Particular Geographies and Yearning

For the past 2 months, I've spent a lot of time driving long distances.  I realize that not everyone likes to drive the way that I do.  I should modify:  I like to drive the way I do when I'm driving alone.  Driving with others in the car is a whole different experience.

When I've made a long car trip, I sometimes feel like I've fallen out of time.  I used to think that I only felt that way after an airplane trip and that a long car trip would help me feel cemented in time.  That's not the case for me, at least not right now.

In the past, I've felt a longing to be in places other than where I am:  it's been a longing for a particular geography mixed with a longing for particular people.  At this time in my life, I feel fully present wherever I am, almost as if other places have ceased to exist.  When I'm in my seminary apartment, I rarely think about my little house in the mountains.  When I was in the mountains this week-end, my seminary life seemed like a dream I had.

Have I finally mastered the art of being fully present in the moment?  I'm so often thinking about parts of my past, usually with a mix of regret and sadness, mixed with yearning and nostalgia.  When I'm not thinking about the past, I'm plotting the future.

Sadly, I don't think I've mastered the art of being fully present.  I think I'm fully present because my living situations are so new.  I had only lived in the North Carolina house for a month before moving to seminary housing.  

The fact that seminary housing is temporary might also explain why I'm able to stay with the present moment more successfully now than in the past.  Or maybe it's because I'm so happy with my current situation.  When I'm mired in home repairs or job stress, my go to relief has been yearning for either the past or the present.  Right now, I'm happy with my classes and my seminary apartment--no need for my escapist coping strategies.

Can I learn techniques from this time?  Let me think about how to sustain this being present in the current moment, even when I'm less thrilled about my circumstances.  Let me think about how to train my brain to be more often in a state of Zen acceptance, less yearning for something else.

Week-end of Abundance

I head back to DC today.  I have a 6:30 pm class, so there's plenty of time.  Once, though, I'd have thrown the last load of stuff in the car, filled up my thermoses, and been on the road by 4:00 or so.  But that was back in the South Florida days, South Florida where it is never truly O dark thirty.

Here in the mountains, it's dark--dark--before the sun comes up.  It will be safer to wait until a bit closer to sunrise to leave.

Yesterday at the Crafts for Christmas retreat, one of the woman said that her father had told her that for every fog in August, there will be a snowfall.  I said, "Well, we're in for a humdinger of a winter."  Everyone nodded.  One of the few non-foggy days in August was August 28, when I headed back to seminary by myself at 4:00 a.m.  The roads weren't foggy, but they were dark in a terrifying way.

The women at the Crafts for Christmas retreat talked about weather wisdom of the elders, and about Harriet Tubman and navigating by the stars and about how younger generations have no sense of any of this.  What a relief to be amongst my people:  educators and people who know how to make all sorts of soul sustaining things, from preserved food to cookies to quilted hearts.

I ate as many cookies in one day as I eat in six months.  When I got the invite for the retreat, I said that I couldn't bring a craft to share, but I was told there would be plenty.  Yes, plenty--many people brought not only supplies for their craft, but other supplies too.  It was heaven:  tables loaded with cloth, beads, baskets, papers, wood, found objects, on and on.  

We were similarly equipped with food.  In fact, I'll be taking some of it back with me.  I felt a bit bad for not bringing food to share, but there was plenty, and I know that more than one person delighted in the fact that they were helping the seminary student who didn't have time to cook or gather craft supplies.  I apologized once or twice and then decided to quit nattering on about it.

We are all from religious communities who believe in sharing, who believe that the sharing produces abundance.  And we had an abundant week-end.

Soon I will head back to my abundant life in DC.  I have a car crammed with all the last minute items that I didn't take last time, from a laundry basket to a lamp.  I have some groceries and some treats.  I have books that I planned to read for this week's classes; I did skim them, but for the most part, I devoted myself to crafts this week-end.  My spouse and I had time to reconnect.

I indulged in the abundance of crafts and Christmas music and cookies and reconnections, and I have no regrets.

Crafts for Christmas Retreat

I am back at my little house in the North Carolina mountains, rain pattering outside, peppermint mocha in my mug.  I made a quick trip back for a Crafts for Christmas retreat that's happening this week-end.  

I am remembering past autumns when I would make a quick trip to the mountains for a planning week-end for Create in Me.  I could never figure out how to come to both the planning week-end and the Crafts for Christmas week-end.  This year, my schedule is more flexible, there is no in-person planning week-end for Create in Me, the drive is shorter, and I have a house at Lutheridge with a spouse here doing work on the house.  In short, this year I have many more reasons to come.

Yesterday, I got up and was on the road by 4:15 a.m.  Even so, there was more traffic coming out of the city than I expected, and some road construction on I 66.  Eventually, the traffic thinned, and the fog rolled in, which made the merge onto I 81 feel harrowing in the dark.  The trip became much easier after 6:30, once I had more light to see by.

It is a lovely drive, mostly mountains, and yesterday, not too many big trucks barreling by.  I listened to various NPR shows, and marveled at the life of Queen Elizabeth, who died on Thursday.  On Thursday night, I made this Facebook post, which I want to preserve here:  "While many corners of the world discussed what the death of Queen Elizabeth would mean for the larger society, both in and out of England, I was in Church History class, learning about a much more ancient empire (first century Rome). And then I walked back across campus under a mostly full moon, which made me think about empires ancient and modern, how they come and then they go, and the moon shines on, oblivious."

I also loved Monica Hesse's article on Queen Elizabeth, with this insightful summary:  "Was it a fairy tale? Was it feminism? The highest-ranking woman in the world, and her power came not via her hard work or via a wedding ring on her finger but via a chaotic ladder of genealogy reaching through centuries: beheadings and infertility, abdications and overthrowings, all leading up to this singular woman holding the throne longer than anyone had before, or likely ever will again."

Back to yesterday's trip.  Soon enough, I was back home.  We talked about HVAC options, talked about what to have for lunch.  I took a shower while my spouse went to the grocery store. We ate lunch, cleaned up, and talked about a few more house renovation decisions that are coming up.  Then I wandered over to the retreat.

It's held in the big, ramshackle house where my family gathers for Thanksgiving and where my spouse and I stayed for Music Week this summer.  Yesterday, the tables were arranged in stations with a variety of supplies at each station.  As with the Create in Me retreat, there will be so many options to try.

Last night, I made a potholder, in the way that I made potholders as a child, with a loom and loops.  Why did I make a potholder?  I only have one at my seminary apartment, and I'd like to have more.  It was fun until the end, when I had to get the very tight loops off of the loom.  Even so, I marveled at how much progress I've made with my right hand.  Not too long ago, I wouldn't have been able to do this at all:

A few women joined me to make potholders of their own, and we talked about our memories of potholders.  I remembered my grandmother, who kept the potholders that I made for her when I was a child.  They were in her kitchen drawer when she died, even though she hadn't needed them in years.

Then we had pizza for dinner and more conversation, and I headed home to sleep in my own bed.  

Today will be another day of creating for me, while my spouse goes to a church choir retreat to work on music that they will sing from now until Christmas.  I look forward to seeing what we all create today.  What a gift to be able to be here for this time.

Reaction Drawings

In my Creative Process as Spiritual Practice class yesterday, we explored an interesting practice that our teacher called Reaction Drawings.   She gave us a stack of blank paper (just regular paper like the kind you'd use in a copier or printer) and a graphite stick (like pencil lead without the wood around it and squared edges).

It was a 30 minute exercise.  Every 30 seconds, the timer dinged, and we turned the sheet of paper over and did a new sketch/drawing/scribble.  That was the only instruction.  Here's my first sketch:

And my last sketch (which might be upside down):

And a selection of the ones in between.

It was an interesting experiment.  Thirty seconds isn't enough time to worry about technique--it's not even enough time to finish a sketch.  Some of our sketches responded to past sketches, while others went in a different direction.  The frenzied pace didn't let us sink into a meditative space (both a plus and a minus).

I said that I expected to go through my pile of sketches and find one that I didn't remember drawing.  That didn't happen.  I was also intrigued by my approach to the graphite stick.  It took me about 12 sketches before I turned it on its side and experimented with broader strokes.

We spread out all of our sketches in one space which was an interesting way to see them.  It also allowed us to walk around the room, once we all gave permission, and to look at everyone's work.  And because we had all went through the same process, it wasn't a chance for one person's sketches to shine, for one person to be lauded as the best artist.

Our instructor talked about using the process as a reaction to something specific like a newscast or a piece of music or a mood.  She talked about her own experience, about using the process to journal in a way or to jolt herself out of boredom/blockage or to move herself out of a bad mood.

My teacher brain also thought about other ways that this group process could be interesting.  Could it be used in a Composition classroom?  Are there other places where fear of the blank page might need to be overcome this way?  I think the answer must surely be yes.

What a great class!  When I begin to doubt my reasons for being on campus (yes, it happens--I'm never far away from self-doubt), let me remember this class and the opportunity to take it.

Waiting for the Locksmith

Soon I will go for a walk.  Yesterday, I spent the whole day in my seminary apartment, waiting for the locksmith, so I need to get a walk in.  I'll go up to Wegmans and get a few items to finish the week.  I hope to do more substantial shopping this week-end when I'm back in North Carolina.

The locksmith did come, but the new lock won't be here until this morning.  Hopefully we can get the problem solved today.  It's good to know that it's not just my imagination that the lock is difficult.

Yesterday was a good day to stay close to the apartment.  All day, the sky looked like it might storm.  We never did get a storm, but it was lovely staying inside, watching the sky, baking bread, sending out poems for possible publication, updating my Books Read list and my offline journal.

Plus, my sister called.  She was in the neighborhood for a follow up appointment and wondered if she could drop by.  I was happy that I was home and could say yes. She had seen the apartment when we dropped off boxes a few weeks ago.  It was cool to be able to show her how I had settled in.  Plus, we had a good chat.

I got my reading for Church History class done.  I checked and doublechecked my class shells to make sure I was caught up on assignments.  I'm never caught up for long, but I'm caught up this morning.

Along the way, I heard of deaths.  Anne Garrels has died.  She was an NPR reporter, going to unsafe places I never would dare to venture.  Peter Straub died, and his daughter Emma created a powerful tribute thread to him.  On Facebook, I heard of the death of a pastor, who happened to be a friend from college.  We had fallen out of touch, and when I heard his death, I regretted that I hadn't tried to regain contact when Facebook helped so many of us reconnect.

The sky is getting lighter.  Let me get ready for a walk.  And then I'll wait for the locksmith.

It could be worse.  In 2017, I was waiting for the arrival of Hurricane Irma.  I'm glad not to have that anticipation.

Community Building

This morning, I'm forgoing my morning walk.  I've been told that the locksmith will be here early, and while I'm pretty sure it won't be before sunrise, I don't want to risk missing the locksmith.  Plus, the lock is starting to spook me.  It took me a long time to get into my apartment last night after class.

So, I will stay here and bake bread and get reading for class done.  And since I don't have class or other commitments today, when the locksmith is done, I can still go for a walk.

I got into my apartment last night and felt exhausted--it wasn't about the lock.  I got home from Williamsburg on Monday at noon and worked on both the online classes that I'm teaching and a fairly intense analysis of preacher (me) and congregation that my Foundations of Preaching class required for Tuesday.  Yesterday, my schedule was fairly intense, with 2 classes and Chapel.

Last week the chapel intern asked me if I would read one of the passages for Tuesday.  I said yes before I realized it was the opening convocation, but I would have said yes anyway.  I was assigned the Call to Worship.  I got to the chapel early so that I could make sure I could navigate the stairs.  The professor in charge of the service also made sure that I was comfortable.  And it went well.

It was delightful to do the passing of the peace and to have my favorite New Testament professor say, "Peace be with you, Kristin."  Dr. Abts, who gave me great feedback on my poems as part of a Spring class, spoke to me after class--she looks so different in person!  As I waited in line to exit, I realized that one of my small group members from Spiritual Formation class was in line too--we made some small talk while waiting.

I am glad I had the experience of those online classes before coming to campus.  I feel like I have a bit of a head start towards knowing people.  Some of my fellow students from last year are taking in person classes, so that's a treat.

It's a shame that there's no food service on campus.  Or maybe it's more accurate to say that it's interesting that I feel more comfortable getting to know people over coffee or a meal than I do without food.

Last night, in the Foundations of Preaching class that's offered in hy-flex mode, we had our first small groups that were a mix of Zoom folks and in person classroom folks.  It went much better than I was expecting.  We're in a large lecture room, so two groups were at either end of the room (total of 3 of us in the room) while the remaining groups went outside of the room (to the lounge or hallway) to set up their groups.  We didn't have feedback, and we were able to hear each other--hurrah!

Before the class ended, several of us contributed to the chat to talk about how much it seemed to build community almost instantly.  In a small group on Zoom, we were able to see each other much more clearly which made us feel a better sense of connection.  I had a similar experience earlier in the day in my Pastoral Care and Counseling in Context class.  Even though we're on Zoom, we both live in DC.  maybe we could meet for coffee in real life some day.

Perhaps I'm not the only one who feels more comfortable building community over coffee.

The Prodigal Poetry Legal Pads Return!

I have gotten to a new stage of the moving process--realizing what's missing and wondering if it's still in a box somewhere.  The morning that the moving van came, I put several last minute things in one last open box:  a plastic gallon tea pitcher, my immersion blender, my small mug from the National Aquarium.  I thought I brought that box with me to seminary, but I'm pretty sure it's not here.  My spouse thinks it's not at the Arden house, but I'll take a last look when I return there this coming week-end.  We haven't lost much, so I don't want to believe we lost a box.  Plus, we checked off all the boxes when they came in.

During the past week, as I've worked on poetry submissions, I thought about how long it's been since I typed in new poems.  I write poems by hand on a purple legal pad.  In an ideal world, I would return to the work after a few weeks, make revisions, type the poem into the computer, and start sending it out into the world.

Over the last ten years, my best practice has dwindled.  In a good year, I've entered 5-30 poems into the computer.  I think it's been about 2 years since I entered anything new.  My submitting has also dwindled, and if I'm not submitting, why type drafts into the computer?

This morning, I reflected on a good reason to do it--because then I have it.  For a brief minute, I thought I might have lost my box of purple legal pads full of rough drafts, about 10 years of rough drafts.  I had more legal pads, but I had entered all the finished poems out of them.  For decades I kept all the rough drafts, just in case.  But it's become clear that I'm unlikely to go way far back to work with drafts.  I can barely keep up with the recent rough drafts.

The thought that I might have lost all of my recent rough drafts (a decade's worth of rough drafts) made me feel wretched.  It didn't make me feel any better to realize that I didn't remember exactly what might have been lost.

Happily, I thought I remembered that they might be in the box with my sketchbooks--and happily, they are.  

I will likely be in this apartment for the next year or two.  Let me not waste this time.  Perhaps, if I focus, I can get all the more recent poems entered into the computer before it's time to move again.