Have just spent a couple of days in the big city – doing a concert, some shopping and eating out. Imagine miracle of miracles then; when I went to slimming club last night I was all ready with the excuses, only to discover I had lost 2lbs. All I can say is that it must have been the retail therapy.
It occured to me that whenever I wanted to learn how to do something new, I always bought a book about it This used to be cause for much hilarity amongst friends and family. (After all, how does one learn to paint, sew, climb, do yoga, whatever…without first trying it?) Anyway, I am now sixty three and facing the hard facts about aging. So I decided to get serious about it, and have sent away for six books from various places in the world.
If I am still writing then you will know I am still doing it. Aging I mean.
A favourite walk – on a lovely day….. Glenstrae.
The electrician phoned yesterday, I found myself torn between telling him he needed his time off, to being grateful that he is willing to give up part of his weekend to do the most urgent of the work on the new shower-room.
In the end I expressed both of these things. And now await his arrival!
Have just found the “Images” function on google. What fun to put in whoever and whatever to see what comes up. And yes, this blog does come up amongst the images for my name.
Go on – have a try. (If you haven’t done it already!)
This poem of RS Thomas helps me to think about what God as a concept actually means. And about what it means to relate to God.
Why no! I never thought other than
That God is that great absence
In our lives, the empty silence
Within, the place where we go
Seeking, not in hope to
Arrive or find. He keeps the interstices
In our knowledge, the darkness
Between stars. His are the echoes
We follow, the footprints he has just
Left.
Congratulations to HM The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh on their 60th Wedding Anniversary today. The service at Westminster Abbey yesterday was a reminder of how difficult things must have been for them over the years. It spoke of a marriage lived in the glare of publicity and bounded by duty.
But the snippet I liked best from the news coverage was that old Queen Mary (who was a feature of my young years) looked at the wedding presents and mistook a gift of a traycloth of lace from Mahatma Ghandhi, for his loin cloth. She described it as “indelicate”. I also liked the idea of 151 nylon stockings as being part of the trawl of gifts.
I guess you can tell that I am an unashamed monarchist. However, I do concede that watching the monarchy can destract us from what government is up to.
Loved the new Cranford series which started on BBC1 last night (Elizabeth Gaskell). Interesting to think about a community faced with change in the mid nineteenth century and then to relate it to high tech living today. It will be a regular Sunday evening date for me at any rate.
November – a strange time of year.
Nearly Advent
Almost a looking forward
Yet I want to look back
To make sense
To let go
To grow.
Thanks to Randall Friessen for this timely reminder. It is the little things that make a life and a difference. So often nowadays I feel inadequate and find myself asking where all the years have gone and what my journey of ordination was all about. Then I read something like this, and remember that we can all make a difference, wherever we are and however we are feeling.
