If it was this time yesterday, I would have been on the road for two hours. I got up, brewed some coffee for the thermoses, and headed north to Columbia, South Carolina for the last onground intensive for my certificate in spiritual direction. By Saturday afternoon, I will be a certified spiritual director. Two weeks from today, my next round of seminary classes start.
As I drove, I reflected on the past 2 years. As I've made my way through this program, it's become clear to me that seminary was really what I wanted to do. I have liked the certificate program well enough, but the way that many people approach the practice of spiritual direction is a little too close to therapy for me. I am not trained to do that.
I had a fairly easy trip up I95 and I26. Along the way, I listened to NPR, with stories of rising COVID rates and the snowstorm that shut down part of I95 in Virginia. I listened to analysts looking back to the storming of the Capitol on January 6. I thought about my trip two years ago to the first onground intensive and how much has changed since then.
As I drove through South Carolina, I saw an unusual amount of downed trees, and I got to the campus of Southern Seminary (LTSS) to discover that power was out on the campus. Happily, the commuter house where I'm staying still has power, water, and wi-fi. I'm not sure what will happen as the week progresses if the power isn't restored.
I am guessing that we will move to an alternate site, which will make this strange intensive even stranger. It was always going to be strange, as this new, more contagious variant has made more people decide to do the intensive remotely. Half of my small group will be attending by Zoom.
I did think about whether or not it was wise to be attending in person. But I really yearned to be at the seminary campus, even though it will be a different experience than last time--perhaps it will be even more different than I was expecting.
One of my Create in Me friends is also working on her certificate, so she came over the mountains yesterday. In the late afternoon, we went to a really cool cloth shop (we're both quilters) and then to a Latin place for dinner. We ordered the Latin Sampler for 2; it could easily have served 4 or 6 or 8, depending on appetites. We have a kitchen in our commuter house, so we brought leftovers back. Will we eat them? Meals are part of this intensive, so I suspect that I will not.
After we returned, we had a long and satisfying conversation with our other housemate who had arrived while we were out; one more will arrive today. We talked about how this certificate program had changed the trajectory of our lives. We talked about backpacking and hiking. We talked about health and the pandemic.
Throughout the day, I keep thinking about how I had envisioned this January unrolling, back when I first realized my job would be ending in September or December, and so I applied for seminary. Back then, the intensive was scheduled for MLK week-end, so I planned to go to the intensive and then to keep driving up to study in person at Wesley for the Spring 2022 term. Much has changed since the planning that I did in the spring.
I want to do some writing while I'm here. As is often the case, I'm astonished at how long it has been since I have written in my offline journal. I need to start doing some deep thinking. It is the day before the feast day of the Epiphany, after all. I am ready for epiphanies (to which my epiphanies reply, "And we are ready for you to notice our steady light that has been trying to guide you)".
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