And all the rest: March 2010

Sundays

I’ve gone through many phases in my relationship with Sunday. I’m sure many of them are familiar to some of my readers. There was once a time I did not differentiate the days, I grew a little and then it was Fun Church Day, then Boring Church Day followed quickly by This-ought-not-to-be-boring Church day. Then in rebellion I gave up on the idea of Sabbath and told God “so there.” And now I am largely indistinguishable from the majority of Christiany people whose Sundays are not restful but packed with activity and events and church. Nevertheless, I believe I have come to once more enjoy the day and have carved out a little Sabbath rest, which in the end, I have interpreted not as a ceasing from activity, but engaging an altogether different activity. I have enjoyed this Sunday and it has generated in me a blog. (There is a particular feeling in my mind attached to blogging. I should blog about it one time).

“Sunday” begins at 12:30am after my shift when I drive home to a hot bath and an overnight honey mask (one of these days I am going to rant about how much the beauty industry not only over charges for products but poisons skin with untested toxins). (I have a special pillow case for the mask, don’t worry).

As of yesterday, my Sunday morning now includes breakfast in bed with a tray I just got at MCC. I have been looking for this sort of tray now for over 6 months. Below is a picture of what it looks like.

(That’s not me—yet. But more imortantly, that is not now, nor ever shall be, my room).

4.50$ The trick to MCC shopping is to have a mental list always ready and to go whenever you have a little 15 min gap and quickly move through the store looking for the various treasures you know you need (or didn’t know you need).

Church

Church takes up the hours of 8:15-12:30 (assuming I am singing). Which I was today, and we even got a little outrageous and decided to do “Jesus my All in All” as a round... whew.

I have finally found a church I like. Perhaps it would be better to say, I have finally found a group of people I like getting together with on Sunday. I still hate sermons for the most part, but I am learning to sip it away with a cup of coffee, a few snide remarks and get on with the good stuff: all the wonderful interaction that happens in between the Real Service. My favourite are the little children who have not quite learned the rules of etiquette. Our church is small enough, however, that any Formality is rather informal.

After the sermon there is a 10min coffee break, where I recover from the moral lecture with my 2nd cup, and dissuade the small children I “teach” to wait. They do not care about grown-up things like coffee, so they make faces and gestures to remind me that I have momentarily forgotten the central meaning of the universe: them.

We explored the property today. Found a fuzzy caterpillar—no doubt the scariest thing she’ll ever go through. We are going to petition the Leadership Team to allow us to construct a “Castle” (complete with suspended machine guns... these are not my children).

Sabbath

It is the next 2 ½ hours which are the heart of my Sabbath. 12:30-3:00 is set aside to do all the home-ish things I have neglected during the week. I cook foodies for lunch, wash cloths, and clean the house. Are you surprised that this is my Sabbath? During the week, if you do not count sleep, I spend roughly 40mins of consciousness in my house a day (roughly 20 mins to wake, eat and leave, 5 sporadically throughout the day (ie retrieving things I inevitably forgot on my first trip to school) and 15 to settle in for the night).

These 2 hours on Sunday are not for homework, they are not creative acts, they are not even for any form of leisure. They are set aside to inhabit my home.

Perhaps it takes the homeless to realize how much significance there is to caring for possessions and space. Doing “home stuff” is not an ordinary “chore”, but, I realize, a form of worship in that one takes care for what has been given, often at great expense.

Today for the first time this year, it was warm enough to hang my laundry outside. Have you ever spent time hanging laundry outside, reader? I recommend it. I have logged countless hours doing this at L’Abri and it is close to gardening in many ways because you are there with your thoughts, the noise of the trees in the wind, sun on your face and arms and putting order to your world. (I should include this in my beauty rant: why do people pay for tans when they could just go outside and not only get a good tan, but also create something in the process!? One has to be careful not to wear t-shirts all the time, of course).

So elated by the experience of hanging my laundry, I decided to wash my car.

I think I am solar powered.

Sunday ends with one last shift where I prepare for the next week, hopefully doing homework. Which I am doing at the moment, but then I have a thought about today, so I write it down. I am distracting myself I know. I justify blogging during busy school times by telling myself that I need to remember that I actually do enjoy writing, and that it will help me to enjoy writing my papers. I don’t know that this is really true, but it is plausible enough for me to believe it.
Monday begins at 12:30am when I arrive home and face the coming week before drifting into a short nap. Tonight I will get home and face the reality of only 3 weeks left of school.

I should go back to reading.

Hello Spring!

Yesterday saw unprecedented highs of +8c! The snow was melting, and I spent two hours reading outside listening to the sounds of water everywhere running away into the earth, melting! This is the time of year when the earth goes through its most amazing transformation. We watch as wakes up from a death like sleep--a wakening which incorporates all our body as we hear, smell and see spring come into being! It is the mystery of life, and coincides with the Easter season and we experience in the earth some part of the great wonder of the resurrection.

I could barely contain my joy yesterday, and needing some outlet for it, I went out and took some pictures.