Cemetery Yellow

You know, I used to walk in that cemetery three, four times a week.

I've been five times in the last fourteen months. Once with my family to choose the general location for the bench. Once with The Lovely Daughter to meet with The Monument Guy. Once with Musical Friend to visit her husband's place and our son's. And now twice, just to walk. I can stand it again.

Gratitude in the Face of Grief

Loyola Retreat House Gardens (Guelph, Ontario)

I think I'm going to do most of my blogging over here for the next few weeks.

A disjointed but nevertheless connected concoction of thoughts:

Some weeks ago I heard myself saying out loud, "I don't want to be grateful to God for anything." I knew, even as I made that statement, that it was a bad sign. It's a beginner's mantra, that gratitude is the foundation of any spiritual life, in any tradition. But I didn't take back what I said.

Of course, we are all beginners, always. Fortunately I remembered that, before I turned on myself as well as the world at large.

Then a few of the RevGals started to post ABCs of gratitude, something, or a list of somethings, every day or so. Hrrrumph, I muttered to myself, in my best imitation of Scrooge. (Actually, what I said, possibly even out loud, was something closer to an emphatically italicized and enlarged "B.S.")

Then I went on retreat. I had practically counted the minutes, all through summer Hebrew, looking longingly at pictures and imagining a respite of silence and perhaps even the company of God. And then my five days there manifested another form of desert: a parched and unsettling place in which I couldn't breathe.

And now, I can hardly look up or incline my ear without someone saying, "Almost the first anniversay." Two emails today alone: "How are you?

Well, I am OK. Since returning home, I have avoided that raw place inside, the one that simply will not be healed yet. I think I'll know when I can take another look, but this month probably isn't the time. I need something else right now, and I'm heading for the gratitude thing.

Not every day. Not alphabetically. Or poetically or literarily or musically or gracefully. Or even consistently. Just whatever I can manage.

Coming to a blog near you: Gannet's Non-Bullshit Gratitude. Photo illustrations courtesy of The Retreat that Wasn't.

Silent Speaking

On Retreat in Canada

Mount Angel Abbey Revisited

Last fall, I posted about our visit to Mount Angel Abbey, which we more or less stumbled upon when we visited our daughter for her college's Parents' Week-End. We were in no shape to travel anywhere, but we felt that since she had somehow managed to return to college, we wanted to support her with our presence when other families might be enjoying themselves. We had, in fact, a very nice visit, and my encounter with the icon of Christ Pantocrator at the monastery probably kept me wobbling forward for another few months.

I had hoped to spend the night up there at the Abbey, my own private mini-retreat, while we were in Oregon last week, but the guesthouse was full and I concluded that I would have to find another time, another year. As it happened, though, a combination of desire and the time change propelled me out of bed and up to the Abbey for 6:30 a.m Lauds on Friday morning.

I had about half an hour to myself when I arrived, which I used to wander around both outside and in the chapel and then, finally, to settle down in front of "my" icon. Once again, I found the sense of peace and hopefulness that has been so elusive these past nine months. The sky was utterly blue, the chapel exuded a sense of the holy and the still, and the voices of the forty or so monks as they sang the psalms and prayers for half an hour offered a call to clarity for the day ahead.

My prayer in that chapel? ~ it's the only place I've found in which the turmoil and agitation of the past year subsides. Apparently I need to move to Oregon.