Past Pumpkin Patch -- with Labyrinth

These waning days of pumpkin patches makes me think of past experiences.  Back in 2013, I wrote the following post, which continues to be one of my pumpkin-themed favorites:

Walking the Pumpkin Labyrinth

Yesterday I got to my church early to help set up for the Fall Festival we were having.  I wasn't really needed, so I walked over to our pumpkin patch. 

We've sold a lot of pumpkins since we unloaded the truck 9 days ago!  There were pathways through the pumpkin piles, so I walked slowly, dare I say, meditatively.

I thought about how similar it was to walking a labyrinth--and how different.  The main difference, of course, is that a labyrinth goes in a set pattern so that there's one way in to the center, no matter how much the walker winds around the center.  The pumpkin patch didn't have that quality.

It was an interesting difference, to stand and see all the pathways open to me.  In many ways, that felt more like real life.  Each path seemed equally appealing--again, like real life.

I have always envied people who have one pressing path, the way they know they are supposed to go.  I admire people who don't let themselves get distracted by all the other possibilities.  I do wonder if they get to a point in life where they feel some sorrow about all the experiences that their singlemindedness denied them.

As I walked the pumpkin "labyrinth," every so often I caught a whiff of the pumpkins themselves.  You may not think that pumpkins have a smell, but after spending 3 hours carrying them during the offload from the truck, I'm here to report that they do.  I found that organic smell to be wonderful.

There were also places where I could tell that a pumpkin had met its end.  Here and there were piles of seeds and pumpkin muck.  And some of the pumpkins are not far from descending into decay and rot.  I haven't walked a labyrinth that has such explicit reminders of mortality, but it seemed appropriate.

As I walked amidst the pumpkins, I thought about the wonderful diversity in the pumpkin world, and the wonderful diversity in other populations.  I thought about how a pumpkin looks like a head. 

I thought about the role of pumpkins in our culture, how strange our ancestors would find it that we take a gourd that takes so long to grow and carve faces into it.  They'd probably see it as a terrible waste of a nutritious food. 

I thought about the wonderful holiday special, "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown."  I thought about the sincere pumpkin patch we've created on the front lawn of the church.

Our front lawn is on a very busy corner, 72nd Avenue and Pines Blvd., with the south campus of Broward College across the street.  One night, a drunk driver plowed into our pumpkin patch.  Thankfully, it was very late and no one was shopping for pumpkins.  Some of us still have nightmares about how it could have been much more terrible.

As I walked, the sun was beginning to get high enough that we could all see it.  Soon the air would turn hot again, but I still had a few minutes to enjoy the slightly cooler air.  Part of me wanted to sit on a pumpkin and ponder, but I liked the act of walking to each pumpkin pile and paying a mental tribute.  I liked the serenity that came to my brain from walking slowly and with purpose through the pumpkins.

Soon it was time to go to spin class and to use physicality in a different way.  Both experiences left me with a sense of calm.  But the pumpkin patch left me with a sense of awe.

Theology of the Pumpkin Patch

Every year, as the lectionary returns to readings that use sheep or crop yields as a metaphor, I wonder what has been lost to modern ears. Years ago, as I helped unload pumpkins from an 18-wheeler truck to our church’s pumpkin patch, one of the children asked, “Why are they so dirty?”

I said, "Because last week, they were growing in a field."

I could see the child looking at me as if I might be joking; after all, he's never seen pumpkins growing in a field. He may never have seen anything growing in a field. We are in an urban area, after all. I wondered if I should do more to explain.

And then I thought of all those agricultural metaphors, where Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven is like ... .” That parable of the seeds and the different types of ground – do we really understand that parable if we’ve never planted anything?

Each year, many churches transform part of the grounds into a giant pumpkin patch. It’s one of the more popular fundraising and community outreach events that my congregation did in its old space, and subsequent references are to those past years, along with current pumpkin patches. In my search for relevant metaphors, I’ve wondered, what does this pumpkin patch tell us about God and God’s community?

Our pumpkin patch contains all sorts of pumpkins, both the traditional orange kind and several types of green pumpkins. We offer both pumpkins and gourds. We have every size of pumpkin you could want, from the largest pumpkins that could be a chair, to those we’d use for a pie, to the very small, cute kind that you can put on a fireplace mantel.

In the variety of the pumpkins, we get a sense of God the creator who doesn’t stop at just one possibility. We get a sense that in God’s creation there’s room for every kind of pumpkin.

Those pumpkins don’t come off the truck by themselves. Our church must provide the labor to get the pumpkins to where we want them to be. When I helped unload the pumpkins through the years, I thought, “I’ve never felt like a part of a more seamless Christian community than I do right now.”  

That’s not exactly true. But the times that shine in my memory are times of similar service: serving dinner to the homeless, doing a winterization project for homes of the poor in the inner city, working together to create a wonderful vacation Bible school experience for children. 

Unloading the pumpkins also reminds me of something else that I cherish about church communities: At their best, there is room for everyone. The littlest ones can carry pumpkins, if they want to help that way. Those of us without the strength to carry pumpkins can help sell them. 

I think of myself as having no upper-body strength, but clearly I’m wrong. By the end of an October night, I had carried at least 400 pumpkins. I would not have expected that I could do that since I can’t do 10 pushups at a time without my arms screaming at me. And yet, it needed to be done, and so I kept moving the pumpkins and pushing through my fatigue. At the end of the night, although I was exhausted and covered in dirt and pumpkin gunk, I felt an exhilaration that I hadn’t anticipated. Similarly, God has plenty of surprises for us. 

As I cradled those pumpkins, which so resemble human heads, I felt a strange tenderness toward them, the tenderness that I imagine God feels toward us all. In some ways, pumpkins are so sturdy and yet so fragile. All it takes is one slip and the pumpkin is rendered useless, a pulpy mess of slime and gunk. And yet, even from that accident could come new life, if one planted the pumpkin seeds. From that one pumpkin, we could grow a whole new patch, life out of death.

As I drove home after we unloaded the pumpkins, I thought about all the ways I was surrounded by evidence of God's grace: an abundance of pumpkins, a great group of fellow workers, the beautiful sunset, the almost full moon, the exuberant children, blessing after blessing. I felt gratitude for my healthy body that could carry all those pumpkins. I said a prayer for those who had grown and harvested the pumpkins in a distant field in New Mexico. I went home to wash the pumpkin gunk and soil off me, and I felt additional gratitude for warm water and a cold swimming pool in which to soak my sore feet. I felt more appreciation than usual for my soft bed and clean sheets.

The next morning, I woke up with very sore arms and a soul singing with gratitude. I said hello to the pumpkins I brought home, pumpkins that won't be here very long.

None of us will be here very long. I want to adopt a more sacramental approach to life. I want to see evidence of God's grace all around me, in the lowliest gourd, in the greatest pumpkin, in every human who crosses my path. 

Support Your Local Church Pumpkin Patch

I have been part of a church that offers a pumpkin patch every year, a huge undertaking, from the offloading of the pumpkins to the selling of them.

That South Florida church funded a variety of special projects and ongoing ministries with this pumpkin patch.  When the church had a traditional Sunday school, funds went there.  The church used the funds to help repair the roof that covers the part of the building that is more used by community groups than by the church..  The church used the funds to pay for Vacation Bible School, an event which is attended by more neighborhood children than church member children.

I love the fact that the pumpkin patch itself is a form of community outreach and a service of sorts.  I love that it funds other community services.  I imagine that most churches who have a pumpkin patch use the earnings in similar ways.

Picture from the Ghost of Pumpkin Patch Past

So, this week-end, as you prepare for Halloween, drop by a local church pumpkin patch.  Your dollars will go further than if you bought a pumpkin at a grocery store. 

Hurricane Remnants and Travel

Last June, when I left Indiana after the first TEEM onground intensive that I attended, I thought ahead to our next gathering in October, where I anticipated autumnal shifts with still-warm days.

I did not anticipate a hurricane affecting the weather that far inland.  But here we are.  I've changed travel plans, and instead of leaving on Sunday, I'm leaving in a few hours.  There's already a bit of rain here, but nothing like what is expected later this morning.

We are supposed to have record breaking warmth in the 80's in the early part of the week, and cooler temps by week's end.  I have packed a variety of clothes--lots of layers for my upper body, some with sleeves and some not, and shorts for my lower body which is odd-shaped and hard to fit for long pants in this time of my life.

This hurricane has turned out to be a normal-ish hurricane, not a monster that zoomed up several categories just before landfall--how refreshing!  It moved ashore as a category 2, very survivable for most structures--not a fun way to spend an evening, but likely not life threatening for many.

I am still glad I changed my travel plans.  I should be able to stay ahead of the storm remnants today, and it will be good to head into the week being better rested.

Celtic Spirituality and October

I met Tim Brown at the onground intensive for TEEM students back in June when he came to talk to us about stewardship.  He's well versed in that subject, but also in saints old and modern, about all things ELCA, and about Celtic Christianity/history/spirituality.

This morning, he made this post on Facebook, and I wanted to preserve it:

For the ancient Celts, October signaled the end of their Autumn and opened the door for the shadowed half of the Celtic year.

Samhain (which literally means "summer has ended") marks the final feast day of the season, and the convergence of the shadows and the weather inclined the Celts to believe that spirits were able to walk among the living causing mischief, curses, and sometimes blessings.

Practically it meant bringing in the cattle and the sheep down from the summer hillside and into the byre and the stable, now full of the harvested hay brought in throughout August and September.

It was also the time to slaughter the animals and prep them to last as far through winter as possible with salts, cold storage, cottaging, and drying.

The very last bits of barley, wheat, turnips, and apples were picked from the now naked fields, because come November the faeries would start breathing on all the fruit, frosting them and making them inedible.

While the sun still glowed it was also time to get the wood and peat stacked and ready for use. No one wanted to chop and gather in the frigid days coming.

This was a joyous month for the Celts, as the whole family was regularly gathered in the house and the barn: baking, salting, prepping, and preserving, envisioning the coming winter feasts and the cozy days ahead.

The summer sun now became the warm, dim room, and the noisy insects would be replaced with long talks and stories from family and visiting friends.

October has come.

Of Apple Farms and Alternate Futures

Later today, I will stop by my favorite apple orchard on the way home.  I will be buying apples today and then again later in October--all for the sake of writing projects for my classes.  Tomorrow my Nonfiction Writing will have 3 kinds of apples, and we'll discuss the kinds of reviews we could write.  Then on Friday, we'll write those reviews.

I have a memory from a past autumn of driving to my favorite orchard and seeing a farm for sale.

This morning, I went back through my blog to find the reference, and I did; this post from September 29, 2011 has this bit:  "I continue to try to convince myself that a farm for sale is not a sign about my life's direction. I'm trying not to think about the proud tradition of poet-farmers in this country. I'm reminding myself that a farming life would leave me too exhausted to write. Too exhausted and broke to boot."

Each time I make the drive, I try to remember which property was for sale, and today will be no different.  But I do wonder if the house that was part of the property has since been torn down. It was looking old and tired 15 years ago:

Fifteen years ago!  I didn't ever call to find out how much the farm would cost, but I assume that even 15 years ago, I couldn't have afforded a 38 acre farm.  It is one of those choices, though, that still intrigues me.

If I see a farm for sale today, on my way to the apple orchard, I might make a different choice.  I would imagine keeping my teaching job in Spartanburg, while also running an apple orchard, while also teaching online classes part-time, while also preaching part-time in Bristol, Tennessee.

And then, I probably would make the same choice I made in 2011.  I would back out of the driveway and try not to look back.

I am so grateful to have arrived to living in this area, even without buying a farm 15 years ago.  If I had bought that farm, I might have missed out on my dream jobs that I have now:  teaching English classes at a small, liberal arts college (a dream job for my whole adult life) and preaching every Sunday at a small, country church (only very recently recognized as a dream job).

Shifts for Those with Sense to See

I am always intrigued by how we can see seasons shifting, long before the calendar would tell us to expect these changes.

We have to learn to see with new eyes, eyes that focus on what's there, not what we're expecting to see. It's more of a shift of imagination than with our literal eyes, our literal sense: 

It's similar to how we can see God at work in the world--but it might mean we need to change our focus. 

Once we see it, the changing of a season, the evidence of God in the world, it's hard to ignore.

In future years, I might see this photo as evidence of a world on fire; I wouldn't be wrong, but it's early morning mist here, not smoke from fires.

One aspect I can't capture:  the way the greenness of the trees is thinning, the way I can see distant lights from roads in ways I couldn't just a month ago.

The Hinge Festival of Lammas

Early August is a hinge point in the calendar. In some ways, it's not as obvious a hinge as the autumnal equinox or the summer solstice; in fact, it's the time directly between those two hinges--we're as far away from the start of summer as we are from the start of autumn. But in some ways, it's just as significant a point of seasonal shift.

If we lived in medieval England, we would be celebrating the festival of Lammas, a festival that celebrates first harvests with loaves of bread standing in for that first harvest.  There might be processions to bakeries, to bless them and to bless the bakers.  

It would be a festival that celebrates abundance, the abundance that comes later in a cooler climate.  Of course, we here in Appalachia are celebrating that abundance too; the summer vegetables are still going strong with beautiful tomatoes at the farmer's market.  Yet across the region, apple orchards are opening today.

We may have slogged through summer long enough that we may feel that nothing will ever change--it will be hot and humid forever. The light hasn't changed significantly, the way it will in a month or two. But we are losing more daylight each day as we hurtle towards a different season. Students aren't in school yet, but the time draws closer. Most of us aren't agricultural people anymore, but if we were, we'd be seeing crops in their final ripening. Harvest would be coming soon.

Now is a good time to take an accounting. Have we been planning some summer festivities that we haven't gotten to do yet? Now is the time. Do we need to adjust our trajectories for the rest of the year? Let us make some plans.

Celtic Wisdom: The Last Days of July

 ELCA Stewardship specialist Tim Brown made this Facebook post today:

In the heat of waning July days, the ancient Celts would ready themselves for the August festivals and the beginning of the harvest.

They would take these final days to spend intentional time resonating with the world around them, relaxing in the earth and seeking out sacred spots to bless and in which to be blessed.

You might say this ancient practice is a precursor to our ideas of "vacation" these days. Summer rest is not something we invented, Beloved, but inherited through the long echoes of phenomenological rhythms that pulse throughout the looping threads of time.

Celtic author Mara Freeman notes three ways to honor the earth in these last July days that fall on the cusp of transition.

First, you can give thanks. Find a quiet spot in nature, breath deeply, listen carefully, and be grateful for what is around you. She notes that "a sacred site does not have to be famous or located in a distant country. It can also be a quiet, secret place you have found in the woods or, if you live in the city, a favorite old tree in a local park." (from Kindling the Celtic Spirit)

Secondly, do some clean up. Whether it is in your backyard, along a well-hiked stream, your local park, or even just bush pruning around the house, caring for nature is an act of sacrifice to the very Earth who will, in the coming months, sacrifice fruit for us. Pruning, by the way, is necessary for many plants, and should be done with the plant in mind, and should not primarily be about how your yard looks from the street.

Finally, take a pilgrimage. Journey to a place where the Earth has been damaged or is in danger of being defiled, calling attention to it. Whether it is the pipeline in the Dakotas, over-fishing off the coasts, or even unwelcome infringement on a natural prairie in your little pocket of creation, walking there, seeing what is happening with your own eyes, and calling attention to it is an act of power and grace. Or, as one theologian puts it, "an actively mobilized process of bearing witness to woundedness and to the mysterious possibilities of the sacred."

In these acts, the whole Earth becomes an altar upon which our attention, our love, and our gratitude is sacrificed. These acts have rippled throughout the cosmos from our ancient parents until today.

How will you add to the wave?

May Days and Feast Days

Here we are in the merry month of May--how can it already be May? The first day of May has ancient roots as a celebration of Spring and new growth and the return of warm weather. More recently, the first day of May has become a celebration of workers.

So let's think about some ways we could make the day special:

--The traditional way would be flowers, traditionally flowers that we would leave on dark porches for people to discover when they woke up. It's probably too late for that approach, but it's not too late to appreciate flowers. You could buy some flowers or a flowering plant. Or, for future enjoyment, you could do what we did: buy some seed packets, plant them, water them, and see what happens.

--It is probably also too late to weave long ribbons around a Maypole. But we could braid ribbons or strips of cloth and meditate on the types of joy we'd like to invite into our lives.

--Today is a good day to think about workers, workers of all sorts. We're having more of a national conversation these days about work, about gender, about who takes care of children and elders while people work, about the locations of work. I look forward to seeing how it all turns out--I'm holding onto hope for positive change, even as I'm afraid we can never make the improvements that need to be made.

--If we're one of the lucky types of workers, the ones who aren't under threat by bosses or by globalization or by robots, we can support those who aren't as lucky. Send some money to organizations that work for worker's rights. I'm impressed with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, which works to protect the migrant workers in the fields of Florida, but you certainly have plenty to choose from.

--Can't afford to make a donation? Write letters on behalf of the unemployed, the underemployed, everyone who needs a better job or better working conditions. Write to your representatives to advocate for them. What are you advocating? A higher minimum wage? Safer worksites? Job security? Work-life balance?

--Today, Anglicans, Episcopalians, and Lutherans celebrate the feast day of Philip and James; others will celebrate May 3. These are not the most well-known disciples. Today you could reread the Gospels, a kind of literary Easter egg hunt, to try to find them.

--Can you create something that weaves these strands together? Here are some possibilities: a sculpture made out of ribbons that explores the world of migrant workers. A poem that celebrates flowers and contemplates the ways that we love some blooms (flowers) but not others (algae, cancer). A painting that uses weaving in some ways to think about the past century of efforts to enlarge the workplace and make it safer. A short story that updates the story of Philip--who would he be today?

What Time Is It? What Season Is It?

 I'm one of those people who wish that we wouldn't turn clocks forward or back, even though I know that if we did that, we'd lose something in terms of darkness and light.  If we had fewer sunsets that came later or fewer sunrises that came earlier, but I don't think I would care.  For me, it doesn't matter if we spring forward or fall back, it takes me weeks to get back to a regular sleep schedule, as regular as my sleep schedule is.

This week, in addition to a time change, we've had a drastic change in the weather--it's been downright hot.  So my sweaty self thinks it's summer, while my light sensitive eyes read spring in the shift in light, while my body is still back in winter in its desire to go to bed early.

I had thought of this time away as having writing residency possibilities, at least in the morning, since I get up hours before my parents.  But instead, I'm tired.  I pulled up some poem rough drafts that I thought I could finish transforming into final drafts, but no, not this morning.  I need to write Sunday's sermon, and if I was really efficient, I'd also write the one for the following Sunday, when we'll be away at a family wedding.

I want to write something more profound as a blog post.  But it won't be this morning.

Happily, Rabbi Rachel Barenblat has written something more profound.  In this blog post, she writes eloquently about why she won't be using AI when she crafts sermons and other religious writing--or any writing:  "My divrei Torah and sermons are love letters, of a kind: they’re love letters to Torah, to God, to my tradition, to the communities I serve. They’re not just communicating information, they’re conveying heart. This may make me old-fashioned. (The fact that I’m still writing longform blog posts on my own blog may also be a sign that I”m old-fashioned!) But it is still my goal to communicate with others without AI mediation. It matters to me that what I share (here and on the bima) are always the words of my own mouth and the meditations of my own heart."

Today my mouth and heart are tired.  Here's hoping for a better day tomorrow.

Halfway Point of Winter

We are at the halfway point of winter--halfway between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox. Today is Candlemas, where Christians celebrate the presentation of Jesus at the Temple, and pagans long ago celebrated the goddess Brigid (and the feast day of St. Brigid was yesterday), and some Wiccans today will be celebrating at Imbolc, or a variation of any number of pagan holidays. It's also Groundhog's Day. It's one of those times when we can almost perceive the shifting of the seasons. It's not spring yet, but it will be soon.

Candlemas is the feast day that speaks to me. Candlemas celebrates the presentation of Jesus at the temple. It's the last feast holiday that references Christmas. We could see it as the final festival of Christmas, even though most of us have had the decorations packed away since even before Epiphany.

This morning I'm thinking of Simeon, who held onto the promise of the Messiah throughout his very long life before he saw it fulfilled. He waits and he waits and he waits. But finally, at the end of his life, he does hold the Messiah, the light of the world, in his hands.

Simeon holds the baby Jesus. Imagine it: to hold the light of the world in your hands. In so many ways we still do. We carry the light of the world inside us. How can your body deliver light to the world?

Some churches and monasteries will bless the year's supply of candles. I love this tradition, although it's never been mine. Today would be a good day to light a candle and to think about our own lights. Are we dimly burning wicks? Take heart--the Bible promises that we can still be useful. Does our light burn pure and true? Take care to protect that flame.

The holidays of early February (Groundhog Day, Candlemas, St. Brigid's Day, Imbolc and Oimelc ) remind us that the light hasn't really left us. Spring will be here soon.

A Post-Epiphany Prayer as January Settles In

For those of us who need help understanding the signs that we see, let us pray.

For those of us who search for new directions, let us pray.

For those of us who lose control of our fears and insecurities, let us pray.

For those of us finding that we need to take a new road, let us pray.

For those of us who need a new dream, let us pray.

For all of us, we pray.

Help us to bring the message of God's love to the world, whether our approach is more like the angel choirs or the steady light of a distant star. 

Help us to be the star, shining a message of God's love to the world. 

Give us the courage to follow our visions.

Thanksgiving History in Fabric Scraps

Here I sit, at the kitchen table of the big, ramshackle house at Lutheridge, the church camp where my family has always had our holiday festivities (well, since 1992 or so), the house where we’ve assembled for at least 20 years.  It was at this table, on the Saturday of Thanksgiving week-end in 2022, where I first assembled the log cabin patch out of scraps, and I’ve been doing it ever since, and may just continue to do it until my fingers won’t let me.

It has been a great Thanksgiving this year, although zooming by too fast, and I know I likely say that every year.  This year, all the members of the next generation are teenagers now, which brings a certain sadness about all the books we’re not reading about giving a mouse a cookie or llamas in pajamas.

 Happily, there are other joys.  We spent much of the week-end helping the oldest teenager in the house with a project she envisioned:  letters made of fabric scraps, sewed on a sweatshirt.  When my cousin wrote me in advance and told me what she had in mind, I brought all my fabric scraps with me.

 

 

The project became a bit bigger than we first thought it would be.  She chose small squares, and we made them into larger squares of four patches; then we made took the template she’d made of paper letters and cut out the fabric.  We used the Steam-a-seam product to make sure the letters didn’t move around.

 

 

And what do you know—it worked!  It looked very much like the picture that had provided the inspiration, and she was very happy with it.  The whole family had a great spirit going in, and they assured my spouse and me (mostly me) that whatever happened would be fine.  I was worried about a ruined sweatshirt and the crushing of creative dreams—I’m so happy that didn’t happen.  The oldest teenager was so happy with her creation that she wore it on the long car trip home.  I wish we had had more time to sew the letters to the sweatshirt, but she knows how to do it, and her mom knows some folks who will help, and in the meantime, they won’t wash the sweatshirt.

In a way, that’s a metaphor for the whole holiday time together—the worry that the experience won’t live up to expectations, the happiness of time together, the realization that it’s all going to be O.K., even if not exactly perfect.

                                                                                                           

Thanksgiving Morning

Thanksgiving morning, in a house with no wi-fi, and a writer determined not to use her hot spot until the last possible minute because she, unlike much of the U.S.A. does not want to pay for unlimited data on her cell phone. But she knows what to do. And so she writes the old-fashioned way, typed in a Word document that will be uploaded later.

You thought the writer might use a pen? She’s not that old-fashioned—she still has electricity! And she’s willing to pay for the version of Microsoft Office that’s always available, regardless of Internet access.

That writer, of course, is me. I’m being cautious with my cell phone usage because one past Thanksgiving of reckless abandon showed me how much data can cost, when I left the hot spot function on overnight. I am educable.

But I’m also delighting in disconnecting. I’ve gotten a sermon written in the past hour since I got up. If I’d had connectivity, I’d have spent that hour looking at stuff on the Internet, and likely feeling dispirited. Now I am feeling virtuous!

Long ago, I did write with a pen and paper, and I do remember that I had to fend off distractions then, too. Back in those days, I might be tempted to read the newspaper before I started—the old-fashioned kind, that arrived on the doorstep, not on my computer screen. The world is always trying to pull us away or lull us into complacency or sedate us—or terrify us or make us feel inadequate.

Let me take a moment before Thanksgiving starts in earnest, a moment to remember some of the wonderful events that have already happened:

--We have managed to gather at the ramshackle house at Lutheridge where we have gathered almost every year since 1992.

--Not everyone could come. But we had new participants—yesterday my mom and uncle’s cousin’s wife came over for a wonderful afternoon of talking and reminiscing.

--The babies that I once read to are now teenagers. They are grown but not gone yet. They have interests (fabric! Cooking! Getting ready for Christmas!) that intersect with mine. What a delight.

--We did not gather at this house last year because of hurricane damage from Helene. I have not looked out of these windows at Thanksgiving until this year, although I was in the house in September. In September, the view was obscured by the trees still in full leaf. Now that the leaves are down, I’m sobered by how few trees are actually there.

--It is also sobering to think about how much older we all are. On the other side of the spectrum from babies grown into teenagers are the rest of the family, with a variety of health challenges.

But for today, we are here, the house is still here, and we will celebrate that fact with food, my favorite meal of the whole year.

Halloween 2025

 And so our beautiful October comes to a close.  

Today is Halloween, and I live in a house that will have no trick-or-treaters.  We have discovered a Roku channel that offers nothing but NYPD Blue, so we'll probably watch some more of that.  I used to watch the show in the 90's, and I forgot how compelling it is.  I stayed up later than I meant to last night as I hoped to see how a narrative arc about a serial killer would end, so I may go to bed early tonight.

In my adult life, I approach Halloween as the beginning of an important time that lasts three days.  I'm a theology geek, so I call it a triduum.  Halloween emerged from its pagan roots as a natural bridge to All Saints Day (November 1) and All Souls Day (Nov. 2). More on those holidays in the coming days.

This year, I'll spend Halloween writing a sermon.  This year, what scares me is the willingness of politicians to let SNAP benefits expire.  I can create an All Saints sermon that references the Biblical texts, our current political situation, and all the saints who have come before us.

I still have to teach, of course.  But the semester has revealed that my classes on MWF are nothing to fear or dread; no classes are, but I'm trying to use Halloween words today.  In Brit Lit, we'll cover Joyce's "The Dead," in a bit of serendipity.  In English 101, we'll sketch leaves and pinecones and acorns while we explore how sketching might impact our ability to describe things.

That class will probably be more openly enthusiastic than the Creative Writing class where I did the experiment yesterday.  Every semester, I know that each class will have a different dynamic, but each semester often surprises me in how that dynamic plays out. 

I will wear my candy corn earrings one last time.  Here's a picture that I took at the school's pumpkin patch a few weeks ago (look at that glorious blue sky!):

This morning, I'm thinking of past Halloweens:  in childhood, where I'd spend months planning my costume, the joy of all that candy.  I'm thinking of 2016, where Halloween was my first day as an administrator at a new job, and my first impression of people was the costume contest and the joy with which they approached the idea of a costume contest.  

I'm wishing I had time to bake, time for more contemplation.  Well, maybe next year when Halloween will be on a Saturday.  This year, I'll continue to enjoy these elements of my best life:  getting ready for my Sunday at the country church I love so much, fun classes to teach today, and cozy time in the evening as we cook together and then revisit quality TV from decades past, while I stitch a new quilt top for the well-worn quilt on our bed.

Keeping Our Lamps Trimmed and Burning on the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels

 I've had the spiritual "Keep Your Lamps Trimmed and Burning" in my head for much of the week-end:  "Keep Your Lamps, Trimmed and Burning, for this work is almost done.  Children don't grow weary."  It was the anthem for Sunday worship at St. Stephens, and it was also the theme for the women's retreat that the church offered, the retreat where I led workshops on spiritual journaling (more on those workshops in this blog post).  

It was a great retreat, with lots of thoughts on what keeps us on fire and how our lights are threatened by candlesnuffers everywhere.  It was a rich subject, and we could have spent a week or more on the subject.

I was most moved by the closing worship for the retreat.  We gathered around the paschal candle in the worship sanctuary.  Earlier in the retreat, we had thought about something that's important to us that we worry will be lost.  My list could have been long, but we were asked to choose one to bring with us to closing worship.  

As we entered the worship space, we were given small candles, the kind that we get on Christmas Eve.  At the end of the short worship, each woman came to the paschal candle and lit her candle while she said the thing that was important.  The whole assembly said, "Keep Your Lamp Trimmed and Burning."

We heard things like "freedom" and "democracy" along with specific items.  Mine was "the idea of the value of a liberal arts education."  I loved that we took time for each woman to state her item and we met each offering with a prayerful chant.

We ended with a song, "I Want to Walk as a Child of the Light," and not for the first time, I reflected on how wonderful it is to sing together.  I am much more used to sitting in spread out sanctuaries where I only hear my own voice.  I much prefer to sing in closer quarters, where I can't hear any individual voice.

It was also a great way to close the retreat.  We have much work to do, but it was good to remember that we're not doing it alone.

On this feast day of Saint Michael and All Angels, it's great to have these images in my mind:  lamps trimmed and burning, candles lit with prayers for protection.  We didn't invoke the protection of the angels during our retreat, but today's feast day reminds us that along with our earthly help, we can call on divine help too (and for a more traditional writing about this feast day, see this blog post).

Misty Morning with Haiku

It has been a week of perfect autumnal weather, the kind of September weather I used to envy when we lived in South Florida, and we had months to go before we would get any relief from relentless heat.  It's been the kind of weather where we have warm/hot days followed by cool nights and misty mornings.  There's rain here and there, but nothing that disrupts plans.

This morning, I'll go for a shorter walk than usual.  I'm being observed this morning in my English 101 class, so I want to give myself plenty of travel time.  I'm not stressed about the observation itself, which is a nice change of pace.  I know that the people in charge are not looking for a reason to get rid of me, and that's not always been the case in my teaching life.  But I don't want traffic to snarl up my headspace, so I'll give myself extra travel time.

Here's a photo from Monday's walk, in which the mist enthralled me, and I stopped to get the perfect photo to go with the haiku I composed while I walked.  I'll post the haiku-like creation below the photo:

Misty cathedral

composed of early bird song

baptism by fog

The Autumn of Life

 Yesterday I found myself in my Creative Writing class with my plans for the class upended.  I had planned to give them time in class to write, but we changed the due date to Tuesday, so it makes more sense for Tuesday to be the writing day.

Happily, I had come prepared with the worksheet that I described in this blog post, the Build Your Own Ode to a Season worksheet.  While they did that, I pulled up Keats' "To Autumn" on the Poetry site (the site that has the materials from the magazine, along with many other resources).  We listened to the poem without following along, and then we listened while we followed along, with the poem projected on the larger screen.  And then we talked about it.

What a treat to talk about this poem.  The more I read it, the more perfect it seems.

Because it was a Creative Writing class, we talked about the symbolism of autumn, the symbols themselves and how a story or a poem set in autumn might use that season as a symbol.  It made me think about who is in the autumn of their lives and who is not.

When Keats wrote this poem, he knew that he had TB, and he must have known that he was likely to die--so he was in the winter of his life.

I am 60 years old, so clearly in the autumn of my life.  But I want to think it's early autumn, September not late November.

Last week, I posted this picture, mist rising off the lake.  I can't always capture the mist, but I think I was successful here:

Yesterday I read the first line of "To Autumn":  "Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness."  I asked my students if the mornings had been misty lately.  They looked startled.  I realized that they probably wouldn't know.  They're probably up after the sun has risen and burned off the mist.

But here at a higher altitude, it's been very foggy/misty, and I've really enjoyed watching the swirls.  I've thought of past generations, surrounded by fog and mist and smoke, and it's no wonder they believed in ghosts, that they described ghosts the way they did.

I'm feeling a bit haunted myself.  It's strange to teach this poem to students who are not much older than Keats was when he wrote this perfect poem.  It's strange to think how much older I am than my students.  When I first started teaching, I was only a few years older than my students.  Now I am decades older.

Like Keats, I'm haunted by my mortality.  Let this haunting prompt me to do my best work!

Glints of Gold and Green

Yesterday, I captured this shot as I walked up the hill to the chapel at Lutheridge:

On the one hand, it looks like a summer morning--there are still lots of green leaves on the tree, and the hints of gold on the trees aren't changed leaves (not yet), but the sun shining through.

But the signs of seasonal change are there--the road has lots more leaves on it.  The shift is underway.

God's movement in the world is often like this picture.  In some way, it looks like nothing different from any other point in time, especially from one day to the next.  But those who are alert will notice that something is shifting.