All those souls...

Working on some new disciplines here.

Yesterday was a good'un -- two church services in two different communities with (highly different) potluck meals after each.  My oath, those ladies can COOK.  Wow.  Anglican baptism with Eucharist in the morning, and preached; Taize singing, with no sermon, in the evening.

On the way home, before I reached the Big Highway -- here came the SNOW out of the north-west.  It was an interesting 120-kilometer drive home, but NO difficulty, lots of traffic but nobody doing anything quixotic in my vicinity.

Meditating on saint-ness...and its misunderstandings.  Things never yet quite adequately explained to my satisfaction.  Not "holy celebrity."  Not "co-dependent martyrdom."  The term "personal holiness" gets bandied about more than is useful or comfortable, (or it used to) and I have never ever heard it defined or illustrated as anything other than -- basically -- inexperience, of a particularly sidling, bridling, eyes-rolled-upward sort.  

Who was it, now, who said that the saint we most admire -- instinctively -- may be the greatest threat to our spiritual/moral wellbeing?

Ah well.  We sang Sine Nomine at least once, yesterday, all verses, although we could have had a bit more "WHOMP" -- (this is the hymn known in my household as "WHOMP For All the Saints" you understand).

So here's to the saints with some WHOMP in their natures.

The coffee's made, speaking of WHOMP, and this to-do list isn't going to do itself.  Defend yourself, Monday!!!

Celebrating "all them saints," this morning with the Giotto Madonna from Ognissanti in Florence (I see there is a splendid new book about the Umiliati as patrons of painters...)

And here we go, trying this blogging bit, yet again.  A timed exercise, this morning.

I am still trying to find a schedule that will accomplish the things that MUST be done (and there are more than a few, even among "the retired") and leave as much time -- and energy -- and daylight! -- as possible for the WANT to be done...the reading and writing, the small creativities, the sociable moments.

I'm not there yet!  But partly in aid of that, and in reflection that I am now not just in the second half of my life but in the fourth quarter, in fact -- I've embarked upon the Ignatian Exercises ("in daily life" -- i.e., spread over 8 - 9 months instead of packed into a month).

It has been a long time since I undertook anything at even this modest level of discipline (an hour a day).  It's frustrating, but it seems to be helpful.  Good to be confronted again with the Principle and Foundation, for one thing.

Struggling with Ignatian "indifference" (easy come, easy go?).  There was a moment's insight yesterday when I realized that "greed for" (books, let us say, for example, yes) followed up by "neglect of" does NOT, arithmetically, amount to "indifference."  Or "detachment," if that word is more comfortable for you.

So at present I am doing some work "honorarily" at a parish in town, and doing Sunday duty, remunerated financially, at a parish out of town (with the same patron).  This assignment involves about 90 minutes driving each way.  It's eastward to work and westward home -- squinting into the sun, in other words.  But before long it will be dark both ways, as I know, which will solve that problem definitively.

Yesterday afternoon I began a big cooking binge, with the aim of having meals in the fridge or freezer needing only to be warmed up at mealtimes for the rest of the week.  We shall see.  Still trying to adjust my grocery purchasing to the reality of ONE two-legged occupant and ONE (very small) four-legged occupant in this abode.

Hallowe'en last night was not overwhelming.  I might have had a couple of dozen callers, most of them quite, quite young, and all of them very polite.  Trick'or'treaters in this area are heavily parent-accompanied...usually by shadowy figures out on the sidewalk, calling, "What did you SAY?" to cue the "thank you."  But one Mom appeared on my porch as the Seuss Cat, complete with goldfish in bowl, closely partnering her offspring as Thing Two, with a placard explaining that Thing One was felled by chicken-pox.  All this drama!  

It was mild enough for light jackets, fortunately. And then just before eight o'clock a very light rain began, and that was that -- turned off the porch light, blew out the pumpkin-candles, and firmly returned the left-over sweets to the freezer.  

And time's up.

One more Sunday (one more river to cross)

After the sacred nap -- should have gone to the basement for it, it is uncomfortably hot in the house -- WITH my library book (Hermione Lee's bio of Penelope Fitzgerald) -- huzza, at last and however briefly I believe I have sorted out all the Knoxes.  Including Evoe, who had nothing to do with olive oil.  Punch, rather.  Alas the book is too large for comfortable reading in bed.

I have that, and Nixonland, and various lighter things for this week's investigations.

Meantime: find clean shirt (black shirts in hot weather, NOT practical)... pick up prescription, collect student who needs transportation, don't forget crackers, and off to the ordination at the Cathedral.

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.

"Goin' on a TRIP"

The #1 granddaughter is getting equipped for her new status as a Conscious Traveller later this summer.  You see her above, getting into the skin of the role.  I hope travel is as much fun for her as it has been for her Grandma.

Just home yesterday in the small hours from a cross-country jaunt to a major ecumenical conversation.  A new venue that I hadn't visited before, a style of hospitality I already knew very well.  And we had a very fine time altogether.

I have a suspicion that when the time finally comes for Shady Pines, I am going to have a very fine time there also.  Ecclesial gatherings often mean we are assigned rather small, spartan, sparsely-furnished rooms for our sleeping and ablutions -- and invariably I am as happy as a clam therein.  Maybe because a dorm-room was the first space I  thought of as MINE?  who knows.  But it's quite funny, I think.

This was an especially challenging jaunt in some ways because of various symptoms that appeared about 24 hours before departure...despite the lapse of 64 years since the chicken-pox, and the Zoster vaccine a couple of years ago -- SHINGLES.  So the day of departure along with a haircut and a midday church meeting I found myself speed-dating both my own physician and an optometrist (shingles being particularly bothersome around one EYE, where complications can be serious).  

And then picked up a prescription for formidable big blue pills, finished packing, hired the little boy next door as cat-feeder,and off down the highway to the airport. 

The plane was full and I had a centre-seat, between two genial types returning home to Newfoundland, so conversation was very brisk until they worked out "who they were" with reference to each other, and just exactly how crazy HE had been over HER youngest aunt, and like that.  Then they went to sleep, and I tried to, and by about 2 a.m. I was thinking if someone would just open a door maybe I would try walking home--but the cabin attendant brought me some water and I got my little air-blower turned on cool, and managed a little bit of shuteye with some comfort...

Then a limo to the conference centre, and a rendez-vous with a friend of fifty years' standing, and breakfast, and a bit of a nap, and we were into our ecumenical deliberations.  Part of the work at this session was making videos of each of us reading our essays on very basic questions.  Challenging!  I hadn't worked with a teleprompter before -- and of course this was scheduled on the day that the shingles were most conspicuously LEPROUS.  But I had a little sit-down with myself on the topic of Vanity~~and the lovely young woman directing our videos was equipped with face powder and a big brush~~so that went off all right too.

A very special group of people -- theology nerds, to start with, but there are also aspects of "book club," and "writing group" and heaps of benevolentia mutua animorum as the poet Petrarch called it.

The shingles are (is?) improving.  Feeling quite pleased with myself that I thought of taking my good old-fashioned icebag with me--our hosts showed me where the big icemaker stood in their back kitchen, and on the way home a kindly bartender filled the icebag one final time,so that I could keep everything happily numb throughout the four-hour flight.  I had a row to myself this time, so could stretch my legs and wriggle about as I pleased.

Now emptying bags and working at re-organizing the permanent "go kit" in each of them, and then it's time for the post-trip paperwork...and, in due course, back to the rhubarb fields!

 

When you come to the end of a pretty good day...

It was a happy Pentecost -- up very early with lots and lots of time to get everything ready to go -- out of the house about 9 a.m. and arrived at The Church of Two Names an hour and a half later.  An easy drive, blazing sunshine, just one stretch of highway where paving is happening: an interlude of the stink of tar, and the rattle of "loose chips".
The route is not one I've taken very often, but it is a kind of thrill to swing northward toward a whole array of sonorous destinations, with "Alaska Highway" at the foot of the list ... and the thought that I just might could run away altogether, if I took the notion.
Arrived good and early for the service; the church is next door to a large Roman Catholic church: "Cage match -- Spiritual Ecumenism vs. PARKING SPACES".  I went around and around a couple of blocks, and, true to form, the minute I parked, turned off the key, and opened the door, that was The Signal ~~ Ite, missa est ~~ they all came out and drove merrily away.  It's actually kind of a municipal tradition in this community. 
Preached on the Holy Spirit as the Inconvenient Infrequent Conflagration AND the unquenched unnoticed essential pilot light, and how that manifests itself in language, in speech.  It seemed to go down well... Fluent instantaneous Pamphylian, vs. five words in a row that make sense.  I worked off a sustainable sermon-text from about five years back...
We were  a small group, about fifteen, service went smoothly around and over the inevitable idiosyncrasies.  Pleasantries were exchanged, and off down the road for home, stopping on the way for a good, healthy, late, lunch (in a restaurant, yet, conscious of the honorarium in my pocket).
I was full of yeasty ambition to continue working in the yard, but instead had the usual nap and am about a third of the way into The Lords of Finance.
Time now for a little snack, a little tidying in the kitchen perhaps, another kick at the laundry situation, and so to bed.

All you hungry campers...

"Today is Wednesday, Today is Wednesday, Wednesday SOU-OUP..."  according to the old campfire song, anyway.  No actual soup on the menu at Tether's End today.

An undecided sort of day -- brilliant sunshine very early, then heavy, racing, threatening clouds, now some of both.  Do I go out for a walk!??  Do I seize shovel and get all seriously gardinacious before my poor bedding plants die of sheer boredom??? Do I go out to the kitchen and cook and eat accordingly?  Do I burrow into this impressive heap of library books?  Do I go back to my desk and attend to the now-definitely-due thank-you letters I need to be writing?

Retirement is challenging (Platitude of the Day). On Sunday at noon I wrapped up the most recent interim appointment after three months of half-time duty in a small parish in a small town ninety kilometers from home (exactly ninety kilometers, and exactly fifty-seven minutes, every single trip).  At this point, beyond a single Sunday-supply appointment on Pentecost in another small parish, in a small town, rather more than ninety kilometers from home, there is no word of a further interim assignment.

So the cassock has gone to the dry cleaner, and the surplice is in the laundry "whites" pile downstairs, and the stoles are up on a hanger in the spare-room closet, and the prayer books and the communion kit are tucked away on a shelf, not too high. 

And I contemplate the possibility that I may now, in the fifth year after retirement from full-time parish ministry, really be, really and truly, RETIRED.  Which gives a bit of perspective on the exercise of ministry, perhaps even some of that 20/20 hindsight stuff.

I was a curate, part-time, for about four years; ten years in full-time ministry as Rector, Head of Staff, Senior Pastor~~whatever your nomenclature~~and I've been an interim parson since February 2010.  Since then I've served six parishes, part-time: three in the city, three in the hinterland.  And the difference from full-time ministry has been staggering.  I've been relaxed; I've been comfortable and unanxious; I've been -- happy! (I KNEW there had to be a word for it).

And there has also been a difference in the climate, the ethos, of the parishes I've served.  The folks have been warm, and friendly, and appreciative.  Now have I been happy because the people have been different?  Or, as I very much suspect, have the people been different because I've been giving off a very different vibe?  And if that's the case, where the heck was that vibe during the previous ten years!?!?

When I took leave of St. Thaddeus, on Sunday, we had a potluck lunch of ESCHATOLOGICAL splendour--you know, where everyone finds what s/he most enjoys--and there were PRESENTS -- a photograph of the church, and a bushel of flowers, and a beautiful hand-crafted pen -- it looks like byzantine jewelry, but it's decorated with tiny little electronic components I couldn't even name -- and a little trousseau of hand-knitted things, hot pads and dishcloths and a SCRUBBY which I can use on my saucepans or my heels, whichever needs it more. 

There were also speeches, on the general theme of "We've tried to figure out how we could JUST KEEP YOU ALWAYS" and there were very elderly retired farmers saying very quietly, "You know -- we JUST LOVE you" and the wives of elderly retired farmers telling me how much they and their husbands have enjoyed and been moved by the sermons ("You reduce him to tears, every time, Crimson").  And finally one Mother-in-Zion who leaned in close and said, "I probably shouldn't even say this, BUT -- your HAIR looks WONDERFUL."

Somehow I could not dredge up any impulse to re-assert my Personal Boundaries under those conditions.  I just sat down and mentally rolled around in the ambient goodwill and affection and praise.  Perhaps that means I really am somehow "too far gone" to exercise ordained ministry with appropriate professionalism.

But I don't really think so.  Now I will go and write some more thank-yous.

Pentecost 20C -- got faith?

The point -- if there was a point of this sermon (notes below) was that the miracle done by faith is NOT the miracle of the spontaneously supernaturally uprooted mulberry tree.  The miracle is not moving the mulberry tree but moving the disciple[s].  The folks seemed to be happy with that -- and then we had a great potluck lunch.  There were little kids and even a three week old baby to cuddle...

Pentecost 20, preached at  St Swithin’s in the Swamp, October 6, 2013.

I speak with you this morning in the presence of God.  AMEN.

All summer and into the fall we have been reading in the gospel of Luke; and if we were going to put a title on what we’ve been reading, it might well be, “Things we wish Jesus hadn’t said.”  More formally, we might call them “The Hard Sayings…” – not necessarily hard in the sense tht we don’t understand what he means – sometimes hard in the sense that we are afraid we DO understand what he means, and we’re not sure we like it.  At the very least, Jesus upsets the disciples’ expectations, and our expectations as well. //a signal to pay attention//

This morning’s reading from the gospel is one of these passages.  Look with me for a few minutes at what happens.  The disciples ask to be given more faith.  What a natural, innocent, harmless, blameless request – the kind of thing one might well say in hard or challenging circumstances//lamentations//. 

But how does Jesus respond – does he say, “Why, sure, I thought you’d never ask” and comply with this Perfectly Reasonable Request?  Not a bit of it.  He is quite rude about their request, in fact.  He tells them they don’t have any faith at all (you can almost hear the “Huh”) and then he says something quite wild about a mulberry tree, and wraps up with a gratuitous scolding about something else entirely.

What on earth is going on here?  Something seems to have been wrong with the request!  1. What did they really want? 2. And why didn’t Jesus give it to them?

1.    He’s just told them about the obligation to forgive – and it’s a hard one.  So before they start in forgiving, they say, “if you give us enough faith, we’ll do it” – or, more likely, “if you don’t give us more faith, we’re not even going to try.”  “Increase our faith” turns out to mean, “give us more strength, more power ~~ make this task easier ~~ and then we’ll do it.”  “FAITH” is a kind of magic, a kind of superpower, that will keep the life of a disciple from costing us anything, including failure.

2.   And Jesus doesn’t give it to them; in fact he mocks their desire to do what they – and we – must do by supernatural means.  God does not do for us what we can do for ourselves.  That mulberry tree is there to demonstrate this.  If we want that mulberry tree flung into the sea, we can manage it without divine intervention, without extraordinary spiritual power… //lady evangelist story about new Christians wanting spiritual power – wouldn’t exercise what they already had//

3.   The word “exercise” takes us deeper into Jesus’ program here.  The disciples do need more faith (and often, so do we); and faith is a gift from God; but it is a gift like the other gifts we are given, such as a talent for music, or a capacity for athletic accomplishment.  None of these gifts comes as a wrapped-up, ribbon-tied accomplishment – every such gift is a gift of “potential” – not the finished expertise, or virtue, but something like “a kit” – some assembly is required; some exercise is required; some practice is required )Carnegie Hall story). Such gifts  never mere luxuries or mere ornaments, always given in response to need – courage, patience, only present where they are needed (in great fear, in great frustration)…  They don’t “make things easy” – they make us willing to confront what is hard.

4.   When we want to have the spiritual gift, such as faith, in its perfect form before we undertake the tasks that are set before us, we get the process backwards.  We have been given enough faith to start to be obedient in some small things – and by our obedience we find a) the limits of our faith[fulness] and b) the faithfulness of God toward us c)the increase in faith that we have desired – not in our own spiritual “easiness,” but in our capacity to be a blessing to other people, to our community, and to our world…

 

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.

Monday all day long

It's late, and I'm about to fold myself toward bed, I think.  Yesterday was "plenty" -- preached three times, one sermon at the early service and a second sermon (different readings) at the second and third services.  And I cut cake world-without-end...after the services.  Very kind things were said, and there are roses...and then Ace Brother, who had been waiting altogether patiently, whisked me away "whisk" to our favourite Sunday-brunch place, and we ate eggs with pleasant accompaniments and then reformed the constitution, the church, the nation, etc. and so forth until, in effect, they threw us out.  Back to the erstwhile workplace to pick up my own vehicle and then home through the least credible entanglement of traffic barricades and obstructions and constructions and detours...

Fell down on the couch with a blanket and slept hard for five solid hours.  Got up and "went to bed properly" and slept for another seven.

So today has been pretty productive...suffice it to say two vacuum cleaners came into play.

Number One granddaughter arrived with her accoutrements just after three o'clock.  We had a long walk all around the neighbourhood in the pleasant sunshine.  I put her hat on for her.  She took it off.  I put her hat on.  She took it off.  There was kind of a RHYTHM to it...and then on the way home we went to the PLAYGROUND, where there are SWINGS and SLIDES...she laughs aloud at the sight of them (she's not quite 15 months old) and is overjoyed to "be swung"...and fearless about coming down the slide by herself.  

What else is in the playground?  A lot of very little people...and their grandparents...so we compared notes, bragged, etc.


Came home (enjoying most of a rice cake in fragments as we went along) and then she was definitely hungry.  She practically inhaled a banana...I have never seen such an appetite in one so little... and we played.  I have a number of oversized stuffed animals, and these hit the spot... good to know!  Great hugging and cuddling and patting ... then it was supper time, with the nice things her Mama had brought for her...and her Mama arrived and was able to snatch a little supper for herself before inserting Granddaughter into her jammies and away they went home.

Absolute bliss, but oh! boy! there are reasons why we don't have babies in our sixties, and my muscles are reciting them all tonight!!!  

Tomorrow will be grass-cutting day here, weather permitting -- and a quick trip to the dentist -- and a bunch of little fiddly errands -- and then a dinner party "out."

I am in between appointments for almost the first time in three and a half years...and enjoying the freedom.  Lots and lots of projects to do but everything takes longer than it used to, and a "clear week" before me seems like inconceivable luxury.

If this is Wednesday, it must be...Wednesday.

It's morning, I'm up, I'm washed, I'm dressed, I'm reasonably groomed, I've taken my meds, I am having a pretty good skim milk latte (having made a pot of espresso earlier) and anticipating some Enhanced Oatmeal.  Decided oatmeal-every-morning would obviate weary choice-making.  But it definitely needs help/work/thought etc.  Pretty sure I want to carry on with the additional sesame seed flax seed wheat germ wheat bran cracked wheat sunflower seeds* possibly unsweetened coconut raisins or even craisins cinnamon cloves and of course salt.  The Tabasco was an interesting experiment, but.  Thinking now along the lines of crumbs of dried lemon or orange zest. Artificial bacon bits, for now, no.

"The policy here" is to assemble all these good things, plus water, in the teeny-tiny oatmeal saucepan in the evening, and apply heat upon rising.  So dried enhancements, like the lemon and orange peel, have leisure to reconstitute themselves overnight.  Thinking further on this weighty matter.

*The theme of this cereal is "let's be moving right along here," as you see. 

In other news, coming to the end of my third part-time interim post-retirement appointment, and facing forward as confidently as possible.  Meantime, granddaughters continue shedding joy in all directions...and Beloved Famblies are all well.

Wrangling together a sermon on the Dedication of the Temple and the Faithful Centurion and the Astonishing Galatians.

And so we go on...

Here it is Thursday and there should be an Ask the Matriarch post up already -- and there isn't -- haven't found the exactly right kind of cyber-trowel to spoon it into the RGBP slot.  EVERYBODY BE PATIENT...especially me.

Still dark out -- in another hour we may begin to see some intimations of dawn, and the sun will skulk and scuttle around the Eastern-Southern-Western horizon until between 4 and 5 this afternoon.  Meantime, though, it is MILD -- -3 C for people who do metric, or about 26 F.  We can expect some thawing later on. 

So it might be a day to do an outdoor task -- given that one could, today, stand still for ten minutes or so without freezing solid.

I can shovel the snow off my new deck -- I can clear a bit of a path to the compost bin -- I can even ambitiously dig out access to the SHED.  And retrieve therefrom the emergency shovel, which I'm supposed to have in the trunk of the car (I know, I know, I know). 

And when I've done all those fun gross motor things -- I can figure out how to instal the outdoors component of my fancy tell-all thermometer.  Preferably, on one of the supporting posts in the shade of the new back deck.  Nothing like a little power-tool work to make a person feel competent.

And "competent" would be a good feeling about now.

Heading back into work mid-morning (for "work", read "employment" !!); continuing interim, part-time, on a day-to-day basis -- like a hockey-player on the injured list... (what, by the way, is a "groin-pull," and how exactly does one get... oh, never mind)

There is a noon Eucharist, for which we can anticipate a congregation of six at most.  Today, complicating matters, there is a BIG memorial service at two.  BIG as in Major Civic Philanthropist.  So it will behoove us to "euch" with brisk efficiency, minimizing the pauses for silent reflection, and scoot out from under the chariot wheels of the funeral director's staff.  Our HOS is on vacation.  The memorial service is in the hands of senior diocesan clergy, not including the Rambler, who can come righteously home and get on with the installation of thermometers, etc., before heading out for supper.

Unbridled Domesticity...

I've never been much of a fan of "household hints" -- no time, or no trust, or both.  There are a number of Domestic Stratagems I learned from my mother or my mother-in-law, my aunts, a few girl friends...but not many.  That said, I seem to have amassed a huge collection of print-out Nifty Advice.

So it is disconcerting to find suddenly I'm developing a taste for these things.  Instance.  According to the expert instructions, I concocted a "Fruit Fly Trap."  One small glass of apple cider vinegar, three drops of dishwashing detergent, set it on the kitchen counter near where I prepare fruit and vegetables.  Son of a gun, this morning, if it wasn't full of little Drosophila Melanogaster corpses.  Well, not full, but more than a few.  Bless my soul.  It worked.  What next.

Well, actually, I think I know what next.  Somebody here is recommending that vodka be substituted for water in making pie-crust.  I have pie-crust mix (home-made); I have vodka.  It almost seems...MEANT TO BE.

Perhaps I've spent too much time and effort in pickling and canning, this month...culminating today in a session with my commere in which we made Barbara Kingsolver's triple-threat recipe.  First you make a tomato-based barbecue sauce, and jar up some--not all--of it, and process it in the canner.  Then you add peaches and sugar and what not to the residue, cook it down, jar (again) just some of the new mixture, and process it in turn.  And finally additional raisins and walnuts (and we thought up some additional seasonings) produce chutney -- in rather more than the manageable volumes indicated by the recipe.

All three products tasted different, were slightly differently hued...and MOST tasty.  So La Commere and I are wafting about this evening in an aura (or maybe MIASMA) of PICKLE and domestic accomplishment.

Enough to make anyone feel an affinity with Heloise.  Or something that starts with Hel-.  Like, perhaps, a Helgramite.  So there is a picture of a Helgramite at the head of this post.

Stay tuned for further "Helgramite's Helpful Household Hints."  Yes.

Oh while we waited for the jars, all 27 of them, to cool, we drank ginger tea and reformed the church, the entire church, root and branch, from top to bottom and from stem to gudgeon.  MOST satisfying.

Just a Bowl of...

Monday, and nominal Day Off – Vestry/Parish Council meeting tonight, however.  We have begun the transition process at St. Curious Too – the Rambler departing, fading gently out of sight like the Cheshire Cat, Fab New Rector arriving, all this happening in just about a month from now.

And then the Rambler has stipulated for a couple of weeks OFF.  A little awkward to negotiate vacation time from part-time appointment, but we’ve done it.

Time Off will probably coincide with … RENOS to Tether’s End.  The eventual response to the basement dampness;  it is just boring to be in such a panic every time it rains.  In the process there will be construction of two new “approaches” to the abode—an elevated deck on the east/kitchen side (at present I can if necessary exit the back door, but the first step is a doozie) …and a replacement to the original concrete front stoop.

This prospect all makes me very happy.

In the meantime I am spending the day in the kitchen.  Made a fine batch of cheesy baking-powder/sourdough biscuits…In lieu of buttermilk, I used a generous dollop of my new batch of yogurt, which is extremely tasty too.

And I’ve just pitted a generous four cups of local sour cherries (Nanking, possibly?), gift of a fruit-picking friend, with a PIE in view – double-crust type, for the freezer.

I have this relationship with cherries, and cherry pie, dating back to the winter 60+ years ago when my mother had included ONE CAN of cherry pie filling in her list of provisions for the winter.  It was all duly delivered, and midwinter she baked the cherry pie I had been drooling for for months.  She set it on a high shelf in the back entry to cool.  And the local red squirrel came and had a complete hey-day right in the middle of it, before she brought it in again.  Mom was not open to my suggestion that we eat all around the edges.  So we had no pie after all.  Oh, the bitterness.

Then after taking up residence here in Prairie Metropolis, I rejoiced in the availability of big black sweet cherries, in season, from Neighbouring Super, Natural Province.  I bought a cherry pitter -- the type where you push with your thumb, like a syringe.  And I pitted so many cherries for canning, that I pinched a nerve and numbed my hand and wrist (not to mention dying the whole appendage deep purple with cherry juice).

Onto this scene of Domestic Martyrdom (temporary) arrived one of the Spousal Cousins, with Wife.  Wife sympathized: "Oh, I had exactly the same problem from working the slot machines when we went to Tahoe last winter."

Never did manage to find points of commonality with that woman.   But I did go and buy a heavy-duty pitter, and have avoided further injury.

Trying to get space re-organized in the fridge to accommodate the provender I have acquired with a view to PICKLES.  It's time to go downstairs and inventory JARS, lids, etc.

There are two kinds of people in this world -- this is the polarity that cuts across generations, ethnicities, language, class -- there are those who know what a Mason jar is, and those who don't.

New

Advent One -- new church year, new season, new week -- old blogger!

Went gadding this morning -- celebrated an 11 a.m. Eucharist in a different parish -- saw a number of old friends and met some new ones. A personal treat, to celebrate according to the Book of Common Prayer, and to hear one of the city's premier organists at work.

Home with every intention of watching the National Classic this afternoon (The Grey Cup -- think Superbowl, think FA Championship, if you're in a different jurisdiction), but after a very good lunch indeed, napped all afternoon on the couch. Much appreciated by Nefertiti the Wonder Cat. Feel asleep right after the national anthem, woke up just in time for the Victory Interviews.

Already late in the evening, relatively, and not having done much to work off my lunch, I've had a bowl of jack-o'lantern soup, with various adornments -- a diced avocado, a slosh of cream, bacon bits, Thai sweet chili sauce -- and a small baked apple, and finished the latte I made before I fell asleep. Bedtime approaches rapidly.

Lots of unbloggables, of late. Too many people know who writes this blog. I was away from home to a Major Eastern Metropolis earlier this month for the semi-annual Big Palaver, and at a reception following our Major Anniversary Celebration, a complete and utter stranger walked up to me and asked, "Are you Crimson Rambler?" Signal for cookie crumbs to "go down the wrong way."

But perhaps attending to the blog daily is a useful part of the structure I am beginning to try to impose upon, or infuse into, my existence. Yes -- I know, I know -- at least every few months for the last thirty-plus years, I have determined to find/create/retrieve/obey some kind of structure, system, order, rationale ... but this is different (also a perpetual whine).

So all the domestic minutiae are coming under scrutiny...with some modest success.

And so is my theology...under the influence of old pressures removed and new pressures recognized.

Time to dismantle my "nest" on the couch, run the dishwasher, set out tomorrow's STRICTLY LIMITED task-list, and so to bed.

Catch y'all again tomorrow if we're spared.
And a happy and blessed Advent to all.

CSI: Exodus, and Philippians, and Matthew...

Here is approximately what the good folks at St. Coffee are going to be in a position to hear tomorrow morning. It is notes only. But anybody who is stuck, FEEL FREE.


This morning’s readings, in the customary order in which we read them, struck me as being like one of the notorious television crime dramas in a way, where the story is introduced to us at a moment of crisis somewhere in the middle of the plot – then we have a flashback to carry us back to a previous situation, and finally we move through what we saw first, and all the action and the loose ends are neatly tied up just in time for the final commercial.

This morning, we need to start perhaps not with the Hebrew scripture, the Exodus reading, but with the opening of the Gospel story. One of my friends says, “it all starts the way a love-song might start: a man planted a vineyard” – we hear about an idyllic, perfect setting – then the music breaks, there is violence, accelerating and increasing, things go wrong and the wrong gets “wronger still” and at the very climax there is even a murder, with a corpse – we have everything here except sirens and flashing red lights.

But it all began with a love song, a song about a vineyard, a song anticipating and promising a feast – lots to eat, and lots of lovely stuff to drink, too. In some ways – I think – there is nothing quite as marvelous as making a feast for people you love, knowing that they will be delighted and gratified by what you have prepared, and will be happy. The act of doing that – like the act of putting in a garden, or planting a vineyard – means more than it is – it expresses a sense of connection, a relationship – let’s just keep it simple, here, and say that it expresses LOVE. But what happens when it goes wrong?

The story of God and his people, God in a relationship with people, does not start with the handing down of the house-rules. It doesn’t start with regulations – it starts with a love song, a setting that is not only a place but a promise of provisions – and that idyllic beginning is picked up in the Psalm, in the confident, glorious chorus of the opening verses (hard not to sing them) – “The heavens are telling the glory of God” – try not to lose your place, because we’re not quite finished with the Psalm.

I am hopping about among the readings because more and more as I untangle and reflect on Scripture it seems to me that the readings work TOGETHER – not just by simple repetition, or by simple verbal echoes, but because what is presented in each reading helps us see more deeply into the others. Kind of like ultrasound…it shows you more than you thought was there!

So things start to go wrong, in the love-song, and now we look at the reading from Exodus //the 10 commandments// now even here what we have is not just a handing down of rules: “here they are, memorize and obey these or you are in big trouble”…

The rules come second, as logical conclusions to something else – to what precedes them: “I am the Lord your God” – that’s not just God clearing his throat, you know – that’s God reminding them (and us) of what has already been discovered. “I am the Lord your God” which means that you’re my people, and I have done all these things FOR you, I have planted you a vineyard, I have brought you out of Egypt SO THAT NOW you are ABLE, CAPABLE of living like THIS – now if you don’t, of course, there are logical consequences (some of them sketched in), but the first thing you have to understand is that I have loved you and liberated you, and now you can live this way, you are FREE to live in this way, like truly free people: not having to steal, or lie, or cheat, or murder. BECAUSE I have done all these great things for you.

But we fail to get it. Over and over and over, we go back to slave-thinking, to a slave-perspective – the utmost ambition is to “get away with something,” to exercise the irresponsible power of oppressors, to BE oppressors; conniving, like the wicked tenants, in a way that inevitably means murder eventually.


So where are you and I, in this artfully told story? In the Gospel story, I think, we see ourselves in two lights. We may be the tenants; and we may be the outcasts.

We have to take the story seriously, altho’ Jesus was talking to the Jewish religious leaders, the “good church people” of HIS time. But we have to take it seriously for ourselves too – get ready for this kind of seriousness, because I think all the rest of Matthew between now and Advent 1 is exceptionally tough and gritty going//fire and brimstone//. So we must take it seriously, and not be smug or complacent about our “tenancy,” our “already” relationship with our God.


But then on the other hand, neither are we to be sunk into despair because we are not faithful tenants, or because we don’t feel like insiders, or because, just maybe, we think we deserve to be cast out. Now this is where Paul comes in//very artful// If we were watching a crime drama, Paul would be the guy in the lab, the geek who is fascinated by the theoretical aspect of what is going on, who gives us the schematic understanding of what we’ve just been told, he’s like the person who takes the back off the watch, and says, See? These are the works, the "innards" -- look at this story from THIS angle, from how we understand righteousness by LAW and righteousness by FAITH.. . and he’s excited by what this means, by what it has meant for him//and he's excited enough to use words a lot less dignified than ‘rubbish’//.


Someone has called this parable of the vineyard the most depressing parable in the whole Gospel. But Paul is here to keep us from agreeing with that assessment. Paul is here to say, “Keep going! The story may be over, but YOUR story is NOT over… Press on, and be hopeful and rejoice” //whether full of joy or bent double under disaster, a text for each of us.

So we conclude with rejoicing, because what we have been told about the patience and generosity of God IS wonderful.

We rejoice—maybe with just a little tremor in the voice, as we try so hard to remember that this is not just a story about avoiding a bad outcome; that the commandments we have heard are not just about what do we have to do to go to heaven – the creation, and the law, and the prophets, and the sending of God’s own son are about what we must hold in mind: our lives are about recognizing, and knowing, and loving the Lord our God, the owner of the vineyard. About knowing and recognizing and loving his beloved son.

And the consequence is that we remember to ask for power to do what all of creation does, what all of creation is for – and was for, and will be for // end of Psalm//The HEAVENS are telling the glory of God …may the words of OUR mouths and the thoughts of OUR hearts…

the Friday Five (it's Friday somewhere, I'm sure)

Kathrynzj has invited us to play this Friday Five this week.

What are some things you appreciate about the season of Lent? Perhaps you would share 5 of them with us. And for your bonus question feel free to share one thing you could do without.


1. I like the discipline (yes, that word) of Lent but think it should include more than just "the bridle" -- on the pattern of Dante's Purgatorio I need the whip (OK, OK, the quirt, then!) to push me forward as well as the bit to pull me back. So this year I'll be thinking about what phrases would work best in both functions.

2. Purple. I feel blessed that I have a custom made purple stole -- real violet purple, not the "grape-a-lade" red-purple...

3. And the season -- the lengthening daylight, especially in this seemingly interminable winter.

4. Holy Week done as high'n'solemn as they'll let me get away with...ideally, daily Eucharist, Maundy done with a meal and the Pedilavium and the stripping of the altar, Friday with solemn devotions, and the Great Vigil with as many readings as possible and as much darkness as possible, but this year, see point #3 above!!!

5. The opportunities in teaching the children in this solemn season without either trivializing everything or scaring them into nightmares. I like "serious explorations" with children, even quite little ones.

And what can I do without? rushing the season (chocolate easter eggs on Good Friday, for example), and jamming the season, multiplying extra-parochial services and observances like the re-affirmation of vows, for Pete's sake.

ahhhhh.

The last couple of weeks have been a good time for the Rambler...it's a cliche, maybe, to talk about "healing," but I certainly do feel more able to function and with more energy than for quite some time.

The trip south of the Longest Undefended Border in the World (!) was a great source of joy.

I should backtrack here a little bit, perhaps. When I was first able to read, we spent a lot of time with my grandparents, who subscribed to a lot of American magazines (because that's what there WAS, children, is why). They were ideal reading for a curious child: "Life" with wonderful photographs, "Look," "Collier's," and of course "The Saturday Evening Post," with plenty of fiction in every issue, terrific cartoons, Norman Rockwell covers, and all.

I was aware that we lived in Canada, and that south of us there was another country called the United States -- we were close to the border, and now and then visited a great-aunt near Seattle. But most of my awareness came from American magazines. And over time I came to the deep conviction that although the bits around the edge might be a bit dodgy, if you got into the very middle part of the United States, you would find that THAT was where the "Good People" lived. It was a pretty untested assumption, but comforting nonetheless.

And then I grew up, or at least got older, and became more worldly-wise, and dismissed that youthful impression with derision.

But every now and then I get to travel into the "very middle part of the United States," and am forced to admit, every time, "By damn, I was right in the first place."

Setting aside for the moment the stellar hospitality of my hosts in the Cheesy Bit of the Very Middle Part -- folks, they even let me cut up the lefse for the ordination dinner, I was so honoured -- just the experience of travel ... from the efforts of all at Teeny Municipal Airport, ticket agents, security crew, jet-bridge attendants, flight attendants, who all but threw me bodily onto a flight for which I turned up so late it was embarrassing...to the total strangers I encountered on the people-movers in Enormous Hub of Air Travel...I was flabbergasted, people looked me in the eye and smiled and said "hello there!" Friends, it's downright Uncanadian Behaviour. But I think I like it.

More, another time.

miduum of the triduum...

Taking a short break this afternoon for a nice grilled cheese sandwich with bread and butter pickles (internal to the sandwich, mmmm) ... a homemade latte ... a little desultory television...and then time to get changed and saddle up and go do a communion visit. Back to St. Curious in time for the Vigil tonight at 8...assisted by three other parishes, so the Rambler gets to ride the bench unless one of the visiting clergy sprains something vital.
It's been a good Holy Week at St. Curious -- Palm Sunday went beautifully including some slightly impromptu processing by children and choir, happy distribution of home-made palm branches (hooray for newsprint): then daily Eucharists Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday; a students' supper Maundy Thursday followed by a mighty footwashing (on a scale hitherto unknown in those parts); children doing a fine and happy activity on Good Friday during the Good Friday devotions -- with a very good turn-out, mightily cheering to one and all.
A lovely interlude on Friday evening -- local small chorus has established the tradition of a "sacred concert" on Good Friday in the Fancy Schmancy Downtown Concert Hall; and this year their choice was the Brahms Deutsches Requiem; 30 some select voices and piano accompaniment. There was a good crowd including a significant number of local clergy--it is such a treat late on Good Friday to participate in something beautiful and reverent without having to DRIVE it!
And this morning an innovation, an Easter Egg hunt on the church grounds for children of the community, and thanks be to God there was no snow to contend with...contrary to ALL expectations (head-shaking, tooth-sucking expectations), there were at least 20 children in attendance and a whooping good time was had by all.
Just to ensure that the laughter never stops... Fab Rector at St. Curious was up early this morning and let out her Faithful Dog, who went out like the valiant creature he is and promptly found a skunk. They did not part friends. So on her schedule today also is the de-stinking of her mephitic hound (also self, house, clothing, etc. etc.).

Nobody has as much fun as we do, nobody.

And there were swans this morning, flying over the river...
Happy Easter, alleluia.

a happy Sunday

Preached this morning at St. Curious on the temptations of Christ and what they say about the nature of God and the nature of a human being, and managed to set it in context with both other readings AND the Psalm. Once again...I thought I "had it covered" and then the latterly verses of the Psalm detonated in my hearing AS I heard them read at the early morning service. I got rather carried away, I'm afraid...
A light lunch with the Daughter Unit and then home to prepare a sustaining early supper, catch about an hour's sleep, and away with #1 Son to see a local production of Annie, featuring #2 Son. He reported with humorous chagrin of the audition procedure, that he was asked to do a dance routine and then cast as FDR: "Right, I dance like a guy with polio, good to know that." (I am old enough BTW -- and INCORRECT enough -- to miss the presence in the cast of characters of "the Punjab" and "the Asp"--anybody else remember them???)
I do try not to dote, you know, and to be fair-minded and impartial in my assessment of what I see on stage when the offspring are participating. FAIL. The little so-and-so can speak so as to be understood...and when he sings he sings on pitch. Both of which in my astigmatic opinion set him distinctly apart from the rest of the cast. In short, Ma is proud tonight.
And so to bed.