Closer to fine

After the eighteen months of wandering through the desert (though having moments of hospitality), after eight discernment committee processes, I finally ended up fifteen miles from where I last served a congregation. I considered congregations in MA, CT and even Mexico. And when everything settled down, I landed at the congregation where Anne has been attending since 1994, eleven miles from our tiny house.


The preacher at the service of installation and celebration of a new season of ministry, the Rev'd Gwen Groff, a local Mennonite pastor, said eloquently:

... Which leads me to the last thing that Lee wanted us to focus on. This land. This thin place on the earth. Lee said what she is interested in is "connecting with the land and living in a thin place." The term "thin place" has been used in many ways, but I believe the phrase was originally used by the Celts, whose theology said that there are places on earth where the veil between heaven and earth is very thin, places that serve almost like a portal where you can practically reach through or step through and experience God.

Now I think of those sacred places as destinations, a place you travel to as a deliberate pilgrimage, or stumble upon unexpectedly. Lee's words, that she is interested in what it means to live in a thin place made me think of thin places a bit differently. Because if the psalmist is right, and Basil is right, that God's Holy Spirit is everywhere, then one place isn't more "thin" than another. A thin place need not be a windswept stone circle built on an energetic convergence of ley lines. A thin place is anywhere our hearts are opened to God. God is always here. But in a thin place we are more open to God, we are suddenly made aware of God's constant presence, and we are more likely to take risks of listening and being transformed.

A thin place is not only a place we feel something; it's a state of being where we become more like the God we meet when our hearts are open. A thin place can be experienced in worship. This sanctuary is worn thin by the prayers that have been spoken here. And a thin place can be experienced in action, in working across differences and finding God in the other. [(c) Gwen Groff, 14 June 2013]

Church of Our Saviour, with its long history of farmer priests, its close connection to the land, and its Benedictine tradition all make for a peaceful, peace-filled spot in the Vermont Greens. COS is where the priest truly can live out relational priesthood, come back close to a vocational rather than professional priesthood, live with one foot in the 19th century when this place was founded and the 21st where it lives and reaches out to the local community.

I feel exceptionally at peace here, in a way that I have not since 2008 when I left Northfield. This sense of 'coming down' right was solidified as today I attended a wedding reception of two former parishioners. As I talked with other members of where I last served, I gave thanks again that I am no longer in that stressful place. Somehow COS seems more authentic, closer to the ground, not lost in pretense.

To my delight, I once again have a vegetable garden with potatoes (I no longer remember what types), green, purple and yellow beans, tomatoes and lots of hot peppers. The beans are sprouting as are the 'taters and the peppers and 'maters are coming along. No, I won't be Fr Dan or Fr Heminway in cassock out on a tractor (the church doesn't have one), but in a small way, I can tap into the ethos of the farmer priest which is so much a part of the history of this place.

Now... if any of you have $30K out there, it would go a long way to helping us repair the vicarage chimneys and replace the roof, and shore up a collapsing barn, all of which are on the National Historic Registry (!).

[Blogger ain't wordpress; formatting here is disastrous.]

Gardening

A dozen or so of us
helped Eric with his garden
today.

A cookie jar
that he would take to his
wife, Elaine,
and say, 'The jar is empty,'
and she'd fill it
with wonderful home-made
cookies
sat on a shawl of hers.

Today, though,
the jar held Elaine's
ashes
and we gently and lovingly
scattered them in her
garden midst the rows
and plants now
fallow
awaiting the spring blooms.

And while some chose to
wash their hands after
scattering these holy ashes,
I did not,
preferring instead
to let them seep into my skin,
to take Elaine's spirit
into my hands
only to lift them up
to the sky
and commend her
to God.

Hands on the land

[the old garden mid-summer with exuberant lavender bush in the foreground, pepper plantation mid-photo and potatoes back, 2007]


In a few words, I miss my garden.

For fourteen years, I put in a garden and enjoyed its produce: lettuce, broccoli, green and yellow beans, heirloom tomatoes, tomatillos, assorted hot peppers, potatoes of various sorts, cilantro, parsley, asparagus, raspberries.... I enjoyed putting it in, to see the rows of little plants that would eventually bear all these goodies (despite my minimal weeding). It was wonderful to walk out the back door with a colander or sauce pan and fill it with the night's dinner.

As we would reach this time of year, I would pay special attention to the frost reports. Even now, two years later, my ears perk up and I think about how I would have to haul out the tarps and sheets to protect my still-green tomatoes from the frost.

I have given up on gardening here because of the pests — squirrels, Japanese beetles and I don't know what else. I am thankful for the parishioner who has been supplying me with fresh tomatoes and beans from his garden but I do still greatly miss getting my hands in the earth.

I kind of wonder if the next rector at the church I used to serve will also put in a veggie garden or will it continue to be a parish-activity? (They still tilled and planted it and then gave the produce away to local charity.)

Of cats and fences

Odd combo but that is what is in front of me right now... a shot of La Doyenne perched perfectly on a branch and a branch that crashed through the fence this evening.


She lines up just right with the quetzal.


I didn't think the storm tonight was anything remarkable, just five minutes of wind and hard rain but when I went downstairs to get dinner going, I looked out the kitchen window to see this. The fence went up when the church conveyed an odd strip of property (looks like a former right of way) to the people behind so they could convert the garage into a carriage house (the red building). They provided the fence. This all took place six years ago; I was on Standing Committee which had to approve the transfer. What we lost was a twelve by forty foot strip of land where two rectors back had a garden. Ah.


A panel of this type fence is something like $125-150. Oh well. At least no daffies were smushed.

God help us when the whole tree comes down which will happen sooner than later since it seems to shed branches every night because I am constantly picking them up off the lawn (such as it is).

What is it?

Of all the things that I have posted on Facebook, this photo has generated the most comments.

It is of the stump that Compa helped me dig up (I started working on it on Wednesday) with shovels, trowel, lopers and pry bar. It looks like a multi-chambered heart.

I have no idea what type of vine came out of it other than one that had huge, huge leaves and would grow so fast that you could see it making gains in a couple of hours. Someone planted it long enough ago that the roots go under the footings of the patio. We'll be battling this hydra for ever. But it won't go up the trellis this summer nor will its tendrils reach over and take over the rose bush or hibiscus I planted last year. Evidently two summers ago when no one lived in the house, the vine climbed up and over the patio roof and managed to get to the second floor window (my study).

No more!!!

I was laughing too much to have the look of: Aha, got you, you sucker!

It now is in a very dark place, the dumpster over at the church. God help whatever landfill it ends up in. I dared not put it in my compost heap lest the thing come back to life and take over the back part of the yard.

Ever onwards.

Catch up time... again

Alright... some photos now that I have Photoshop again.


Apropos of nothing, but something that cracked me up when I was at my alma mater four weeks ago. All the street covers had been stencilled with these words.


Cats will find the darndest places to sleep but la Doyenne seems quite happy here.


Mr Officious reads the Lead with a highly critical eye.


The two dark grey tabbies found a common spot on the bed in the sun.


Monday night we had our favourite ensalada mixta (whatever you want to put in a salad) — but the photo features the bread cutter (un coupe-pain) I bought for my parents in 1976 — hunted all over Limoges, France to find one. My father returned it to me because he is afraid of chopping one of his digits rather than the bread.


All of a sudden the maple tree outside my office window has leafed out which totally changes the light in the office. The light becomes much more dappled and soft.


I still am not used to living in such a suburban-looking house... never mind, the daffies I planted last year are up and thriving.


And the lilacs in the backyard are blooming today. Paradise!


The sign says it all.

An Aloha moment

Yesterday after all the conversation about cilantro — whether you love it or hate it and how that might well be pre-determined — I had an Aloha moment, a craving for cilantro.

For those of you who have not been to San Salvador, you would not know that near the pro-cathedral is a funky sports-restaurant called Aloha. It is within walking distance and when I lived at the cathedral during sabbatical I occasionally would take lunch there. My usual lunch was pollo a la plancha, grilled chicken, which came with pico de gallo and fries. So last night I made a good bowl of homemade salsa with lots of cilantro and roasted some potatoes to go with the chicken.

Definitely an Aloha moment!

Tonight before vestry a simple bowl of salsa will have to suffice.

[photo surprisingly does not have cilantro but that is because that particular bowl of salsa had ingredients that came only from my garden and the cilantro was past.]

The geese knew

I was out in the raspberry patch at 7.45 this evening when a flock of Canada geese passed overhead, honking and in their characteristic 'V.' I thought it a bit odd, they are not normally flying north or anywhere like that at this time of year and I wondered if they were going to get Esther.

Yes, they were.

She died peacefully at 8.45 tonight with one of her two sons and one of her two daughters at her side, and her other two children having called within five minutes of her death. So over the phone, separated by 65 miles, I read the prayer said at the time of death phrase by phrase and her son repeated it after me and he and his sister, laid hands on their mother, drew the sign of the cross on her forehead and blessed her.

Go in peace, dear Esther. May you rise in glory now. I'll catch up with you some day.

Transplant

Having made the mistake of wandering over to the other side, a blog written by someone who is out of communion with TEC and who thinks we are not preaching the gospel, etc., etc., I need to think of something more cheerful.

So I post a photo of a hollyhock. Why this? Mid fall last year, when I realised I was leaving, I dug up two hollyhocks and two white lilacs and planted them down here. One never knows with transplants if they'll like their new environment. With these, they may be a remnant because so much of what I planted was dug up and grassed over.

In any event, this hollyhock bloomed today. It clearly is happy. Once it gets established, I can dig up some more and transplant it at my permanent home. (I did but they didn't winter over.)

I spent this evening planting Asiatic lilies. Come fall I will put in daffodils because there are none here. And soon I will put in your basic day lilies. All of this planting (rhodie, blue hibiscus, red oriental poppies, climbing rose bush) is my way of saying, OK, I am claiming this place as my home, even though it is temporary for however long God deems it to be 'mine' (knowing that the house and property belong to the church).

I am now in my eighth month here. Is it yesterday I moved in? Or has it been ages? The answer depends on the day....

What is it???

OK, horticulturists: what IS this vine? It's non-flowering and creepy, really. I will have to move the hibiscus I just planted (to its right) because it hadn't quite yet exploded as it has. I've noticed other houses with arbors that have this same vine so I guess it was planted intentionally. It takes over and provides shade, I guess. I think I may dig it up in the fall, though I have taken note of its trunk and roots — it will be an afternoon project. If it were morning glories, no problem. But this borders on invasive.

Meanwhile, every place has its gardening challenges (up north it was a weird sort of bamboo-looking weed that couldn't be eradicated). Here, in addition to this vine, is another vine that creeps along the ground and then takes off as in strangling the raspberry bushes. It is totally obnoxious. I spent twenty minutes yanking this sycophant off the bushes, losing a couple of precious raspberries in the process.

My pepper plantation is miserable.

And I don't know what the squirrels do other than fling maple leaves all over the backyard. It looks a mess because it is one.

So, yeah, gardening has become quite a challenge. Like golf (which I have never played and never will).

All in a day

After the work morning at church, I went off to a nursery run by church members at which the World's Best Cat Sitter had purchased me a gift certificate. Back here, I planted three poppies, a hibiscus and a rhododendron thanks to this gift. How generous!


Here's the one blooming poppy. Another one has a potential bloom. Eventually they will get established and will be happy in the sunny spot where I've placed them.


I will probably have to move the hibiscus over a foot or so and will do in the next couple of days but I simply wanted to get it in the ground.


I need to get something to liven up this grey patio. It is nice but needs colour. Marble is local.


Ayup... it's that time of triennium.

A little bit of normalcy

I chose not to move the columbine. White circles are two peppers.



Click on photo and you get a slightly larger version that shows numbered pepper plants!

Since yesterday was a killer day and since it is supposed to rain tomorrow, I issued a priestly (not godly) admonition to the secretary and organist/choir director and told them to go home and enjoy the beautiful afternoon. I could do so since they were already out the door :)

Though I cannot have the huge vegetable garden of years past because there simply is not the space, at least I can put in a few things so today I put in my pepper plants. If they all survive, I'll have a nice crop of good and hot peppers. I thought I had bought fewer than in years past but forgot the six I had ordered from a colleague who started peppers, heirloom tomatoes (they may go in self-watering containers) and fox glove for me. All told, I think I have 32 plants. Four of them look in extremis, four of them need help but the others may make it.

Since I have joined/bought shares in a CSA farm co-operative, I can get the fresh potatoes, beans, green stuff throughout the summer. That will take care of my need for decent, fresh and local veggies. Sure, it won't be the same as going out and digging my own potatoes but it will tide me over until I figure out how to tame this back yard.

There is a nasty vine that is all over the spot where my pepper patch is. Also, the pepper patch is right next to the raspberry patch. I think I have dug up all the roots but I know better. They are a lot easier to extract than black berries! I decided to keep the columbine and also some lady's mantle.

Whatever photo I put up, you will be singularly unimpressed but this little garden is better than nada. Moreover, it is a Proustian moment, une mémoire affective, that takes me back to 13 Junes of planting my veggie garden.