labyrinth

So over the weekend I was at the Chant Retreat put on by the Center for Sacred Art. It was a beautiful and restful experience and I've spent the last 2 days trying to figure out how that 48 hour period fits in with the rest of my life. The theme for this retreat was the work of Thomas Merton, and we talked a lot about how his disciplined commitment to both contemplation and creativity influenced his faith, as well as the larger faith community that he was a part of. It's kind of funny, every year I seem to leave the retreat with an idea for a needlework project that I then don't really ever get very far with. This year, with Thomas as inspiration, I might.

Sunday afternoon we had a 3 1/2 hour period of silence. I really enjoy that part of the retreat - in years past, thinking about it has been a carrot that got me through the Christmas kerfuffle. This year I wasn't as stressed out by Christmas, so the period of silence didn't seem to be as big a contrast. But it was a wonderful way to spend an afternoon. I started out with a hike up into the hills behind the retreat house. St Andrews Retreat House is right off the beach, and at that level it was very foggy and everything was still covered with frost. The higher I got, though, the fog cleared and it was sunny. I could see the tops of the Olympic mountains and got glimpses of the ocean through the trees. There were still patches of frost on the trail, wherever the sun hadn't hit, and I wished I'd had a camera because there were some cool moments between the sun and the frosty bare branches and crunchy grass.

After my hike, I tried to walk the labyrinth. I'm not a good labyrinth walker; I'm too goal-oriented. "When am I going to be done? How much farther? What am I supposed to be thinking about? Am I walking too fast? When's the revelation going to hit?" I thought I must look pretty funny, at least at first, marching along at a pace that wasn't a lot slower than when I was on the hiking trail. I think I slowed down a little, but didn't have an "aha!" moment of any kind before I was done. So I tried it again the next day, trying harder to stay focused on the moment, the right now, the breathing. And maybe my lesson is that slowing down and learning to walk a labyrinth - or engage in any contemplative prayer - is a process. Maybe I have to learn how to get through a labyrinth without needing to feel like I've accomplished something in order to accomplish something, if that makes sense. Maybe even "trying to figure out how that 48 hour period fits in with the rest of my life" is too much of a goal. Maybe I just need to let those ideas be, and they'll fit in wherever they need to.

And in the meantime, there's a blackwork Celtic cross that I might sketch out, and maybe even stitch. Will keep you posted. After all, once Our Lady of Fabio is finished, I'll need another big project. Although I called My Dear Sister yesterday to wish her a happy birthday, and it seems I mailed her Christmas Socks to the wrong address, so will need to try again. Fortunately I've already got a pair started.

[Add On - 2 hours later] Just went for the Modified Maple Leaf Death March walk (2+ miles up and down the hills of my neighborhood). When I was a little over 3/4 of the way through, I passed a man. He walked up to the corner of 94th just as I was passing it, and said, "Ho, Good Morning" when he saw me. He was a little rumpled, looked like a younger, shorter version of Bill Murray with shoulder length hair and better skin. He was carrying a black duffel bag of some kind and possibly a beer bottle (maybe root beer?). Anyway, I said good morning, and he said, "You're an exercise walker. I'm a get here to there walker". I laughed and responded that there was something to be said for both kinds. "No", he said, "only the get here to there kind. Otherwise there's no point". I laughed harder, kept walking, and thought, "Dood, you'd really hate the labyrinth, then."

our lady of fabio

(photo above taken 1.17.09)

(photo above taken ~ 10.15.08)

So, as you can see from the photos, progress has been made! I worked on it for a while yesterday, and came to the realization that I'm nearly done with the actual cross stitch parts. I have some gold Kreinik braid to fill in, and some outlining to do, but then it's just putting on the beads. Oh, and I have to go over it carefully and fill in all the missed stitches. I'm a little nervous about the beading. I've been working with a 12" hoop, but there's so much beading all over the piece that I'm afraid the hoop won't work. It'll catch the beads it's clamped over and may pull them out of place. I do have a plastic "Q-Snap" frame w/ the clamps, but am not sure it's big enough. So I might need to get stretcher bars to do it right. I've not done a project that has this much beading before, so it'll be a learning experience. On the plus side, though, I should easily have it done and framed in time to donate to the St C's auction. And in case you missed the joke, I've christened the piece "Our Lady of Fabio" because if it was a movie photo for some kind of Christmas movie, you'd need Fabio to play Joseph. I'd done a large Our Lady of Guadelupe cross stitch and really liked how it came out, and always wanted to try one of these Mirabilia pieces, but the more I worked on it, the more I realized it's too romantic for even my taste (which tends towards the romantic). Hopefully one of our St Catherine's parents will appreciate it enough to bid on it.

And now I'm off (or will be later today) for my annual Gregorian Chant retreat, but on by the Center for Sacred Art. It's a chance to chant the hours with a group of other like-minded (off-beat, a little wierd, eccentric at least) souls. This year the theme is Thomas Merton, which should be interesting. I don't know a lot about Thomas Merton, but have checked out a few of his books from the Library, so look forward to a weekend of learning and reading and chanting. I was going to bring Our Lady of Fabio along, to work on tomorrow during the 3-hour silence, but unless I can get ahold of some stretcher bars, I'm afraid I don't have enough work left to do to make it worth the trouble of bringing her and all the necessary supplies. Which leaves me sorta scrambling for a project to bring. Because you know I can't go away for two nights without something to do with my hands!

cool Advent hymn

Last night was a chant choir rehearsal. We're getting ready to sing the Vigil for the First Sunday in Advent. When I put the schedule together (last August) I'd picked an Advent hymn, Verbum Supernum Prodiens, for the choir to sing at Communion. The problem was, there are two sets of texts associated with the title "Verbum Supernum Prodiens". (Also two hymn tunes that I've found, but that's another story). One text is the Advent hymn, which is early, possibly 2nd half of the 5th century but likely 7-8th century. The other (later, associated with St Thomas) is a hymn for Corpus Christi.

In the Liber Usualis, there's the Corpus Christi hymn, and I found the Advent text on-line (but no music, just words). The challenge was to somehow get something on paper that had the music with the Advent text. If I was a more organized person, I could have contact St Meinrad and ordered a copy of their chant writing software, but I'm not. I tried to find something I could just download, hopefully for free, but didn't have any luck w/ that, either. So after spending a good three hours yesterday afternoon trying to figure something out, I ended up taking a sheet of vellum art paper with notebook paper underneath it and writing it out by hand. The girls thought it looked pretty, and they could sing from it fairly easily, so it was a success.

The text is really dark and at rehearsal we spent a while looking it over before we sang it. As an example, the fourth verse goes like this:

Non demum artemur malis/ pro qualitate criminis/ sed cum beatis compotes/ simus perennes caelites.

which translates as:

Saved from the whirling black abyss/ forever more to us be given/ to share the feast of saintly bliss/ and see the face of God in heaven.

I was a little concerned that it might be too dark for the group, but they totally got into it. I loved it when Miss Soprano T said, "it reminds me that He's not a tame lion", and she went on about the strength and power of God, and how we should feel awe at times. It was a great discussion, and we will be singing an ancient Advent hymn for the first Saturday in Advent. Cool.

On the home front, I was over half way done with a crocheted sock, but decided I didn't like how it was going so I ripped it out and started over. The good thing was that if I hadn't ripped it out, I'd have probably finished it last night, which means I crocheted a sock in two days, which is greatly encouraging considering I want to get three pairs of socks (at least) done for Christmas.

And then there's the ongoing saga of my Dear Son and his winter sports choice. He really really really wants to play football next fall, and I'm using that to motivate him to join swim team this winter. I really don't think 9 year olds should play football, but I guess it's probably better to play when everyone's under 100 lbs than it would be when they're all 200+. I need a break from him playing team sports, until he gets his temper under better control, and he's a good swimmer, so I've made him a deal. He swims for several months w/o complaining, and I sign him up for football without complaining. It sounds so simple all written out here, but it's taken sometimes twice-daily phone calls to Mom (MY mother!) to work it all out in my head. Mom is so patient....