Category Archives: The Great Outdoors

Morning Glory

25 Monday Jan 2010

Posted by in Life at Home, Prayer, Soul Care, The Great Outdoors

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The navy sky will soon fade from the sun’s washing of light.

For now it’s dark in Mesta Park.   I sit in my favorite living room chair looking out my dining room window.  The house is quiet, my husband off to work at the smallish former servant’s quarters outback.  The dogs, replete with food, have settled in all around me to sleep.  The candle is lit, bouncing light off the walls, while a prayer-book and Bible wait in my lap.

The words will keep, while watching the blue colors change outside my window will not.  I’ve no popcorn to eat, but I hold a strong cup of coffee to help me wake up with the day.  The curtain of clouds is open today and the promise of color waits for its call.

This morning glow show is one I never grow tired of — navy turns to unwashed denim to washed denim and corals and oranges and pinks mix into the crowded blue — meanwhile the artificial light, that glows through the windows of other houses surrounding me, reduces from stark contrast until lost in the sea of sunshine.

Eventually, my eyes let go of the scene playing on the screen outside my dining room windows.  I turn my head to look out another window, but my eyes get caught by the light playing over my favorite Thomas Kinkade print, one appropriately called, Morning Glory Cottage.

I love everything about this charming little cottage — the blue roof, the fence out front, its name.  And though I cannot detect them with my eye, I know riotous heavenly blue morning glories grow somewhere on the face of that old cottage.  Yellow light glows behind the windows, and I think, how good my cobalt blue glass would look sitting on the window ledge.

Someday, I hope to live in a cozy cottage like this one, when I’m too old to climb the stairs of this lovely old two-story of mine.  Or maybe I’ll downsize to a one-story before then, when I’m ready for a smaller place.  Someday will come all too soon.

For now, morning has broken and its glory surrounds me.  I look out my sanctuary upon the sky in worship.  Only then can I break open the prayer-book to read.

Connecting the Dots

15 Friday Jan 2010

Posted by in Far Away Places, Prayer, The Great Outdoors

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Walking a Prayer Labyrinth

I confess to not sitting in front of the television for the latest news in Haiti.

If ostriches bury their heads in sand, count me as their close feathered friend.  I do not wish to watch the Haitian people pick up the scattered and broken pieces of their lives on my television set for the same reasons that I refuse to rubber-neck at the scene of a car wreck.

I risk that others might find me hard and uncaring, but I keep my eyes averted out of respect and compassion for the victims of the tragedy, and those close at hand who are doing their level best to lend a helping hand.  Refusing to rubber-neck at television coverage is my way of  granting the Haitian people privacy and space to grieve, to grapple, to gripe and grope toward solutions that are barreling upon them at warp speed.

I’ve been getting my occasional updates off the radio.  I was sitting in the Subway Sandwich parking lot when I first heard the story on NPR, last Tuesday evening.  The island of Haiti had suffered a major earthquake, the news anchor said.  Seven point O on the Richter scale.

The story did not  grow into front page headlines on Wednesday, at least in my small dot of the world.  I wondered if there were no ‘hard’ news to report.   But by Wednesday afternoon — or was it Thursday? — I heard tell of 50,000 dead.  Later it grew to 100,000.  But those interviewed hedged their bets by saying that no one really knew.

So far, the few dots I can connect are these:  Tuesday afternoon late.  7.0.  Death and destruction.   Aid promised and descending, and in the short-term, disconnected.  Shock all around.  Years to recover.  For the “lucky” ones.

Why is it that we talk of what we do not know, especially when tragedy hits?  Is it a way of making the unreal real or thinking about the unthinkable, a way of expressing grief, of showing concern or merely an exercise in connecting dots?

Until God shows up in the actions of human flesh, women in Haiti are leaning on their faith to deal with the aftermath.  I learned this news from CNN, while waiting for a doctor’s appointment earlier today.  The reporter concluded by saying that these Haitian women were turning their eyes to God for help.

Following their lead, I too will keep my eyes on God…and connect with the “dots.”

Open for Business

14 Thursday Jan 2010

Posted by in Life at Home, Prayer, Soul Care, The Great Outdoors

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Already, that first bluish light on the eastern sky is lifting the darkness that covers Mesta Park.

I like to watch the day open for business.  One solitary car drives on nearby Walker Avenue.  There are no birds yet.  No squirrels.  No dogs running up and down the fence.  All of this will come later.

My day began at four-thirty this morning  with my husband getting ready for his Houston day trip.  We both have full days, so an early start helps keep the day more spacious.

Tonight I’m bringing supper for my contemplative prayer group.  Nothing difficult — just a little potato soup and chicken salad, that I will serve on those lovely French Saigon baguettes from the grocery store near my home.  I have the night off from leading; it will be easier to prepare the physical food than serving in my normal role of writing and facilitating the evening’s prayer meditation.

The break creates space for my spiritual direction coursework.  I’m contemplating my final project — a paper that I will present to my small group of fellow students and instructors.  The topic, rather open, will allow me to pursue my own interests as they apply to the work of spiritual direction.

I shake my head in wonder that this three-year journey is almost over.  The prayer practices, the Ignatius retreat and even this spiritual direction practicum year have all helped to open up my life, much like the day opens up before me.  What business will  arrive  after the course work is over and my certificate is in hand?

For now, it is enough to rejoice in knowing that light has washed away some of my former darkness.  I will end my three-year journey better acquainted with myself and an Everyday God — such knowledge allows me to be more accepting of faults and brokenness — by own and others.   I notice that I also exercise greater patience, and though I still keep busy days, I no longer try to stuff 10 pounds of life into a five-pound day — now I’m down to six pounds.  Maybe in time, it will be only four.

I am better at waiting in the dark unknown for the light and answers to come.  Even now, I look out my window and the day is here.  Walker Avenue is busy with cars.  And the wind is shaking the leaves of that old Magnolia tree  to wake it up for business.  The birds are out, for I hear their sweet chirps.  And somewhere out there, hidden behind the Magnolia leaves, is a squirrel or two beginning their day.

It’s time to wake up three sleepy-head dogs.