W - E - I - R - D (but wonderful)

I don't quite know what to say about this, but I have to say something; so here goes.

Three years ago, while at the Summer School for Liturgical Music in Jordanville, NY, I took a bad fall down a flight of stairs. Incredibly, I didn't get that badly banged up; I got a chip fracture in my right wrist (the one I write with, naturally), and my knee, which took the brunt of the fall, actually didn't break, though it was terrifically swollen and painful for about a year. X-rays didn't show any damage, though, so no one has ever done anything about it.

People were kindness itself to me when I fell. The Summer School Director and his wife put in a lot of time running me to the hospital for checkups; the students fell all over themselves trying to make my life easier; blessings particularly on the guy who took me to the hospital the night I fell, and ended up missing dinner because of me. There was also a kindly babushka who belongs to the parish who gave me a bottle of oil from the tomb of St. John of San Francisco.

Except that over the past three years, walking has become increasingly difficult. There were some other side issues with my right foot, now thankfully resolved, but three years later, I still have three lumps in my knee, one in front and two on the side, and off and on, they really bother me. I still can't kneel at all, which is real interesting during Lent and confession, but even more interesting when trying to clean around the house.

Last week sometime, I managed to do something to this knee, twist it or something, in a way that made it extremely painful to get around. I limped through my household chores on Saturday, and managed to stand aright in church on Sunday by hanging on for dear life to the music stand in the choir loft; but when I woke up yesterday, and the pain was still with me, I didn't know what to do. Going to the doctor is not an option; I've been trying to get a doctor to look at this thing for three years, and no one wants to bother. (New Hampshire must be where they send all the bottom-of-the-barrel med-school graduates.) As I finished my prayers yesterday, having trouble standing and getting to my feet during those, too, I growled, "All right, enough is enough," and reaching for the little bottle of oil that the kindly babushka had given me three years ago, I dabbed a little on my index and middle fingers and smoothed it all over my knee.

And it hasn't given me any trouble since.

OK, why am I so surprised? I mean, what did I expect? Why did I rub this stuff on, if I didn't expect it to work? I guess...because things like this happen to other people, but not, as a rule, to me. I guess I still can't get over the fact that when something is hurting me, that actually matters to God, He actually cares enough to do something about it. With the exception of my husband, this never happens in my life. The point of my existence is to take care of other people, not to be taken care of; so even though I know He cares, in a general God-loves-everybody sort of way, it still takes me by surprise that He notices, that He reaches out a healing finger.... Yeah, that He kisses my boo-boo.

What would He not do if I weren't afraid to ask Him, because dammit, I still Don't Want to "Bother" God.

We Now Return You to Our Regularly Scheduled Program

Shamelessly cribbed from Philippa's blog (I tried to insert a link, but it didn't come up):

FIRSTS
First best friend: Karen Morrissey in Middle Village when I was 6.
First car: 1967 VW Beetle.
First screen name: What's a screen name? I could tell you my first scream name....
First pets: I know it was a dog, and I know I was around 8, but for the life of me I can't remember its name. It didn't last too long.
First piercing: never. Ewwww.

LASTS
Last cigarette: Never smoked.
Last car ride: Yesterday, to Weight Watchers.
Last kiss: Last night, before bed.
Last good cry: In my book, there is no such thing as a good cry. I hate crying.
Last library book: P. D. James's latest, but I can’t remember the title.
Last movie seen: The American President, on video.
Last beverage drank: Cup of peach tea.
Last food consumed: Chicken thighs, with rice and California-style veggie mix.
Last crush: The Old Pussycat!
Last phone call: Can't remember!
Last time showered: Last night.
Last shoes worn: New Balance walkers.
Last cd played: Rarely play CDs -- who needs 'em when you live in an area with *three* classical-music stations?!
Last item bought: Gardener's soap from a new shop.
Last annoyance: People who don't use their heads for more than hatracks. I'm not the brightest crayon in the box, so if I can see a thing, why can't anyone else?! The really galling part is when they say, "Ohhhh, I never thought of that!"
Last shirt worn: Rose-pink polo shirt.
Last website visited: Blogspot
Last IM: Never did learn how to do this.
Last word you said: "G'night, Sweetheart. Sleep tight."
Last song you sang: Closing prayer at Vespers.
What color socks are you wearing? Right now? Bedroom slippers!
What's under your bed? "This house is protected by killer dustballs."
What time did you wake up today? 3:45 a.m. Don't ask.

FUTURE
Where do you want to go? Short-term: Church. Long-term: Someplace quiet. You wouldn't believe how noisy Gonic, NH has become.
Where are you going to live? Right here, for as long as possible!
How many kids do you want? Six. But the two I had are just fine. :D
What kind of car(s): I'd love it if I could buy another Escort -- can't beat 40 mpg. Failing that, I'd love a Mini Cooper, but they're expensive as sin.

CURRENT
Current mood: Hey, I've been up since 5:00 a.m. Let me wake up first!
Current music: None
Current taste: None.
Current hair: Needs to be brushed, but at long last, my bad-hair days are pretty much over. Menopause is good for something, anyway.
Current clothes: Nightgown, bathrobe, bedroom slippers.
Current color of toenails: Natural, dahhhling!

UNIQUE
1. Nervous Habits: I pick the sides of my thumbs.
3. Can you roll your tongue?: No, and why would I want to?!
4. Can you raise one eyebrow at a time?: Just the right one.
5 Can you blow spit bubble?: Yes. It always impresses babies. ;-)
6. Can you cross your eyes?: UGH!
7. Tattoos?: No, absolutely not. I can’t stand them!
8. Piercings and where: See #6.
9. Do you make your bed daily? I air it out first -- throw back the covers and let the fresh air kill all the dust mites. Then I shake it out and smoothe it (it's a duvet), but when I shake it out depends on my schedule.

CLOTHES
10. Which shoe goes on first?: Left.
11. Speaking of shoes, have you ever thrown one at anyone?: No. If I were ever tempted to throw anything at anyone, it wouldn't be a shoe.
12. On the average, how much money do you carry in your wallet?: That's classified. But it's under $100.
13. What jewelry do you wear 24/7?: Wedding ring, engagement ring, gold cross, and watch.
14. Favorite piece of clothing?: At this point, anything that fits. But I would love to find a nice riding skirt in a deep tan (deep, rich brown my second favorite).

FOOD
15. Do you twirl your spaghetti or cut it? Twirl. I never heard of cutting spaghetti!
16. Have you ever eaten Spam? You mean you eat Spam? ;-)
17. Favorite ice cream flavor? Sadly, I can’t eat ice cream. But when I could: coffee chip.
18. How many cereals in your cabinet? Three: oatmeal, Cream of Wheat, and Great Grains. I also have a couple of Ezekial cereals, but I find I can't eat them -- they have, shall we say, an unfortunate effect on my digestive system.
19. What's your favorite beverage? Iced coffee in the summer, peach tea any time of year.
20. What's your favorite restaurant? A local breakfast/lunch place called Benedict's. They have the best-prepared, most reasonably priced food, and their kitchen is spotless.
21. Do you cook? Not only do I cook, I cook international. That's why I hate summer; who wants to eat hot food in the summer?!

GROOMING
22. How often do you brush your teeth? Once or twice a day.
23. Hair drying method? I wash it at night and sleep on it wet. In the morning, it comes out with just the right amount of fluff.
24. Have you ever colored/highlighted your hair? A long time ago, I used to get my hair highlighted red (I love red hair). But it doesn't take on greying hair, and if there's one thing I can't stand, it's women with wrinkles and bright red or blonde hair; so I'm not getting it done anymore.

MANNERS
25. Do you swear? On rare occasion.
26. Do you ever spit? One of my least favorite habits (in others - don't do it myself). I can't say enough about how it grosses me out.

WHAT'S YOUR FAVORITE
27. Animal? That's easy - sheep!
28. Food? Anything German. Brings back happy memories.
29. Month? September. No, wait, October. No, wait, I love 'em both.
30. Day? Sunday. Monday's a close second. I love the feeling of a new work week.
31. Favorite Cartoon Character? I have favorite cartoons, but no one character.
32. Shoe Brand? At this point, anything I can walk in. I have terribly crippled feet.
33. Subject in school? History or English. I hated school generally.
34. Color? Brown.
35. Sport? Bicycling.
36. TV show? NCIS. I used to love JAG, too, but the last two seasons were phenomenally stupid.

IN AND AROUND ROOM
41. The CD player? We have two: one in a boom box, and one in one of those Crosley record players that looks like a 1930s radio.
42. Person you talk most on the phone? The kiddos.
43. Pictures up? I have a few pictures of English cottages in the living room. What I would really love is to frame some of my Thomas Kinkade calendar art.
44. Do you regularly look at yourself in store windows and mirrors? <>
45. What color is your bedroom? Blue-flower wallpaper. But I think we're going to re-do the room pretty soon, and I will probably look for something green, to go with the rest of the house.
46. Do you use an alarm clock? Not usually. Morning people have built-in alarm clocks, I find.
47. Window seat or aisle? Doesn't matter, usually, though on a train I do like to look out the window.

LA LA LAND
48. What's your sleeping position? Right side.
49. Even in hot weather do you use a blanket? I need at least a sheet. But no, I'm not really comfortable without some kind of weight on me.
50. Do you snore? There is a canard to that effect....
51. Do you sleepwalk? No.
52. Do you talk in your sleep? Gosh, I hope not! But how would you know?
53. Do you sleep with stuffed animals? No, but we have a whole menagerie of stuffed animals that take the place of the kids.
54. How about with the light on? I can't think of a better recipe for interrupted sleep that some light glaring in my face.
55. Do you fall asleep with the TV or radio on? No.
56. Do you sleep with the door shut? Depends. In the summer, when the fan is on - yes. (It pulls in the air more efficiently from the window if the door is closed.) In the winter, when the heat is on, and we like to sleep with the window open - definitely. The rest of the year, no.

The Party of Evil or the Party of Stupidity: Some Choice

As all my nearest and dearest and most of my cronies know, I usually spend two weeks every summer at the Summer School for Liturgical Music in upstate NY -- two weeks of hobnobbing with other folks who love to sing and love Orthodoxy, it doesn't get any better than that. A couple of summers ago, I was chatting with one of the professors about politics, and he opined that one's only real choices were the "Party of Evil" or the "Party of Stupidity."

Now, since this person is from Boston, I was pretty sure which political party he considered "evil" (Boston being one of the most solidly Democratic cities in the nation), but I was curious to find out why he thought the Democrats were stupid. So I asked, "Which is the Party of Evil?" He looked at me as if to say, "You're kidding, right?" and answered, "The Democrats, of course." And while I was still picking my jaw up from the floor, he added, "What's more evil than killing your own children?"

Good point.

I raise it because, reading other people's blogs, I am struck with the venom directed at the Bushes. Regardless of one's opinion as to how this latest fiasco was mismanaged (and having seen FEMA in action on many other occasions, I'm not convinced this was any different or worse), there's such a personal quality to people's vituperation. Really, it's been that way ever since the election of 2000, when people were convinced Bush "stole" the White House. (Yes, Gore won the popular vote, but not the electoral vote. That has happened before, most recently in 1960, when the other Most Hated Republican -- Richard Nixon -- refused to request a recount.)

So I got to thinking. And it seems to me that for the absolute foulness of public discourse to cease, the only solution is for the nation to keep electing Democrats, since at least Republicans are funny when taking potshots at the opposition.

In that case, which is worse? To live with four years of Republican mismanagement, a lot of malcontents spewing venom and hatred at everything that the President undertakes, and rousing the rabble until we become a camp of armed militia on either side of the political spectrum? Or to live with the Party of Evil in power, supporting the demolition of the family and the wholesale murder of the unborn and definitions of marriage that are most charitably described as "creative," selling the country down the road of perdition until a takeover by Anti-Christ is inevitable -- but the rabble are Fat, Dumb and Happy, and intelligent discourse becomes not even a memory?

I don't know. Well, I do know -- for myself. I will continue to vote according to my conscience, and also according to the way I have voted most of my life: deciding early on which candidate I'm against, and not looking too closely at what's left. Unfortunately, I think that's how most people vote nowadays.

Oh, and I'll spend Election Days as I spent this past Election Day, singing alternately, "Save, O Lord, Thy people," and "To thee, the Champion Leader." That way, whichever wins, I'll know it was the will of God, and I'll be content.

Out of the Closet

No, not that closet. I've just decided I'm tired of closing myself up so I don't tick people off.

This is from a local news service:

Note: In a distributed breaking news alert, we cited an Associated Press report that said engineers working for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers were shot by New Orleans police officers. The Associated Press later retracted that report, saying the engineers came under fire and that the police shot the gunmen.

I have said it a couple of times, and I will say it again: What's up with that? You complain about nobody coming to help you, and when they show up to help, you shoot at them? Gimme a break.

Uncovering people who died hiding in houses or who got caught in floods is going to be "as ugly a scene as you can imagine," said Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff.

Wait a minute. There was a mandatory evacuation order put into effect on Sunday. What part of "mandatory" did people not understand? Yeah, yeah, I've heard about the Poor Unfortunates Who Didn't Have Transportation. Nobody talks about the fact that buses were sent for these folks, who turned down the offer of help.

Despite complaints about the government's sluggish response to death and misery in the Gulf Coast region, Chertoff said it's too soon to start blaming people for perceived mistakes in how hurricane relief has been handled.... On Monday, the president will visit the region for a second time. His administration has been taking considerable heat for what's seen as a sluggish response to the disaster.

This is the one that really gets me, the notion that somehow, this is all Bush's fault. As if he were personally responsible for the hurricane. As if it were his personal responsibility to see to it that the city had a workable evacuation plan in place before this thing hit. Excuse me, isn't that the Mayor's job?! So is it Bush's fault that the people of New Orleans elected an incompetent boob who can't lead his way out of a paper bag?! Did Rudy Giulani blame the government for 9/11? (And incidentally, he could have, with considerable justification, since the Clinton Administration had spent 8 years sitting on its backside while Osama pulled his machinery together.)

The stress and strain from Hurricane Katrina aren't just taking an emotional toll on civilians. Police are also feeling the effects. The deputy police chief in New Orleans said two of his officers have committed suicide....published reports indicate as many as 200 officers have failed to report for duty, including some resignations. Riley said some officers may be missing work because they've been trapped at home and been unable to reach their command centers.

But nobody's helping, oh, no. When two cops commit suicide in the space of a week, does it occur to anyone that maybe the city is asking more of its police force than any human being should be required to give? No, heck, that's what we pay them for! Hint: There isn't enough money in the world to pay cops for their regular job, let alone this kind of crisis.

Then there's this:

Nearly a week after the hurricane blasted its coastal region, Mississippi continues to suffer, often in silence. It felt the full force of the storm but the destruction and misery in Mississippi have been overshadowed by media coverage of the catastrophic aftermath in New Orleans, said University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato.

A classic case, I guess, of the squeaky wheel (New Orleans) getting the most grease. If I can find a site that's collecting money for the victims of Mississippi, that's where I'll donate. I'm not going to help the Mayor of New Orleans get away with pinning his incompetence on somebody else.

There are a few slivers of light in the storm-ravaged region.

A $62 million National Emergency Grant was announced Saturday by Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, to fund about 10,000 temporary jobs for Hurricane Katrina clean-up and recovery in Louisiana.

Chao said the temporary jobs will mean paychecks for thousands of dislocated workers and will help to clean up, rebuild and repair their communities. Federal officials said all 64 Louisiana parishes will take part in providing work sites for displaced individuals until evacuation orders are lifted.

We were just talking about this last night. This is what needs to take place, people working on their own communities to get them back up and running. Why are people in the rest of the country being asked to house and feed refugees, when they should be housed and fed near the site of their own homes, so they can roll up their sleeves and get to work on the reconstruction?

Then there's this:

Help comes from unusual places in times of tragedy.

Afghanistan, with a government propped up by other countries, is pledging $100 dollars for U.S. victims of Hurricane Katrina. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul said the pledge came in a letter from Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Afghanistan relies heavily on financial aid from the U.S., and Ambassador Ronald Neumann said Afghanistan's compassion and generosity bears testimony to the strength of the ties between the two countries.

The European Union and NATO said the U.S. asked for emergency assistance. Both said they're ready to help.

More than 60 countries have pledged assistance of some sort for the recovery effort. Among them:

A half-billion dollars is coming from Kuwait, the country a U.S.-led coalition liberated from Iraqi occupation in 1991. Another $100 million is coming from Qatar.
The 22-member Arab League is calling on Arab nations to provide hurricane relief.
Austria, Belgium, Britain, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Luxembourg, Finland, Italy, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Spain and The Netherlands have pledged assistance.

China has offered $5 million and pledged logistical and other assistance. South Korea is sending $30 million. North Korea, which views the U.S. as its main enemy, has sent a message of sympathy through the Red Cross.

Not mentioned, sadly, is the fact that Russia was the first to offer aid. But what gets me is Afghanistan. Did somebody say our presence there was a waste??

Ten Things I Love About September

10. As knitting guru Elizabeth Zimmermann once put it, "September is the logical beginning of the year." Which says something nice about Orthodoxy.

9. The tourists head home.

8. When I bring my laundry in from the back yard in the evening, the house casts a long enough shadow that I'm not standing in that glaring summer sun.

7. In September, there is no glaring sun.

6. It's dark earlier, so I have to put the lights on in the house, and it's all lit up when dh comes home from work. I like lit-up houses. Can you tell that Thomas Kinkade is my favorite artist?

5. I get my life back, because I get my brain back. No more wishing the sun would go away so I could think.

4. Good sleeping weather!

3. Only two birthdays, all month. In a family as large as mine, that's worth remarking.

2. No more cold suppers. I get to cook again.

1. That wonderful autumn glow, when everything turns to gold, especially in the early morning and the early evening. I read once that it has to do with the angle of the sun and particulates in the air, and the sun reflects off the particulates (composed mostly of stuff that plants shed) and creates that golden glow. Trust a scientist to explain something magical.

The only thing I dislike about September is that it's hurricane season. On the other hand, here in the northeast, most of our hurricanes seem to occur in August. And since everyone else is commenting on the disaster in New Orleans, I might as well, too, if only to say....

What's with shooting at rescue personnel?!?!?!

Hmmm...

Although I'm not sure it will show up publicly, I have just deleted 8 comments from my last post -- all spam. Can't help wishing these people would get a life. Now we all have to deal with Word Verification, meaning, if you want to post a comment, you have to type in a squirrelly-looking word that says you are a real live human being, not a half-life whose only purpose is to sell penis enlargement to women, or something equally dim-witted.

That said, I feel I must comment on something rather unpleasant that has occurred on the OrthWomen's list. I'm referring, of course, to the current flap over feminism. I won't go into the history of the flap, since I think you are all on OrthWomen anyway, but what was interesting to me was the reaction not only on the list, but among the moderators. This topic caused passions, misunderstandings, recriminations, sleeplessness -- and one moderator resigned from that position, though still a member of the list. (Me.) To me, that says everything that needs to be said on the subject of feminism. It always was a hot button, it remains a hot button, as far as I can see it's entire raison d'etre is to push buttons -- this is not any kind of appropriate topic for Orthodox discussion.

And I am still mightily annoyed with the original OrthWomen's member who felt compelled to push this agenda onto the list. Go feel Empowered someplace else, willya?

This Explains Everything....

A word of explanation: My husband works for the federal government. Although he is not the author of this piece, it would be fair to say that it resonates with us.

A NEW DISCOVERY: A Breakthrough In Government

A major research institution has recently announced the discovery of the heaviest element yet known to science. The new element has been named "Governmentium".

Governmentium has one neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312 particles. These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton like particles called peons.

Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert. However, it can be detected because it will always impede every action with which it comes into contact. A minute amount of Governmentium causes a reaction to take four days to complete, when it would normally take less than a second.

Governmentium has a normal half-life of 4 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places. In fact, Governmentium's Mass will actually increase over time since each reorganization will cause morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.

This characteristic of moron promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as "Critical Morass."

When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium -- an element which radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many "peons" but twice as many morons.

Lament

The rock 'n' roll raucousness now is stilled;
with Vivaldi the halls of the house are filled.
Where gerbils and hamsters once reigned supreme,
there's time to think, and plan, and dream:
The kids are gone.

Two-a.m. feedings have long since fled,
and two-a.m. entrances nothing to dread.
From close of day to dawn's rose-red,
We sleep the sleep of the grateful dead:
The kids are gone.

The bathroom is free, our showers are short,
we no longer hasten from sport to sport,
the mountains of laundry are molehills at last,
and supper in shifts is a thing of the past:
The kids are gone.

There's time for our hobbies, we read at our leisure,
we walk and we talk to each other for pleasure.
But once in awhile, a brief, sorrowful sigh,
or a tear quickly wiped from a treasonous eye,
reveals our awareness: Our life's task is done.
The kids are gone.

© 2005 by Meg Lark

Every once in so often, it just hits you. Yesterday was one of those days, for no evident reason.

Nothing too much is new. Scrambling like mad to get ready for my third year of Russian. It would help if Life didn't keep getting in the way, but it does, and probably a good thing, given the sentiments expressed above.

Tick, Tock, Tick, Tock....

After it began to rain yesterday, and my husband could no longer work in his garden, he came in and was rattling around the kitchen. Suddenly he stopped and looked at me with a peculiar expression on his face, and said, "It's been a year since Chris moved out."

Yep. A little over a year, actually. When the move took place, I was at the choir school in Jordanville, so when I walked in the door at last, and brought my suitcase into our bedroom, I was confronted, at the other end of the hall, with the sight of Chris's bare bookshelves. It was like a small knife slicing right into the solar plexus. Now a year has gone by, and we have seen him twice in that year. He has grown enormously in self-confidence, knowing that he can, after all, make it on his own in life; he has a job he loves, and has mastered the art of finding his way around a strange community and making it home. He seems to have found his own place in the world, and that's a beautiful thing to see.

However, just because the kids go out on their own and you're no longer "responsible" for them, doesn't mean you stop wondering if they're OK, if they're warm enough in the winter or close to heat stroke in the summer, if they're getting enough to eat, if their finances are OK, if their friends are "good enough" for them (as if there were such a thing as friends who deserved your Wonderful Kid)... The list goes on and on. I have a dreadful suspicion that I will be fretting into eternity about great-great-great grandchildren -- or maybe I should just leave that to their great-great grandparents???

Body by...????

More years ago than most of you have been alive, there was an ad for (I believe) General Motors cars, featuring a sleek, gorgeous machine, along with a sleek, gorgeous blonde, and the caption, "Body by Fisher." Which body, was left to the imagination of the viewer (and the ad was clearly designed to capture the attention of people with very little imagination).

For the past three or so weeks, I have been working out at a local gym. Relax, never in anyone's wildest dreams will I ever have anything remotely resembling a Body by Fisher, or anything else earthly. I'm of two minds about it: I deplore, absolutely deplore, the Cult of the Body that exists in modern America. I see some of these people working out, and the exercises they are doing.... One involves kneeling on the floor between two weight posts, grabbing a handle from each, and pulling on them while bowing down to the ground. Would any one of these people consent to doing any such thing in a church? Obviously, I don't know; but they are happy to do it at the gym. And the question for me is, do I want to do such a thing at the gym? Well, no, it's not a serious question, because there is only one place I would do any such thing. But it bothers me that such a clear act of worship should be possible anyplace but at church. Or maybe what bothers me is, it's such a parody of worship.

So why am I there in the first place? Because I need to get this old bod moving somehow. I need, desperately, to strengthen leg muscles that have lost all tone since I fell down that flight of stairs three years ago, and on top of that, began experiencing such pains in my right foot that I was barely able to hobble around. (The two are unrelated, though there was a possibility at one point that a bone might have been broken in the fall, and had been overlooked in the face of more obvious injuries.) The pain in the foot, it turns out, was from -- are you ready for this? -- a badly fitting pair of athletic shoes! Good brand, very well known, and in fact the shoes I have now are the same brand -- but it was just the way this one pair of shoes was designed, so that the lace tightened right on a nerve that disabled the whole foot. No, I didn't get this diagnosis from my doctor. What, Dr. Dementa giving serious consideration to the ills of a fat person?! I went to a shoe store that specializes in hard-to-fit feet.

Anyway -- there is a point to this, I think -- it does seem to me that the body I have, "Body by God," should be maintained in sufficient shape to allow me to handle the tasks proper to this point in my life. I should be able to wash windows, for instance, without feeling as if pushing up the window is the equivalent of an upper-body workout. I should be able to change the beds, including flipping the mattresses, without feeling as if that was a full-body workout. At some point, though at this point it's a distant hope, I would love to be able to kneel down so I could scrub the tub. (When I fell, my knee was one of the injuries the ER people were most concerned about. Three years later, it still bothers me.)

At least, I'm hoping there's a difference between caring for the body and worshipping the body.

Failure is one of the courses in the menu of life....

"Failure is one of the courses in the menu of life. And I've never been a gal to pass up any of the courses." --Rosalind Russell, actress

No particular reason for posting this. I have just always liked and admired Rosalind Russell, who usually played roles that featured gutsy, classy "dames," as they were called in the '40s and '50s -- "Mame!" was one of her roles. In addition to being a very well-known actress, it was less well known that she was a faithful Catholic who never missed attending Mass -- how many modern actors and actresses can say the same?! So when I came across this quote, I just had to post it, for who among us has not known failure?

Keeping quiet and laying low these past several weeks. It's been hotter than hot (I nearly had heart failure when I read on my son's blog that he now understands why there was a near 100% mortality rate among firemen on the Trans Siberian Express), and, as I posted last year, I never do well in the heat. My heart can only bleed for those who are pregnant and imminent. The absolute worst month for having a baby, in my opinion, is September -- October is a close second -- but July and August are equally cursed. I had my son in June, and that was bad enough.

April, on the other hand, is a *delightful* month, and so, I would assume is May. (I don't have any experience with May.)

Cross stitching like mad on a gift for my sister, a piece done in "redwork" (all shades of red, actually shades of dusty pink) with five hearts in the center and a very elaborate border, and the words, under the hearts: "Love Grows in Our Home." Anyone who knows my sister, knows how true that is. (Besides, her carpet is the same shade of old rose as the floss that came with the kit.)

My next project, after the Dormition fast -- during fast periods, I try to work on the Golden Tikhvin Theotokos I posted some months ago -- will be a gift for my son. Christmas or birthday, depends on how fast I get it done. (Hint: Your walls are too bare, Chris.)

Sea Change

My, it's been awhile since I posted. Obviously, we got back from Pennsylvania OK, though I never want to make that trip by car again -- 9 1/2 hours of pushing to get there and back, focussed on the road and the other nuts on it, to say nothing of some very high places that had my heart in my mouth. Next time, I take the train.

On one hand, I wish our son lived closer. At times like this, it's very comforting to feel as if someone cares about you, as in, you come home and there's a hot meal on the table and clean clothes in your drawer. But we do see a big difference in him -- he looks as if he is finding his own place in the world, with a job he loves and an area of the country totally unassociated with The Parents. This is what used to happen to young men when there was a military draft. They'd leave home still boys, and come home men, mostly with a sense of purpose and an awareness that they had something valuable to contribute to the world at large. I'm beginning to see that in Chris. And it's very nice to see.

Meanwhile -- just keep praying, I guess, that the really Right One comes along. I know she's out there somewhere. I just hope we all recognize her when she does show up (it took my in-laws nearly 25 years to appreciate the fact that my presence in their son's life was a good thing....) =:0

Old and Distrustful

Does anyone remember the scene in the second or third Star Trek movie -- I forget which -- when Dr. McCoy asks Jim Kirk how he's feeling, Kirk answers, with a sense of wonder: "Young. I feel young."

I feel old. More than that, I find, to my bemusement, that I am old. I am an old lady. I'm not sure how this happened, but this afternoon, I was bringing in a load of laundry from my clothesline, struggling up the back steps, all three of them, and wrestling with the laundry basket to get the back door open, and I realized what I probably looked like to the commuter traffic that was, at the time, streaming past my front door. If they even looked at all, that's what they saw: a fat old lady wrestling with laundry. Sheesh.

And I hate leaving home, these days. Tomorrow we're off to visit our son for his birthday, and I mean, come on, it's not clear the other side of the world. We're driving 400 or 500 miles to Pennsylvania, probably down through Massachusetts and Connecticut, into New York State, and across the Hudson River, maybe touching a bit on New Jersey before hitting Pennsylvania. And all I can think is two things: (1) Massachusetts has the worst drivers in the entire U.S. It's a fact, it's been proven by some insurance institute or other. And (2), HOW HIGH IS THAT D*** BRIDGE OVER THE HUDSON GOING TO BE?!?!?!?!?! I am terrified of heights, always have been. Give me childbirth any day. Yet I know he can't come home -- it's the busy season for the railroad that employs him -- and this is his first birthday away from home. And -- well, I promised I wouldn't say anything more about That Other Thing. (See back a few posts.)

Okay, so where's all that Trust In God I'm always telling my kids they should have? Why can't I just say, "OK, Lord, this trip is in Your hands, I'm just going to sit back and enjoy the scenery"?

Because I have 60 years' worth of Other People's Catastrophes rattling around in my brain. The time that a chunk of I-95 came crashing down, and all those cars hurtled into space. The 1989 San Francisco earthquake. TWA Flight 800, a whole lot of schoolchildren on their way to France for their senior trip having no idea that 11 minutes later, they'd be in pieces, floating in the Atlantic Ocean. A cloudless September day, a secretary sitting at her desk with her morning coffee, booting up her computer and looking up to see what that godawful noise was, only to find a jet-engine propeller boring down on her. 9/11.

Things happen.

Ironically, it's not even that I mind the end of life, since I know it won't be an end, but a beginning (I just hope it's a good beginning...). I just don't want to die in terror. I want my last few minutes on earth to be "painless, blameless, without shame or suffering," and I want my last thoughts to be, "Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me," not, "I can't believe this is happening" -- assuming I'm even capable of thought. What do you think about when you find yourself hurtling into nothingness??

It's so old, not wanting to travel and see new places. Old people like to sit at home. Young people like to Go.

Pray for us on this trip.

What Happens When You Meet...?

As I think I have posted before, I have been steadily transcribing the Matins and Vespers prayers of the Church into my computer, formatting them into a Franklin Compact planner size so that I can take them with me either when I travel, or on my way to class, or just out for a morning walk. It started when I first learned of praying the Hours, when I was 12; something about having a fixed time for praise and supplication has just always fascinated me, and when I came across a Horologion for laymen (now, unfortunately, out of print), I scarfed on it. That was something like 12 years ago. Then I attended the Summer School of Liturgical Music in Jordanville, NY (being at the time a choir director), and learned that there were a whole lot of other prayers that I wasn't praying, and without them, I couldn't learn the music I needed to in order to graduate from the course.

That finished me, and over the past year, I have been transcribing first the Octoechos, then the Triodion, and lately the Pentecostarion. I do have permission from my spiritual father, though he asked, "Did another priest tell you to do this, or is this something you dreamed up on your own?" Once I explained the circumstances to him, he blessed me to keep praying these prayers, and I must say that my understanding of the Church has taken off since reading the various Canons. For example, who knew that the entire week of the Fourth Tone has Canons to the Theotokos asking for her protection specifically from Moslems?? Could have used that around 9/11!

Today I have entered the rubrics for the Matins of the final Saturday of the Souls. There is no form of death that is not covered in these rubrics. It's sobering to read prayers for people who have "been rent asunder by beasts, who have been devoured by fish, or who were buried in earthquakes or pits or under cliffs" -- among many other forms of perishing. And all of them committed into the compassionate hands of the Lover of mankind.

It brings a thought to mind, though. We all have people in our lives whom we just can't stand, who just rub us the wrong way. There are multitudes of people who have seemingly gone out of their way to wrong us. And there are people who have inadvertently wronged us, people who live to stir up trouble, and idiots with whom we share the road. And they all cross our paths at one point or another.

Now, someday, all these people will also die and face God. And what then? I mean, supposing you were already dead, and by God's mercy you found yourself in paradise, and along comes this schmuck who tried to steal your job, or who made your work or school life miserable. And he's standing there before God, being judged, and his life is the usual mess of good stuff and bad stuff that all of us have. You get to see him as he really is, wretched and trembling and possibly terrified at finding himself not in his body anymore. And -- what? Would you really stand there and say, "I hope I don't have to live with this guy in eternity, too"? Because what would be the alternative? Could you really hope *anybody* would spend eternity in hell???

I don't think I could, and I've known some doozies in my lifetime. Thing is, there are people walking around out there who, when they say they've known some doozies in their lifetime -- I'm at the top of their list. Yet I know I hope not to spend eternity in hell, so what makes me better than my own doozies? Which means...either I go to hell, or I'm gonna have to spend eternity with these characters. Including all those wretched teachers who made my son's life so miserable when he was just a kid. You have no idea what forgiveness costs until you have to extend it to somebody who hurt your kid, especially when they should have known better.

Could I really wish them in hell, for eternity??....

Back There Where the Past Was

Visiting my priest yesterday, and since my daughter lives not too far away, I thought I'd pop over and see what she was up to. What she was up to was lying on the sofa, the victim of a tummy bug. She wasn't writhing in agony, and she was able to hold a civilized conversation -- well, as civilized as it can get with an almost-two-year-old showing off all his toys and his Ain't-I-Cute flirty grin, which is very charming, but distracting when all I want to do is swoop her up in my arms and tuck her into bed with tea and toast and lots of mothering. Slight problem: Even when she was a little kid, she always hated that kind of fuss, and now that she's an adult and would probably welcome it -- I'm not quite sure how to go about offering it. And then there's the Grandma Thing: How do I fuss over The Baby without making my own "baby" feel as if her only use in life is producing entertainment for The Grandparents?! I like my kids, not just their offspring!

Once I was back home, a tree service showed up to do some yard work I'd contracted for -- nothing radical, just clearing out some saplings that are growing inconveniently close to the house, and fertilizing a couple of ornamental trees we bought two years ago. (I'm sure I could do this, if I knew what I was doing. With my track record, though, I'd feed them something that would be sure to kill them off.) Got chatting with the cutter, and discovered that (a) he had gone to the same college as my son, and (b) he knew my son, not from the college, but from the place where they both worked. We had a lovely chat about forestry in general and my trees in particular, and my son incidentally; then, when he had gone, I e-mailed my son to tell him this guy had said Hi.

And lurking in the background -- hope I'm not boring anyone with this same old tale -- is an awful awarenesss of two people with whom I once shared daily life, two very special people who just aren't Daily anymore. It's a weird feeling, to visit these adults in their own homes, in the environment they have created for themselves, and some of it is very familiar and some of it is so different, I wonder whose looking glass I stepped through. (Case in point: When we visited our son in November, I walked into his house and found it full of Mission-style furniture. I would never, in a million years, have chosen Mission for him while he was living at home; but the second I saw it, I said, "Yes, this IS Chris." It suits him exactly. Our daughter, on the other hand, has so much furniture from home that walking into her house isn't all that different a feel at all.) It's so strange to see these two competent, capable adults carrying on with the business of life -- and still remember when they really needed a parent to direct that business for them. I'm very proud of them. I wish I could see a whole lot more of both of them.

However, one of the great benefits of having adult children is being able to relate to them on an entirely new and much more equal level. Yesterday my daughter was telling me about a singer named Tom Waite (or it might be Waites, can't remember -- he's generally so far off my radar scope, he's in another dimension), who was described as "Cookie Monster with a fifth of Wild Turkey." And then she put on a Tom Waite CD. I howled -- the imagery was so bang-on accurate! I'll never look at Cookie Monster the same way again! Thanks, Christa.

One Last Time, till next year:

Tone 8: It is the day of Resurrection;/ let us be radiant for the festival,/ and let us embrace one another with joy./ Let us say, O brethren, even to those that hate us:/ Let us forgive all things on the Resurrection:/ and thus, let us cry:

Christos anesti ek nekron,/ thanato thanaton patisas,/ ke tis en tis mnimasi, zoin harisamenos!

Christ is risen from the dead,/ trampling down death by death,/ and on those in the tombs bestowing life!

Christos voskrese iz smertvikh,/ smertiu smert poprav,/ i sushnim vo grobekh zhivot darovav!

Wow...

I purposely kept this off the other blog, which I know these two read, just so I wouldn't exacerbate the situation. It's been a long, long time since I had to deal with this kind of...well, I guess I'd better not say it. No point making things worse.

I will say this, though. Those of you who are mothers know this: There is no worse pain than watching your kids hurt. You would do anything on earth to stop that pain, and when you can't, you need to talk about it. This is a girl whom we welcomed into our home, were prepared to accept into our family, loved not just because our son did but because she is genuinely loveable -- and to read the kind of response I just have, takes my breath away.

I notice no one is saying anything about dissing me....

I could *strangle* this girl....

The inevitable has happened: My son and his girlfriend have broken up. I found out by reading his blog (he knows I subscribe), and the whole thing was about what a jerk he is.

So I called him. I'm worried about him; he's out there in PA all by himself, now that Tootsie has broken off their relationship, and I was hoping to find out what had happened.

Are you ready for this?

When they were sharing a home (not "living together," since there was never anything sexual about their relationship), she complained that he "wasn't doing enough around the house." These were the days when he was working 70 hours a week as a bus driver, so fatigued that one day he actually ran a red light; then, when he got his railroad job, he was commuting 90 minutes to work and 90 minutes back home. Not to mention all the snow-shovelling he did this past winter, which I know about because she wrote about it on *her* blog.

Now that he has his own place, she's upset because he Doesn't Communicate with her. So she writes him an e-mail to break off their relationship. This is communication?!?!

This is the same girl who got upset with me because I posted to the list that she had never had any men in her life, as far as living with one went.

This is the same girl who, get this, didn't want us to come and visit our son for his birthday because she was still so upset with me over the "awful things" I had posted to the OrthWomen's list.

This is the same girl who goes to bed at six in the morning, and gets up at two in the afternoon. No job, she Just Doesn't Sleep Well at Night.

And my son is walking around feeling like a jerk?!?!

It's taking all my self-control not to e-mail her and LET HER HAVE IT!!!!!

Cancel New Address

I just realized -- I have no means of notifying anyone who reads this that I changed my address. So CANCEL THAT NOTICE about the new address: It remains www.nepsis.blogspot.com.

I hope this is comprehensible. Clear as mud, probably.

Nicholas & Alexandra & Jim & Meg

Description of May 17th:

Wedding: $300 or so, including the gown, the rings, and the food for the reception (it was 1969, my dad was on strike, so we held the reception at the house).

Honeymoon: $200 or so (we stayed at the weekend home of my husband's cousin).

Three years in Germany: free (he was in the service).

First home: $250/mo. rent, plus, let's see, I think $750 for the furniture (bedroom suite, sofa, and kitchen table and chairs. Everything else we cadged from the homes we had grown up in).

Kids: Don't even go there. One moved out at 24, the other at 25, so figure 29 years' worth of exponentially increasing expenses. My only regret: not having more kids.

36 years together: priceless.

And now, as the Buddhists say: After ecstasy, the laundry. Not that I mind doing laundry. Just coming down off the high of the past three days of having that Special Someone all to myself. Why read Anna Karenina, the story of adultery and its fruits, when I can read about one of the greatest love affairs of all time?

Currently Reading: Nicholas and Alexandra

New Blog Address

To my intrepid readers who have been accessing my site as www.nepsis.blogspot.com: I have just changed my address to www.muttonings.blogspot.com. Makes it easier for me to find my blog. ;-)

Reflections on Motherhood

1. I always knew my kids would grow up and move out. I just wish they had moved out closer.

2. Looking around this house, I can see that it was time for them to move out when they did. Actually, it was time for them to move out before they did. You really do outgrow a house.

3. I wonder if everything important in life assumes an air of unreality when it's over. I'm having a hard time believing I ever actually lived in Germany. I'm having a hard time believing we ever shared this house with two other people.

4. I guess that, although it was time for them to move out, I would have liked to know them better as adults before they did.

5. Rooms that seemed so big when you were small, become so small once you're big.

6. Overall, I can't think of anything I'd change in my motherhood techniques, such as they were. They weren't perfect, but they did produce two spectacular people.

7. I do wish we had played more board games as a family.

8. Once they're gone, they're gone. Even when you do see them, they have become such different people that you wonder if this is the same person you shared a life with.

9. If I had known these things when I was younger, I wonder if I would have been nicer to my mother.

10. On the other hand, I wonder if my mother would have been nicer to me, if she had realized these things when she was younger.

Happy Mother's Day.

Christos voskres!

Well, it rained last night, so I missed the Resurrection service, too. I must admit that was a mixed curse, since, as a morning person, the midnight services has always been especially rough on me. But the sheer beauty and joy of it has always carried me through. Not this year, though.

On the other hand, I woke up a lot during the night. And every time I woke up, I'd think, "Christ is risen!" smile, and go back to sleep. Now it's 5:00 a.m. (5-ish, anyway), and I'm up for the day.

Spent yesterday baking two kulichi, that Russian Easter bread that is full of all the cholesterol we've been denying ourselves for seven weeks, all the butter and eggs (for cream and cheese, there's the pascha, which also has butter in it). The one kulich is for the Agape Vespers my parish in Saco is having; everyone was invited to bring something special from their paschal tradition, and since the parish is now about 70% Greek and 30% convert, there's at least a chance we'll get something other than roast lamb and baklava. Like, well, pascha and kulich.

The second kulich is something I was asked to do at the beginning of the semester. Every Monday afternoon, my Russian class holds something called "chaipitye," or tea-drinking, which is supposed to be a chance for us to sample Russian food and talk about Russian topics (in English, thankfully!). I was asked if I could provide something paschal for this meal. I e-mailed my one Russian prof yesterday as it was baking, and this morning, her comment: "My mouth is watering just reading this. I cannot wait to taste everything." The irony is, this particular professor is Jewish -- non-practicing, at that -- and my other professor is an out-and-out communist. I should see if I can find an icon of the Resurrection online, and print out and bring that along with a couple of my other icons. After all, this is an Orthodox feast. (I am so bad.)

CHRIST IS RISEN! TRULY HE IS RISEN!! Best news I've had all year.

Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, O Lord...

From yesterday's high, crashing back into reality. I will not be able to attend any more services until the Agape Vespers on Sunday -- and even after that, I won't be able to stay as long as I'd like.

I drove back, that whole 40 miles, this morning, just so I could be at the Royal Hours. That was good till about 11:00 a.m., and then I had to come back home, in theory, so I could bake kulich (but I didn't. I did some laundry, then spent a lot of time on a prayerbook I'm making for myself). And I've spent the afternoon kicking myself for not having hung around for the Vespers of the Unnailing, which took place at 3:00. The Greeks do something very beautiful -- my former ROCOR parish didn't do this, so I don't know if Russians have this custom -- the Greeks have a structure that represents the Tomb of Christ, and right after the Royal Hours, they decorate this Tomb with flowers and set it on the solea in front of the Royal Doors. At the Vespers of the Unnailing, they take the icon of the Body of Christ down off the cross, process around the church with it, and place it in the Tomb. Then, at night, everybody goes up to venerate the shrouded Body, and during the Lamentations the Tomb is taken off its stand and paraded out into the street, while the entire church follows it holding candles and singing, "Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us." The Tomb is processed around the church, then held high above the door so that everybody can pass under it. At the end of the service, everyone gets a flower off the Tomb.

I could have stayed and helped decorate the Tomb. I could have had Orthodox fellowship with people I really enjoy. Instead, I was Conscientious and came home, and have been wallowing in isolation ever since. This Lone Orthodox business is FOR THE BIRDS. I want my Pascha! I want fellowship! I want to be with other people who know how beautiful an Orthodox life is!

Surfacing (glub)

A comment from a new subscriber (Hi, Mimi!) reminded me -- oh, yeah. There's a world of blogs out there, from which I have been noticeably absent lo these past two weeks. Hello, time to rejoin the human race.

Well... No, that hasn't been my problem, exactly. My problem has been more, the Dative Case in Russian, followed by the Instrumental Case, and the attendant humongous vocabulary lists. Tell me, who in their right mind starts to study Russian when they are pushing 60?!?!?!

And Holy Week hasn't helped. In fact, neither has Great Lent. It's just been the most mixed-up, squirrelly Lent I think I've ever experienced. Nothing earth-shattering, apart, of course, from having my son's Significant Other explode in my face because of the comments I posted about my son's situation on the OrthWomen's list. (Still haven't heard from her, BTW.) But you know how, when you wake up late, you spend all day trying to catch up? That's how all of Lent has been. Now it's Holy Week, the Bridegroom is at the door, and never mind running out of oil, I can't even find the dratted lamp.

Fortunately for all of us, but especially a scatterbrain like me, God is God; and being God, He is so phenomenally merciful and doggone good. I went to Liturgy this morning in a parish that's 40 miles away, which I attend every other week (the parish that's closer has Liturgy every other Sunday, so it works out). This particular parish is in Saco, ME, right on the southern shore of the state, and it's about an hour's drive from where I live in Rochester, NH. I like the priest because he is very conservative and very aware of the need for a spiritual life, as opposed to some of the Greeks I've met who truly believe the Church is about preserving Greek culture.

For reasons I have yet to fathom, this parish has Holy Thursday Liturgy at 6:00 a.m. Not too big a problem for me, since I'm a morning person anyway, except that I do have to be up at around 4:30 a.m. so I can leave the house by 5:00, to get there by 6:00. That didn't happen today, but even so, I only missed about the first 15 minutes. So I get there, they're just reading the Epistle, and then that long, long Gospel (just think of Christ on the cross, if you want to think in terms of long -- must have seemed like all of eternity to Him), and then comes the Cherubic Hymn.

Now, there are three people standing at the Chanter's Stand, but it's pretty obvious none of them have a clue what to do next. So yours truly, former choir director and person-who-sang-before-she-could-talk (according to my aunt), started singing. Great Entrance occurs, and the next Big Hymn comes, as we all know, right after the Epiclesis: "In thee rejoiceth." By this time, I've figured out that apart from the two priests celebrating, I am the only person in this building at this time who knows the music, so I sing a bit more strongly. Finish that hymn, and about five minutes later, I feel a tap on my shoulder. It's one of the people from the Chanter's Stand: "Could you please come over and give us a hand?"

OH SURE. YES! ABSOLUTELY!! Ask me if I want to breathe! The only reason I wasn't there faster is that I haven't learned to fly. After Liturgy I received several comments on how nice my voice was, and why wasn't I singing in the choir, to which I answered, quite honestly, "They sing too low for me." And they do. Last time I tried to sing that low, I got nodes on my vocal cords and had to stop singing for two years before they healed. But you know -- it was so nice to sing again as a cantor, something I haven't done since Fr. Dean left in 2001 (I acquired the nodes under his successor).

Thank you, God, for letting me use this particular gift today. I appreciated Your heads-up that maybe this Lent wasn't the bust I feel like it's been.

Wacko Drivers

Church in Maine today, one of the two parishes we visit regularly (the other parish is very small, and only has services every other week). During the sermon, the priest mentioned that it has been a very tough Lent for him, and that got my attention, since every Orthodox Christian I know has said this has been an unusually tough Lent. I wonder why?

Afterwards, we drove to our daughter's house for lunch. Our daughter became a Catholic a year or two after her marriage, so for them Easter is long over, and she had -- meat. Just meat. Around 3:30, just as we were thinking of getting underway, she trotted out the strawberries she'd been saving for dessert. That's the kind of Lent it's been. We did have a nice visit, if you ignore the counter-cultural Orthodox bits -- and the fact that the Orthodox "bits" are your whole life, somehow gets lost in translation. I'm still trying to figure out how to get that across.

Anyway, after a truly lovely afternoon we drove home our usual way. As we took a turn-off onto a side road, a van shot past us and one of the passengers yelled something at us. A mile or so later, we were on another highway -- also part of our usual route -- and the same van pulled up hard on our bumper, then passed, forcing us into the breakdown lane to avoid getting our bumper clipped, and gave us the finger once it was in front of us -- sped off down the road, having narrowly missed oncoming traffic. I hate warm weather, it brings out all the nuts. (I should add that my husband was driving the speed limit, which was 55 mph.)

Three or four miles down the road, we pulled up to a traffic light, right behind the green van. The light turned, the van didn't move, and my husband tapped the horn. The driver started up -- came to a dead stop so that we were smack in the middle of the intersection -- then took off with a roar, and a few hundred yards down the road, made a left into a gas station. I didn't like the look of that. Sure enough, shortly thereafter, who do we see in our rear-view mirror again. This time, we were close to a State Police barracks, so my husband pulled into the parking lot, giving Tootsie a chance to get a decent distance down the road. And that was the end of that -- we thought.

We get all the way into Sanford, which is about 15 miles from where all this started, and whom do we see in the left-turn lane? Fortunately (we thought) we were going straight, so we did, and Tootsie made her left. Suddenly my husband pulls hard into a side street and heads down, glancing into his rear-view mirror -- this chick had made a U-turn after making her left, and was pursuing us down the main road out of Sanford. Can you say "stalking"?

The side street seems to have done the trick; we got back onto an intersecting main road, and got home by another way. I just hope this idiot isn't roaming the streets of our town, looking in each and every driveway for our car.

What is it with female drivers, anyway?! I used to get so offended when I was young, and men would make remarks about Female (or Women) Drivers; but so help me, they were right. All the worst drivers around here are women, and I don't understand why.

So Much for Silence

For the time being, since I seem to have a whopping two subscribers, both of whom know my situation, I think I can discuss it fairly freely here.

Thanks to both of you for your insight and comments. If it were a question of sinfulness, yes, being made aware of it would be a very good thing, painful though it might be. What's more painful is the frustration, as one of you so accurately pinpointed, of having to apologize for an offense inadvertently given -- that's nothing, we all do that -- but not having it accepted, and also, the notion that the remarks I made were a deliberate attempt at character assassination. Once people put their own spin on your actions, nothing you say or do makes any difference; and as you both know, this is an important relationship in my life.

I'm glad, too, to have the input on silence not being a good thing, since the description of "bad" silence -- a prison -- is exactly what this is becoming: a place to be stuck in, where my letters are not answered and my phone calls not returned, and I just don't know where else to go from here.

The answer, I guess, is patience, the hope that over time, being distanced from me will get to be more of a disadvantage than an advantage. I do have one ace in the hole: my son's favorite recipes. (The way to a man's heart...) I used to share them, but have by no means given them all out, so when he gets sick of having the same five recipes over and over, maybe then I'll hear from his Significant Other. But at this point, as things stand, I don't see what else I can do for these people, and racking my brains for a solution is wearing, to say the least.

Thanks, ladies -- your input was a big help.

The Silence of the Mutton

Recent events, which I would prefer not to discuss publicly, have had me thinking about the possibility of observing an overall silence -- including shutting down my blogs. In looking back over my life, one consistent thread has emerged: It seems I can't open my mouth without somebody taking offense. I can say the most innocuous thing, such as expressing an admiration for German culture, and in somebody's mind, this automatically turns me into a Nazi. (Yes, this actually happened.) Sort of like me telling my mother-in-law that I hoped my kids would get to spend junior year abroad (they didn't), and her telling my husband that I was planning to throw them out of the house when they turned twenty.

So it's a serious temptation just to say nothing. Not nothing offensive, since that seems to be impossible: Nothing. Just my prayers. It's radical, it would almost certainly lead to isolation, which is never good, but then, neither is offending people, so who cares?

And then I opened my e-mail Inbox, and I read this:

The Spiritual Senses: St. Mark 7:31-37, especially vs. 34: “Then, looking up to heaven, [Jesus] sighed, and said to him, ‘Ephphatha,’ that is, ‘Be opened.’” Read here of a man who could neither hear nor use his ordinary physical organs of speech. However, the man heard the command, “Ephphatha!,” and “...he spoke plainly” (vs. 35). After that, there was no silencing the man nor his friends.

Who has not encountered terrible seasons when the spiritual senses are closed off to God? The Prophet David knew such inner silence and darkness: “And now, what is my patient endurance? Is it not the Lord? Yea, my hope is from Thee. From all mine iniquities deliver me; Thou hast made me a reproach to the foolish. I was dumb and opened not my mouth, for Thou hast made me. Take away from me Thy scourges...” (Ps. 39:10-13 LXX). (From the Bible study Yahoogroup Dynamis)

I'm not sure what exactly to think about this. But it was plainly the will of our Lord that this man be able to speak; in other words, not speaking was not a good thing, and He made it possible for this man to speak.

So, I guess this is also His will for me, considering that this particular reflection came into my life on the precise day I was seriously considering giving up speech; also considering that I still have the use of my vocal cords. After all, if He didn't want me to speak, I could have developed laryngeal cancer or something. As for giving offense, though -- I'm not sure there's much I can do about that, other than shutting up permanently. I can't control what people choose to read into what I have to say. I do my best to keep it non-offensive as it is, so total silence really does seem to be the only alternative; and since that's evidently not the Will of God, well.... Chill. Stop putting words into my mouth, and thoughts into my head, that aren't there. You know who you are.

To Be the Tree

If you ever get a chance, try to locate a recording of Krysztow Penderecki's "St. Luke Passion." Penderecki is/was a very modern composer (I'm not sure if he's still alive), so this particular Passion is a chaos of some of the most god-awful sounds human voices can make. But I recommend it because of the very, very last chord of the piece, when three four-part choirs come together for the final "GLORIA!" -- a masterpiece of harmony, when you suddenly realize that the piece had to be chaotic, because the Crucifixion was a triumph of chaos -- but God's perfect harmony is still more triumphant. What genius.

Yesterday, as I'm sure we all know, was the Feast of the Holy Cross. In typing up the material for this Sunday, I was struck by this Ode from Canticle Nine of the Canon: Let all the trees of the forest dance and sing, as they behold their fellow tree, the Cross, today receiving veneration: for Christ, as holy David prophesied, hath exalted it on high. Some years ago, I belonged to an Orthodox list, now sadly defunct, on which we encouraged one another to write poetry about specific events. This was my offering for September 14, the Elevation of the Cross:

To Be the Tree

"Cursed is he who hangs," they say,/ as though there were nothing worse./ But I tell you, to be the tree,/ on which hangs the One Who created me/ -- now that's a curse.

No matter to me He rose from the dead./ I hide myself for shame./ Those others with me, on whom others died,/ in terror and trembling also hide,/ for fear of the flame.

Three hundred years I lay in the earth/ before I felt it turning./ Now, in the light of day I stand,/ exposed to all by a woman's hand,/ and await my burning.

But wait! What does St. Helena say?/ "Behold the life-giving Tree/ by which salvation came to man!"/ Even I, it seems, was part of God's plan./ Salvation comes -- even for me.

Let all the trees of the forest dance and sing, as they behold their fellow tree, the Cross, today receiving veneration....

Addendum

I just realized that in these times of excessive Political Correctness, the final paragraph of my last entry may offend somebody; so I should clarify that the word "Polak" is simply the Polish word for a man of Polish descent. I grew up hearing about "good Polaks," and never realized it was anything but a compliment until I was married and said that to somebody, who automatically assumed I was being facetious as well as anti-Polish. Some people assume too danged much.

From one "Polak" to Another...

This afternoon, my husband and I drove to a local restaurant to celebrate my stepfather's 90th birthday, which was yesterday. We had a wonderful time, and around 2:30 we started drifting out of the restaurant on our way home. As Jim and I left the restaurant, one of my brothers, on his way out of the parking lot, rolled down his window and said, "Turn on the radio when you get into the car -- the Pope just died."

This particular Pope is very special to me because he was Polish, and my stepfather (who's really the only father I've ever known -- mine died when I was two, and my mother remarried when I was three) is also Polish; his mother was a Polish farmgirl from the Lodz area, and his father came from a rather more cultured family in, I believe, Krakow, the Pope's hometown. My grandmother used to refer to him as her "boyfriend," and kept a large portrait of him -- maybe 24" x 48" -- in a place of honor on her wall. She was so thrilled when he was elected. Although I left the Catholic Church right around the time he was elected, I always felt that he was a "good" Pope, in the sense that it was obvious he truly cared for his Church and for his vocation as its temporal leader. It was never about power for him. I felt bad for him because it must have become obvious to him, as the years went on, that he would never be able to undo the damage caused by Paul VI; but he had to keep trying. Now he can rest from his labors.

My husband and I were just speculating about the next Pope, where he might be from and what direction he might take, and I realized: Religiously, it's not going to affect me. For the first time in my life, the election of a Pope will have no direct affect on me. Will the new Pope choose to admit women to the priesthood, or reinstate liberation theology (Marxism in a cassock)? Or will he affirm the policies of John Paul II and continue to try to stem the liturgical abuses that have eviscerated Catholicism? I don't know, and I almost don't care, except that whichever direction he takes will affect everyone in the world -- that's the nature of being the leader of a large body of human beings. Whichever direction he chooses, he's bound to annoy somebody; somebody, somewhere, will declare that "this is the final nail in the coffin of the Catholic Church." What a very great shame, how sad, that people who are depending on this man to be their shepherd will continue to be buffeted about spiritually, just when and where they are at their most vulnerable. For their sakes, I do care.

Meanwhile, on a much more personal level, I'm dealing with the dichotomy between life and death: The 90th birthday party of one old Polak, and the death of another Polak five years his junior (John Paul II would have turned 85 this year). The old Polish song, "Sto lat," "May you live to be 100 years," keeps drifting through my head. It was sung so often for the Pope. It's sung at every Polish celebration, and I heard it many times, growing up. Sto lat, Francziszek Swienty (not my maiden name, but close); may your memory be eternal, Karol Wojtyla -- our Polish Pope.

Back on Track

Yesterday I had my first "real" confession in two years.

I love confession. For those of us brought up Catholic, the word conveys a sense of either beating up oneself, or getting beaten up by the priest; for those of us who were raised Protestant, the word smacks of "papism," something Those Catholics do, and therefore to be shunned. But Orthodox confession is a true gift, a time of taking inventory and assessing where one is or is not on track, and if off-track, how to get back on.

To the despair of certain members of my family (you know who you are), my earthly life is governed by a set of 5 x 8 pages, also known as a Franklin Planner. I don't use this tool as well as I could or should, mostly because I spend so much time on other pursuits, such as my current and concurrent projects of learning Russian and entering the Triodion into my computer in a format that will allow me to take it with me wherever I go, like on early-morning walks around the Common in the middle of our town. Why just say prayers when you can pray with the birds?

Anyway, one of the components of the Franklin Planner is the development of a "personal mission statement," something that allows you to define your purpose on earth. Mine has been clear for some time: "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in heaven" (Matthew 5:16). Recent events in my life have shown, and confession has confirmed, that not only have I gone off track on this mission statement, I have been altogether derailed. (A little RR terminology for my railroader son...) But hey -- derailments happen all the time, right? So you roll up your sleeves, get out whatever equipment they use on the railroad to set trains aright, and get that puppy back on track and under steam.

Under steam I am not, yet. But definitely back on track, with a clearer vision of how to implement this mission statement, now that the "grime" around my particular light has been cleansed in confession. "This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine..." And keep after it, so that when, not if, it starts to dim, I'll catch it before it gets too grimy to be seen. "Let your light so shine before men...."

I love confession.

Memory Eternal

At 3:35 this afternoon, my Aunt Mary fell asleep in the Lord.

It wasn't entirely unexpected; she was 83 years old, she had macular degeneration and a wonky heart, and her life over the past year had been rather wretched: one of her sons had mortgaged her house, then defaulted on it, so that she was forced out of a house she had lived in for almost 60 years. She didn't want to move out to Vancouver, where this son's job is; she didn't want to move in with her other son, whom she never liked; so the alternative was to move her up to NH, where she had two nieces and a nephew to keep an eye on her. That move seemed to do something to her soul. She became very bitter, very suspicious of people, and ironically, the only person she really trusted was the son who had occasioned the foreclosure!

So her passing is somewhat of a blessing. What bothers me about it, though, is that for the past year, her entire conversation consisted of reminiscences about her "womanizing" father (not that we ever heard from anyone else in the family!), her "stupid" husband, her "sneaky" second son, and her "brother-in-law, who treated her sister so bad" -- since that particular brother-in-law happens to be my stepfather, who worshipped the ground my mother walked on, that was especially tough to put up with. And I used to think about how she would carry that bitterness of soul with her into the next life, and wonder what I could do to get her out of that mode of thinking, so that she could face God with something positive. I never did figure it out.

This afternoon, after she passed, her sons, my sister, my brother, and I sat around making jokes about her life, and about her "setting heaven on its ear" once she got together with her brothers and sister, and that bothers me, too: I know what Orthodoxy says about our passage from this life to the next, I know that it isn't the current "floating-to-a-better-place" Feel-Good b.s. that our culture promotes. And yet, for that short space of time, I bought into it. On the other hand, what the heck was I supposed to say?!

Well, it can certainly be said that she lived life to its fullest: not just in negative ways, like her drinking and smoking and doing pretty much whatever she felt like, regardless of how her husband felt about it, but also, in the way she opened her home during the post-WWII housing shortage to any of her relatives who needed a place to stay. She took in three cousins (that I know of, there may have been others), her brother and his wife, who lived with her for a number of years, and at one point, one of my brothers who was separated from his wife. (Not all at once, of course!) They lived with her and her husband and sons, paid her rent as they could, ate from her table, and enjoyed her hospitality as long as they needed it. When she and her sister (my mother) bought a summer home in NH, that too became a vast open house for whoever wanted to vacation near the White Mountains. There's no way I could do something like that.

We all have our gifts, and hers was a strong sense of family. I hope it will cancel out any of the negatives in her life, and there were many. May your memory be eternal, Aunt Mary!

Forgiveness: Not an Option

As mentioned in my previous post, I have managed to almost completely alienate two people whom I care about very much, and have apologized to both. One has accepted my apology, the other...much more resistant.

I can understand that. Some things are harder to forgive than others. For me, there are four things I have struggled with over and over again: (1) my mother's abuse of me and my brothers when we were growing up; (2) my mother-in-law's repeated attempts to sabotage my marriage; (3) the neighbor we had, when our kids were little, who lodged a complaint of child abuse against us; and (4) the various teachers my son had throughout his school career, who made no attempt to get to know him and made his life miserable, who knows why.

It's hard to know which is the hardest to live with. Attacks on your kids are always more painful to live with than attacks on yourself, but ultimately, attacks on your kids are attacks on yourself, since your children are you. The neighbor who reported us for child abuse -- ultimately, her allegations were proven false, but colored the whole of our kids' upbringing, since we lived in constant fear of its happening again, and I knew of cases where kids had been forcibly removed from the homes of loving, caring parents whose chief "crime" was bringing up their kids in a Christian home. The little snipes and digs my mother-in-law excelled at were difficult enough to bear, but the outright lies she told my husband about things I'd said to her were almost beyond belief (such as telling him I was planning to send our son out of the house when he was 20, after I'd expressed to her the hope that he would be able to spend junior year abroad). As for my son's teachers, all I can say is, if you want cookie-cutter kids, go bake cookies. Chris was so far outside the mold that the only way to interact with him was to take him on his own terms. Those teachers who could, said he made their whole career worthwhile. Those who couldn't, made his life a misery, and by extension, our lives.

As for my own mother...after 35 years of thinking about it and talking about it, intellectually I can grasp that her own background ill prepared her for motherhood, and that she did her (limited) best with what she was given. The fact remains that my entire childhood was filled with terror, between the sadistic nuns at school and my sadistic mother at home. And this experience colors my entire relationship with God, as I struggle to believe that I have worth in His eyes.

How do you forgive these kinds of things?!

The author G. K. Chesterton wrote of having been slapped in the face so hard, by one of his schoolmasters, that he was deafened in that ear. When he was 80, he wrote that he felt he had finally completely forgiven that schoolmaster. All those years, 70 or so, and at least 30 or 40 of them as a Christian struggling to live life in Christ -- and it took him that long. His secret was that every time he thought of the injury done to him, he made a conscious decision to forgive -- for the sake of Christ. That it didn't happen overnight, was his gift to all of us who struggle to forgive wrongs that assault our innocence.

Then there's my personal model, the Theotokos. I read once that it wasn't her Yes to the Angel Gabriel that mattered, it was her Yes at the foot of the Cross. If you read some of the Stavrotheotokia of the Church, there can be no doubt in your mind as to what went on in her heart. And she had to forgive those who put her Son on the Cross. She has to forgive -- us. Our sins, those things that occasioned the necessity for the Cross. Worse, we actually ask her to intercede for us. What a nerve, to ask such a thing! And, to my eternal amazement, she does. She actually forgives us the pain we have caused, not to her -- though that's bad enough -- but to her Son, the worst pain any mother can be called on to endure.

Well then -- forgiveness is not an option. It's a requirement. It's a struggle, and that's OK; but it remains a requirement. So I'll just keep on struggling with it, as I hope others will with me.

I never feel really prepared for Lent -- it's always all I can handle just to fast. I don't think a young mother should even think about fasting -- being a mother is enough! (One reason it's such a good idea for our priests to be married -- it's harder for them to get on their high horses about The Church Says when they can see how their own wives have to struggle with the chores of womanhood -- like bearing, feeding, and caring for children.) Reminds me of a comment I read somewhere else, from a young mother who worried that she wasn't able to focus on the Liturgy because her children took all her attention -- she was told by her Bishop, "Your children are your Liturgy. Bring them to church, help them to learn how to behave in church -- that is your prayer." Wow.

Meanwhile, with a skill and elan that only I possess, I have managed to anger two people I really care about, right at the beginning of Great Lent. I don't know how I do this, but I've done it pretty nearly all my life -- caring about people, in trying to express that, I manage to tick them off no end. As of yesterday, I was just about ready to give up trying, just crawl into a corner and not contact anybody or do anything that wasn't strictly necessary for the upkeep of the house. And then, in Touching Heaven, I read this:

An encounter with [a staretz, an elder] may reveal a clear and brilliantly lit path, the very one you have been patiently seeking. Or, it may not. The gift one gets may simply be permission to go on struggling. We seek guidance, and sometimes receive; we seek relief, and sometimes receive only the encouragement to keep fighting the good fight....Occasionally it feels as though the world has an overwhelming power to crush us; that is, if our human nature doesn't finish us off first. But there is absolutely no sound promise offered from the circles of holiness that life is free from struggle. To struggle is to engage, and to engage the spiritual life is one of the few worthy pursuits of man.

Or, as we used to say in my youth, no rest for the wicked. Not struggling is not an option, in this calling. Dang.

Weather or Not, Here Comes Lent!

It's snowing. Again.

Normally, I like snow. I certainly prefer it to the broiling heat of summer, when the sun glares down on you through a haze of humidity and all you can do is sit around the house in survival mode. When it's 25 or so degrees out, and the snow is falling in big, fat flakes that cover all the bare branches of the trees with a coat of white, there's no wind, and it looks as if all the world is drowsing -- that's beautiful. I don't even mind shovelling in such circumstances, because as dusk falls the street lights pick up the sparkle in the snow and it looks like "poor man's diamonds." It's almost a moment for prayer.

That hasn't been our weather since the beginning of March. Today's blizzard is the third in two weeks -- March 1, March 9, and now today -- and though at the moment there's no wind, it's supposed to pick up considerably and stay that way for the rest of the week. I still haven't recovered from Wednesday's storm, when we had sustained winds of 40 mph and gusts near 80. I stayed in all day; my poor husband was the one who went outside and coped with the waist-high drifts and the brutal winds. To top it all off, Jim, despite 25 years of living in New England, still thinks like a New Yorker, that we are supposed to have crocus in our garden by March. (Hasn't happened yet. We usually see crocus sometime in April, forsythia around the first of May, and lily-of-the-valley -- known elsewhere as "Maybells" -- in June. IOW, we're a month behind almost everywhere else, except maybe Canada.)

I'm trying to find some spiritual benefit in all this, but all I can think is that last week, I missed church due to my cough, and this week, I'll miss church due to the weather. The final two Sundays before Lent, and I'm missing church. This does not bode well for my spiritual state, during a time that always brings its own struggles, when you definitely don't need anything extra to have to cope with. Like taxes. Or weather. Or the commuter bus breaking down three times in a week, as it did to Jim this week. (When he mentioned that to the bus company yesterday evening, they told him they'd give him a free bus pass for next week. Small compensation for getting home at 7:30 p.m....)

Podvig takes many forms, I guess...

Musical Muttonings

Have had a comment to my last post on my Xanga site, asking, "What is a Triodion, and what is an Octoechos?" Worthwhile answering in a separate post.

The Octoechos is the weekly prayer cycle of the Orthodox Church. It was set up in the eighth century A.D. by St. John of Damascus, and consists of an eight-week cycle of musical "moods" -- not to be confused with the do-re-mi scale of Western culture -- used for praying liturgical prayers. The closest you can come to this structure in Western culture is a knowledge of the "ecclesiastical Modes," the Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, and Mixolydian scales, and their "plagal" tones -- I must admit to being a little fuzzy on what constitutes "plagal," but it seems to be a fifth above the "base note," or tonic, of the original Mode. So for example, Dorian mode begins on the key of D, and on a piano you would play an octave starting on D and going straight up, without any sharps or flats. In Byzantine Church music, that's Tone 1. We'll be in Tone 1 in two weeks -- this week is Tone 7, known in the Greek Church as "varis," or Grave. (I don't know why -- it doesn't strike me as all that somber! But it is considered somber enough that in the week following Pascha, when all the Tones are sung one per day, Tone 7/varis is the only one omitted -- too "grave" for Paschaltide.)

The Triodion is based on the Octoechos. Again, the basic 8-week melodic structure is used, but it adds prayers that are particular to Great Lent, the 40 days preceding Pascha.

So what does all this have to do with me? As a church musician and former choir director, I like to sing my prayers, and I also went to great pains and expense to learn all of this, so I don't want to forget the melodies. I also like my prayers to be portable -- when I'm on the go, I still want to be able to say them. So, last year, I took the basic Octoechos prayers I purchased at a monastery and entered them into my computer, in a format consistent with a Franklin Covey Compact Day Planner (www.franklincovey.com), and every week I take out the previous week's Octoechos and insert the new Tone. Now I'm doing the same for the Triodion/Lenten cycle -- entering it into my computer and printing it out, week by week. Fortunately, the Triodion is already available online, so all I have to do is format it and print it out (which takes considerable effort anyway, since what's online is in modern English, and I prefer liturgical English). I'll do the same, God willing, with the Pentecostarion, which is the cycle of prayers from Pascha/Easter through the week after Pentecost.

Hey, we all have a compulsion of one sort or another. Mine's more harmless than gambling.

Here we sit, in the middle of yet another blizzard, this one with not so much snow, but with winds howling all around -- sustained at 20 mph, gusts up to 50. It will be good for starting to work on the Triodion -- yes, now that the Octoechos is finished, I decided to go ahead and enter the Triodion, greatly assisted by the fact that it's available online (I was going to try to post the url, but I can't get into it without losing this post. If anyone's interested, let me know, and I'll look it up before I post next). All I have to do is cut, paste, and format, and I have everything in front of me for my prayer rule -- Vespers and Matins. (Note: This is Music Geek or Liturgy Geek stuff. Stick with the prayer rule your priest gave you!)

Stayed home and worked on it yesterday, in fact -- for the past week I've had a cold, and it just wasn't going away. When I woke up dizzy yesterday, I figured I'd better not even try to drive to class, and instead visited the doctor, who prescribed an antibiotic. I feel better already. But boy, it's been some winter; I don't believe I've seen a winter like this in all my life, and I can recall some pretty nasty blizzards in the 1960s. One or two per season, though, not one after another like this year.

Being Broken

Thy creating command was my beginning and foundation; for desiring to fashion me into a living being out of that which is invisible and that which is visible, Thou didst form my body out of earth, and didst give me a soul by Thy divine and life-creating breath.

-- from the Aposticha for Friday evening Vespers, in Tone 6

Had an e-mail from my son this morning that has sparked all kinds of contemplation, this final week before the start of Great Lent. Somehow, he has found out that he has Asperger's Syndrome, and wants to know why we never told him about in the 25 years he lived in our home. Good question.

Asperger's is classified as "high-end autism," and its chief characteristic seems to be that people with it can function beautifully in the world of books, of ideas, of creativity -- but not with other people. They can't pick up on "body language," and it causes them all kinds of grief. As I wrote to Chris, we never told him for the simple reason that it wasn't even recognized as a condition in this country until 1994, when he was halfway through high school; and even then, we ourselves didn't find out about until our son-in-law, who's a teacher, had a kid who was coded for Asperger's, and while researching the condition on the net, he came across the description. And our daughter recognized her brother right away. By that time, Chris was 21! And yeah, it sounds like him; but there was nothing we could do about it, at that point. There's also the matter that by adulthood, the condition is considered much less severe, mostly because a kid with Asperger's has been acting like an adult all his life, and as his peers catch up to his intellectual level, he just doesn't stand out as "odd" anymore.

I read my son's e-mail before starting my prayer rule -- one problem with the cold I have is that it interferes drastically with my sleep cycle, so I was up and wide awake at 3:00 a.m. -- and as I began my prayer rule, all I could think of was that God made this beautiful, beautiful soul -- and nobody appreciates how wonderful he is. (OK, not "nobody" -- his father and I do, of course, and thank heaven he has a girlfriend who knows how special he is!) But all his life, he's had to carry this cross that had no name, being made to feel as if something was "wrong" with him, that he was "flawed," or somehow "broken." And in this society, when something's broken -- we throw it away.

But how can you throw away a person? I don't know. But we do that too, in this society. If you don't fit the standard model, if you're in any way "weird" or "different" or "nerdy" -- you're a reject. That's what he's lived with. That's what we've lived with.

But not in Orthodoxy.

In Orthodoxy we have Fools for Christ, those people who give up even the appearance of sanity, like St. Xenia of St. Petersburg. At monasteries, there are monks and nuns who are a little "strange" in the head -- not that they represent any harm to anyone, but they just don't function like Everyone Else, maybe they obsess on music or they can't bear to be touched, or they have some other off-the-wall "defect." At the monastery where I go every summer, there's a man who has lived with the monks since he was 10, when he developed meningitis, which left him at the mental level of a 10-year-old. He's now in his 80s, and still living there, still an important part of the community. In Orthodoxy, it isn't just that there's room for a wider variety of people; it's the recognition that God made them as they are, and therefore what they are is good and right in His sight. That's the fundamental problem in this society, we've forgotten God -- so we've forgotten that He makes all kinds of people. Including people with Asperger's. Including people with more severe forms of autism. And He not only loves them, He cherishes them.

Recently I was reading in Guideposts about a woman with a "weird" son, a kid who isn't into sports or competition, but who loves animals, and who works at an animal shelter. One day he brought home a dog that no one could keep -- she was just "untrainable." Got into the laundry, chased people just for the fun of chasing them, rooted out anything they tried to hide, drove the family nuts. Somehow the kid introduced his dog to a cop, who said, "This dog would make a great police dog." They ended up taking her and training her to be a member of their K-9 unit, and, as the mother said, "Everything I thought was wrong with her, was what they were looking for in a great police dog." And I thought, there's a place for everybody in God's plan. Everything that's wrong in one situation, is exactly what's needed in another. There are no "rejects" in the sight of God.

My son, whom I love more than life itself, whose great beauty of soul has always been my inspiration... Help him bear his cross, O Lord, and lead him to that place where he is exactly what's needed. He has so much to offer, my beautiful child.

There's something to be said for getting sick at, or near, the beginning of Lent.

Since Saturday I have had a cold, although on Saturday I didn't know it, and on Sunday I was just beginning to wonder about it. By Monday it was definite, and yesterday was the worst; and today, I'm still not fit for human society. Now, if you're going to get sick at all, the best way to get sick is with a cold, or even the flu. It's not serious enough to cause you to die by inches, in unimaginable suffering, but it's enough to cancel all your usual plans, lay you flat, and get you to do some thinking, even if the depth of your thought is nothing more metaphysical than, "God, why me?!"

The thing is, being sick reminds you of the one awareness Americans spend most of their lives running from: We are weak. It's almost unAmerican to be weak. Nobody likes weaklings in this country, and to be fair, America wouldn't be America if we hadn't had a sense of our innate strength. (I'm thinking of my great-grandmother on my father's side, one of those tough old Kansas pioneer women who was a child in the days of Wyatt Earp and Jesse James, and who died at the age of 105.) It took stamina to settle the West!

But the fact remains: We are weak. My grandmother on my father's side went deaf at age 10 from measles. My stepfather's sister died from measles, also at age 10. (Come to think of it, I was 10 when I had measles...) My grandmother on my mother's side died from complications in childbirth, leaving behind six children aged 11 to 6 weeks. Nobody wants these things to happen, but they do. Nobody wants to get sick, but we do. Why? Because there's only so much stamina we possess, and when we tap it out -- we get sick. And then what do we do? Stay in bed, drink hot fluids, growl at everybody, and grouse to ourselves that our lives have to be put on hold. And -- at least, I do this -- periodically I look up at my icons with bleary eyes and say, "This sucks."

In other words, I turn to God.

It's good to be reminded at the beginning of Lent that our own resources are limited at best, and probably more realistically an illusion. It's good to turn to God, even if only to say, "This sucks." And God, in His mercy -- allows us to have this experience without pulling the rug out from under our feet ("You have two months to live"). Just enough to remind us that we can make all the Five-Year Plans we want -- He's still in charge.

Point taken, Lord. Now, what else would You like me to learn from this upcoming Lent?