It was Spring..

  It is Spring, it is Long Island and we are young.

The road winds through tall oaks and shadows move over our bus. We are headed for a retreat house that perches above the Long Island Sound. It comes into view, a  huge grey stone building with many windows reflecting the afternoon sun.We see white turrets hanging from the building and are impressed. All smiles and giggles, we take down our suitcases and head for the tall wooden door. Before we know it we are assigned a room on the top floor and lugging our stuff we climb.I fell in love with the room the minute we opened the door. Sloping ceilings, bright white walls, black square key holder and beyond, the still water of the Sound.

We are four high school friends.Patti and I are besties, Carole and Maureen are too and the four of us find delight in almost everything we do.To be together for a week-end seems almost too much. We can read each others minds and a raised eyebrow will send us into fits of glee.

A soft knock comes right after we are settled into our spots.A  black robed nun comes in with a companion. The girl is thin, has white hair and thick glasses.We are asked if we have room for her as she has come alone.We are good Catholic girls and know what we should do but I must say I am extremely  disheartened  that our foursome will be invaded. It was not me who said: "sure, we'll be glad to have her."And now we were five.

The rest of the retreat is a blur to me but this moment, this moment,  I hold in my heart. The stranger, I wish I could recall her name, is walking alone along the beach towards the rock jetty the next afternoon. To understand what came next, I must self critique. I know this auburn haired slender girl who is me, She is shy, introverted, uncomfortable socially in most instances and was taught never to speak until spoken to. And yet, in that moment she goes and engages with the girl. This is totally out of character. We chatted, laughed a bit. Does she remember?

I think of this girl coming alone to a retreat. How did she feel? What drew her ?. I can still see her solemn face. I now know this: that was the first time the Spirit made a request. It is so clear to me.

Now, I offer this prayer: "Thank you, Spirit, for being there that day. For the urging then and since that have borne fruit. Today, I pray for those two girls, both shy strangers, who You showed a way to be friends."

messenger......

 I have known her for most of my life.She is dear to me in a way I cannot describe.A smile that warms, and a heart that beats with only love. A spiritual friend who seeks, wonders and serves.A servant of goodness. 

 A message on Facebook started a new relationship. Someone she knew years ago found her and they shared hours of talk and text. He seemed special, divinely sent? She has been single for a long time, had relationships that weren't the right ones. This new person seemed to be something different. So understanding, so full of promises and wishes, alot of "if only." Could love come calling this late in the game?

 She took a chance to meet and then this star of the universe said he was confused and didn't know if this was right. Blah,blah,blah. In wisdom and with a heart heavy with tears she wrote that she longer wanted to be in this "game".A good letter explaining her sorrow and disappointment.

 Yesterday she sat with the e-mail she had sent, let the tears stream and then the phone rang. She and I both rarely pick up the phone when it rings and the caller I.D. was of no help.Against her long held patterns, she answered and a young voice asked if she had a minute. She said : " I am Meagan and I know alot of people are suffering at this time and I wanted to offer a scripture to you.Would that be alright?"And in a sure and strong voice she said this:

" He shall wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, crying out or pain, for the former world has passed away.:Rev 21:4.

Meagan, a stranger, had no way of knowing that my friend was bereft or that this was the Scripture reading that she and her siblings had selected for the prayer cards given out at their Mother's Mass. But the Holy One knew. At that funeral, this was also read: "who will separate us from the love of Christ? Trial or distress or persecution or hunger....neither height not depth nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God that comes to us through Christ Jesus..." Romans 8:35-39

before we ever existed..

Obedience. Oh, how we chaff at the word. 

"You're not the boss of me, "a child shrieks at another. "Don't tell me what to do",  another, a teen, yells through her closed room door. So when I saw the title of Merton's mediation for today, my interest was about a -2 on the Richter scale."The Sacrifice of Obedience" was the title and as he usually does, Merton brings me around. The following quote did me it:

" Blessed are the pure of heart who leave everything to God now as they did before they ever existed." Meister Eckhart. What???

 What was it like for us before we existed? Immediately, a memory so pure, so precious,  surfaced. A phone call from my son many years ago that told of a conversation he and his three year old had the night before. Riley told his Dad that God told him that the time was right for him to leave heaven and go to earth by entering his mother's tummy. He had to go down the long flight of stairs alone and start his new life.So, leaving everything to God, he did just that and was born here with us 19 years ago. My son, asked if he was afraid and Riley said: "No. but he had to do this alone."

 So that's what it was like before he existed.God spoke and Riley obeyed and that was the beginning.How many children have memories like this before they forget?Maybe this is why we are exhorted to be like little children.God speaks, we obey and His will is done.And earth become heaven, here and now.And the fists unfurl, the brick are dropped, smiles appear and love flows freely like the great Hudson River and touches each of us.

trail angels

 

  If  there has been one gift of this, stay at home, wash your hands, don't stand that close, pandemic, it has been time to read.One book by Scott Peck, led me to type up journal notes from a trip to Great Britain 6 years ago.The last two have connected me to my youngest son in a way that leaves me breathless.

  The first,"Girl in the Woods", is a memoir of an 19 year old , who after a sexual assault by a fellow student, dropped out of college and walked the Pacific Coast Trail from Mexico to Canada.What a story! But the most riveting moments for me were the appearances of the gifts of trail angels. A plastic bag hanging from a tree with sweet peaches, a meal here and there, a shaded hammock, a roof over  the hiker's head just because; with no charge and no expectation of repayment. A wooden shed filled with plastic jugs of water that someone lugged up the mountainside and left for the hikers coming off the desert part of the trail Amazing..

 I remember a trail angel on the Camino in Spain. We at dinner were talking about the loud snoring in the hostels we stayed in and he dug in his backpack and produced two ear plugs for a stranger-me.I told him he was an angel and he said no one had ever called him that before.

 Finishing that book, I picked up another, "What Stands in A Storm.", written about the tornadoes that touched down in the South on April 27, 2011.When it was over 384 people had died and whole towns were wiped off the map.The forward by Rick Bragg suggests that this is not just a story of destruction but of the many stories of kindnesses and courage.

There is one story not in the book but it should be.I tell it the day after wishing my youngest son a Happy 43rd Birthday. It is his story of making friends with a family on their spread in Alabama as he looked for salamander species in their ponds. His sad trip back to the property after that 2011 tornado onslaught. How he couldn't find the place because all the trees were laying down like pick up sticks in every direction. Where houses had stood were foundations. Finally  he found the grandfather who had survived but his son in another house had eventually died in his arms. How the flowers he bought and offered touched the older man as they both stood crying together.

 I was not surprised by the flowers and the tears from this son.He, who hopped in his truck after Hurricane Katrina and drove to Louisiana with a friend and some dog food.They drove around trailer parks knocking on doors and asking how they could help.The first disheveled survivor said' "Hey man, I need beer and cigarettes", and off Sean went on his mission.

If life is a journey, and it is and if we are all on some path, which we are, then we all have met trail angels. 

And so it was at Thanksgiving that Sean spoke of his one year old son at his feet, how deep beyond description did he love that boy.All he wanted for his son was not great grades , not a high paying job but that he be a good person, one who shares with others. I looked down at this bright eyed, smiling little guy who was staring up at his Dad "Look", I said," he is watching you and he will be fine."

Looking For Jesus

 Photo by Clarissa Pinkola Estes



If this has ever happened to you, you know the feeling of terror. I was at the beach with my small children, 5 and 3 at the time. I never liked to go to the beach with them because I was obsessive about watching their every move.So much could happen in the blink of an eye. They were playing right at the shoreline so I took a chance, grabbed my Newsweek, and settled in to read one article.When I looked up only one child was there, my son was not.One can't describe what it feels like. Sheer terror.I was about to scream when I looked to my right and there he came toddling along having gone who knows where.Incredible relief poured over me and I hugged him, weeping.

I never pray the rosary and come to the Fifth Joyful Mystery, The Finding in the Temple, that I don't think of that day. His parents looking for days for Jesus and then the sheer joy of seeing him. I understand.

And now I am going to make a bold statement: We are all looking for Jesus.No matter who you are, what you believe , how you were raised, we are all looking for Jesus.For the Love that will be with us into infinity, without measure and who wants only our good.And like the Mother I was at the beach, He is looking for us too.

I think of Heather King , an atheist, alcoholic, ex- lawyer and ex-wife who stumbles into a church one day looking for a place to hide her tears, or maybe some peace? And found Jesus .I just read her inspiring book, "Ravished". She now has a God centered life. Or Barbara Hall, producer, author and director of the series "Joan of Arcadia" who, after a brutal rape, sneaked into a church and found the peace that passes all understanding.

 It was a summer day in California in the early 70s when I turned back to the One who I had dumped a few years before. I knew what I was missing and just said:"Help" and with a leap of joy He came back into my life.We look for Him and the experience of that love when we hoist a drink, fall in love, try to succeed in business, all the things we chase that somehow don't measure up to our expectations. Because we are meant for the Big Love.And eternal things.

The most precious moments during this quarantine has been sitting with John in the woods reading scripture, praying for others and then sharing what the Lord has been doing in our lives.Looking for Jesus and what he wants us to do.Now is the time, now is the moment. Just ask:"Where are You ? I need you, help."

Simple and holy.

Something so ordinary but I was enchanted. It was a cold but bright sunny winter day on Long Island.It was noon and I was on the second floor looking out at the line of trees that separated our house from the next.They were evergreens and laden with a thick coating of snow.On one branch, spread out as if on a white brocade couch, was a grey squirrel, sound asleep in his after lunch nap.That sight made me so happy, he and I cherishing our restful naps.His solitude and peace.And mine.

This reminds me of a Merton quote that I had to put in my journal: "It set the seal on all the silences in which I had found Him, without seeming to find anything and I knew that I had every time come home with something tremendous, although my hands were always empty." He is talking about his trips to the woods and what he found there. It is my belief that since I have allowed God into my life, if He is a big part of my waking thoughts, then I will find Him everywhere.

 In 2003 I wrote: "In praise of that day when I wandered near the Flint River through the dry stiff leaves to an open spot in the woods.There, dropping low over the water was a dead tree, bent flat with it's bark long gone.The smooth wood presented itself and I sat down.

The sun slanted through the bare trees enough to warm and I settled, listening to the ripples swirling around the tree branches.The barred owls calling back and forth , the small downy pecking nearby. All the sounds that I need to hear to calm my mind and hear what the river , the trees have to say. The white sun seemed like a candle on a high shelf of a church as it flickered through the tree limbs."

I will never forget that day of peace and Presence.

Nor the day of strolling among the trees struggling with an a issue, to find a heart shaped lichen  on a smooth barked tree.Or the amazement of seeing fat lumbering turkeys take off and fly over the river to the other side, their footprints in the snow, splayed and huge.Or the heron that floated above my log soundless in its flight.

Near the end of his life Merton was besieged by people wanting to talk to him, disturb him in his hermitage in Kentucky. I know the feeling. So,Thomas, no longer here, I bow down in gratitude that you wrote what I feel. You were anti-war and then I didn't get it. I do now. Each day you started your writing anchored by words about place, the trees, birds, sounds, all holy. I see the same thing and I am humbled. Thank you.

in these lonely times

  John and I escaped yesterday and got a haircut. It was good to laugh again with the hairdresser that has been trimming my locks for years.I could see that he was happy to feel useful again after weeks of hanging out at home.He said that after all this he learned one thing; he will never retire. Good.

 How are all the people coping, those who have no one that they interact with on a daily basis because of age or health.The ones who enjoy going to Kroger to smile at someone or the library to use computers or be surrounded by books.How hard is this very strange time for them?

 Perhaps the dream I had on April 23, speaks to this situation. It was so clear that I was supposed to be sharing what was revealed. I know it was Spirit driven because in my waking time, nothing like this went through my mind.It has two parts.

The first was to encourage people to find their way to a saint or two. If you don't have a favorite , use the one you chose at Confirmation .Or perhaps use your first initial and find one that way. I thought of St. Stephen, he who was the first martyr.Or use your middle name, which may be a saint's name..Mine is St.Anne, Mary's mother.Ask that saint for their prayers. Perhaps, before you act on something, ask them to help you to make a Godly choice.

 The second was to implore Mary to assist you if God has asked something of you. Like writing this mediation that I had no idea where to start or where to go.Ask for the wisdom to recognize what God is asking and strength to say yes, as she did.

In the dream, after each teaching, a man would get up and recap and all who were there listened intently.It was quite amazing to watch him as if it was a movie.

So I have started to talk to my saints.St.Bernadette, she who was granted visits by the Mother of God. She who was humble and wanted no fuss.The poor saint who became a nun and was ridiculed by her Superiors. Pray for me, dear saint.

St, Therese of Lisieux and St Teresa of Calcutta, who seem interchangeable to me, as they show us how to to do small things with great love.Dear Saints, pray for me.

Maybe this is the time to reacquaint ourselves with a saint, perhaps one we seem drawn to, as a  way out of the loneliness of this time. I found this on Twitter; it seems just perfect and hopeful:

"The Saints in their glory aid and encourage us. When we call upon our Guardian Angel he comes with many friends.Even in our isolation the Saints will come without exception." S Keedle