Oh Time, Where have you gone?

Some days, I feel like the fairy tale about the boy with the ball string- every time he pulled the string he skipped a portion of his life. Depending on how hard and long he pulled the string, he shaved of years in seconds.

I feel so much has happened and yet, I have not even reflected the least bit on any of it! The sad, true fact of the matter is, when I do reflect, I only feel a sense of fatigue. Like the boy with the string, I'm pulling too hard and too fast. I'm not reveling in the ordinary or the mundane.

When was the last time I actually tasted my food? !

Oy Vey.

New life goal.
Stop pulling the string!

Feast of St. Francis.

Yesterday was the offical Feast of St. Francis-- though because of the nature of the medieval calendar and the innate catholic nature of celebration, his Feast day occupied two days!  Of course on Sunday, it was only appropriate to say the Franciscan Crown, which, although longer than the regular rosary, tends to be much more interesting as reflections on the life of St. Francis are inserted into the normal reflections on the life of Mary.

I have deep respect for Mary and her unfaltering "yes" to God.  Her "Yes", simple and beautiful, demonstrates how completely we can trust God. He never abandoned Mary. He will never Abandon us. But St. Francis' "Yes" to God was frought with so much more adventure and humour! I cannot help but wonder if the rosary would be said more often and with more joy than if we picture St. Francis' running headlong into the hands of the Moors to convert them.... or St. Francis, earnestly waking up his whole order on account of a poor friar who thought he might die of starvatition,  and creating a feast out of grapes... or St. Francis and Clare, praying so fervently that the people of the town thought the church was on fire!!!  These are all the joys of Mary, just viewed through another person's actions!

So often, Mary is simply a "good person".  In the human imagination a "good person" translates to terms of being a very pleasant but boring person.  However, by defintion and not by imagination, a "good person" is a person of action who responds to the call of the Holy Spirit.  A boring person has no place in this call to action because a boring person does not " do" anything.   By the saints that litter our church's halls and names we know that the Holy Spirit never chooses boring people. 

Seven Impossible things before breakfast.

I'm not going to kid myself as to the cleverness of my title-- I'm sure, since the film  industry created a fad out of  Alice and Wonderland ,  the sentence fragament " seven impossible things before breakfast" has become horribly cliche. But Cliche is cliche for a very good reason-- because it has expressed exactly what we want to say in the best possible way!  And isn't it the goal of almost every writer, to become the originator of " cliche"? Let's face it-- if your own words are not being overused by other people, it's a clear sign that your words are, well, boring.

But I'd thought I'd give the phrase a whirl and share my seven impossible things before breakfast:


1) Get up. ( always impossible for a night a owl)

2)  Retain hair while washing. ( a gruesome, embarrassing task as in my old age, I seem to becoming more like my father, and less like my mother in that respect).

 3) Keep Willard, the carnival won goldfish, alive without a filter. ( it's probably inhuman and he probably has Ich by now, but filter's are so....EXPENSIVE...and he seems...happy...for a fish)

4). Transpose music for the irascible  church choir without cursing. ( I'm doing God's work, but I'd wish He'd do it Himself sometimes....)

5). Make it through the first half of the morning without coffee.

6). Think of a witty, but endearing and exciting  love note for my fiance's lunch. ( always a pleasure!)

7). Find a job.

And those are the impossible folks. Tune in next time for Seven Insurmountable adventures after tea.







  

Revisiting a Childhood dream

I have a childhood dream that seems to come to me every so often now that I am older. It's never the same though, but seems to have evolved over time.  In the dream, I am in the basement of my house, standing by the room underneath the stairs where we store our luggage.  I open the door and there is a secret passage that somehow leads to the other side of the world.  This is usually ends up being my grandmothers house.  The secret passage, I cannot describe, only that it seems to have gotten bigger in girth with every dream. I also cannot say in much detail what is in the secret passages, only that some passages are safe, and other's are unsafe. I can also say, that each time I have the dream, I know my way through so surely, that I wake up half believing that I have really travelled through such a passage.

  There is a section where the floor is entirely dirt and very dark and has shelves, that have grown into ramps and are slant ways falling into the dirt.  Usually, in the dream, I hurry past this section.
Last night, I did not hurry, but lingered.  There was an old woman in rags, eating the dirt.  I debated on speaking with her, but was overcome with a sort of terror, and hurried through until I found the familar clasp to the door that lead to my grandmother's house.

Instead of finding myself in the upstairs room, as I usually do, I found myself, Ironically, coming through the furnace room in the basement of my house-- just a few yards away from where the secret passage lead.

Two years ago my grandmother moved out of her home, since it was falling apart, and had it torn down.  I suppose, I will never use my secret passage in my mind to get there anymore.

I feel strangely empty. 

All you need in a realtionship: Tea and Vacuum technology.

Each morning I wake up at 6:30 am, throw on my yellow robe, drowsily pad to the kitchen, and proceed to make my love his tea.  Selecting a tea in the morning tends to be almost a herculean task for two reasons: Firstly, because I have a whole cabinet stacked full of teas to choose from and often times my tussled head is bombarded with falling tins of oolongs and Aasams whose positions in the cabinet only seemed to be temporarily held in by the cabinet door. Secondly, because in addition to the tea attack, my brain struggles with making any sort of definitive choice in the morning.  This usually constitutes for the blending of teas in usual and unusual combinations.  I find blending of teas to be beneficial for both my fiance, as he likes the fun and festive mixes, and for the cabinet, as the depleting supply of tea makes for more space to store the teas.    Unless of course, the  cabinet has some sort of vacuum technology placed in it........

I'm a fan of vacuum technology.  Last Christmas I bought my love a thermos that keeps his tea warm for up to twelve hours because it has vacuum technology. Since my love, in addition to sugar, takes milk in his tea, the thermos is very handy.  The milk does not cool the tea too much because the vacuum technology traps the temperature as it is so when you pour your tea twelve hours later  it's still the nice, hot, tasty tea you made in the wee morning hours.  Which makes for a happy fiance.  Which makes for a happy me.  Which results in  a very happy relationship for us all around. All thanks to Vacuum technology.

Following Neil Gaiman, Early Morning Runs, and other whatnot shenanigans.

I had to spell check Shenanigans because, as otherwordly as the word is, it still seems to have a proper spelling. I find that rather unfortunate because I was enjoying being liberal with my "a's" and "n's". So it looked like " Shanannigans!"   But I suppose the "e" does give it a little...something.

Last week, after reading Neil Gaiman's Anansi's boys, I made the exciting discovery that he has a BLOG. Since I have read almost everything there is to read by him, it was more than thrilling that to know that I could read something written by him EVERY DAY! Or whenever he blogs. Unfortunately, although his blog is interesting, it's rather unsettling to know your favorite author  is made of flesh and blood and meets producers, celebrates children's birthdays, and....edits.....works,ect.
But the tone, is more or less, the same, and although slightly taken aback that Mr. Gaiman is human, I am enjoying peeking into an author's life.

As an Afterthought.....Too bad Oscar Wilde never blogged.....though I suspect most of his material, though wildly funny, would not be very appropriate.

Oh. And addressing the middle issue of my blog title: I ran today. My body is now in that paradoxical state of being happily refreshed but pleasantly exhausted. 

I think I'll probably walk later on, and enjoy the sun while it lasts.  I always feel the end of summer expresses Carpe Diem best.

coffee

I  used to think that I was nothing without my cup of coffee securely in hand and a bagel slathered with peanut butter clutched in the other.  I realized, today, as I drove grumpily across town to hand in my time card, that my former assumption was untrue--- I definitely am something.....very.....hideous...with claws and a very deep desire to destroy.

Coffee, then, is none other than my salvation every morning. It is the antidote that keeps me from becoming the evil wicked witch of the west and transforms me into--- Glinda! Albeit, a very bouncy, trouncy Glinda.

And now...
To the munchkins!