another memory

I remember another woman who died years ago.  The same beautiful people who knew the other woman who lead such a prayerful life.

She didn't go to church all the time.  Yet God still prepared her.  Just days before she died in a tragic accident, she told one of her friends she was ready to die.  Before the week was out, we buried her.  I remember reading the Akathist for the departed in tears at home.  Such precious memories.

I have hope for the one I mentioned who stopped going to church.  I have to hope or what good am I?  She was very poor and had deep trauma in early years.  

So many suffer.  So many of us have had or do have mental illness. 

But the wonderful thing is that God is a God of hope.  A God of gentleness.

It's been a blessing for me to share some of my stories today.

My Husband and I shared the tea and sympathy desserts.  

It's funny how you can miss an earlier part of your life but it is often the times of sorrow that come back, surprisingly, to comfort one.

Because it's often those times that God is there in a deep way, even when we don't know it directly.

May God have mercy on us 🙏

what we can control

While it's going to be hard. I decided that I need to simply stop shopping.  At least for some months.  Shopping can give you the illusion of control.  If I suddenly had more things I would feel better for a time.  I don't know why exactly.  I know I have various issues including a fear of running out. A fear that runs deep.  A fear that is baseless.  

I've also hit a wall in my writing at the moment.  I managed to finish the book on the scientist that I mentioned in my last blog post. But it brought no consolation.  I found it to be in general while written.  As far as that goes.  But it gave no lift.  There was nothing consoling.  

But there are times in life where you're not allowed a lot of consolation.  When you're a time of waiting, of growing, of loss, of sadness, of uncertainty.  

It is these times where what does console me I found in the book The Mountain of Silence. And it is not an easy consolation. But it is one I've lived by.  

I'll explain it this way.  20 years ago, a woman from my parish in Ottawa died of cancer.  She really used her suffering by God's grace to transform her into a woman who pray deeply and who was no longer afraid of death.  A woman who had the blessing to do Bible study from our priest and one of her daughters said how alive it made her feel.  She died and her funeral was standing room only.  

But there's a lot of mystery in life.  Many of those people never started coming to church much.  Her spiritual daughter left the church.  The same one who felt so alive in Bible study.  I haven't seen these beautiful people in many years now.  

But yet her holy life is not in vain.  Even if all of us who are still living make mistakes like myself.  But this is what I asked the Lord when she died. Actually I was in great pain/grief and it was more of a demand 🤣😳

But apparently it was a good one. Because the Elder in the Mountain of Silence says the same thing.  And this is it.  It's if I'm to have sorrow. Please let me grow. Please let me mature. 

Well.  Sometimes that looks like relinquishment.  It looks like trusting when you've hit that wall.  When your walks are walked alone.  

When you're asking God please can I learn just to be in the present? For I have a grave weakness of wanting to imagine a future and I now understand that I must not do that. 

I remember when I was in library school and I had such dreams of the future. I was going to have a job. It was going to go well and I could have an apartment and all my pretty things and I would be able to go shopping.  See I grew up on the poor side of things and I'd always wanted to go shopping. 

Well. God gave me a time when I could go shopping.  It wasn't then, as much, it was after I got married.  And I liked it.  But now I understand something deeper.  It's something I always knew, but now I have to face it in a different way. 

It's that shopping truly cannot give consolation you're really looking for.  Years ago my spiritual father, who since retired told me that it seemed like I thought Heaven was like shopping. 😳🤣🤣🤣 I didn't think I was so shallow.  But later I learned that perhaps I was.  That perhaps I'm just a normal human being. 

But it really doesn't give what you think it can. It can give you the sense of control.  That's a big one for us humans.  But what if that's not what life is about?  What if it's about learning to hand your life to the Lord?? What if it's to learn to surrender to Christ?

I'm still very much in process of that.  But even as God helps you perhaps make some sort of progress, there's always so much more.  

I've been assured that I will have many opportunities to practice and learn more humility. 🤣 And I was told that by very caring people.  

So God gave me the grace to do the one beautiful thing I could do today. Other than make that really good pasta.  Which was easy because it was in a jar and I had already made the meat and just needed to cook the noodles. Just to be clear. But it tasted really good. 

But the grace God gave me for today is simply to take this walk. I'm so glad I managed to get out of the house.  

Sometimes I wish I could just go on walks.  Especially on days like this.  It's a warm day. It's sunny and I'm sitting on a bench by the water.  I know one day I won't live here anymore.    We already know that my husband once retired that we can't afford to live here.  New Jersey is very expensive.  

So today I must enjoy what I'm given.  Somehow I have to learn to be content.  It's the same lesson I was given many years ago.  It seems the lessons that you need to learn are the ones that need to be on repeat.  

Years ago when I was going through a very different sort of hard time, when I didn't have a job and was totally burnt out and then tried so hard to learn French and then ended up running out of money.  During those months many months I took a lot of walks. And I had a wonderful Catholic therapist.  She really loved God.  And one of the things we talked about the most was being with God today.  

This involved learning not to worry but also learning to be present to God in the moment.  But I understand know, looking back and also in my present.... It also has to do with not being where you cannot be which is the future. And it means to not think about it that much.

So today I'm thinking about how to do that.  What does it mean to be with the Lord Jesus today? How can I learn to pray and do what brother Lawrence talked about in the book? Practicing the presence of God? 

Sometimes it is a temptation to think we have arrived at some place of stability.  Given how I've been incredibly unstable, you would think I would like the words stability. And maybe I'm supposed to.  I mean it would be nice if I was more balanced.  But at this point in my life I don't actually believe instability spiritually speaking.  

Instead, I believe Jesus is the stable one and I'm the unstable one.  And while I can learn to have Christ dwell in me more, Christ is still the stable one.  

Well.  May God help us.  

Especially when there comes a time that perhaps we don't have the walks in sunshine near water. I know that will happen at some point in my life.  But in all things I need to learn to trust.  

I must get back now.  I'm still sitting on the bench.  I've been writing this essay by talk text. 

Of course there's people that read my blog who I don't know.  I could only trust that the readers in my blog are friendly and kind. Like the ones who comment.

May God help us.  May we learn to see Christ more.  May God have mercy on us.

A new day

I got more sleep.  My PTSD is so much better, my friend could tell.  But I still have bumps in the road of life.

I let go of the holy water jar that Larissa had her last day of life.  The tape with the label was getting mold in it and so I had to remove the label and throw away the lid.  Sometimes small things that you used for years are the hardest things to give up.  But I had to do it.

Made pasta for lunch, delicious sauce 🍝

I finished this book.  So Marie Carie was a very famous scientist who (at least mostly) did not want fame as much as to do her work as a scientist.  This book traces various women who became scientists through her work and mostly ignored the men involved.  It's basically an examination of women becoming scientists and professors.  Not my field so I didn't find it as inspiring.  She forsook her Catholic faith (and one of the other woman she worked with did the same with her Jewish faith).  That's something I learned from this book.  It was not seen as a tragic loss of faith but instead perhaps praised because it's seen as admirable to sacrifice every to science.

Well, she did accomplish understanding some elements on the periodic table.  But she loved radium and studying it.  And she died because of radium poisoning.  A pioneer about radioactivity and radiation and X-ray. 

She was called a martyr for science.  

Radium used to be seen as a healing agent now it's merely hazardous waste.  So this book explains. 

I am not sure what to think of it all.

But I personally want to have a life that is lived for Christ, not anyone or anything else.  

I like science.  I have spent hours reading about it, trying to understand the changes it brought to our world.  

But I guess I am looking for something that science alone cannot provide.

And ultimately I am looking for Christ and the hope of spending eternity with Christ and I pray those who I know and love.

Meanwhile I am in a time of struggle that I must endure and I don't always know the best way forward.  I am greatful for the kindness I am shown here.

really trying to keep it together

I had a really rough night.  Very little sleep.  I think I had too much caffeine (tea).  One pot of chai tea and then 3 pots of decaf.  And I am going through some unbloggable stuff that we just have to go through.  Thank God I am much better than before.  But not sleeping really has a hard time on me.  

In the midst of this I saw a friend who moved away, I had not seen her in two years.  It was really good to see her.

Please pray that I sleep.  I just feel so much worse when I don't sleep. 

Sometimes it's really hard to be strong.  But then we trust that God is our strength.

Once I told a Monastic how awful I felt and she had great pity and said God is cradling me in His arms. 

I know that God is a well spring of love, of gentleness, of hope.

May God help us all. 

Sunshine on a Saturday

 ~ One ~

I'm going for a walk early this morning, it's just Quarter after 10:00 a.m. right now.  The effort for better habits continues. 

~ Two ~

Walked 3.54 miles and took pictures...

 

~ Three ~

I love the sun glittering on the water and the sound of the water gently hitting the shoreline.

~ Four ~ 

Fried up meat and onions; had soft tacos.

~ Five ~ 

The rest of the meat I will use with pasta sauce.  

May God bless and save us all.

fish tacos ~ Marion Cunningham

Notes: do the tomato mixture in 2 goes because we only used half and better to keep it fresh than in fridge for dinner.

Pan frying the fish was easy! I didn't realize at first that you don't flip the fish.  I covered the skillet with the cast iron lid as the thickest part of the fish was not cooking up as quickly.  Worked great! I only used half a lime for the lime juice.

It's a more expensive meal because fresh fish and tomatoes.  But really good. 

And it's great to see how this herb tomato mixture works.

Tomorrow I hope to fry up some meat (a freebie from Fresh Direct) and use more tomato and cilantro.

Something to be thankful for!

* From Marion Cunningham's Supper Book 

This morning the sun shone

 ~ One ~ 

The sun is shining.  I had breakfast of scrambled eggs with ketchup, toast with PB and raspberry jam, and a pot of black tea with milk.  

~ Two ~ 

I am reading a biography on Madame Marie Curie, which so far is a well written book that holds my interest.  

~ Three ~ 

How wonderful it is to look to Christ and His mercy. 

~ Four ~ 

I am slowly writing a bit more, based on some research this past week, on my writing project.  

~ Five ~ 

I feel like something is clicking into place as I look at some history from over 50 years ago.  It is a good thing and very healing.   I know that I want to keep looking into this ~ but it is something that I am interested in because I want what is not that - by which I mean - things were radically changing but I am looking for that which does not change and then seeing what this means. 

~ Six ~ 

I walked over 3 miles today.  

~ Seven ~ 

Some progress has been made. 

May God help us all. 

Today's struggling towards the light

 

Last night I had a special time at a small chapel in NYC that I love dearly.  I was there alone, and light 5 candles. 

I am so much better than I was three years ago. 

But now I am trying to figure out how to get even better. 

How to rebuild a life that was destroyed in so many ways?  One thing I am trying to do is cook better. 

I have not baked or cooked that much in the last years.  It's very hard for me right now to go beyond the waves of sadness and grief and struggle that I am currently in.  I need to distract myself from it in ways that are right to do.

So Friday is a fish day.  I have a grocery order being delivered on Friday with some fish and ingredients for fish tacos.   I feel, to be honest, a bit apprehensive about trying something new.  I struggle at times with feeling like everything I try or do will fail.  

Tomorrow I go back to NYC for a routine errand.  

I had a good dinner.  I fried up two eggs for myself (even on fast days, I know I can't fast like some do), toast with peanat butter, salad and carrots.  It felt like an accomplishment and it tasted good.  that, right now, is a win. 

This is the recipe (above) for the fish tacos.  It's a Marion Cunningham recipe

and I have always liked what I have made by her.

So it really shows that I am struggling to doubt it.

I have not pan fried fish before.

I think that's the big question for me. 

We are going to have them with totilla chips.

update before I post: my friend A thought it looked good.

So that makes me feel better.  

I just have a lot of work to do on my end to 

keep building better habits....

***

I really liked this article on St Luke the Surgeon, 

esp that he struggles and that a lot of people find encouragement

in knowing that he struggled like we do. 

I also liked this part:

"Fr Vasily cautions against trying to reduce our relationship with God to a formula. Grace cannot be earned by enduring a certain amount of pain. Each person’s relationship with God is unique, and much remains hidden from us."  See HERE.

***

I know that God will help me and I am truly taking steps in the right 

direction.  And I am a lot better than I was three years ago.

It's easy for me to lose focus on the good. 

***

But I am trying to blog in an effort to stand and fight, as it were.

To keep rebuilding a life that is best for myself and my beloved Husband

AKA best friend. 

Who took me on a walk tonight, not quite a mile but better than nothing.

***

To that end, I must close this blog post!

May God have mercy on us and help us.

I know each one of us has sorrows and burdens and 

learning to have joy in sorrow is something that takes time.

Notes of Thanksgiving (written mostly on Tuesday)

~ in an effort to build better habits, I am trying to make note of things that I am thankful for. ~

One:

I went to the City (NYC) this morning.  The subway was so full, I had one hand on my cart and my left arm was spread as far as it could go to grab one of the subway polls to keep my balance.  I was surrounded by people.  Suddenly a lot of people to got off at one stop and another lady let me take the empty seat.  I thanked her for her kindness and nearly cried.  I got very little sleep last night.  So that seat was deeply appreciated.  I had been doing well on sleep but last night was rough. 

Two: 

I am doing my best to just show up and do some work.  

Three:  

I packed some leftover roast carrots and chicken tenders.  I had them outside, the air was a bit cold while I sat on a metal chair, in the sunshine.  I felt a bit strengthened.  There is a storytime going on in the room next to the one I am in, the room I often am in with the beautiful paintings.  I am hearing them singing 'itsy bitsy spider'.  And I rewrote a section of my epic writing project.  A few sentences, that I knew needed changing and I figured out how to change.  Words, carved over years now, since 2021. 

Four: 

I am home now.  I had a good talk with my Mom and also my Husband tonight and that was helpful for my goal setting.  Sometimes things happen that are difficult and the way through is not always clear.

I need to keep working on walking more.  My body needs it. 

God helping me, I hope to sleep better tonight 🙏

[I slept better thank God but was very exhausted today]