Terrapin Station

Mystical Breath

From the Daily Henri Nouwen:

When we gather around the table and break the bread together, we are transformed not only individually but also as community. We, people from different ages and races, with different backgrounds and histories, become one body. As Paul says: "As there is one loaf, so we, although there are many of us, are one single body, for we all share in the one loaf" (1 Corinthians 10:17).

Not only as individuals but also as community we become the living Christ, taken, blessed, broken, and given to the world. As one body, we become a living witness of God's immense desire to bring all peoples and nations together as the one family of God.

This reminds me of last night's Eucharist.  We typically have Daughters of the King meetings on third Thursdays, beginning with the healing Eucharist and meeting thereafter.  We do not meet in the summer months...however, last month we had a swimming party at Shirley's great place, and this month we went ahead with a meeting because...we just missed each other!  I looked around at those who had gathered with a great sense of gratitude for the community that we are...although we are very different, we have a crucial common bond. 

As the Eucharist begins, the priest says the Collect for Purity.  As we pray this, I always close my eyes and exhale deeply, imagining my heart opening to God.  Then I breathe in deeply, imagining that I am inhaling the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  It's a great way to bring the breath consciously to worship.

Almighty God, to you all hearts are open, all desires known,
and from you no secrets are hid: Cleanse the thoughts of our
hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may
perfectly love you, and worthily magnify your holy Name;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.

 

The Peanut Butter Saint

My friend has a famous dad. 

He certainly didn't set out to be famous: just to do what needed to be done.  But Father Claude DuTeil started something BIG in Honolulu when he started making peanut butter sandwiches for the homeless in 1978.  There's a great story about him and his ministry in MidWeek, the Honolulu weekly magazine, celebrating their 30th anniversary.

I only know Fr. DuTeil through Mary Ann's stories, but I do have the pleasure of knowing her mother, Bert, who is called Tutu (the Hawai'ian word for "grandmother") by everyone in our parish.  Bert and Claude DuTeil made a difference in Honolulu, one that grew into IHS Hawai'i and has provided over 2 million bed-nights and over 5 million meals to the people of Oahu. 

There's something bigger that they did, though: they brought about changes in the laws that made it illegal to help the homeless. 

When the laws didn't make sense, he worked around them until he could get them changed. 

At one point, the courts went so far as to make providing blankets to the poor a one-way ticket to jail for those receiving the aid.  A judge ruled that anyone sleeping in the park under a blanket was camping illegally without a permit, but anyone sleeping under an overcoat was just sleeping in the park.

"You have never seen as many overcoats as we gave out after that ruling!" laughs Bert, remembering Claude distributing those coats to any who wanted them."

I love the story of these lives.  It reminds me of "I Sing a Song of the Saints of God," and makes me wonder what I am supposed to be doing.  Although most of us won't have our pictures in the paper for our good works, I think they'll end up in God's scrapbook, and God will be every bit as proud of us as Claude DuTeil's family is of him.  And God will be as glad for us as the homeless people are that Fr. DuTeil passed their way. 

Every Conscious Breath

"Every conscious breath you take, even one, is a victory.  Every time you become aware of your breath, and settle back into your rooting and grounding, you become that much closer to yourself and to the divine."

My teacher said this to me yesterday. 

Breathing...

(Melanie Weidner, Listen for Joy)

Mission Trip!

I am excited that I may finally make it on one of our church's mission trips!  A caravan of folks is driving (that's right) to Cedar Rapids, Iowa on July 31.  We'll work the 1st and 2nd of August, mucking out houses that were ruined by the floods.  We'll finish up on Saturday night with "the best pizza ever," according to our fine guide (who grew up there and is arranging all of this). 

Ken is going too!  I'm delighted! 

Prepare the Way

In my town, the roads seem to be "all construction, all the time."  There's a weekly feature in the paper asking a set of questions of local figures, and most everyone answers "What would you change about Denton" with "Finish the road construction at XYZ!" 

There's a place leading to our newest shopping area that's been under construction for the last 3 years.  Really!  It's just maddening.  It certainly keeps me from shopping at those places...at least as much as I would otherwise.  My Weight Watchers meeting is there, or I'd almost never go to that side of town. 

And, this summer, the street I live on has been removed and is being rebuilt.  They did it in 2 sections...the east end first...so I had an opportunity to see what was coming.  WHAT - A MESS! 

Now they are working on my part of the street.  I'm not sure why it was necessary to do this...the street was not in bad shape as far as I can see; while the street one block south is a wreck.  Anyway, on West Oak, the asphalt layer has been scraped away (about 10 inches worth), several curbs, sidewalk panels, and driveway entrances were wrecked out and re-concreted, and the street is currently a dusty blowing mess.  Ugh! 

I have been VERY put out about this!  You never know when you can get into the street, or the driveway; or from which direction.  You never know when you might have to back down the surface that is like driving on the moon, to enter another way. 

But I've decided I'm tired of hearing myself complain about it, and that I'm going to look at it as a metaphor for preparation.  It's Ordinary Time, but things feel more Lent-y to me. 

This summer at work is strange...I have a new "big boss" of a year now.  I have a new direct boss coming in August, and another new upper-level manager arriving in the next week.  We have been working on getting new management in here for the last four years, and working under an interim director for part of that time.  It's often been messy, inconvenient; we've had to learn new ways of doing things only to have them tossed out when the new person arrived.  The direct boss will be wonderful, I am confident, but there will be getting-to-know and learning-to-interpret and all that stuff.  And we are moving buildings in the winter...where we'll have less space than we do now. 

We are doing strategic planning - for the division, and for my own unit as well.  There are high expectations without a lot of clarity as to how they will be supported. 

Anticipating the year to come has been making me feel - well - just plain worn out.  I could use some resurrection! 

So...Lent is classically intended to include prayer, penitence, alms-giving, and self denial.  I'm not sure how alms-giving fits in here...but I'm going to concentrate on daily prayer for my workplace and my new leaders.  I'm going to do what I can to prepare the way, including cleaning off this desk and sorting the files, and getting rid of what I don't need...better now than right before Christmas.  I'm going to finish the strategic plan and turn it in for review. 

And I'm going to have faith that, eventually, the dust of all these changes will settle...as will the dust on my street...and there will be a way forward. 

Clambering out of the Funk?

I've been quite depressed for the last few months.  I think that the incipient infection (which is now history thanks to meds) was part of it...there are other issues I can identify.  Most weekends involved much, much sleeping. 

But I am grateful to be able to say that:

• today I got out of the bag when Ken did and made him breakfast before he went to work
• dusted and organized my books in library room, made up 2 big bags to take to Recycled Books to sell - it was quite a mess and much better now
• I have kept track of and within daily Weight Watchers points for 5.5 days now...the longest I've been able to stick with it in TWO YEARS
• I'm headed to Recycled, library and grocery now
• Yeah! 

. 

The Komen is Coming!

Here we are in the heat of summer, but one day Fall's cooler temps will bring around October, and the annual Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. 

My church will once again have a team, and I would love to have your support if you feel so moved!  Please go here to visit my race page.  I and 25,000 other walkers will be swarming the area around Northpark Mall on October 18, 2008. 

My reason for doing this is, in general, because we have to get rid of this terrible disease.  Sure.  But also because my friends Janet and Gina, whom you've read about in these pages over the past years, both fought breast cancer before developing the other cancers that took their lives.  There are also some amazing ladies in my life who have survived the disease, some for many years. 

I want to make a difference.  Please help if you can.  And hey...if you'll be in the area that day, plan to join my team!  an option on the page linked above. 

Here are Beryl (in pink survivor shirt) and me from the 2006 race. 

Book Reports

I've just finished Have You Found Her, a smart, funny, thoughtful memoir about a woman who volunteers in a homeless shelter and gets particularly close to one of the girls.  The relationship takes her to places and ideas she could never have imagined when she began. 

The author, Janice Erlbaum, has a cool blog called Girlbomb and on it there's a video trailer for the book:

Have You Found Her from Milk Products on Vimeo.

I've also just finished a novel: Keep Your Mouth Shut and Wear Beige, which was an entertaining book with more smartly and realistically drawn characters than I usually find in my summer reading. 

Both recommended.

Cool Raffle!

Earthchick is raffling off some AWESOME fibers.  Go take a look and buy some chances...they are for a great cause and you might be a winnah! 

You will also get to see a great photo of herself and one of her gorgeous boys.  Icing on the cake!  And if you keep looking, you can ogle all the wonderful items she has made.  She amazes me.

Friday Five: Summer Camp!

Mother Laura says at RevGals:  We're settling into our new new apartment, and after a lifetime at Montessori Katie is having a fantastic summer at YMCA day camp. Meanwhile, Nicholas is packing up for a week at Camp Julian, shared by the Episcopal dioceses of Los Angeles and San Diego. His lists of supplies and rules--except for the ropes course available to the teenagers and the ban on IPODs and cell phones--bring back memories of my own happy times weeks at Y camp Ta Ta Pochon, funded by selling countless cases of butter toffee peanuts. So, in celebration of summer, please share your own memories and preferences about camp.

1. Did you go to sleep away camp, or day camp, as a child? Wish you could? Or sometimes wish you hadn't?  I went to day camp once...didn't like it.  Went to Girl Scout camp once, 2 weeks - the longest I'd been away from home!  when I was in 2nd grade.  As an elementary and jr. higher, I went to Camp Allen, the Episcopal Diocese of Texas Camp and Conference center.  I camped there from the first year it was open...several years...and remember my mom writing a check for my registration dated 7/7/77.  That seemed very portentous, somehow.  We also had many happy Parish Weekends there, both from my childhood church (Ascension, Houston) and my first home church (St. Francis, College Station).

My favorite camps so far have been knitting camp, which my mom, niece and I have attended for the last 2 years (2006 here, 2007 here and here) at Camp Tyler.  Unfortunately, we aren't going this year, due to them going to Florida at that time.  : (  Boo, hoo!  I'm very sad. 

2. How about camping out? Dream vacation, nightmare, or somewhere in between?  I've done tent camping but not wilderness camping.  Now I prefer RV camping, where we can go into the AC and avoid the mosquitoes when it's time to sleep...but hike and swim and cook breakfast outside over a fire.  "The best of all possible worlds."

3. Have you ever worked as a camp counselor, or been to a camp for your denomination for either work or pleasure?  No...never did that. 

4. Most dramatic memory of camp, or camping out?   The time that my college roommate and I and her sister went camping at Spring Break, at Double Lake near Coldspring.  We got all set up, and it started to get cloudy.  We ate dinner, and it started to rain (it was cold out, this was March).  We got in the tent and played cards, and it rained and rained and rained...we discussed sticking it out vs. going home, and finally flung EVERYTHING in the trunk of the car and ran.  Yuck.  What a mess to clean up later! 

5. What is your favorite camp song or songs? Bonus points if you link to a recording or video. 

This isn't strictly a camp song...but I remember it so well.  It was at the closing Eucharist of one of my teenage camp sessions at Camp Allen, and we were singing the gospel version of "Amen."  Our sadness at leaving the community we had made, exhaustion from not sleeping the last night, and joy at the time we'd shared together coalesced in a manic session of singing and dancing in a conga-line around the area where the church service was.  Parents arriving to pick up their kids were...very surprised.