Reverenda Rosa

Discernment, Part I

We prayed and sang, first thing in the Vineyard, today.  The Vineyard was once a dining room in the old rectory, now transformed into the parish office at All Saints.  B., my fellow sojourner in the work of parish family life, envisioned this dining room as a gathering place for our intergenerational Religious Formation program for the Fall.  With the help of yards and yards of lovely tulle, and grape vines, banners and a breath-taking poster, we created a space where our the small core group of families who will help lead the way to a new kind of Eucharistic experience at All Saints gather each Sunday.

After we'd finished singing, I quietly took out a bag of flour that had bran mixed in with it.  Another bowl had colored sand.  There was also a small damp cloth, another pair of empty bowls and a sifter.  We all felt the flour and then I sifted it into a bowl.  We all watched the flour gently fall in the bowl, separating out from the bran.  Some more touching, some more conversation about how light and airy the flour felt now, how the bran could be used for something else, but that the flour could be used to make really fluffy, delicious cake.  Then I sifted the sand.  This time, the sand just flew through sifter--much finer and less time-consuming than the flour.  What nobody knew was that I had placed small treasures in the sand.  So after the sand had all collected in the bowl, I handed the sifter around for everyone to see.  There were gasps--three year old twins, two little boys with the most mischievous sets of dancing eyes you can imagine--were particularly entranced.

Discernment comes from the Latin word that means "to sift."  We spent the rest of our time together doing age-appropriate activities that allowed us all to talk about discernment, listening for God's voice, and how we sort out and make meaning of the different parts and voices that constitute our lives. 

Today, doing this work was particularly poignant and challenging for me.  Light of My Life went to the bad place, just as I was beginning to lead our program.  I sat doing the presentation while she pummeled me, and hard, in a way that others couldn't quite see.  I hoped that ignoring her and doing something that I knew would be interesting to her would pull her back into a better place.  I also was aware that someone who knows even more than I do about working with an out of control child was with us.  LoML has a streak of cunning so she was being careful not to get "caught".  I was repressing every single bit of me that quite honestly wanted to beat the sweet b'jesus out of her.  I've learned to accept that part of myself.  I recognize it as a very primitive survival instinct that does not need to be acted upon.  I also know, having learned by the hardest, that there is nothing gained with anything but a very detached, calm response to her acting out like this.

Fortunately for me, J finally caught on to what was going on and removed LoML from the work area.  The following 45 minutes were hell for J--my child pulled all the stops out to test this new person.  Spitting, kicking, throwing stuff, pulling away to try to either get at me or one of the other children.  J knew what she was doing though, and she prevailed.  An hour later, things were calm enough for Spouseman, LoML and I to ride home safely in our car. 

The clergy conference I've just returned from had a lot to do with discernment.  I have been mindful that as LoML heads into adolescence all bets are off with her behavior.  We have a good set of resources in place to help her and I believe we have done a good job responding to her needs, loving her with all our being, and being faithful, both my husband and I, to our vocations as well.  Can that continue?  How do I sort out my responsibilities as a mother, a priest, a wife, a person struggling hard to continue on the journey to health and strength, physical, emotional, spiritual?  That is sifting work for me to do, work of hard discernment. 

On the Way To School

Playing on a CD: "I do Believe"--a sweet, simple tune from this year's VBS.
Out the window:  The deep greens of the subtropics, even in late October, and to my left, glimpses of the seemingly still, quiet river that runs through Fort Lauderdale, the New River, with sailboats and boats of all sizes and shapes, equally still, equally quiet on a busy morning in the city

Light of My Life:  What are you going to do today, Mami?
Me: Oh, man, do I ever have a lot of work to catch up on. It's hard being gone from the church for so many days.
Light of My Life: Are you going to have a service?
Me:  No, not today.  Lots of meetings, lots of catching up to find out how everything has been while I was gone.
Light of My Life:  Is Miss B. going to be there?
Me:  Yes, she's one of the people I'm going to talk to today.
Light of My Life:  Tell her to say hi to me. (This is her dyslexic way of sending Miss B. a greeting)
Me:  I sure will.

(Pause, while LoML looks out the window)

Light of My Life:  Mami, everybody is going to be so happy today at your work.
Me:  You think so?
Light of My Life:  Oh yes, Mami, everyone was missing you so much when you were gone.  Now they can all be happy.

What is it about that little exchange that makes me feel like the luckiest person in the world?

Quick Quick

• Small sources of joy:  a new linoleum floor in the Centro.  A parishioner offered to have the floor installed for us.  We'd been planning to do it, though none of us really knew how to do it.  The installer was this amazing, sweet guy who actually does most of his work on yachts and mansions, laying down marble.  He did it so beautifully.  The space is now light, and airy and joyful.  All we have left to do is put back the baseboards and the transformation will be complete. 
• How we are all connected:  When you've lived long enough in hurricane country, you become more aware of what happens to the weather when a big one is churning out there.  All these many miles away from Dean, clouds racing past us, gusty breezes, the soupy humidity--they all make me uneasy, even knowing I'm safe because they are part of the hurricane system. 
• Once a year, cute is great.  We started VBS this Sunday.  We're using Great Bible Reef so we've made this cool mural of a reef that's pasted up on a bay window.  The window seat is covered with cellophane and crepe streamers to look like water and populated with small stuffed and plastic sea critters.  We decorated cookies in the shape of fish, octopi(??) and crabs, and offered them at coffee hour.  As a I said, one a year, I love cute.
• School morning heaven:  Sitting with a good cup of coffee, Light of My Life on my lap, letting me love on her and comb and fix her hair.  Taking her to school, past the canals and the New River, where the sunlight is dancing and the breeze is just barely rippling over the water.  Singing together at the top of our lungs, "Before the beginning, before there was time, God loved you and me."  Feeling her butterfly touch on my arm as she gets out of the car and hearing her say, "thanks for the ride mom" sounding so mature that it makes my heart scrunch up and puff out all at once.  She's growing up...

Man, I love my life...

Intersection

At my ordination almost exactly one year ago (May 12), the preacher said this:

God grant that the days of your ministry, R, not be days of hard hearing and dim seeing, but days of healing for our church, days of justice—not the excusing of the rich, but the protecting of the poor, not the endorsement of the powerful, but the incorporation of the disenfranchised, not the imposition of patriarchal norms, but the discovery of God’s joy in all that God has made. Remember, the challenge of this mediation is always the mystery of the flesh, which we fear and call unclean—but salvation falls short if it is not of the flesh as well.

These days, that last sentence in this passage gets to me.  Perhaps I'm being over-dramatic:  as I plow my way through water for an hour each day, strengthening my body as much as I can to prepare for my surgery now less than 2 weeks away, I am mindful that my bones will be sawed and hacked and left a bloody pulp that will probably be incinerated so all that will be left is ash.  The pain deep in my leg as I walk tells me I am still complete, if damaged and fragile.  This is the hip that allowed me to climb the stairs up to the plane that carried me away from my motherland when I was 18 years old.  That allowed me to walk down the aisle alone on the day of my wedding as I went forward to meet my beloved.  That hesitated not for a minute to propel me as fast as I could go, carrying my newly adopted daughter as she seized, and stopped breathing, and desperately needed medical attention in the E.R.  This is me, my hip has defined me, as much as anything has. 

Yesterday was a day of pure glory, like only Florida days can be sometimes.  The humidity was low, the sun just danced on the water in our pool.  A banquet of abundance was spread for all my senses, as I walked, slowly and clumsily, with pain, through the water. 

I had come home after my pre-op appointment with my primary care physician, a fiesty, lovely Irish woman who told me that the orthopedic surgeon's report to her made clear that I will be undergoing major, major surgery because of everything that my hip has been through since my childhood.  I couldn't help myself.  I stopped, before getting in the pool, to read email.  There was a brief note from my brother.  It seems that my mom has just about decided that she is going to discontinue any further chemo and move into palliative care by early next week.  Immediately, my mind's eye went to the pictures of her latest CAT scan, her bones so clearly delineated, lit up like a Christmas tree.  All over there were little points of light on them. In a gentle but forthright way, her oncologist pointed to 25 or so of these little bone flashes and said, "this is a new tumor, and this one, and this one, and this one, and here as well...all of them have been formed in the past eight weeks."   

Salvation of the flesh:  hers and mine.  My bones and hers.  But through such loss. I make pilgrimage through the water these days to bring before our Creator, our Sustainer, the only One who can redeem the losses and show me the new life, a small bowl of ashes, hers and mine.  Dear God be merciful today when even breathing hurts.

Having to Say Goodbye

First, I went to the Blood Bank.  I will probably need between 1 and 2 pints of blood during my hip replacement surgery.  Autologous donations are the safest.  The ritual was all too familiar.  My fear.  The sudden shock:  "my God, that needle is so thick!"  I warned the technicians, "I don't have good veins"--whatever that means...The nice one with glasses said she'd found one and went in.  Too soon, she was digging in my arm, as panic and pain tightened into a vise.  Past and present and future, were there all together at that moment and all I wanted was my mom.

Sometime later that day. I was talking to a dear friend, a wise one.  Her question was simple:  Rosa would you be OK if something happened to your mom while you are still recovering from your surgery and you never got to see her again? 

It didn't even register.  Twenty four hours later my answer to her was all about logic--I don't have all the facts yet, here's my to-do list, S is leaving town, there's more blood to bank, look at all the appointments in my Blackberry... "RR listen--this isn't about logic.  What are you feeling?"  "Oh you're right--I need to do some more research on the internet, figure out some survival statistics for a person who's stage IV breast cancer is as far along as my mom's."

Friday at noon.  S and I are having a couple from the parish over to dinner.  S wants a casual table out on the deck by the water.  I resist.  He leaves to go on an errand and I lean down next to my bed to pull out the storage bin of exquisite linenware my mom gave me almost as soon as she found out that the cancer had metastasized.  Most of the linens are white, they graced the lovely tables that V, my grandmother, and A, my own mother set for parties in Panama and Colombia.  So many times they have been hand washed and starched and ironed by my other mothers and grandmothers, women who worked for the women of my family, women who were easily taken for granted.  Strong, beautiful, blessed women. 

Between the thin layers of blue tissue paper that helps keep them resplendent, these embroidered, linen, lace, damask tablecloths and napkins, breadbasket liners and hand towels--these are my legacy, for better and for worse.  Each time I function as the deacon at the Eucharist, spreading linens we call fair, preparing the chalice, placing each vessel with care on the Table, I am being faithful to my mothers.  And this feast, with its linens, the Eucharistic elements, the simplest of all meals, redeems, or at least reinterprets, what was understood as hospitality where I come from, with all its exploitation and pretension, as well as its grace. 

Could I live with never having seen my mother again, should she die while I am recovering from surgery?  No.  And I am one of the privileged ones, in matters of death as well as life.  I have pulled out my passport--I always keep it current.  I have keyed in my AAdvantage number.  I have purchased my ticket and opened up the space on my Blackberry.  At 5 this afternoon, I leave to see my mom, maybe for the last time.