hold my hand

Lately, I've been thinking about hands. On Father's Day, as I held hands with my husband and one of our sons, I realized how different those hands felt. And I also remembered how Dad's hand felt when he held mine.

Ever since, hands have become a part of many of my days. Most of all, I have become more acutely aware of the hand on my shoulder. When I feel it, I picture Dad, or my Uncle, but I know that is only because I loved their hands.

Dad's hands were slightly calloused, warm, and always very clean. He would hold my hand often, even when I'd grown, and always there was a stronger squeeze before he let go. I learned from him the importance of that particular physical connection to another person. I'm a hugger, but I also deeply appreciate the simple helpfulness of a hand to hold.

My uncle drew a pair of folded hands. He talked about the effort he put in, the frustration he felt trying to make them look right. Soon after, in an art class, the teacher said that hands are only perfectly formed by God. Recreating them is especially difficult for any artist and takes extra effort. I remember picturing his drawing, and hearing his very similar sentiments. 

I'm comforted and comfortable with the hand on my shoulder,  the hands in my mind's eye. They are so real, so tangible. Clearly not something I've tried to create myself.

For years, as Christmas presents, we would paint the boys' hands and craft something for Mom and Dad and the boys' godparents: an angel, a Christmas tree, Rudolph. The hand prints were intended to help chronicle their growth to loved ones who didn't get to see them often enough. Hands to hold from far away.

I'm looking forward to where these hands will lead me. I'm open to the possibilities they offer. And I'm enjoying the memories they are stirring.  

dream state

Last night, I dreamt of finding a room in my house. Although it was a house I knew well, it was a house I've never seen in my waking life. And it was also distinctly "mine," as opposed to "our" house.

This was one of those dreams that is simultaneously real and an active exercise of imagination. I knew I was in a dream, and actively participated.

We had discovered some ants on a shelf. It seems every year (much like my real life house), we'd been dealing with the ants, and we had been waiting for the to show up. This time, our goal was to find where they were going, since stopping them from coming in had never done much good. So we followed their progress and discovered tjat the back of the shelf was actually a stone. Removing it, we discovered a fireplace, and beyond that, a beautiful--if dusty and empty--room with wood floors.

Funny that the rest of the room mattered little. All I could take in was the wide open space, the wide plank wood floors, and the dust. And I was as perplexed as I was contended at finally finding another secret room.

When I was a kid, and even into my 20's, I had a recurrent dream about a secret room in Grammy and Grampy's house. At the top of the stairs was a ledge that we would sometimes sit on when we were feeling brave and sure we would not get caught. I was terrified to stand or walk on it, figuring the wall behind me could never offer me enough support or balance.

In my dream, I would walk confidently to the end of the ledge and open the door that was only there in my dreams. On the other side was a beautifully appointed bedroom, fit for a queen. Too nice for me to touch much of anything, but a great place to sit by the window and read.

When we first moved to Pennsylvania, I dreamt of the house I thought we should buy and live in. To this day I can remember how excited I was when I first discovered the secret room in that house! It was almost another house, with a garden patio and French doors.

While in my dream last night, I wondered what I should be learning. I took in what came to me as important: wood floors, space, light, a fireplace, dust. And then I noticed that I was looking down into this room, and realized that had been true of the last secret room, although the room of my childhood was on my own level.

I awoke, as I always have after such dreams, happy and curious. Poised and at peace, but ready to get busy. Thoroughly confused, yet quite comforted. I hope it comes again.

quo vadis

I'm lost. Rather, I am stalled. I am sitting on the shoulder, map open, windows down, radio off, wondering why.

And yet there is nothing distressing or upsetting about it. I'm okay with waiting here for the traffic to clear, for the skies to brighten, for the moment to be right.

Although the map is open on my lap, I find  myself looking back at where I've been more than looking ahead. And I suspect that is part of the reason for the standstill. It's a simple rule of safety: watch where you're going. Clearly, my looking backward is indicative of a need to find something I've left behind--or to realize where I should have left something.

I'm sure there's something to this, and I'm sure I'll be on my way again before too long. I've no need to seek a detour this time. I know the wheels will turn again, or my legs will take up the journey. Either way, I'll get there.

In the meantime, I'll enjoy the view, the weather, the fleeting thoughts, the breeze in my hair. Fortunately, I'm not on my own; never on my own.

thanks a bunch

Thanks, Dad, for being an example to me. Twice today I was reminded that being true to myself pays off on the end. And that often we have no idea what the impact of honesty will be.

Recently, in idle conversation at work (waiting for a process to run), I referred to you, and shortly thereafter, this near stranger asked a question directly related to you. My surprise was in the fact that he picked up on the connection I still feel with you. And that I had never considered the possibility of folowing in your work footsteps.

The truth is, what I most wanted to follow in were your values. I don't always measure up, but my yardstick is also skewed because you're gone. And because I miss you.

You live on in the boys for me. Both because they have bits of you in their looks, some expressions, and in their memories, and because I sometimes hear your heart in what they paraphrase back to me. You always had a way of making people feel real and important. And I'm pretty sure that's because everyone was.

The example you set for love of neighbor was one that I truly did not appreciate until now. We in your family were all your favorites--you said so all the time. I still feel it--your favorite daughter in Pennsylvania, your favorite Stephania. But it was more than just talk. You had a gift for seeing individuals; for finding (and quickly!) that unique thing that made each person stand out.

What I'm realizing is that you did that simply out of being you, not as some effort you'd learned was important or useful. You were you. And no one else.

Your you is very different from me, as it should be. But the way you made me feel lives on, and I do my best to pass it on by being me. The me I do best.

Among my blessings each night, I count you. I love you, and I miss you.

together and apart

All day long, I knew what I wanted to say. Now that I can sit with my laptop, I don't know how to begin. Ordinarily, this moment would have me humming from the Sound of Music, and starting at the very beginning. Trouble is, part of the words that have now escaped me spin the beginning to now, and the now back to before.

Reading Thomas Merton has been an interesting experience, to say the least. Most of the experience has had me looking forward, and there has been plenty of soul searching; all of which I expected. Some of that soul searching has been direct, with essays about finding self, being self, giving self, and losing self. But yesterday, I read something that made me stop and remember. A chapter on sacrifice had me lost until the first steps toward deeper explanation were taken. (Where Ignatius Loyola uses repetition, Merton seems to use spirals, I think.) Somewhere in the explanation, he talks of Baptism, our names, our selves (yet again!), and the way that Baptism draws us in--to faith, to community, to Christ himself.

"But every sacrament of union is also a sacrament of separation." (p. 82). This is where the memory blew into my mind in full color.

When we got married, there was quite a hullabaloo regarding our unity candle. Of all the things that could have caused arguments and/or issues, who would ever have thought such a ritual could be so BIG, for lack of a better word. First, we chose a set of candle holders that were not attached to each other in any way. They matched, but I wanted to be able to use the candle holders regularly and often. To be honest, I didn't understand why we needed a set in the first place. Mom and Dad's unity candle was just one candle. They didn't use tapers to light it; simply used wicks to transfer the flame from the Easter candle to the unity candle. Simple as that. I figured if we were going to use tapers, we might as well be able to burn them, and we both loved eating by candlelight. The idea that I might ever separate the pieces of the set was the first issue.

The bigger problem, though, came with the actual lighting. We said we wanted to keep the tapers lit, having three candle flames, rather than one flame and two dead candles. For one thing, I thought that would look silly, but the more important reason was that we didn't want to extinguish our selves because we were married. This was the point that hit me yesterday, and I hope I can express it. All those years ago, we may or may not have had a memory of yesterday. We were ahead of ourselves: we stuck to our guns and kept three candles lit. In the years since, we have been strongest as a couple when we are both truly ourselves, and when we each have supported the other in that effort of being individuals. Any time one or the other of us (and occasionally both of us) has tried to conform to some ideal we thought the other wanted, the entity that is us has suffered. Worse, there have been times when we've tried to conform to something outside of us; something worldly.

Continuing from the line above: "In making us members of one another, baptism also more clearly distinguishes us, not only from those who do not live in Christ, but also and even especially from one another. For it gives us our personal, incommunicable vocation to reproduce in our own lives the life and sufferings and charity of Christ in a way unknown to anyone else who has ever lived under the sun." I think it's true of marriage, too. My life, his life, our life together--none are like anyone else's, no matter how much aspects of everyone's lives and relationships are similar. No one will ever experience exactly the life--with its ups and downs, joys and sorrows, sufferings and gratitude--that has been set before me. The truest wife, mother, daughter, friend I have ever been has been when I am the me I am meant to be. The more separate I am, the more connected I feel, and in this instance, the separateness I'm referring to is not insular!

There's a good chance I'll spend a few more days on this paragraph, thanks to some good advice I was offered. Although I've moved ahead in the chapter, I have begun and ended my 'reading moments' with that paragraph. It seems to encapsulate the bits of self I've been working on realizing.

from one hermit to another

Frequently, my Minute Meditation is just that: minute, and by that I mean that I know I am not associating enough significance to it. I read, I nod, I blink twice, and I move on. More and more often lately, I've been going back to read it again after lunch. The second time through seems to sink in just a bit more. Today I had a different experience. By lunchtime today, I had completely forgotten what the meditation had been. I remembered reading it, but (perhaps because I was a little off-kilter from weird sleep last night) I could not recall anything about it when I returned from lunch.

During my lunch, I was reading a bit of my Thomas Merton book* about signs (or lack thereof), intention, and will. I've been having quite a yo-yo experience in this section on Pure Intention, and have been wondering about direction and discernment. The first part of what I read at noontime was about seeing the signs, recognizing them as signs, and the fact that the sign is not the end; merely an indicator of a direction. A suggestion, in some cases, rather than a conclusion. I had mixed feelings about this, but it was clear to me that this was an essay I could ponder deeply. Merton was speaking directly to me, and clarifying, somewhat, the complicated topic of God's will versus man's will--my will, in particular. What really got me, after being drawn in by analogies I could relate to, were the gems that followed. "He does not need our sacrifices, He asks for our selves." "...what God wants of me is myself." "And that is why the will of God so often manifests itself in demands that I sacrifice myself. Why? Because in order to find my true self in Christ, I must go beyond the limits of my own narrow egoism." and most moving for me:

"God's will for us is not only that we should be the persons He means us to be, but that we should share in His work of creation and help Him to make us into the persons He means us to be. Always, and in all things, God's will for me is that I should shape my own destiny, work out my own salvation, forge my own eternal happiness, in the way He has planned it for me. And since no man is an island, since we all depend on one another, I cannot work out God's will in my own life unless I also consciously help other men to work out His will in theirs." (p. 63-64)

While reading (crying) and contemplating these words, my phone dinged a message. I waited while everything sank in and settled in my mind and heart, then took a look at the message. It was from Daily Catholic Quotes, and read, "God gave Himself to you; give yourself to God" (Blessed Robert Southwell). I couldn't help but connect the quote (and the timing of the pushed email) to Merton's words. Then something made me stop and wonder how many threads were weaving through my day. I went back to my meditation from this morning and re-read this: "...there is only one way to go to the father: the fulfillment of His holy will!"

Merton has cautioned me against putting too much interpretation of signs, but has also taught me to recognize them when they appear. I've stopped asking to be hit over the head with signs and signals, because I have come to realize that doesn't fit me--the me I was made to be. But this seemed pretty clear to me. See, yesterday I spent the afternoon with some fellow parishioners on a pilgrimage to the oldest stone church in North America. I knew or recognized most everyone there, either from Mass or from other social events, though many I had never spoken with. Together we marvelled at the splendor of this beautiful place dedicated to the Sacred Heart, in the middle of farmland. We admired artwork and builders' skill; laughed at some corny jokes; and learned quite a bit about a particular church, the Church, and American history. We took pictures, chatted, become a little more united in our shared faith.

Later, recalling the day, I laughed right out loud. There's a bit of irony that reveals a bit about how far I have come on my journey. Twice at the chapel I used the metaphor of a milkweed pod, growing and about to burst forth. Both times I was referring to the parish family. It wasn't until my laugh out loud moment that I realized I was really talking about myself. Here's the thing: when we joined the parish, I was happy to be smiled and nodded at, but to be a face in the crowd; one of many. When we bought a house outside the parish boundaries, we stayed on as members because we didn't want to belong to a church in the neighborhood, where the kids' classmates would attend, the neighbors; we didn't want to see the same people day in and day out. Almost twenty years later, I can't get enough of the people I've met at our church out of town. Where I once felt that I just needed a building to go to where I could listen and choose my own level of participation, I now find myself participating in ways I never thought I would consider. I am the seed pod. I feel myself ready to split at the seams, waiting for just the right moment, the right conditions, the perfect breeze to carry my joy farther than I can even imagine. I no longer consider myself a face in the crowd; rather, I am one of many making up one body of faith.

Both the pod, and a single seed.


*No Man Is an Island--Book Club at church on June 25!

gentle reminders

My Miraculous Medal is missing. Again. I don't know when or where I was when I lost it. The medal was a gift--in so many more ways than one--and I feel a little lost without it now. The medal came on a bracelet (an unorthodox way to wear it, I know) and I remember sitting on the couch on Thursday evening thinking that I should tighten up the rings again. But I didn't. I figured I would do it over the weekend; Saturday after the swim meet, to be precise. I know the bracelet was intact on Friday morning when I put it on and at lunch when I took a walk to get my lunch from the fridge. Somehow I didn't notice the medal was missing until I was getting ready for bed.

To be perfectly honest, when I got the bracelet, I didn't know a whole lot about the Miraculous Medal. I knew it was beautiful, and I started wearing it. As I read 33 Days to Morning Glory, I began to understand the significance of the medal, and at one point, wondered if I was really getting anywhere in my faith journey, or if I was just going around in circles. That's the day I looked down and saw that the medal was missing the first time. I was at work, and nearly broke down in tears then and there. I was not positive I would be able to function for the rest of the day, retraced my steps, told a couple of coworkers that I had lost my Miraculous Medal, and was assured they would be on the lookout. Then I looked down and saw it, lying face up, at my feet, under my desk. I'm sure it was an answer, and I have moved forward with far less trepidation since.

Friday night, though, I did not panic. In fact, I felt a sense of calm--sadness, too, but not the debilitating pain I felt before. I'm looking for my medal, and have revisited the spots I went after work, will check around at the office tomorrow, but I have a very different feeling about it. My prayer to St. Anthony, the patron of Lost Things, is that it will be found, but my prayer to Mary is that it is found by someone who appreciates it, whether that be me or someone else. My life has been enriched through prayer--so much more than I thought possible--and that medal on my wrist has been a gentle reminder to me to pray. The habit is a bit more ingrained now than when I first started this phase of my journey, and the gentle reminders are all around me. If it's time for Miracles to happen, they will.

a long way

I read something this evening that made me think hard about the good things in my life. About the pearls of wisdom, the blessings (big and small), the struggles that I have learned to embrace because in the grand scheme of things, they are nothing to anyone but me (and that's a whole level of selfish I don't even want to get into specifically right now!), and most of all, my faith. Lately, I've been thinking, pondering, attempting to discern what lies in my future. Today someone asked me a question that caught me off guard, but I was able to answer honestly--and the answer, with no guilt, was that I didn't know the answer. (Now that I think about it, that was directly related to the portion of Merton that I read at lunch!)

Anyway, what I read tonight was about comfort zones, and it's not the first time this person has brought them up! Over the past week or so, I've felt a little uncomfortable about faith, but for a reason I've never encountered before: I've been a tad uneasy because I've been comfortable. Sounds a little roundabout, but here's what it comes down to....the more I wonder where I'm going, while moving forward step by step, the more I keep coming around to who I am; who I've always known I was called to be. Yet it's evolving......and I'm honestly avoiding what I want to say right now.

Here's the thing: so many of the friends I've made at our church over the years have said, as I have, that our parish feels like home. It feels friendly, warm, inviting. In the time we've been there, we've had two pastors, which could be part of that feeling, but it comes from within the entire community. There is just something there, something special. This morning the Pope tweeted about need and wastefulness. A little later, my minute meditation was about sacrifice. Then a note about a nearby parish that is hoping to engage local youth in wholesome, safe activities to get them off the street. The page I read in Merton was about knowing oneself so as to ignore one's own desires to follow the will of God. Then the note I read tonight about an upcoming challenge.

Back to who I am. I'm a Mom. Even before we had children, I was attracted to the Mom role. So as I'm moving forward, as our kids are growing up and developing into fine young men, I've been wondering what happens next. I will always be their mother, but they won't always need mothering in the same way. I find I miss, truly, the huggy, clingy times; the frantic, too much to do in one day times. Not enough to depress me, but enough to be able to identify some of what is missing, diminishing in my life--the nurturing, the one on one, the deep gratitude for a few minutes alone. We have wonderful discussions, our laughter is on another level. Somehow, I'm feeling a need to share that some more.

I'm getting the idea that all of this will tie together somehow. But it may not. It could just be that a number of pieces kind of look like they belong in this part of the puzzle, but in reality, they don't fit together at all. That's okay. Just looking at them, admiring them, and trying them out in different combinations is fulfilling in and of itself. I've come a long way.

water water everywhere

In the shower this morning, while washing my hair, I was thinking about how sometimes I feel as though I am drifting on this journey. My very next thought was that I have many of my best thoughts in the shower; it's a good thinking place, and I've had a number of friends tell me the same, so it's likely that you, too, have had this experience. (Some of my niftiest tap combinations were born in the shower, although by necessity, were tested elsewhere!) Knowing that these are the thoughts that often mean something important, I went back to the feeling of drifting. And then I thought, "Wait a minute! How can I feel like I'm drifting?"

Here's the odd thing: when I consider my journey (previously, my life journey, and more recently my faith life journey), I always see it as a road or a path. Something to be travelled on foot, and occasionally in a car, though how the car gets from where I leave it to where I need it again, I have no idea whatsoever! From time to time, the path is actually a rocky hill or mountain that I have to pick through carefully, or scale with tenacity. Now and then, there is a nice diversion--a hot air balloon from which to get a nice overall view of where I've been and where it looks like I might be headed (mostly looking back, though. Usually there is mist in the forward, and that is quite alright.), or a tree to rest under or perch in to see what and who might pass by.

I took myself back to the drifting feeling, wondering why I chose that word, and recognized the gently rock and sway of a boat or kayak with no direction or propulsion. The word was accurately describing the moment (it's a good drifting, the kind that feels peaceful, restful, a respite) and I welcomed the awareness. Next thing I knew, I was shaking my head because I was seeing a road, a path--a riverbank! I was really in the same place, going in a direction, with the current. A river is a road in many respects. I knew this from history classes, but had never applied it (like too many things) to my own life.

Last weekend, gazing out at the Atlantic and at the Bay, I felt an amazing sense of freedom, as I always do at wide expanses of sea. I wondered why. What the magnetism comes from. I've heard many theories, ranging from the pull of the moon that makes the tides, to the salt to water ratio in the sea being similar to that of our bodies. This morning, I realized in my quick succession of thoughts, that for me, the attraction is the lack of forced direction. There are no sides, no defining edges, as a road has, a path, or even a stream. (Now that I think about it, I'm attracted to mud puddles for the same reason, so it's not just the salt water, as I often thought!) On my way into work, I saw a quote that made me think about last weekend. I'd seen it before, and when I read it, I thought it was an answer to my question about the attraction: "The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea." (Isak Dinesen)

Throughout the day, as I pondered the connections, the threads that would tie all these thoughts together, I realized the beginning of my real answer lies in the borders, or limits, I put on myself, keeping to the path. Even in my contented drifting, I am fearful of straying from what I know. It's not that I don't take chances, or try new things; it's just that I like to know that there is a safety net. If I am really going to reconcile the two sides of my life into one 'real' life, I need to be true to myself in all things, including my journey. I have to be willing--eager even!--to see the wide open possibilities of faith. Trust that the path I follow doesn't just end at the shoreline, or follow its edge, but may--no, will go directly across the ocean from time to time. I need to look directly into the eyes of Love and take one step, and then another. I need to feel in my soul what I feel when I stand on the shore.

Faith, hope and love, and I'm working on all three.

faith does matter

Tonight is the last in our current Faith Matters series at church. Although I started going as an excuse to get Mom out around people, the weekly nourishment of my faith has become so much more. Mom knows some people now, it's true.....and so do I. More importantly, we've come to know each other, ourselves and others, too. We've learned about our faith history, the grace of Mary and of Jesus, and about the power of mercy. We've prayed with each other, celebrated, fretted and pondered. We've grown. And by 'we,' I really mean 'I,' but in the process have come to truly appreciate the presence that is always with me, in me, a part of me--my travel guide, as it were.

I find myself wondering where I will go next, though I have no doubt the next steps will be chosen well. As I started to work out the words of the previous sentence, the church bells in town started chiming. "Do not be afraid, I am with you. I have called you each by name." Tears of friendship (what else could I call them?) Sprang to my eyes, and I heard Isaiah's words clearly in my heart, and I could say confidently, "No fear today, Lord. I trust in you. And in uour plan for me."

Faith does matter. It matters in the needful and fearful times, and it matters in the joyful and jubilant times. But the times in between, the everyday, ordinary times are the beautiful faith building times--when the simple sound of birds singing lifts your my heart, when a smile lights up a face, when the day's blessings are the fact of being.

(These church bells are like a soundtrack to my thoughts tonight! Now Morning Has Broken....)

Wednesday has become a favorite rest stop in my weekly journey, a family gathering with people I hardly knew a few months ago. Thank you, Lord, for leading me there. Please continue to guide me.

heart homes

I spent the day today in a place that I came to realize was a "heart home." There was time with family of the heart,  too, but there was also specialness in the places. 

In this geographical place, I found my husband, my wings and some roots, as well. But this place is also pretty in a way that's unconventional. Driving around, I remembered the feelings that inspired me to come to school here.

But the water is my heart home, my place of refreshment, renewal and rejuvenation. Standing on the shore, feeling the salty air, hearing the waves, is where I 'belong' -- like going home when I was a kid.

It's kind of funny because I didn't grow up, or even spend much time, around water. That makes me wonder where that home feeling comes from. Is it something natural and inborn? Or is it something I came to love somewhere along the way? We did vacation on Cape Cod one summer, but in my memory, the water/home connection has a chicken and egg quality.
Perhaps there is something more for me to grasp. I took pictures today, which will surround me for a while. If there's more to know, the answers will come in time. Until then, my heart's windows are opened wide once again.