Last weekend I attended a writing retreat. Three days of prayer and a choose your own writing adventure retreat.
It was wonderful.
This was the second year of a January weekend writing retreat, although I’ve gone to two other retreats with this director, and they are all special in their own ways. Last weekend was also very unusual. It was entirely on Zoom, and while that sounds daunting, it was nothing but fantastic all around. I think we’ve all adapted nicely to our technological advancements during these pandemic times.
On the very last morning, our subject was inspirational writing.
As it happened, prior to the weekend, I had been trying to write a reflection on the insurrection at the Capitol the week before, and it just wouldn’t come out. I’ve been told in previous writing classes that for the free write, if you can’t think of anything, just start writing. Something will come.
So that’s what I did, and I thought I would share it with you as we begin another weekend in a new era of this new full-of-potential year.
Inspiration writing is hard.
How do I conjure just the right balance of motivation, spirituality, and reflection on any given topic?
Am I supposed to inspire you?
Tell you what I find inspirational?
Be more subtle than that?
Johnny-on-the-spot and the spot is quicksand.
I made breakfast. It was terrible. Except the tea. The tea was good.
There are times when things don’t work that should and you more or less know that they don’t work even though you also know they should, but you can’t figure out why or what the problem is. Or how to make it better.
We know the opposite too.
This holds true for many things, both tangible and un- , but for me this week, it was a pair of pictures, both Mary, both by the same artist, my friend, Brother Mickey McGrath.
I had attended a weekend retreat under his direction in 2019. His retreats always include his artwork related to the weekend subject.
One of the pictures that I was drawn to was Mary, Queen of the Prophets. It was blue and yellow-gold and swirly and I was perfectly captivated by it.
Mary, Queen of the Prophets (c)2020 Bro. Mickey McGrath Trinity Stores Link attached to picture.
I ordered a print, framed it and hung it in its place.
Every time I looked at it I got a twinge of unease. Nothing specific. Nothing sinister. Just something not quite right.
The feelings I was getting made no sense.
I had wanted the picture for some time. I knew exactly where it would go when it came. But I don’t know. There was something undefined and uncomfortable when I looked at it despite its beauty.
And I lived with it even though I considered trading it back with the picture that originally hung in that space. I think I thought I would eventually change it.
Recently, Brother Mickey created a new Mary art. This one was Mary, Untier of Knots. Our Lady, Untier of Knots is my personal favorite of Marian devotions. I feel an overwhelming devotion to her. I have cards, coins, and medals of this devotion.
Mary, Our Lady, Untier of Knots (c)2020 Bro. Mickey McGrath Trinity Stores Link attached to picture.
For Christmas, I decided ot use a little of my gift money to order the print. I bought a frame and it arrived very quickly. Having nothing to do with the Queen of Prophets in particular, that spot was where it would hang – behind the chair in my corner office. It was time for change and Mary, Untier of Knots was *my* Mary.
As soon as it came I hung it on the wall.
The first time I looked at it from across the room, I felt a calmness wash over me.
There was serenity and feelings from deep within me.
I brought the other picture up to my bedroom. The walls are yellow and I thought it would fit with the blues and the yellow-gold and the swirls of the print. I propped it up against the wall on the floor beside my bed, intending to leave it until I could figure out where in the room exactly it would go.
Then something happened.
I looked at it – Mary’s face, Mary’s hands, the swirling of the background.
Even resting on the floor, it was home. I was full of emotion seeing it in this temporary place, but still…its place.
Wherever I would hang it in my bedroom it would fit; it would be perfect.
Things have a place and when they’re in the wrong one, you know it. Even if you don’t actively know it or the reasons for the discomfort, you feel something real, and eventually with a little nudge, these things can be righted.
Tonight is a unique opportunity to see the conjunction of the planets, Saturn and Jupiter, looking in the sky to some people like a large star, perhaps the same Christmas Star the three wise men (kings, shepherds) saw that guided them to Jesus’ birthplace.
In my neck of the woods, the Northeast USA, sunset is at 4:25pm, and the best time to see the star/conjunction is an hour past sunset looking towards the southwestern sky. With binoculars, you may also be able to see Jupiter’s four large moons.
Some links to read about this special sight while you’re waiting for sunset:
As we come to the last Sunday of Advent, I have finally decided to recommend an Advent book. The book itself begins with Advent but continues with daily readings throughout the Christmas season. What I have really come to share with you is the author, Michelle Frankl-Donnay.
I have been reading her reflections for a few years now, and she is by far my favorite person to read their reflections. They are a wonderful blend of spirituality and real life with the enormity of the universe for perspective. Professor Frankl-Donnay teaches chemistry at Bryn Mawr College and her science background gives an entire feeling with the mixing of the scientific and religious. Whenever I am reading her books durng the holiday seasons, I am wonderfully surprised at my reactions and how much I get emotionally from her reflections.
There are many ways to inspire this month. It starts somewhat in darkness as the nights get longer and the days shorter, but my birthday was last week, so there were birthday candles. Advent began a few days before that and the church has their advent wreath with two of the four candles lit now. In two days is the first night of Chanukah, the Festival of Lights, and it also marks the anniversary of my mother’s death when I will light a Yartzeit candle for her, and then of course, Christmas two weeks after that.
There are many ways to bring light into our lives in this darkest season in what seems to be a very dark year. It may be that the older we get, the more we notice that our childhood heroes keep dying. I remember my mother making comment on that many years ago when she was in her fifties. I am noticing it now, but I don’t know if it’s my age or the year that 2020 has been.
In some ways, the year has stood still, or at least it’s seemed like that with how slowly it’s passing by, and it seems that every week is a new loss: Childhood heroes like Curly Neal of the Harlem Globetrotters, Chuck Yeager, Little Richard, actors that I enjoyed watching on my own and with my mother: Stan Kirsch, Kirk Douglas, Fred Willard, Phyllis George, James Lipton, Orson Bean, and Olivia de Havilland to name but a few.
And those that really hit me hard, whose deaths I still carry with me in some way or form: Jerry Stiller, Grant Imahara, Tomie de Paola, Chadwick Boseman, John Lewis, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and so many others including a dear friend who died just last week.
And yet, we continue on, as we do.
I am attending a three week Advent program on Zoom that includes music, prayer, reflection, journaling, and breakout groups. It is affording me the time, the facilitator calls it the gift of time, the ability to sit still, in quiet, and reflect. Contemplate.
And so I will pass that on to you right now.
Take fifteen minutes. Set a timer if you need to, and just stop. You can come back to this post after the fifteen minutes are finished, but take the time and sit with yourself (and with G-d if you like, but you don’t have to).
– – Fifteen minutes of quiet – –
Did you light a candle? Listen to music? Pray? Think? Draw or color?
This morning, I did all of these things and I was inspired, even just a little, to finish this post.
Some things that inspired me this week:
“Always keep your eyes open. Keep watching. Because whatever you see can inspire you.”
— Grace Coddington
Advent Wreath art. (c)2020Stained Glass Window. Immaculate Conception, Mary. (c)2020The light shining on the Advent Wreath. (c)2020
Griffins and Ginger Snaps 