Slaying Dragons

French legend holds that St. Martha (of Biblical-Good-Housekeeping fame) tamed a dragon that lived under a bridge in Tarascon-- by singing songs to it.

How in the world did St. Martha end up in France, you say? Another legend holds that she and her less-busy sister Mary, their resurrected brother Lazarus, along with Mary Salome and Mary Magdalene set sail with Joseph of Aramithea. The same Joseph, by the way, who gave up his burial plot for Jesus, Who didn't end up occupying it for more than three days.

But I digress.

St. Martha  (just plain old Martha back then ) allegedly tamed a wild beast comprised of six short legs like a bear's, an ox-like body covered with a turtle shell, a scaly tail that ended in a stinger, and a lon's 's head. Martha had some serious courage.

 According to legend, she tamed it with hymns and prayers, took it into town where it was promptly attacked by villagers. No surprise, it died, and Martha seized the opportunity to preach to to the crowds -- many of whom turned to Christianity. 

I've evolved into a Martha-like housekeeper, much to the surprise of those who Knew Me When. HA

I like to stay busy, and I tend to slay dragons that I see on my horizon. Although I have a pretty good singing voice, and pray often and fervently, these days it takes more than singing to slay dragons. 

It takes courage. Courage, that comes from surviving a lifetime of Unusual Events.

Courage to do the Biblical thing, and go directly to someone who has offended you, and not call a committee meeting to mediate. “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over." Matthew 18:14-16 

Courage,  to stand up to people who would censor your thoughts. 

For example, escaping my old boss at the newspaper, who wrote me up once for reporting loss in revenue -- due to the temp covering my desk undercharging my accounts (while I was in the hospital) Wrote me up for "pointing fingers". Huh. "Pointing fingers"... when I was reviewing my personal sales accounts in my absence, and upholding company interests. Never heard a spreadsheet called pointing fingers. 

Or today, accused of violating Diocese policy -- which in fact I did not. "You are not allowed to communicate with parents on Facebook" -- from the person who until today, was ON MY Facebook.  HUH?? Did not use social media during the workday for the incident in question, did not use Official websites for personal use, did not state that my views were that of the Diocese, did not use sexual overtones or contact minors. (Yeah, that's in the communications policy... written out but not enforced much... just gonna walk away from THAT one. ) 

And, sadly, I did. Walk away. Not going to stay and be accused of nothing, by people who are simply afraid to lose donations to the church budget. "Never sacrifice quantity for quality" is apparently not their credo.

I loved my job. Loved my babies. They loved me. Their moms called, and texted, and messaged in frustration and horror, and bolstered my bruised spirit. "We love you..." 

Therein lies my comfort. 

Moms, who call to ask me to sing the songs from Circle Time so they can sing the One Song THAT NEEDS TO BE SUNG at bedtime. HA 

The moms who call,and ask if I can babysit because their kid LOVES me. 

I have to remember, kids that I had in preschool and later in high school youth group in CA are on my Facebook as thirty-year-olds, today. Kids I had here in junior high Sunday school, ten years ago, are still my twenty-something buds. 

"IF THEY LISTEN TO YOU, YOU HAVE WON THEM OVER." Thank you, St. Matthew.

I've definitely won some people over, across my lifetime. :-) Moreover, they have heard about the power of God.

Getting back to the Bible,  the Book of Proverbs offers "six things the Lord hateth, and the seventh His soul detesteth", namely:

1.    A proud look

2.    A lying tongue

3.    Hands that shed innocent blood

4.    A heart that devises wicked plots

5.    Feet that are swift to run into mischief

6.    A deceitful witness that uttereth lies

7.    Him that soweth discord among brethren

Not sure where asking someone to stop hurting your feelings lands on that list. 

Pope Francis has some pretty big dragons to slay. I pray for his courage. I pray he survives. I pray...and I will sing hymns as prayers, as I always have. "All hail the power of Jesus' name, let angels prostrate fall, bring forth the Royal diadem, and crown Him Lord of All, bring forth the Royal diadem, and crown Him Lord of All!" 

Onward to other Adventures, other dragons. Most immediately -- the arms of the one person in the world who actually listens to me... who will be here in our house, in a week. 

Onward, to other Adventures, with my Jonathan. My partner-in-dragon-slaying. :-) 

♪ Bridge Over Troubled Water ♪

Blissfield, Michigan, has bridges. Not the stately covered ones of Madison County,

Iowa, perhaps, but the famed Three Bridges. One, the pedestrian bridge, crosses the River Raisin on its' way winding through the sleepy little farm hamlet on land that looks much like the Texas prairie. Big sky country, broad horizons, and a barn every now and then. (The river, named by the French for the wild grapes that grew along its banks, was the site of a major battle in The War of 1812, so don't think it's just a silly name. I did, then I looked it up to find out WHY it had a silly name. HA) My dad would have crossed this bridge a few times, as a child and a teen,dreaming of leaving the sleepy hamlet to Do Great Things. 

But I digress. Sort of. 

The pastor at the Easter service I celebrated this morning took a different tack from the usual Easter story. So often Protestant preachers go sneaky Catholic/Jewish guilt-laying, on the twice-a-year Easter-ers, heavy into the anguish of the Crucifixion to backlight the Resurrection in order to grab at the hearts and souls of the congregation. Instead of reminding us we NEED TO BE BROKEN, this man spoke of a builder. 

This man spoke of Jesus the carpenter. The carpenter who had to size up a piece of wood and create something out of it. The carpenter who, when faced with crucifixion, took the wood and the nails and the ropes that bound Him to it and built a bridge to the Father. 

A bridge that didn't exist before then, because the Father stayed hidden in the Holy of Holies -- until Jesus built that bridge with His death and tore the Temple curtain from top to bottom. Not a curtain like we have in our homes, either, but a 30-foot high, 3-foot thick hand-loomed curtain that veiled the Ark of the Covenant. No human, no team of humans, could have rent that weaving in half, let alone from the top down. He spoke of walking across that bridge, and picturing the Cross beam, on Jesus' shoulders, under our feet. 

Easter. Bridge Building 101.

I've been trying to rebuild bridges. I didn't burn them, as much as I threw flaming spears, put up barriers and planted bramble. Some may never be re-established. Some probably should not be.  Some are coming along. Fortunately for me, the girl who passed Woodshop with a B-, I don't have to keep slaving away at the renovation and repair with my meager skills. 

Jesus, the carpenter from Nazareth, can clear the brambles and the barriers and brush away the soot from the flaming spears, most of which grew cold more than a year ago. He already has -- and strengthened the supports to others that have long been kindred spirits on the Journey.  

On my Facebook page, a reference which might seem silly,  I can count more than a few Friends who used to loathe me for speaking the Truth --  bridges which Jesus has built to folks who probably would have rather seen me fall off of them and float down the river, at some point or another. 

Jesus took nails, cross beams, and rope to make a bridge to the Father in Heaven, leading us, as the pastor said this morning, away from condemnation, sin, and un-forgiveness. 

A Bridge leading us from trying-so-hard-to-be-holy-and-forgiven that we keep checking our lists of How to Be Good and What I Did Wrong, instead of checking in with Him -- to find what He wants for us. 

Jesus has taken the broken pieces of this girl, literally, and made something new.( I have the scars to prove it.) 

He does the same for all who come to the entrance of the bridge, which, if Catholics and Jews might look closely, is just beyond the empty tomb... 

Like Simon and Garfunkel sang once upon a time, He's the bridge over troubled water, laying Himself down. 

We don't have to Do Great Things, nor redress our Bad Things until we get it right, nor be forgiven by someone representing Him. 

We've got a Pedestrian Bridge which He built on good Friday. Keep looking ahead to the other side. 

"When you're weary  Feeling small   When tears are in your eyes   I will dry them all 

I'm on your side When times get rough And friends just can't be found 
Like a bridge over troubled water 
I will lay me down 
Like a bridge over troubled water 
I will lay me down 

When you're down and out    When you're on the street    When evening falls so hard 
I will comfort you 

I'll take your part     When darkness comes     And pain is all around 
Like a bridge over troubled water 
I will lay me down 
Like a bridge over troubled water 
I will lay me down 

Sail on Silver Girl, Sail on by   Your time has come to shine  All your dreams are on their way 

See how they shine  If you need a friend I'm sailing right behind 

Like a bridge over troubled water 
I will ease your mind 
Like a bridge over troubled water 
I will ease your mind"

♪ Skyfall ♪

Last Wednesday, at the prompting of my heart and spirit, I flew to my father's home state to arrive at his birthplace.

The next two days I spent caring for, praying for,  and about with his younger sister, on hospice. The little sister of whom he was jealous ...and it turns out he had a right to be.

At the end of HER life, her children, friends, and community  love her and looked after her in return for her years of dedication to their father and to them. 

Barbara Ann. My phantom aunt. HA not her fault that she remained a shadowy figure for years to us, since she lived in Michigan, and we never ventured further than Colorado on summer vacations. Apparently, 1300 miles one way was our limit. As a preschooler, my over-imaginative self thought she was the girl on the bread trucks. Hey. They had the same name. (And the same hair). HA ( I KNEW she wasn't the girl on the beach boys' song, since I don't think she ever wore a bikini, nor hung around  Doheny - or any other CA beach. )

The youngest of the three in my dad's family, she measured a model of strength to me. 

Stalwart, steady, rarely  venturing out of her hometown save for the occasional trip to Detroit  or to Ann Arbor to shop.  One of those was to fly her father's funeral in 1977. We had the odd family occurrence of a funeral AND wedding all in one week. When the life celebrations had passed, we took her to see the Pacific Ocean along the Santa Barbara coast. Fitting, I think, looking back. She radiated sheer joy to wade among the waves, barefoot, slacks rolled up to her knees, feeling the sand and seashells in between her toes. 

A letter my dad wrote to MY mother, back  in college, talked of that same glee, a young Barb who propped up her senior portraits all over the house, to include one against the toaster, so that wherever she went, she could gaze upon her smiling self.  Typical big brother, squashing little sister joy. Sigh. ;-)

That same girl stayed with another family in Hillsdale while her folks moved back to Blissfield, for the duration of her senior year so that she could take languages and get a better education than in the little hamlet where she was born -and would remain. 

Dad probably harbored envy because she had a firm grasp on what eluded him. Barb lived a contented life. Smitten by a local high school football star, an All-State ranked player, she'd gone off to college dreaming big dreams. 

Quitting in her undergrad years to be with her fiancé , who had big dreams of his own, a football star for Michigan state. Most tragically, he was savagely attacked in his dorm room and suffered brain damage. She went to him and never left his side. A once bright young man, now limited to the ranks of the working class. Barb worked as a secretary for a Realtor, making slim ends meet, with my cousin Linda making dinner for dad and two younger brothers while her mom finished up long workdays. 

Barbara Ann.  Her middle name may  have been homage to her grandmother, Anna, a little slip of a thing standing in a starched blouse and crinoline skirt, hair pulled back tight. Squinting through spectacles intense humid June heat, in a photograph from a 1922 family picnic. The Peter were precise and practical farm folk - sending registration forms for such events to get a head count. Necessary practicality - the 1922 photo shows upwards of 100 people stretching over four generations. Barb followed the family precision. 

Started a career as the town librarian when her oldest had graduated high school and her youngest was 8, a career that her friends and neighbors will talk to you about to this day. Some of them have saved certificates earned by their children in her summer reading programs! They'll tell you she was strict and sometimes stern at the library, but that she loved the kids who loved to read like she did.

Yep, that's my aunt Barb. Necessarily practical to a fault. Pretty disciplined, indeed, she was the kind of housekeeper who, when she went into labor with my cousin Bruce, stayed at home until she finished up the supper dishes. Then it was time to go.

I had a hard time leaving her on Saturday, even though she had slipped into the end stages. We weren't close through the years,  but in her lay the last vestiges of my long-gone grandparents, aunt, and father -- and the lady who loved the beach that day in 1977. Sigh.

Got on the plane to go home and the opening of the in-flight movie of the day made me weep a little. "Skyfall". James Bond doesn't ordinarily induce tears. But having seen the film already, knowing an ancestral estate Played an important plot point...the lyric to the theme got me. 

"This is the end Hold your breath and count to ten Feel the earth move and then Hear my heart burst again

For this is the end I've drowned and dreamt this moment So overdue I owe them Swept away, I'm stolen

Let the sky fall When it crumbles We will stand tall Face it all together...

Let the sky fall We will stand tall At skyfall"

I did the dishes at your house, Aunt Barb, straightened things, up, and left it nice so you'd be ready to go, for the last time... :-), and on Sunday afternoon, you did.

We will stand tall, with your kids and granddaughters, and beloved widower, while their sky falls, today. 

Give everyone a hug for us...

Thank you, Pope Benedict. Thank you...

Nearly ten years ago now I worked in the daycare of a local church. Dealing with a sociopath husband, three teenage and pre-teen boys, and younger and more ridiculous hormones of my own, most days gave me grief. I emerged from a bathroom break once, heart heavy, praying my way through the day, and made the sign of the cross over myself, as if hugging myself in prayer.

Not long after the 'director' of the daycare summoned me to her inner sanctum. " Some one saw you cross yourself. ARE YOU CATHOLIC?"

My California-psyche sat stunned at the narrow-minded, pointed-ness of the question.

"I'm sorry, what did you just ask me?"

Venom dripping from her sharp tongue, she repeated."ARE YOU CATHOLIC?"

Huh. I looked at her and said evenly, " As my employer you should know that, under federal law, you are not allowed to ask me any questions like that. What else did you need?"

She didn't have much else to say.

I think I've always been slightly Catholic.

Of course not baptized or raised as such, but living with the constant need for approval from other human beings, all in the name of God, of course, is very Catholic.

Wait. I take that back. On a few levels, I was raised as a Catholic, disguised as a Presbyterian. HA

The late 1960's and 70's in our household, like many others, left little room for varying thought, sex=sin, church attendance: mandatory; God watches naughty little girls -- but Jesus loved me, ♪ this I know, and like all the "red and yellow, ♪ black and white ♪ little children of the world". That was our world back then.

Yes, He does. My born-during-the Depression parents couldn't help it. One side moved from church to church in the Mennonite community, the other grew up United Brethren; both generations fresh out of the tent revival days at the turn of the century -- where EVERYONE WAS A SINNER GOING TO HELL.

Watching the resignation of Pope Benedict put the seal on my decision to not complete my journey into Catholicism.
 Two weeks ago I beat myself up over "not finishing another quest, what a loser I am." The very next day the head of the Church ( in which I'd tried desperately to understand and fit into) stepped down, stating, "After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths due to an advanced age are no longer suited" for the task."

If the Pope can step aside then it's okay for me to do the same, thought I.

And then the Christian in me realized how very Catholic I have lived. Who cares what the Pope chooses for himself? Why does that matter to me????

Granted, Catholicism has done much for the world. Established hospitals, schools, given remarkable aid to poor nations. Done much for humanity and....stayed rooted in humanity.

"On this rock I will build my church, " declared Jesus. And He did. The tomb of St. Peter lies below the Basilica. The Church that sings, " we profess your death o Lord, and proclaim your Resurrection, until You come again..." at every mass, has yet to let go of the death, and yet to fully live in the Resurrection. They still want you to focus on becoming holy... which, for us fully human peeps, is unattainable.

I can't ascribe fully to a faith system that says that Jesus' mother is as holy as He is. He was fully human AND fully divine. She was fully human. Like us.

I can't ascribe fully to a faith that only allows the approved to accept the gift of the Eucharist, the body and blood of Jesus given to all mankind.

I can't ascribe fully to a faith that requires your sins to be absolved by one of your peers, in a confessional. While confession and accountability are necessary for a healthy soul, Jesus did not hang six hours on the cross for me to be forgiven by a seminarian. That's going a little bit backwards. The Jews HAD to go to God through a priest, as well, until the Crucifixion, when the Temple curtain ripped in half, from bottom to top at the moment of His death.

A curtain woven three feet thick and ten feet high. Ripped, in half, to reveal the Holy of Holies. From top to bottom. No human force could have done that.

So I went backwards in my quest to move forwards... which is okay as long as you look at the past in the rearview mirror and not make a u-turn.

I've realized that I've lived my life like some sort of crusading Scarlett O'Hara, always dependent on the kindness of others, and always measuring myself against myself and (what I perceive to be) other's standards, and, not unlike the Catholic church and other zealous religious factions, throwing MY faith into other people's faces trying to coerce them into MY way of thinking. That's not faith.

That's religion.

That's the humanity of faith, the rules, the laws, the doctrine, the dogma. The knowledge.

Webster's sums it up nicely: "a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs."

Human affairs. 

Millions of  Catholics bewildered as to what will happen now, since the normal order of their faith system has been disrupted by a human choosing to be human, and not divine. 

I asked my late father, on the one face-to-face visit we had in 20 years, why in the world he became an Orthodox Jew -- after living a life as Christian proclaiming the freedom of faith from such oppressive religion. In his alcoholically academic vagueness, he mumbled, " I was always looking for more answers."

I'm my father's girl. Always looking for more answers, the surety, the inside scoop, the cocky confidence that comes from Knowing All and Seeing All, and being able to Explain It All. Oye.

It's time I step past the rent Temple curtain, the one torn from top to bottom by an unseen, inexplicable force, beyond the human affairs and into the space which only contains God. No answers. Just God. 

"We proclaim your death oh Lord,♪ and profess your Resurrection, until You come again..."

THAT'S the mystery of faith.

♪ The Way We Were ♪

So I'm listening to Barbra Streisand sing, at the Oscars last night...singing for the first time at the Oscars in 36 years. The last time she sang I had my first crush on Jon. We were 10, going on 11. HA

" Memories, light the corners of my mind Misty watercolor memories of the way we were. Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind smiles we give to one another for the way we were. Can it be that it was all so simple then or has time rewritten every line? If we had the chance to do it all again tell me would we? Could we? Memories... may be beautiful and yet what's too painful to remember we simply choose to forget...So it's the laughter we will remember whenever we remember the way we were. The way we were. "

I got misty-eyed listening to her... and more than a little wistful.

Every now and then, I miss my family. Not my boys, or my mom -- or her twin, since they have yet to grow weary of me and set me aside, or they love me enough to not do so. I miss my dad, but in a vague sort of way now that he's actually passed away. I missed him fiercely all those years, hoping for some sort of re-connection, and now that it's gone forever, it's more sentimental at best.

I miss the family I grew up with.  We still talk to each other... but I'm on the outside.

My outspoken, overzealous self painted me out of the family picture more than a few times, and now I'm pretty much out of frame. Either my multiple apologies for erratic behavior fell on deaf ears or worse, were never listened to in the first place. I've tried.

My first impulse this morning was to write to those who have set me aside, hoping to re-establish a semblance of relationship... but then I remembered I gave up co-dependence for Lent, HA.

Gave it up for good.

I have my memories. One of my nieces is expecting her first baby, and I wish I could share that with her, but I'm unforgivable. Sooo... I remember her as a little girl playing with my boys, a headstrong teenager vying for attention between her sisters ( I know how ThAT felt HA ). I remember happy family times with all of our children playing and laughing together. I miss her, and her mother, and sisters, and her brother and his family, but they are content without my infrequent presence in their lives. Her brother, the father of four boys, had one of them sit down and write a letter to another sibling about the things he liked about them.

Good advice. Wishing it would carry across the family, to me... but it doesn't. Oh well.  "So it's the laughter... we will remember.."

I have my memories of one who gathered all the family in on holidays, handled our anxious grandmother ( across town from her), before and after my ever-patient grandfather passed away. I have her recipes, the wooden clogs she sent me from Holland as a little girl, the reverence of worship that she taught me without preaching a word. I offended her one too many times with my political views, and multiple attempts at reconciliation have gone by the wayside. I guess I'm one of those memories that's "too painful to remember.. we simply choose to forget..."

I know some families don't stay close once everyone has grown up and moved on and such...but some do. And some of my family is close to the others. Just not to me. :-( That's where the wistfulness sprang from last night.

Like the baggage I spoke of in my last blog, we can either carry it, set it aside, or consider it a burden. I just remember the good stuff these days...but wish it was reciprocal. "Misty watercolor memories of the way we were. Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind smiles we give to one another for the way we were."

We were fun, once, and loving, and close. Thank God for memories, and for  the way we were. :-)

Baggage. It's everywhere. Get used to it.

Jonathan and I have a lot of baggage. Four marriages,  nine kids, four divorces, living in a war zone, living with cancer, PostTraumaticStressDisorder ( both of us, although mine is non-military related ), family goofiness, you name it. A lot of baggage. 

We also have a lot of luggage. Gorilla boxes, old garment bags, suitcases, duffles, military gear -- a lot of stuff.  Jon works overseas and recently had to get an ADDITIONAL passport because his was full. 

I have logged more air miles in the last three years than I did in the previous 43 cumulatively (including a trip to the Holy Land with my father once upon a time) traveling towards healing from cancer.  

Baggage. For the most part, we tend to handle it pretty well. Neither one of us enjoy hauling luggage around.

It's a pain, post-operative, or traveling alone after having chemo. 

It's a pain, hauling body armor around and waiting for Space-A flights that often take 24 hours to hop on to. It's just the way it is. You got stuff. It goes with you. You don't REALLY need it...you can always get more stuff. But it's your stuff, yours to lug along, for the journey. 

Occasionally, when we have money problems or a former spouse pops up like a bad penny, we have to carry that baggage again, momentarily, until we remember it needs to be stowed. 

Grief is like that. Initially it paralyzes you. It ebbs and flows and ebbs and flows until the tide recedes. Occasionally it resurfaces, and then goes out with the tide again. You never know when it will pop up. 

I remember a seemingly trivial occurrence, years after my dad left and moved abroad (AND disowned us), seeing someone put their cigar stub on the same flagstone that he used to, on a visit to the house. Daddy would come home, smoke his cigar for a few moments, then put it on that ledge and come in. In the morning he'd grab his remaining cig and head off again for another day. 

That person, repeating that small inconsequential action, had no idea it crushed me - almost physically - for a moment. 

That memory isn't baggage, in the psychobabble term. It's a memory. 

I don't think about it every second, but I remember that instance of grief, and years later, I'm grateful I can recall it vividly without the accompanying twinge. I'd have baggage if it caused me to write a manifesto... but I don't. I just have vivid memories...until someone says, "You've got a lot of baggage." " You've got a prolific amount of triggers that need to be healed." Then I find myself tucked into a ball on a chair, unable to react, the epic failures of my life dancing like skeletons around my heart. " Do you need counseling? " No. 

Do I have baggage?

Yeah, I do. Or... maybe I don't. Setting psychobabble aside, I have that particular gift of vivid memory that brings me back to certain events as though I'm still there. 

Yesterday a friend of mine, a Realtor back home, let me know that in the six-degrees-of-separation world that we live in these days, that she'd gotten a new listing right across the street from the high school we went to together. The house of my lifelong family friend, 'Aunt' Rose and her best friend of 54 years, 'Aunt Jo'. 

I practically grew up in that house. I learned to swim in the pool there, played in the cabanas out by the deck, chatted it up with the rabbi who lived across the street, shared confidences with Rose in the kitchen about love and life and faith, played poker with my sisters...wow. What a wondrous thing to have my high-school friend help a new family move into that wondrous place of happy memories.

Huh. I got tears in my eyes thinking of those happy days, and I wanted to run home and see the house before new furniture got into it, as though it would preserve it. Silly, sentimental, and sweet. 

Last weekend I got tears in my eyes when I chanced to intersect with my past, evoking memories of someone I chose to be with in a less happier time. Huh. I wanted to run home at that time, too, and I did. Home is good. 

Am I a baby for wanting to run home? Maybe. Maybe not. Home is a safe place, especially when someone tries to force you to do something or be something you are not. 

Baggage? Yah, I have baggage. Who doesn't? Who doesn't have a junk drawer, a cluttered closet? Who doesn't have memories that evoke emotion??

Baggage isn't necessarily bad unless it's lost or thrown at someone. Triggers aren't necessarily bad. They remind us that we have been failures, epic in nature, but we have also been huge successes. 

When we take it on a journey, baggage can either be a burden or a comfort. 

The trappings and trailings of our memories, the poignant moments for good or for bad which make us get tears in our eyes are good for our souls. Sometimes, like that guy innocently leaving his cigar on the ledge, sometimes the tears punch us in the stomach for a minute. Sometimes, they bring back images of swimming with my sisters and being loved on by special people, and our hearts are warmed and soothed. Perhaps it's His way of keeping us strong. Lugging it along, stooping to sit on it and close it back up, heaving it into the rubbish bin on occasion, or lifting it gently, to be stored in a special place. 

Jonathan and I have a lot of baggage. We've brought it all home, together. 

We'll continue to sort it out, together -- sometimes closing it back up until it's time to unpack it  -- and either file it or pitch it. 

We believe that Jesus died on the cross so we don't have to drape ourselves in it, and feel guilty for it for the rest of our human lives, let alone for eternity. We believe that the sackcloth and ashes that we have each worn, on certain days of our lives, are only for those certain days. 

Jesus died for us, to turning our mourning into dancing. Jesus showed up on the planet to bring life...

...so God doesn't want us to forget about our past. It's part of who we are, part of where He's led us, how He's shaped our lives. If there are parts that were awful, so be it. It's forgiven by His death on the cross -- but just because it's forgiven by Jesus, for all time, doesn't mean it didn't happen.  

Like Jon's passport, when it gets full and tattered, we get another so there are clean pages to stamp. 

That's the passport to peace, the peace that passes understanding. That's Jesus. 

♪ How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand? ♪

"She climbs a tree and scrapes her knee, her dress has got a tear She waltzes on her way to mass and whistles on the stairsAnd underneath her wimple she has curlers in her hairI've even heard her singing in the abbey She's always late for chapel but her penitence is real She's always late for everything except for every meal...I hate to have to say it but I very firmly feel: Maria's not an asset to the abbey.
I'd like to say a word in her behalf-- then say it, Sister Margaretta -- Maria makes me laugh.

How do you solve a problem like Maria? How do you catch a cloud and pin it down? How do you find a word that means Maria? A flibbety-gibbet, a will'o'the'wisp, a clown? Many a thing you know you'd like to tell her, many a thing she ought to understand...but how do you make her stay? And listen to all you say? How do you keep a wave upon the sand? Oh, how do you solve a problem like Maria? How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand?"

Lyricist and songwriting team Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein II wrote these lilting notes to describe a novice Catholic nun living in Salzburg, Austria, in the late 1930's. ( My mother probably had no idea that these would fit her second daughter to a tee, as exasperated as she would become, and has  remained, regarding my unconventional Calamity Jane self. Sorry Mom. Least I can sing. ) As we all know, the orphaned Maria became governess to Captain Georg Von Trapp's seven children and they eventually married  -- their remarkable tale crafted into the R & H musical, "The Sound of Music".

I've always been a lot like Maria Von Trapp. Always late, always singing, always hoping for the best but fairly hapless in achieving the best, always judged by others as just not quite acceptable,  loved and cherished as long as I'm making everybody laugh and am a sparkly pretty party favor who follows the rules without question.

I AM a lot like Maria in the fact that despite all that, I am loved and in love with a man who has several slightly incorrigible children who need to be loved. :-)

I'm pretty sure that's also where my interest in Catholicism began, all those years ago, listening to the Nonnberg nuns sing praises to God.

I'm also pretty sure my year's journey into Catholicism has run its' course.

I just returned/escaped from a morning at a Catholic "retreat".

Convinced by peers and associates that it was not Catholic but Christian and a "faith-building" weekend, I reluctantly went, hoping to be blessed by camaraderie and fellowship and time to pray and reflect. I was supposed to stay until tomorrow night. I lasted from 6:30 am for four hours, after being herded to and fro by a team that Captain Von Trapp would have been proud of.

All they needed were ship's whistles.

A team that snapped at me when I wanted to step outside for some fresh air. ( YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO GO OUTSIDE). Huh?

A team that did not allow anything but water to be brought into the upstairs meeting room, even though they'd stated several  times that we were to make ourselves at home and ask for anything we needed. (Don't ask Catholic ladies on a planning team for coffee. Not a good idea. They're on a schedule.)

A retreat without cell phones is one thing. A chance to reflect, to pray, to be away from everyday life, yes, that's what I reluctantly agreed to.

A rigorously scheduled PROGRAM, from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. at night, that the parish priest won't make time to come in to bless, one which does not allow one to reflect, to pray, or to relax, is not a retreat.

It's an in-service.

After being banned from the coffee three times, banned from the outdoors-- to the extreme of cardboard over all the windows--  and desperately trying to keep my claustrophobic self from freaking out in a small room crammed with fifty women, I asked to speak to one of the team in private -- and even THAT had to be approved. By someone else.

" Do you know her? Let me see if it's okay." Really???

We finally got to go outside. GASP -- the horror.

I told her that the crux of my dilemma was that one of the team leaders happened to be the aunt of the girl that my former husband had denied knowing. Denied seeing someone else, denied getting engaged when I saw them together WITH their engagement pictures, and denied being STILL MARRIED TO ME after I called the pastor who married THEM. While WE were still married.  Yep. That's what we call bigamy, folks. And that's what my lawyer told him  -- and my former Hurricane Husband promptly sent the divorce fees, got a divorce from me four months AFTER marrying this lady's niece.

I wasn't mad at that niece's aunt-lady. She didn't marry him. Lucky for her.

I'm not mad at the niece. She was lied to, just like I was when the serial groom married me after abandoning his first marriage.

But because of all that, I couldn't concentrate fully in the room crammed with fifty women and no window to look out of ,when I wanted to ask her if she liked my furniture which he took from me when he left, if the big screen TV I paid for had a good picture for the Super Bowl last week at her niece's house.

 I know. Get over it. Yep. Move on. Thank you.

Same thing people tell my dear friend who lost her first-born four years ago.
"You've got to move on."

We do, dammit. We move on because it will kill us too if we stay there, but we'd rather lay down and die. We keep moving on. Until we find a baby shoe in a drawer, or until we see someone who knows the someone that we loved, even if it was the wrong thing to love them.

Sometimes it's too much, especially when leaders of a retreat see you crying and still make snide remarks, and get irritated with you for disrupting THEIR PLANS EVEN THOUGH THEY SAID THEY WERE THERE TO SERVE, just like the nuns in the Abbey in Salzburg.

I was in a corner, FINALLY with coffee in my hand, trying to collect my sad self in the corner before rejoining the group with the little dignity I had left.

Another Team lady walked past me, looked over at me, and said, " Let's hope she's done talking...".

I thanked them for their 'hospitality', grabbed my stuff, and headed home.

Problem solved for the Captain Von Trapp Team leaders. Now they can stick to their schedule.

TWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEETTTT.

I'm at home, and in seclusion, just like Maria at one point.

The Catholic Church has run just fine, yep, sho' has, for two thousand years without me, and it can keep on going that way. I love the antiquity of the Church, the traceable continuity to people who KNEW Jesus, who ate with Him, and walked with Him.

A 2,000 year-old-faith, built on the message of the Messiah who never snapped at anyone except money-changers defiling the Temple, unfortunately still remains in the clutches of power-mad peeps. I do not love the rigid order of things that is explained  vaguely as " there have to be rules...". No duh.

That's what the Ten Commandments are for.

I AM like Maria. I sure as hell don't fit in the Abbey.

I do not fit, anywhere -- except in a room full of young children.

Funny, that's what one of the staff told me one day, that I had skills and talents that worked well in that room, and that's where I should stay. I'll do just that, until my own 'Captain' comes home and whistles for me.

How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand? With care and awe. It doesn't stay long...