Terrapin Station

Ave Maria - Bono and Pavarotti

U2 Lyrics - Ave Maria

(Pavarotti & Friends 2003)

(Bono singing)

Ave Maria

Where is the justice in this world?

The wicked make so much noise, mother

The righteous stay oddly still

With no wisdom,

all of the riches in the world

leave us poor tonight

And strength is not without humility

It's weakness, an untreatable disease

And war is always the choice

Of the chosen who will not have to fight

Ave Maria

(Pavarotti sings in Latin)

Ave Maria

Gratia plena Maria,

gratia plena Maria,

gratia plena Ave,

ave dominus tecum

(Bono singing)

And strength is not without humility

It's weakness, an untreatable disease

And war is always the choice

Of the chosen who will not have to fight

(both singing)

Ave Maria

Birds in the Thinking Place today

Here is the Blue Heron:

and the cattle egret (there were at least two dozen of these, huddled together):

plus others I can't name

working on it...

Birds in the Thinking Place

Went to the thinking place by the pond this morning.  It was starting to rain, but the birds were flying around busily over the trees.  Catching bugs, I would guess. 

When I was little, my mother told me that if the birds were calling during a rainstorm, it meant the rain was not going to let up any time soon...that the birds knew it and knew they had to get out and get their food, and that it wouldn't do for them to wait. 

I listened and what I heard was that I need to do some work first, and take some rest afterward.  Okay, got it:  Not all the work...not all the rest.  Went home, cleaned out one shelf of the laundry room. 

As Brandon would say:  Boo Ya. 

Please pray for Elastigirl

Elastigirl is on a Tres Dias weekend!  Would you please keep her in your prayers?

Here is my Flylady Water Bottle, which says, "Love Your Body, Love Yourself."  As a reminder to myself, I have added the sticker. 

It's a nice little three-part mantra for the day.

Love Your Body

Love Yourself

Pray for Elastigirl

Y'all be sure to drink plenty of water, OK?

Prayers, please

My mom emailed a few weeks ago to say, she did NOT have a heart attack. 

Well, now that she's had all the horrible followup tests, it looks like she did have a severe heart attack with significant damage to the heart muscle. 

Will you please keep us in your prayers?  And if you think about it, pop on over to her blog and say howdy...

And, if you have chest pain, arm pain, etc. (see this site for women's heart attack symptoms), PLEASE call 911 (or its equivalent in your country) RIGHT AWAY!

Prayer for today

My soul waits for the Lord
More than those who watch for the morning
More than those who watch for the morning

Lord, you have always given
Bread for the coming day
And though I am poor,
  Today I believe

Lord, you have always given
Strength for the coming day
And though I am weak,
Today I believe

Lord, you have always given
Peace for the coming day
And though I am of anxious heart,
  Today I believe

Lord, you have always given
Me safe in trials
And now tried as I am ,
  Today I believe

Lord, you have always marked
The road for the coming day
And though it may be hidden,
  Today I believe

Lord, you have always lightened
This darkness of mine
And though the night is here,
  Today I believe

Lord, you have always spoken
When the time is ripe
And though You be silent now,
  Today I believe

(Celtic Daily Office)

thanks to Lorna for this one today.  How I needed it.

The Boudreaux and the Janet

Last night at about 2 am Ken heard Boudreaux whimpering in the office.  He wouldn't come when called, so Ken went to get him...

he has something wrong with his left leg or hip and won't put any weight on it at all.  He has been verystill on the bed since then.  This is not normal.  The earliest we can get him in to the vet is 11 am.

Trying not to panic, have to get ready to go out of town this afternoon to give a workshop in Austin this weekend.  Ken is supposed to be going with me for a little R&R around the workshop. 

And:  Janet's transplant is happening at 10:00 a.m. CST.  Go, stem cells, Go! 

Please pray.  Thanks.

EDITED TO ADD: 

Boudreaux's knee joint had slipped out of the socket but was back in by the time they went to the vet.  He is favoring it, but doing much better.  He has an anti inflammatory med to take daily. 

By the time Ken called to tell me, I had worked myself into an absolute lather about it.  Thanks for your thoughts for him. 

Janet...The stem cells are in there!  Let's have lots of meiosis!

Prayer Vigils

My Daughters of the King chapter is holding two 24-hr. prayer vigils for our sister, Janet Brown. Janet has acute myeloid leukemia and will have a stem cell transplant on November 1 - All Saints' Day. Prior to that, she will start an EXTREMELY intensive chemo regimen on October 25 (tomorrow). Our two vigils are on those days, from midnight 'round the clock. 

Please join us in praying for Janet's healing before, during, and after this crucial procedure. I have shared the resources below with my chapter and thought my bloggy friends might enjoy them also. 

I commend to you Gratefulness.org, one of the several websites I know of that allows you to light a virtual candle, indicate for whom it is lit, and keep it on your computer desktop throughout the day.

If you light a candle for Janet there, you may enter "group initials" of JFB (Janet Francesca Brown) which will put all of our Janet candles together.

I also recommend EchoPrayer, which, when you program it, will send you prayer reminders as frequently as you wish (I get them every 2 hours).

This year our DOK group is studying prayer, and our first program was by Fr. David on "Why Pray?"  He pointed out that God loves us and wants that intimate prayer relationship with us...and that we need it with God....and if we don't take time apart for it, the relationship isn't going to happen.  I think it's a bit like a married couple who end up as roommates and no more, because they never talk to one another. 

OK, and so a prayer vigil seems to me a different sort of thing:  in addition to our regular relationship time with God, we are taking very specific time to hold Janet up to the Light, praying for God's best for her and that she will know how loved and treasured she is.  It's not magic...it's bigger than magic. 

In my mind's eye I see a great glow descending upon the Stem Cell Transplant Unit at Medical City Dallas.  Here's Medical City.  I hope it's ready.

Thanks be to God!

This morning

I prayed for you this morning.  Yes, you.  In church and everything.

My brother-in-law's Scout troop stayed last night in the Youth Room of our church (on their way to an early flight to Washington, DC).  I met them there last night to let them in and went back this morning to see them off. 

Once they'd left (4 am sharp) I went back into the building to make sure lights and AC were in their proper positions and that all was as it should be.  Then I went into the dark church and knelt before the side altar, where there is always a candle burning because the reserved Sacrament is kept there.  I prayed for a long time, and names kept coming...people I interact with daily, people I haven't talked to in years, family, friends, bloggers around the world, and people I do not know. 

And the prayer continues.  Bless you today.

Today in Church...

Today in church...

• Heard an awfully fine sermon from My Favorite Seminarian, one which has convicted me that I need to seriously consider and pray about going on our annual mission trip to Navajoland next summer.  Oh, my, there are so many reasons why I haven't gone along on this trip.  In the meantime, as she preached I remembered an uncomfortable conversation I had with God as a teenager, "I want to be a Christian, and all, but I don't want to be a MISSIONARY."  (Trust me, I know that one week in Bluff, Utah does not a missionary make!)
• We had a visiting priest - a woman!  I think she was there because our rector had planned to be out of town.  I had the delight of seeing a woman deacon and a woman Gospeller, two separate people serving AT THE SAME TIME.  Such visions are few and far between around here. 
• My friend S. was there!  She is scheduled to deliver her third child by Caesarean tomorrow.  This is a sweet baby girl who we initially feared would come very early...like, at 32 weeks.  But she has gone to full term and that is a great blessing!  She had baby Emma with her (9 months) and looked great. 
• My friend C. and her family were there, too...my first time to meet her newly adopted daughter from China.  A darling baby! 
• The announcements took for-freaking-ever
• Fr. David carried on the conversational tone from the announcements to the Eucharistic table by going off on a long riff about when or whether we should kneel or stand during Eucharistic Prayer C, and why.  Mercy!
• As I left the loft for communion, our wonderful organist signalled to me to pass her the hymnal she needed for the Eucharistic hymn.  Since she was improvising with one hand, I offered to open the book for her.  "What page?" I hissed.  "861," she said.  I took about forever to get it open and place on the rack in front of her.  (She was improvising all this time.)  She looked puzzledly at the music, which was an arrangment of "In Paradisum," the part of the funeral service that is chanted at the committal.  Then she started flipping back to get to the CORRECT piece, numbered 816.  Much more appropriate for a communion hymn. 
• I had to stop on the stairs and laugh hysterically at the idea of folks wondering why they were hearing "In Paradisum" at the Eucharist. 
• Sally (organist) didn't need my help, clearly.  She could improvise for hours while finding her own page number plus cooking a full Italian meal and diapering a baby.
• After church we went into the chapel and tied knots in a flannel prayer blanket for my friend Janet.  You have probably seen this done...each knot contains a prayer.  Here's a photo of some folks knotting one...ours will have to be washed and sterilized before it can be given to her, because the chemo is going to wreck her immune system.  But the prayers will certainly not wash out. 
• 
• On the way to church I cross the Lake Lewisville bridge.  That lake - is 9 feet above its "full" level.  That lake - was very, very close to that bridge. 
• It's starting to rain again.