Everything's Coming Up Ros...aries

I did something to my back more than two weeks ago and hadn't been able to do much except complain a *lot*. Since all of you who read this blog know me, I would like to thank you in advance for not saying to my face: "Yeah, um... that was a lot of complaining". I have officially beat you to the proverbial punch.

It seemed like I wasn't able to accomplish anything. So many of the things that need to be done for my job require using my back -- unloading the dishwasher, picking up laundry, washing the floor, hauling recalcitrant preschoolers out of naughtiness, driving for extended periods of time, maneuvering grocery/ supercenter carts through oceans of self-absorbed fellow consumers -- hell, even just propelling my substantial self forward. My instinct was to just push through it: shoot back a handful of Advil (TM: thank you!) and do the things that need to be done anyway.

I would conquer! Pain be damned! And then my body said "NOoooooo!". And I lay on the floor while Little J treated me like a moonbounce and occasionally asked "Mommy, why are you letting me jump on your belly?".

When I return from a walk, I highlight the day on the calendar in bright yellow. I had such a nice little pile of glowing golden squares of accomplishment! But when I was in too much pain to walk, the calendar became a long, barren stretch of blank boxes. I started to feel restless and deeply pissed at the same time. I wanted to be out! I wanted to be doing! Accomplishment NOW, dammit! My nightly strolls were no longer about walking out to meet God and the truth about reality. I had started off just saying the rosary as I went; then with the acquirement of my iPod Shuffle (TM: awesomeness!) I began listening to pious audiobooks. Well, one night that wasn't doing it for me and I switched over to "Bossypants" by Tina Fey (hey. she's funny). I began to fantasize (and "fantasy" is exactly what it was) about eventually walking marathons and starting to jog and maybe doing a half marathon after the pilgrimage and eeeverrything's commminngg up ROses!

I think it would have ended about as well as it did for Natalie Wood (in real life, not "Gypsy"...ew...).

It seems I was given the time and the space to think about what I was doing. I was forced to remember why I am doing this in the first place. And I'm grateful for that. (Of course, it's a lot easier to be grateful when you can move around on your own steam instead of being victim to people "helping" you with their Ikea vet kit).

The pain I felt was in my back, but what was really hurt was my pride. The walking had become something I checked off each day to say "I am doing something good". It was an activity done for its own sake instead of being a place where I go to meet Another.

I'm mostly healed now and have begun again. But I leave the fantasies at the door and walk only with the beads.

Light Over the Neighborhood

Today is September 12, 2011, ten years and one day after the attacks on our country.

I lived here in the DC area then. I was on my way to class in the city when the first plane hit the towers. As it became clear that it was not an accident, I made a u-turn and sped home. I would have been passing the Pentagon about the time the plane struck there had I continued on.

One of the articles I read online yesterday exhorted the reader to remember not September 11, but September 12 -- the day we were all kinder to one another, the day we remembered who we are as a nation. But I remember the days immediately following the attacks as days of sheer terror. The sky had been ripped open and we did not know what else was going to happen. Everything came to a complete stop; all we could do was wait and see what, if anything, would happen next. I, for my part, seriously doubted that life could ever be the same again -- and I don't mean pat-downs at the airport or the War in Afghanistan -- but whether I would have the time and freedom to marry my boyfriend, to have children, to have a life.

The article made me realize: I don't want to be the person I was on September 12, 2001. I am a better person not the day after, but a decade and a day after, because of all that I have been able to receive in the last ten years.

When I went out for my walk tonight, the moon was full and bright and only slightly obscured by wisps of cloud -- just enough to add some contrast and texture to the scene. Growing up, I was told that the sun is the "Light of Our Lord" and the moon, the "Lamp of Our Lady". The idea behind this symbolism, of course, is that the moon, like Mary, does not generate its own light, but gets its light from the sun (Son) and shares this light with the world.

That moon was like a companion along the way, especially because the neighborhood was unusually silent tonight. I did not meet a single person as I walked along, did not hear any voices, did not encounter one car. Yet, it was not unnerving but peaceful. It was like everyone was snuggled down in their houses remembering that this day could have not been. The moonlight bathing this little flock of homes made me think of gratitude, and of allowing ourselves to be led out of darkness.

A pilgrimage toward The Pilgrimage

I am embarking on a journey and would like to enlist your support.

Every year The Avalon School and its sister school, Brookewood, hold a pilgrimage to ask Our Lady's intercession for the continued growth and development of the schools. My husband is one of the founding teachers of Avalon, and my daughter is in her second year at Brookewood. For my family, these schools aren't just a job and an education -- they are a very specific call, a designated path in our lives.

The walk is more than twenty (20) miles. In the past, I have been able to complete one leg, about three (3) miles.

(You mathmagicians out there will be able calculate the disparity).

Last year, as I watched the boys and girls and teachers and parents and friends trudge through all 25 miles, I was so proud of them and the schools, yet so disappointed with myself. I physically did not have the stamina to even attempt more than one part of the journey. But underneath my sadness, I heard a small voice. "Next year", it said to me. I looked up and saw the back of the statue of Our Lady being carried in procession and promised that next year I would be right behind her.

Preparations have begun. For the last few weeks I have been walking most days for increasing periods of time. My treadmill committed suicide the first day, so I have been walking through my somewhat hilly neighborhood in various kinds of weather. It is a slow beginning, but at least it has begun.

Will you come with me on these little walks? There's a poll question in the top right hand corner of the main page. Tomorrow is my birthday, and the day the Catholic Church celebrates the birth of Mary. Make us a gift and say a prayer --that The Pilgrimage may be a success, and that I may accomplish my part in it.