LENT IS TIME TO TAKE STOCK OF OR LIVES AND OUR DAILY EXPERIENCES

 Taking stock of our lives

Once upon a time, an ancient story tells us, the master had a visitor who came to inquire about Zen. But instead of listening, the visitor kept talking about his own concerns and giving his own thoughts. After a while, the master served tea. He poured tea into his visitor’s cup until it was full and then he kept on pouring.
 
Finally, the visitor could not bear it any longer, “Don’t you see that my cup is full?” he said. “It’s not possible to get anymore in.”
 
“Just so,” the master said, stopping at last. “And like this cup, you are filled with your own ideas. How can you expect me to give you Zen unless you first empty your cup?”
 
Lent is the process of emptying our cups. 

Lent is a time for trimming the soul and scraping the sludge off a life turned slipshod. Lent is about taking stock of time, even religious time. Lent is about exercising the control that enables us to say no to ourselves so that when life turns hard of its own accord, we have the spiritual stamina to say yes to its twists and turns with faith and with hope.

I also think that this PANDEMIC and so  much time at home is pushing more reflection on us.

I think about  junctions in my life when I made choices which made a huge difference. Also it is impossible to go back to those  crossroads. They are in the  irretrievable PAST.

 Each road chosen leads us to others. 

It reminds me of that enigmatic poem by  Robert Frost.

The Road Not Taken

 

BY ROBERT FROST

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

 

Somethng I share with President Biden

 Since the inauguration of our new  President there have been numerous stories about his long life of struggle and his many  attempts to become  President.

One aspect of his difficulties that is mentioned is his  problem of stuttering. 

 I do not understand my own  experience of stuttering, but I did share this both humiliating and  repetitive experience that undermines  every attempt to communicate.

My stuttering surfaced when I was about four years old.

 I recall that  I  was certain that the stuttering was  a sign that I also was like my two sisters who had Down Syndrome,  "RETARDED." 

That was the accepted term then-- better than Mongol or Idiot that people often hurled at them when we  went out to play.

So when I started in Kindergarten at Prospect Street School I  was extremely aware of my stuttering. I had to plan ahead what I was going to say. The M-sound was impossible.  I could not say Ma or Mommy or Mother.  So when I raised my hand to answer a question in class I had to find a way to answer without that dreaded M sound.  I did not always succeed.  and so the fact of my  speaking disorder came to light.  When  that happened I was consigned to a Speech therapy group. And I do  remember how shameful it felt to me that I had to stand and leave the class when those sessions were  scheduled.

I did not like the fact that the group that I was assigned to had people in it that were  slow learners and that had trouble speaking  at all. Also I was in the same school as my older sister Janie. And she often raised a ruckus in the hallways  there and I would be called out of class to calm her down.  THAT was not easy.

I also  dreaded the recess  times when I often  tried to defend Janie as she attempted to play with the girls in the school yard,  She saw this as  interference and told me to let her play,  She did not mind that they were using her as a steady-ender  when they jumped rope and she never had a turn,  I minded that fact but she was just glad to be in the game.

All these  situations made me long to be in another school. The  final blow was the scene in my speech therapy.  The  man leading it kept on saying that I was not moving my tongue correctly.  He put his fingers into my mouth and I could not tolerate it and bit down on his hand which I did not want in my mouth.  He yelled at me and sent me to the principal's office.

 It was a time of disgrace and mortification and I was crying  when the principal came into the room. She admired my dress which my mother had made from a fabric that was  a design of open and closed books,  She asked how someone who could read and write so well was crying in her office, I told her and she said I  would be excused from speech therapy in the future, 

I was grateful, but I was determined to leave.  I was  at the same time  receiving instruction  in preparation for making my first communion in the next year.

I began  talking  about how much I loved the religious instruction and wished I could go to a Catholic School.

My mother  agreed with me and encouraged me, and she talked my Baptist father into  letting me leave the public school. 

I started the Second grade at Saint Joseph's School, and my life was transformed.

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS

 SO glad to be Back in the Bucket after sometime  at the Brigham in Boston.

It is a great hospital and I am grateful that I can go there for procedures and surgeries.

But I am grateful to be back in my home and awaiting the first big storm of the year.

This really feels like Xmas to me and brings me back to the Xmas times of my childhood.

I recall one  Xmas when my mother waited until near Xmas  Eve to purchase a tree. I was so afraid that  we were not going to get one,  Then she told me to dress warmly and walk with her to a place where she had noticed trees for sale. It was a freezing night in December  but I was happy to  go. We left my two sisters alone and we  looked up to the second floor tenement  windows where they were  both watching us and waving happily.

When we arrived we had walked  what seemed to me a long way in the wind and blowing snow. We went up Columbus Avenue and there he was a man with a few lopsided and skinny trees  standing in a bare spot next to the railroad tracks on York Avenue. He was closing shop and clearly did not expect  to sell these  neglected and rejected trees.

My mother told him that she  had only 5 dollars. Could he sell her a tree for that  price?

He looked at her and me shivering in the wind  and he picked the scrawniest of a scrawny bunch and tied it up for us and took the five dollars. Then my mother  picked up the  trunk end and  I held  onto the  top of the tree and we retraced our steps. 

 When we got to our house on Englewood Avenue, we looked up and my sisters were watching for us still.  We waved and they came running down the front stairs to  help and the four of us  hauled  that tree inside. I said that we had waited to the  last moment. She laughed and said yes and in two days we could pick out a better one from  trees thrown out  the day after Xmas.  

We laughed and said  that we would keep ours for the Twelve Days of Christmas.  AND WE DID.

NOSTALGIA DURING THIS HOLIDAY SEASON

 CHRISTMAS WAS ALWAYS A MIXED BAG

I have already written about  the ways that my Aunt Grace provided  the food for our Thanksgiving and also our Christmas feasts.  But there is so much more to  Christmas than the  big meal which is really the entire focus of Thanksgiving.

We had various ways of preparing for Christmas.We thought a lot about Advent.  I also tried to go to daily mass.  Devotional aspects of the season increased after my father's departure in 1953.

Even before that sad event we celebrated or at least I did by saving whatever money I had and buying Xmas gifts.  Our gifts to each other were  not very glamorous. I would pace around Grants and Woolworth's looking at lipsticks for my Aunt Anna and  a perfume for my mother. I got my sisters paddle balls one year and that was a big hit. They could  play with them quite successfully. I had seen them borrow those of other kids, and I knew they could make the ball bounce off the paddle.
 I remember that when my friend Lucille came over to see  my tree and gifts and she looked at the three piles of  gifts that we had opened--one for each of us children. They were almost identical--pajamas, underwear, a new robe, socks. She said, "I see that you have a very practical Xmas." My mother laughed and my Aunt Anna said that she was rude. She was not, she was just being truthful.
We did not get toys. None of us cared about dolls.The only thing that I got that my sisters did not get would be paper doll books and coloring books. Our stockings were filled with an orange and an apple and some walnuts in the shell. Also sometimes hair ribbons or hair clips.
One winter I  had complained to my Aunt Grace that I had to wear some cast off hockey skates of Lucille's brother when we went to the  Blue Pond to skate.  I was amazed when new  lovely white figure skates showed up under the tree for me.There was no giver's name--these were from Santa.  My mother  warned me  not to whine anymore to  my Aunt Grace and I  knew what that meant.
Aunt Grace was always  my secret Santa.  
When  my father was still with us, I do recall some  sudden eruption of a great gift--like a tricycle. Later when I was about six, he brought in a large and gorgeous doll house. Somehow, there was some suggestion of  scandal  about these gifts--that he had won them in a card game or even stolen them.

 I remember that one Christmas morning he reached under his pillow and took out a small box and in it was a gold cross very plain and simple on a gold chain.  I still have that cross.

SECRET SHARER IN THE BUCKET

Joseph Conrad--one of my favorite novelists-- has written  a novel  with that title  THE SECRET SHARER.

 I recently received not one  but two communications from someone who wishes to stay  an anonymous fan. This person  knew my home address and sent cards.  The second one was  to celebrate my  50th anniversary.

  I have been absent on my own  blog and this caused some concern.  I had another  visit to the Brigham and a surgical procedure --  I am now  in my second day  recovering at home.

These medical events are  difficult and   discouraging.  I have a bunch of new  appointments in December and I doubt my ability to keep them.

Time will tell; I certainly can no longer tell.

MY Secret Sharer tells me that he/she?  likes the fact that my blog recalls details of growing up in Pawtucket in the 50s.  I take that endorsement as a hint that she also recalls those times and that decade in this little city.

I enjoy recalling  that part of my life also, but recent events have demanded a more topical response.

  I have  made a point of staying away from politics and  yet, I could not evade the pandemic and the effect that it has had on so many people.

Even the Brigham seemed changed--chaotic and  over run- in my recent visit there.

I am glad to be home  And I will try to return to the 1950s in my blog. STAY TUNED!

Playing the Hand We were Dealt in the Bucket

Today we are celebrating --50 years  we have been married.

I remember that cold November day. We had  both been  teaching, and  we had been told in no uncertain terms  by my mother not to come for Thanksgiving if we were not married,

She did not want us to continue "Living in sin."

Actually we had already  gone to City Hall a few times  and gotten a marriage license at City Hall. But   we let each license expire.  I was too  close to the disaster of my first marriage.

I COULD NOT BEAR A SECOND FAILURE AND DIVORCE.

So we went down to City Hall one more time  dressed in our everyday teaching clothes. When we got there and filled out the form, the clerk said, "The Judge is still here; you could get married today."

I guess he had noticed the  other lapsed licenses.  

We have no witnesses I answered.

"Oh, I can be a witness and my receptionist  would also be happy to oblige."

So he herded us into the inner office and introduced us to the  Judge,

"We have no ring,"  I protested weakly.

The justice reached down and took the ring off a cigar.  "This will do until you get another."

With all my excuses shot down, we stood there and  made our marriage vows and signed the form that  he presented.

We were given the official Marriage Certificate and we ran out into the now dark and  drizzling night,

A couple of days later I  brought that document to my mother's house  to guarantee that we were not denied our Thanksgiving feast.

That strange marriage lasted these 50 years,

Well they say the first fifty years are the hardest.

So we hope for smooth sailing now into the sunset.

DARK TIMES IN THE BUCKET

 TUNING UP TO SING AGAIN IN THE BUCKET

Been back about a week after spending more time in hospital and rehab.  And believe me it is not a good time to be in either  place during this pandemic. 

 IT WAS A VERY LONELY EXPERIENCE. 

EVERYONE HAS TO ISOLATE FOR 14 DAYS. ALSO NO ROOM MATE AND WHEN NURSES COME IN OR  A CNA THEY  MUST GOWN UP AND PUT ON VISORS AND MASKS AND GLOVES. THEY DO EVERYTHING AS QUICKLY  AS POSSIBLE..

Draw blood or take vitals and leave. NO VISITORS!

But enough about me--- I Never like it when my blog takes a negative turn,

I hope after one more time in December  going to the hospital  I will be better and the Blog will recover too.

Then I came upon this poem.  That even --maybe especially-- in the DARK TIMES we must still sing.

excerpts from “Will There Be Singing”

Juliana Spahr

^ During these days, I would wake up and my head would hurt  and then I would realize that in my dream  I had said to myself that I should write some poetry. But my dreams never explained to me why.   Or how. How to sing in these dark times? It is true that I have been with poetry for a long time.  Since I was a teenager. Those loves of many years and our bodies changing  together. And yet also the deepening of this love. Despite. That day with the breeze in the bar And we said together, there needs to be some pleasure in  the world .  And next, poetry is the what is left of life. And we pledged, more singing. And we referenced by saying, In the dark times. Will there also be singing?   Yes, there will also be singing. About the dark times. SO I am back and so is the Blog--still  singing.