abandoning good food ("I like it" = "it's good" right?) -- nutritious, EXPENSIVE good food mind you...

So then I had to do the analysis.  People are allergic, sometimes.  People have dietary restrictions, sometimes.  People may not have proper food storage.  People may not have the wherewithal to store OR cook food -- they're in shelters or they're in friends' homes or they're in single rooms or they're in cheap motels.  People may not know what the heck it is that just showed up in the food hamper.

So i don't know what the answer is.  Part of me wants to set up a hot plate and a stock pot at one end of the church hall, and hurl the rejected groceries into one almighty no-two-weeks-alike slumgullion, meantime crying out in the wilderness -- "Look, look, you can eat this, this is so good, just do this and this and you've got supper tonight and lunch tomorrow...."

Then I go and pick up McLagan's book on hold at the Library, and she is rubbing my nose in it, for one delirious radicchio recipe after another comes tumbling from the pages.  I've just taken the Radicchio Pie out of the oven.  I'm working on repressing my gasps of distress on food bank days.

There's got to be a solution...

Friday again, woo hoo, I think, anyhow...

Up and full of good resolves this morning, some of which I've even carried out.

It is a constant, repeated (I don't know whether I mean "continuous" or "continual" or both of them) business managing what I need to do, what I want to do, what I have to do, and what I can do -- not to mention "what I FEEL LIKE doing" which usually has nothing to do with any of the above.

Part of this -- I think of it as "ergonomics" in a sense -- has to do with noticing when there is energy and when there isn't -- against a backdrop in which the constant is "less energy than there was, more than there will be" -- which is disconcerting at the very least.

Part of this is learning to ask the question, "What and how much of it do I need to do today in order to feel contented when I turn in, tonight?"  because there will always, always, be more on THE LIST than can be done in one day.  Not to mention more things in the "henh" file.  I am very fond of the concept of the "henh" file. (It contains all those items which you pick up, or remember, or think of, and then say "henh" and lay them down again.)

I have letters to write.  I have nearly finished the laundry.  I have made two business-like phone-calls.  I have scheduled some deliveries.  I have done all the newspaper puzzles over my breakfast this morning -- a sign of sufficient sleep last night.

There is ironing.  There are groceries to manhandle into meal-form before dark.  There are pots to wash, books to read, carpet to vacuum, and a kitchen floor to scrub...and somewhere in there, a walk; and somewhere soon a foray to buy new bedding for a new bed, a brand-new bed, to be delivered next week--very exciting.

And there are books to shelve, papers to sort, archives to shred, garments to mend, projects to complete.

And there is a parish on the horizon--six weeks' interim supply work in last summer's venue, "Little Prairie Town Halfway to the Jumping-Off Place" as we might call it.  Long, long drives every Sunday, but I'm looking forward to it.

But the Blog Post is done.  So now that comes off the list.  It suffices.

Three, and counting

After a fair-ish night's sleep, up in good time and did a complete patrol of the house.  Part of the new daily discipline will be to go into every room of the house, every day -- and when weather allows, to walk the perimeter of the front and back yards, every day.

I am more and more aware that if I do not continue to push -- physically as well as mentally -- into the corners, the corners will draw in and the world will grow steadily smaller and smaller.  As I said to my Helping Neighbour last week -- "I have to cut my own grass just often enough to keep me from thinking 'Oh, I can't'.  Because if I start to believe that, I can't continue to live in the house."  He agreed that that made sense.  Same goes for snow-shoveling, and a degree of house repairs.  Same goes for digging in garden-space.  Push the edges, all the time.

Besides...if I don't look at the rooms, I forget what is in them.  I have too much stuff (I know I'm not alone) but the corollary to that is that one doesn't OWN what one can't FIND.  So, working on that.

Went out midday and had a long catching-up visit over coffee with a good-friend.  We were in a mall coffee shop a long way from home-base -- and still, two or three other people who knew one or both of us came by and joined in the conversation -- it's delightful.

Just before I went out, made a verbal arrangement for six weeks' pastoral and liturgical supply in the wonderful parish I served as interim last summer...will try for 6 - 8 weeks' tenure there starting in September, before the weather and travel conditions become too daunting (it's 200+ km., one way).  Looking forward to this -- looking forward to seeing the dear folks again and the lovely terrain between here and there.

Let us be candid, the "re-MEW-neration" is not unwelcome either!

Then stopped at the library on the way home and handed in TWO books and picked up Roz Chast's memoir of her parents' decline (Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant?) -- and just for frivolity, a volume of Carrie Fisher's memoirs.  So there is a lovely varied little stack of "stuff to read," here.

Had a bite of early supper and went off to ride herd on Thing Two, my junior granddaughter, while her parents did chores around the house and in the yard.  We had a fine playtime with snacks and about five books, and then I helped her Mom with bathtime.  Thing Two's sibling is due in about six weeks or two months, so it is timely and appropriate if Grandma hoists the little girl in and out of the tub...  Much enjoyment.  Son Unit and DIL Unit and I accounted for a box of Haagen-Das ice-cream bars -- so home to put the garbage out for early-morning pickup.  Chasing Shackleton on the TV.  What a story.  (What a MAN!  Whoo!)

Tomorrow, I think, at home all day and -- I hope -- working productively.  Library reading -- and I have Slow Church on the reading pile (this morning I bookmarked the videos of Stanley Hauerwas talking about SC -- looking forward to hearing his perspective also).

A good day with lovely affectionate moments to look back on -- helps with the recurrent feeling of being at odds with the ENTIRE KNOWN WORLD, which burbles up from time to time.

Moving along

Aha.  Back again at 70+1 day.  Got through a Eucharist this morning with active help from "Sound System Guy," "Musician," and "Acolyte," not to mention "Rector's Warden" and others in uncredited roles.  Preached -- about three times longer than I meant to.  I have a strong feeling the congregation was finished listening well before I was finished talking.  However they were polite, and did not retract the honorarium.  We had good coffee afterward and pleasant if desultory conversation.

One of the Rambler's birthday gifts yesterday was a set of beautiful bedsheets.  Of a size incompatible with the Rambler's current bed.  Which has been her current bed since 1967.  Indicating the impatience of her family with her SLOWTH in the replacement of worn-out furniture.

So this afternoon I must ramble forth and take advantage of a momentary mattress sale (but when are mattresses ever NOT on sale, we ask ourself), and then investigate a suitable bed-frame, like, you know, with a headboard and a footboard and side-rails, and like them.

And then grapple with the whole SEQUENCING problem -- delivery of new bedding, delivery of new bed-frame, removal of worn-out bed, possibly ripping up of worn-out bedroom carpet somewhere in the one-two-three-four of that process?

And the lovely Robot Lady at the public library has called to tell me I have a book on hold, so I should pick that up this afternoon also.

And think about some supper, and the week's doings ahead of me.

Avanti! Away I go.  No Sabbath nap this week!

Thursday. Spring. One thing and/or another...

When I finished up my last parish interim assignment at the end of January -- it was actually February 2nd, and included an Annual General Meeting and a potluck lunch as well as the regular Sunday Eucharist -- I came home and resorted to the Couch of Sunday Nappage, as is my wont and certainly seemed to be my due, at that point.

"Aha, " I said, "I will catch a couple of hours here under my fleecy throw (and a strategically placed cat), and then I will Rise Up and see about supper and the week to come."

I got right up off that couch -- eighteen hours later.....

"Hark!" I said, "I must have been more tired than I realized... and perhaps probably I could be Coming Down With Something, judging by this here sore throat..."

And I was.  Not to dwell on misery, but sore throat, congested head, nose running like Alph the Sacred River, and presently a rattling heavy "productive" (as they say) cough.

"Yes!" I said, "the well-remembered end-of-assignment, adrenalin-shut-down, immune-system-vanished, COLD.  Well, we'll just ride this out, and not be pestering the medical profession for a trifle."

That was about February 3rd.  Yesterday, having grown very very tired of the infinite loop, see paragraph #5 above, that I have been apparently stuck in, I went to my doctor.  "Six WEEKS?" I said.  "I don't think so..."

Diagnosis: bronchitis, probably pneumonia, possibly reactive asthma.

A FISTFUL of requisitions and prescriptions and a half day of running about in response -- I have an antibiotic (2 big pills daily WITH FOOD) -- I have Puffer #1 (red) (once daily and be sure to rinse mouth afterward) -- I have Puffer #2 (blue) (four times a day if necessary on a "rescue" basis) -- I also have the continuing threesome of pills combatting the usual blood pressure and cholesterol -- and I have a new bone-density medication (one pill weekly with plenty of water on an empty stomach, NO FOOD for an hour, and remember to stay upright after taking lest it LODGE somewhere).

You will be able to hear me coming because with all these meds in me I shall rattle like the bones in Ezekiel.

But the SCHEDULING involved in all this medication !!!!!!!!  What happened to the Merry Spntaneity that was supposed to characterize my Golden Years????? Eh?????

Maybe this IS my Lenten practice.

Meantime it is officially SPRING, saluted in these parts by a fresh fall of snow, plunging temperatures, and high winds.  

In other news, I have a new parish assignment 90 km away, half-time...again, interim.  

In other news, I have a vegan cookbook (no, but I have dear vegan friends)...my last purchase before Lent. 

Well, the last purchase until I found R. N. Whybray, The Making of the Pentateuch: A Methodological Study on the sale table in the theological library.  It was only 50 cents -- and signed by the author -- and dedicated to his son and his two stepdaughters -- and the stepdaughters are second cousins to the Rambler.  So how could one resist?  (Yes, it's a VERY long story -- some other time).

Time to pay some bills.  "Today we have Paying of Bills"... and some overdue correspondence... also LAUNDRY... and cookery toward the end of the week...
 

 

Back again...

Don't look now, but I'm blogging again.  Up at 5, blanched and peeled peaches (big BC freestone-type -- the stones may be "free" but oh boy, the peel wasn't) and put together a Dutch oven full of ingredients and made six pint jars of Peach and Raisin Chutney.  The jars all sealed.  There was a spoonful left over for me to enjoy with my lunch.  Jars are cooling on a rack in the kitchen.  Contentment.

I bought a half-case (allegedly, 10 pounds, but I think the fruit merchant was a bit generous in his measures) while I was at the downtown market in Prairie Metropolis on Saturday.  A full case was beyond me, I knew, in part because I was coming and going by bus.  As it was, I "blessed" the ones I had purchased before I finished wrastling them home.  I've eaten several "in the hand" -- and there's enough left still for at least a generous peach pie and something else, not sure what.

I'm in the "crack" between two ministerial assignments -- finished my happy summer stint with the parishioners in Intensely Orange -- Sundays only, one service, a 400 km round-trip drive through prime agricultural country as well as a small national park, so I had at least a glimpse of Bison bison athabascae  once a week -- and on the last Sunday at different points along the way I saw FIVE moose -- and at least three vast flocks of snow geese resting and fuelling up for migration among the stubble.  I'd seen snow geese before, back East on the St. Lawrence, but never on the western flyway. 

Pretty rich stubble this season too.  My summer congregation were, um, agriculturalists, and as we got on from August into September they began to smile very, very cautiously and mutter, "she...doesn't look too bad, this year..."  This unemphatic perspective translates into newspaper headlines about "Best Yields EVER"... wheat, barley, and canola...   I kept saying to myself, "There IS corn in Egypt yet..."  Must be irretrievably carnal-minded, I guess, but nothing improves a vista like the visible presence of (potential) GRUB spread over it.

So now it's time to get dug into St. Leroy's, here in town, half-time, while their Rector has parental leave.  The trick will be giving an honest half-time's worth of work AND NO MORE.  Still juggling that in my own head.  I'll see what the lay leadership thinks about priorities and necessities.

All this--and reading, and reading, and reading.  Working on understanding my OWN priorities and necessities.  I seem to have been doing that for a very very long time.

Family Day

It is "Family Day," soi-disant, in Prairie Province -- cynics see it as "we needed a Monday off in February" and/or "Previous political figures attempted to compensate for inadequate parenting they provided by proclaiming a holiday in honour of families."  Whatever.  It is nice to have a Monday off particularly when the weather is not outstandingly horrid.

As it is a provincial holiday, not a federal one, the Post Office works, and we GET REAL MAIL.  Including some reading matter -- Jen Hatmaker's 7, or is it SEVEN?, and various magazines.  Also donation receipts to attach to the tax return.

Cleaning house, focussing on small areas i.e. about 18" square.  As long as I can see results heading to the curb on garbage pick-up day, I'm happy.

And doing some cookery -- made bread this morning from the sourdough basic recipe, with many modifications; the usual yield is two medium loaves, but this morning I made one loaf and a speculative quantity of long rolls suitable for hot dogs etc.  Came up with 10, of varying sizes, and I think 12 would be feasible.  This is basically white bread but it is mightily enriched with veg. oil, skim milk powder, wheat germ, wheat bran, cracked wheat, and quick (small-flake) oatmeal.  Sometimes sesame seed on the bottom also.  I'm well pleased with the result.  Makes good sandwiches, makes good toast, makes good French toast, and eventually makes great croutons and/or crumbs too.

Yogurt (home made) and granola (home made) for breakfast, very tasty.  I'll take a large jar of yogurt to #1 Granddaughter tomorrow, she consumes it at a great rate which is good for Grandma's ego.

Still computing courtesy of the public library (also open, this afternoon, predictably full of young'uns)...

Did not preach or officiate or do anything liturgical this last Sunday except to garb up and adorn the chancel.  Having worn out my alb to the "borderline disgraceful" stage, I regularly wear cassock and surplice.  Turns out this suits the African constituency in the parish just fine.  A delegation informed my Excellent Boss recently that "THAT one" (i.e. me) "is PROPERLY dressed"...which he found very funny, fortunately.

Reading Umberto Eco, a slim collection of essays entitled five moral pieces.  I acquired it for the sake of the essay titled "Ur-Fascism"; in other translations it appears as "Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt," which is wittier.  But there is also a gorgeous little essay in the form of a letter to Cardinal Martini of Milan -- title approximately, "When the Other Makes an Appearance."  Wow, can this man THINK.  (So can Cardinal Martini -- not surprising that their public dialogues were a very "hot ticket" in Milan.)

I'd better make a break for home at this point, company coming for supper...

Faint, but pursuing...

A very fast post here to say, "Still alive" but not reliably connected to the internet in ANY WAY except when I can get to the public library...for a once-a-day 60-minute free session on the computers here.

It is SOME tedious, but OTOH lots of opportunity to do all those things that normally are deferred until after I've "just checked what's on Facebook etc. etc. etc." --

Lent has begun well and quietly -- renewing some resolves and taking steps to make them easier to keep.  Considering installing bear-traps all over the couch so as to preclude the "I'll just lie down here for a minute" gumption-sink.

Managed to inventory both the little freezer upstairs and the big one downstairs -- my neighbour came over to retrieve his "turducken" which he had stored with me for lack of space at his house.  Of course it had migrated to the bottom of my freezer so it could go wibble-wobble in company with my (two!? how did that happen) "famine turkeys"...by the time we had made our way down to it, there was so much food spread out around the freezer that listing it right then and there was the beloved line of least resistance.

Now to make some sensible meal plans.  Came home from the BE with all my baggage PLUS an "airplance cold."  It's gone away now, but while I was laid low the things I had cooked and frozen in January were mighty welcome.

Reading various things, Tzeporah Berman on environmental activism, some William Styron (I don't get it, or I don't get it YET), and The Best Spiritual Writing 2013, including the New Yorker article on the "C Street House" -- whoo.

Granddaughters flourish, and the eleven-month-old has learned to blow kisses.  This makes conversation with Grandma quite smacky.

OK, library time is nearly up, time to pack up here and mount an assault on the supermarket.

Peace, all.

creeping back toward the light...

It’s 6:30.  The furnace thinks I’m now out of bed, and is kicking the temperature up to 68 F accordingly (from 64 overnight, not bad).

I’ve been up for some time – about an hour and a half.  I’ve read a National Geographic article on the Lakota people and life on the rez in South Dakota.  I’ve read quite a lot of Zadie Smith, review essays in a collection called Changing My Mind.  It’s due at the public library tomorrow.  Maybe I can figure out how to renew it on line?

I’ve taken my meds, and drunk a glass of water, and eaten two pieces of toast (home-made bread: one with peanut butter, one with honey) and made a POT of coffee from fresh-ground, and drunk most of a mug of it.

Finished the big crossword from the weekend paper.  Bundled the weekend paper into the recycle bin.  Unloaded the dishwasher from yesterday, and put odds and ends of dirty things in it.  Disassembled and cleaned my espresso pot.  Added skim milk to my shopping list. 

Considered for a bit just what I want to think of as DONE by bedtime tonight: organize my Christmas cards and list…put clean clothes away…write the better part of 50 personal notes to enclose with a seasonal charity appeal…box up some journals for transfer to a library elsewhere…clean the cat’s box…clean the email inbox!!!  Write a half dozen overdue letters…vacuum and mop the kitchen floor…clear the kitchen table, the dining-room table, and the laundry-room table.  Make a start on the pantry.  Concoct vegetable stock for soup base.  Think a bit about a meal plan for this week.

Straightened up the sofa cushions (where I slept the first part of the night last night).  Made the 187^th reaffirmation of resolution not to do that again…

8:30.  Bathed, dressed, ready for the day (using the term loosely).  The usual swathe of Hummers and Escalades bearing junior-elementary types to the school over the way has come and gone again.  It’s looking like a cloudless day on the way (sun just barely-barely UP).  Had a glass of juice and read today’s paper and did the easy Monday puzzles (“Japanese sash” in three letters, first letter “o” and last letter “i”), read the obits and the comics and glanced at the editorials.  Disregarded the sports section.  The National Classic next week involves only the Hated Calgaries and the Hated Torontoes, I am cheering for both of them to lose.

I think I can take this day in 20-minute lumps, if I pace myself.  So the next 20-minute lump will be Mattins.  

Midnight.  The first reading for Mattins was from I Maccabees.  It included just about my favourite Scripture verse EVER: "et cecidit elephans super ipsum, et mortuus est illic."  And the elephant fell on him.  And he died.  Well, you WOULD, wouldn’t you?

Spent a happy evening babysitting the wonder-grandbaby.  She was undeceived by her parents’ surreptitious departure to choir practice, and disposed briefly to fist-fight her grandma over the Bedtime Question, but settled down and went to sleep quite promptly anyway.

Roads were good, but fog settling in as I drove home.  Tomorrow is also a day—and I can’t find my keys.

A hiatus.

About to turn in after a different shape of day -- housecleaning as hard as I could go from breakfast time on, with minimal cyber-playing -- and then a drive to the airport, and collecting my Travelling Kinswoman.

We have had our dinner and talked ourselves to a standstill. Must try to get together oftener than every 25 years.

Tomorrow morning, back to the airport, and then the daily mixture as before.

But what a lovely break in the routine!

movin' on...

It doesn't happen very often, but every now and then I get a useful and salutary -- I hope -- reminder of the kind of Total Desolation that used to envelop every experience of worship, a grim mixture of grief and rage. Didja ever have one of those Sundays when you just want to put your head down and BAWL? (too cold still, despite much moderation of temperature today, to go out and dig WORMS, you understand)

It's been an extra - ecclesiological sort of a day, wrapping up with the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity service this evening (anybody else HATE Sunday evening obligations?) at which a number of persons spoke. Some of them knew how, and some of them told truth. So that was restorative.

And then I indulged myself in at stop at the supermarket for Favourite Things for a very late supper here at home.

Re-thinking the local and current assumptions about ecumenism, however; and the (I'm sorry) prevailing cant about "unity," and "diversity" and so forth.

More and more, I think that we speak -- in the patterns of our habitual and "received" discourse -- perhaps not with forked tongue, but rather out of both sides of our mouths at once. And the left side knoweth not what the right side uttereth, worse luck.

More and more -- at least part of the time -- what is bandied about as churchspeak sounds to me like a rough draft of 1984; we have a list of nouns that are "double plus good" and a list of nouns that are "double plus un good"; and we fling them at each other like rocks; and everybody goes "YAY" and "BOO" right on Pavlovian cue, without ever examining what is actually being said.

Three more sleeps, however, TBTG, and I am within hailing distance of the end of the PRE-DO list. I can see that nice little bit of after-deck in my mind's eye, believe me.

My only worry is how they will ever be able to get the POINTY END of the boat sufficiently down into the water so they can cast off...what with all the Rev Gals falling on each other's necks back at the BROAD END.

Never doubt that you make a difference, y'all (or is it "all y'all"?).

Work...

I am coming to see that the price of being at ease in my house is Unremitting Toil, which seems contradictory. But the daily necessities were neglected for so long that now just cleaning up after a meal, or tidying up after reading the paper, or running the vacuum cleaner, or completing the ironing, feels like Vast Accomplishment.

The problem of course is that it Doesn't Last...it's all to be done again next day, or at most a week later. Energy flags before I get to the Major Unpleasaunces in the house -- not to mention the yard (please).

However, today and this evening, I DEALT with one of them. In one corner of my kitchen cabinets I have a deep cupboard with a two-tiered lazy-susan arrangement. It's been a catch-all for almost 40 years... things get pushed to the back, and forgotten, and packaging deteriorates, and squalor ensues.

Most acutely, most recently, when I discovered that a can of evaporated milk had blown its bottom. ICK. Ick involving a lot of other items, too, of course.

So this afternoon I unloaded everything in the cupboard into a couple of stout cardboard boxes; disassembled and removed the lazy-susan mechanism (with some profanity); scrubbed its components, which involved some serious soaking and strong chemicals; scrubbed the cabinet shelves that surround the turntable space; and actually managed to get all the pieces and so forth back into the space and securely re-assembled (a little more profanity).

And then I scrutinized what I had removed, and some of it, including the Froot Loops that expired in 2006, went straight into the garbage. Some of the rest will go downstairs to the big pantry.

Most happily, I know, now, what's in that cupboard; and oh, there is going to be SUCH a cooking, and a baking.

For the foreseeable future, opening that cupboard door will be a minor, but real, pleasure. And that's clear gain.

Meet Mary Brown...

Marking, perhaps, I hope, I hope, a new stage in the ongoing battle with TIME.
Way way back, oh, ten years, maybe, a very savvy senior laywoman (with whom I served on a volunteer board) gave me advice about the creative and caring use of the daytimer, daily planner, write-on calendar, whatever YOU use to keep track of appointments and so forth.
I knew all about the 2/3 rule: “Don’t fill your schedule more than 2/3 full, you have to allow for the unforeseen that will come plucking at the hem of your garments while you are on your way to do something else.”
But my friend Phyllis taught me something else. “You take that daytimer,” she said, “and you look ahead a week or so to the first day when nothing is scheduled, and you draw diagonal pencil strokes all across it. Then at the top you write ‘Mary Brown.’ And Mary Brown is YOU. That is YOUR day. And don’t you dare encroach upon it when you’re getting calls and requests and invitations and so forth. And if anybody looks over your shoulder, and says ‘But what about Thursday?’ you can just say, ‘Oh no, that day is completely booked for Mary Brown, see?’”
Well, the Rambler knows good advice when she hears it, but she usually has to ADMIRE it for a while before putting it into effect. So yesterday was the first of what I hope will be a long happy series of Mary Brown Days.
The weekend was a full one. Exhilarating, and happy, and gratifying. But FULL. So it was good to take Monday as a day to follow my own behests, at my own pace.
What did I do? Well. I did everything in twenty-minute bursts, carrying my little twist-timer around with me. Everything, that is, INCLUDING looking at the computer (that’s part of the secret).
After her morning prayers, Mary Brown likes a high-protein breakfast – bacon’n’eggs, yup. Contemplated the ‘heel’ of my last pound of bacon and decided the two thin slices would be breakfast, the thick off-kilter last piece would go into spaghetti carbonara one night this week. So THAT is all accounted for, no waste.
Then Mary got all the laundry done, all but a set of sheets and pillow-cases that will need some extended soaking. Mary fetched indoors the super-giant empty vinyl paint-bucket (from last summer’s house-painting job) and has commenced scouring it clean for service as a washtub/soaking tub. Laundry all finished, another twenty minutes accounted for all the ironing.
Mary likes a nice tidy restful looking bedroom too, with no books and/or magazines among the sheets; that took another couple of twenty-minute blitzes.
We answered the e-mails that had been hanging out there. We responded to our phone messages. We went to the bank. We went to the dry cleaner. We went to the bakery outlet and bought ten loaves assorted, and scored on our frequent-buyer card.
Then we got all tidy and decently dressed and went to the university women’s club first dinner meeting of the season, and caught up with old friends and met some nice new ones. Watched a fascinating presentation on late 19th century, early 20th century, Tea Gowns from the University Collection. Worth and Poiret, oh my, oh my.
We came home at half-time; Mary doesn’t do late nights. So we wrapped up the day with a mug of tea and a little reading: the first lecture in Jaroslav Pelikan’s The Vindication of Tradition.
Mary is dropping by again on Friday. Stay tuned.

a quiet Thursday.

At the end of the day, not displeased with what is now DONE...but boy, a lifetime habit of procrastination is hard to break.

But.... some bills got paid, some things got cleaned, some food and drink were prepared, some finances were put in order, some paper was abolished...some text was read, including some blogs...some phone calls, some internet chats, some television.

What's left? well -- run the dishwasher, iron a small heap of "flats", set a batch of yogurt, clear off my bed (I sleep in some of it, I pile books and periodicals on the rest); some notes to write -- and blog to post.

Happiness of the day was getting my registration form in for the BE 5.0. In the morning...will arrange to get the initial payment made via Western Union.

We here in the True North (Strong and Free) are threatened with rotating postal strikes, beginning at midnight tonight... I believe in organized labour, I believe in collective bargaining, I believe in the right to strike--I just wish they wouldn't exercise it when I have things to mail and time is of the essence. On the other hand, ordinary folks now make so little use of the postal service, I wonder what effectiveness a strike will have...or whether this may not be a case of "cutting their nose off to spite their face."

so...breakfast with a friend in the morning, and then Western Union, lunch with another friend, a session with my Siggy -- and some sermon work.

This may be the Sunday to make the pitch for ecumenism, taking advantage of John 17. Not sure yet.

I made a big batch of cold-brew coffee this morning...anticipating, perhaps, some warm weather.

Two or three issues of TLS await attention. In fact we scored TLS, the New Yorker, and Canadian Living all in one day's mail this week. Two parts ideas, one part recipes. Onward and upward toward the Perfectly Balanced Existence.

Reading Katherine Paterson's The Spying Heart, on writing for children.

Wednesday again...

A pleasant sort of a day, mainly at home -- after going in to celebrate the eucharist, and then lead the book study with the Wednesday ladies, and then bolting across town to an ecumenical executive meeting...emails let us down and we had not-quite-a-quorum, but enough to make a practicable plan for our next steps. And good coffee of a Netherlandish intensity, and sugar cookies alongside.

Home and some reading -- made some purchases for St. Curious, bought insect repellent, made some financial plans (short-term), completed the laundry, with just a small basketful of flat ironing to do in the morning.

And then my ambition kind of petered out. But somewhere in there I finished Charlotte Bronte, Shirley, which I've found a delight for its depiction of the collisions between the heroines and the particular personalities of the clergy. I infer that Charlotte Bronte was not impressed when her father's curates "dissed" Yorkshire customs and manners.

I have a bundle of periodical reading here also -- and a little chapbook from Ursula Le Guin, The Wild Girls, with an essay on reading and an essay on modesty, both of which are eminently quotable.

Fred McMurray and Joan Crawford on the TCM channel in Above Suspicion, which was a great book; and they're always fun to watch, but I think I am just too sleepy tonight.

a poem I couldn't resist sharing, an echo from my previous life

Did I Miss Anything?

Tom Wayman
From: The Astonishing Weight of the Dead. Vancouver: Polestar, 1994.

Question frequently asked by
students after missing a class

Nothing. When we realized you weren't here
we sat with our hands folded on our desks
in silence, for the full two hours

Everything. I gave an exam worth
40 per cent of the grade for this term
and assigned some reading due today
on which I'm about to hand out a quiz
worth 50 per cent

Nothing. None of the content of this course
has value or meaning
Take as many days off as you like:
any activities we undertake as a class
I assure you will not matter either to you or me
and are without purpose

Everything. A few minutes after we began last time
a shaft of light descended and an angel
or other heavenly being appeared
and revealed to us what each woman or man must do
to attain divine wisdom in this life and
the hereafter
This is the last time the class will meet
before we disperse to bring this good news to all people
on earth

Nothing. When you are not present
how could something significant occur?

Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human existence
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been
gathered

but it was one place

And you weren't here

___________________________


Tom Wayman's works copyright © to the author.

a desultory sort of a day

Trying to put some kind of order into wht has gone on in my life since BE 4.0...let's see...

We came home on the Friday in good order, and then in a flurry of packing/unpacking I managed to fit in a piece of theatre -- Son Unit #2 in a local production, semi-concert style, of Jekyll & Hyde. There was really only one night I could go at all -- and that was Saturday. Other family were there so we had a chance to say "Hey" to each other before tottering off into the snow.

Up early on Sunday, that was last-before-Lent, or Quinquagesima, or T-Fig 1.0 -- was excused from the early celebration to convey Son Unit #2 and fiancee to the airport for an expedition to Germany and Austria. Caught up with the congregation in order to assist, a little, with a baptism...

Then back to the laundry big time and homework for the next jaunt which began Ash Wednesday morning early. Flew across the country into blizzard conditions and the contrasts with the week before were ACUTE. I had just got used to "Hola" and there I was back in the land of "Bonjour"...meditating on the beach at Tulum in view of "les gars" ice-fishing on the Lac des Deux Montagnes...just getting used to wallowing in luxury with 2100 other people and there I was with 11 others rattling around in a huge no-longer-in-use, eerily untouched and well-kept, Roman Catholic convent. A complete dearth of towel animals. Or mealtime flourishes with napkins.

Although I must admit when I went to lunch the first day without slippers, Sister Lucie pursued me with small nunny shrieks and a shopping bag full of hand-knit "pantoufles"...she didn't QUITE knock me to the floor, but definitely stood over me uncompromisingly until she had fitted me with a suitable pair.

I was in Montreal, for so it was, for a session of the national Anglican/Roman Catholic dialogue. Two other women -- both RC laywomen theologians, and very good ones too. The rest, clergy. Three bishops altogether; the other clergy (male) are for the most part teachers of theology, working actively in ecumenism. I think I'm the only "pure parish" clergyperson. I love these folks -- this is the second time I've met with them -- and our discussions are meat and drink to me. But oh good grief where are the points of contact between THIS koinonia and the one we enjoyed on the boat and continue to enjoy on-line?

One lovely lovely moment when, in discussions of communication and publicity for the great 40th anniversary celebration next November in Montreal, the Rambler brightly suggested that we should set up a Facebook page. "And they all moved away from me, there, on the Group W bench..." and looked deeply, deeply puzzled.

This anniversary celebration will be a service in Montreal in the "Oratoire de St. Joseph" atop Mount Royal, a kind of epitome-point for French-Canadian Roman Catholicism, with much architectural and liturgical splendor. And cardinals'n'them. I can hardly wait.

Oh and I had a wonderful conversation at the lunch table on our final day at the convent. A very large group of women, belonging to a local choir, were also at the convent for the day. The Rambler was in "her blacks" i.e. clericals, as one about to travel. There was whispered discussion and covert glances.

Finally the boldest of the group approached our table. You will have to imagine this all in the most elegant French (I can follow it, but I am slow to find the words to respond).

"Madame? My associates and I could not fail to notice that you, although a woman, are wearing a Roman collar? If it is not offensive to you, might one enquire why?"
"Certainly, it is because I am a priest in the Anglican church."
"AAAAahhh" (with noddings over her shoulder -- I thought, right, somebody in your group just won 25c on that one) "and are there many women in the priesthood, in your church?"
"Well, in our own diocese, at present, about half and half. And of course we rejoice in the minsitry of our SECOND feminine bishop."
"AAAAahhh. And would it be appropriate for one to felicitate you?"
"For the most part, certainly, thank you. On certain days, expressions of sympathy, perhaps?"
-- merry laughter on both sides. (And much mirth for the Catholic bishop sitting with me.)

what, Thursday already???

Oops, missed a day there somehow.

The heat of the last few days has abated. Heavy solid cloud cover this morning with rain in the offing. Suspense...waiting to see whether the minor stopgap measures I've taken will keep rainwater out of my basement.

What's on the board for today? (yogurt yogued, overnight, as hoped for, and has been "jarred up" -- I suppose an intelligent woman would set it in the oven IN the jar it's to be stored in, right? Ok, next time) (cold coffee concentrate is ready to be filtered off).

Unload dishwasher and re-load, I think there is enough lying about to fill it already (blitzed the Science Fair projects on the lower shelves of the fridge in time to get the whole sorry lot out to the curb -- garbage day)...

The laundry's all done and the ironing also...I could pack my bag for the weekend...

Some surface clearing in the kitchen wouldn't hurt, and maybe a bit of baking, as "heating up the house" isn't going to be a problem today.

I've begun sorting OUT my clothes...after years of "shove it in the closet and snatch it out again"...and have discovered a latent luxury that I'm now going to enjoy...I have enough nighties to enjoy a fresh clean one every single night. Wow.

In the sorting process, beginning to fill a bag with stuff I'll not wear again. I should probably tackle my bureau drawers too...I could do that on my lap while I watch television in the evenings.

Meantime I am reading through the two most recent issues of TLS, and the new Anglican Theological Review; there are limericks in the poetry section, and I approve. Interesting article on potential convergence between Episcopalian systematics and the "Emergent" phenomenon. Haven't gotten into the review section yet in any thorough way.

Also floundering about among the bedclothes are Levinas, Beyond the Verse, very tough reading, it would probably be more,um, LIMPID in the original French; and Harvey Cox, Fire from Heaven.

Trying to coordinate some travel plans for what remains of the summer -- and I'd like SOME time on the road before I have to have snow tires restored to Harriet-the-Echo!

all right then...

Trying here to rebuild a sensible life.

And how many hundred times have I begun this in 65 years? (almost 66)

Never mind. Now is now.

So: I have managed to say Morning Prayer (BCP) every morning (except Sunday) for 10 days. Second Samuel and First Corinthians. My word. That David was a piece of work, wasn't he? This morning, the fate of Ahitophel. Reminding me to go back and read Dryden again. If I can find him in the tohu-bohu downstairs.

Then a list for the day. Any old list, in any order.

And then, JUST DO THE THINGS ON THE LIST.

So far... I have had some breakfast and some home-latte, and cleaned out the vegetable bins of the fridge (OOG) and emptied the results into the compost bin, and then cleaned the fridge under where the bins sit (double OOG), and then it was no trouble to pry the kick plate off the bottom of the fridge and give it a good scrubbing, and so it goes;

Then I rescued a couple of peaches and put the kettle on and blanched them (and dealt with a brief mutiny on the part of the microwave, which doesn't always "answer the helm" as I'd like it to)...and managed to wrestle the skins off them and cut them off the pits....thumbs very uncooperative with this task despite extra-strength Tylenol. But now I have nice peach pieces in the fridge for the yogurt-granola parfait which will be either tonight's supper or tomorrow's breakfast.

Weather threatens to be stinking hot again today, so I retrieved three nice chicken breasts from the big box of frozen ones in the downstairs freezer...re-bagged the remaining contents and got that miserable awkward cardboard box out of the freezer. Gave the chicken pieces a preliminary thawing in the microwave (now docile again), and have them baking in the toaster oven -- being all green and energy efficient here folks!!! So then I'll have cold chicken "in hand" for the weekend.

Somewhere in there I made a bit of a meal plan for the next few days.

And fed the cat. Who has decided that she can eat Friskies Turkey'n'Giblets after all, just to please me.

And set out a jar of sun tea to brew. In the sun.

And looking at the not-improving yield of the vegetable bins, I decided I need to learn to make caponata. Thank you, Giada! so that's on the list for later today.

Oh yes, I cut up two large and incredibly convoluted red peppers into medium dice and put it all in the freezer...to bag later, will add colour and flavour to my dinner next winter!

Also on that list -- answer a couple of emails and then SHUT DOWN the laptop for the day; spend an hour on Sunday morning's sermon (leaning hard on Walter Brueggemann); strip and remake my bed and start the laundry for next week; clean the litter box; phone two friends; move an additional box of fabric and craft materials upstairs; start a cold-brew-coffee process (trying to complete it without getting coffee grounds in my ears!!!). Find a rational place for the new wet-dry vacuum and all its "giblets" too. Find a rational place for a bag of nice clean dusters/rags. Apply water and Miracle-Gro copiously to the exterior of Tether's End.

And possibly bike decorously up to the Public Library and read for a bit, in the A/C there...

And tomorrow is also, God willing, a day.

apologetically...

...AND...I'm back. Not that I've been away, but just in a personally unbloggable place for too long.

We live in a weird world, as you have probably noticed. The Rambler had to go out in search of a Wet-Dry Vacuum Cleaner this afternoon (declaring a temporary truce with Major Dept. Store for the purpose)... and charging out of the store with the very large box in her arms ("it isn't heavy, it's just AWKWARD") was momentarily stopped in her tracks by a tasteful display of the very latest thing in small appliances...an electric Martini Maker. Yes. Sheesh. And where is this taking our society, other than -- as Peg Bracken said, to "Fat Wrists for all"?

It struck me particularly as not that long ago I had visited the same local Retail Apotheosis (known to some as "Le Grand Mal[l]") in search of passport photos (YES! The Rambler is about to tackle the Longest Undefended Border in the World, pause for laugh)...

And in the afterglow of passport photos and a splendid conversation with the charming elderly gentleman who took them, it seemed appropriate to do a bit of a mall-crawl for the first time in years.

A new kitchen-outlet called Benix, having an intriguing sale, and browsing about the shelves I found some truly excellent martini glasses -- NOT acrylic -- very plain except for a tasteful gold something on the stem -- a bead? a bump? a lump? Aha, "knop" is the word -- and generously sized. So we bought two, not knowing when we might want to share a nice medicinal martini with a fellow martinist (thank you, Garrison Keillor).

Brought them home...and confronted the complete lack of cocktail shaker. Hmmmm. Soooo... put four big ice cubes in a Ziploc bag and beat the snot out of them with the old steak hammer, rejoicing in being a tool-using hominid -- the opposable thumbs are mostly downright hostile but by golly the frontal lobes are still snapping and crackling....

Tipped the fragments into a lovely clean glass jar, formerly containing pasta sauce, added 3 oz. premium single-estate vodka and 1/4 oz. dry vermouth (Martini's very own), put the lid on, and shook the bejeepers out of the mixture--tipped it all into one of the nice new glasses, added three olives, AAAAhhhhhh.

Must now go downstairs and play some more with the new wet-dry vac. The saleslady was most helpful: "I could put this on a dolly for you if you like?"
"No, I'll be fine, it's not that far to my car."
"Oh good, and if you walk fast and look mad, people will get out of your way, right?"

And I have some major eavestrough-tending on the Immediate Agenda...at present all the water on the west half of the roof is funneled directly onto the front porch (of course), whence it cascades under the concrete front stoop where the soil has subsided, and hence down the foundation to the spot where it comes in, into the storage space under the stairs (house is a bi-level)...so one mops and mops in a crouching posture. And for a change, one can stand up and concuss oneself on the floor joists.

Never a dull moment.