Sister Christer

the mysterious location of the banana - or - things i forgot about living in community

• how it feels to be needed and to be helpful to others on a daily basis

• sisters are funny people

  the odd places you find things... today I found a banana (a real live banana) in a box of cereal (Golden Grahams, since you asked.)  Random banana in the box outside the bag with the cereal, but going brown nonetheless.

• the way things end up in different places from day to day (i.e., cereal bowls) (well, and, bananas)

• the beautiful rhythm of the voices lifted in prayer together

• how much patience it takes to be with someone who is memory-challenged

• how much joy it is to be with each one of the sisters

• how entertaining a NASCAR race can be when shared with several others (and how much knitting one can get done while doing the sharing)

• the daily laughter

  eating with others and preparing a meal - daily sacraments

• how i fit in the world

• the tyranny of "the way it's always been."

• the comfort of "the way it's always been."

• challenge, hope, peace, prayer, acceptance, love, frustration, generosity, charity, faith, and all the bananas

at a loss of idioms

i love language and i love humor and this here, this takes the pie.

loving memor(ies)

Rosalie Wilcox 4-29-1933 - 2-14-2007

si, yes, oui, uh-huh.

risking my heart (because I believe that's what it's for.)

budget cuts

gonna be barking elsewhere for a while.  blessings and prayers for you and the new year.  may peace prevail on earth.  amen.

advent

It's a chilly Redwood City morning.  The Christmas lights twinkle.  I'm drinking my coffee and reading about how to manage a dysfunctional Christmas - this may be the year I don't break into tears.  yeah, right.

Mom's not here.  And though I hope, I don't "know" where she is.  I mean, I know where she is.  But more immediately and painfully, I know where she's not.

Chiquita, the beautiful, bossy, white, Mexican street cat, wants attention.  She leaps into my lap.  But, she's older now.  She misses by a foot.  And by that I mean her foot lands in my cup of coffee.  And we both leap then. 

This has been the saddest December I have known.  Duh.  Of course it has.  It's the tension.  The many tensions.  Work - not going swimmingly; the "firsts" without Mom.  Birthday and tree decorating and knitting Christmas and holiday and music and then, the presents.  What do you get for someone who's dead? 

Christmas cards are coming in for Mom from people I forgot to tell.  And should I send them a note in the return Christmas card about her death?  Should I wait until after the holidays?  How do people handle this?

And I want to send cards, but don't know what to say.  Merry Christmas?  I want others to have one, but how can I say that when I know now that sometimes it's absolutely impossible.  Oh, I say it.  I tell people.  I know others don't need my sad baggage.  They will have their own one day, if they don't already.

The joy, the happy, the cheer of the holidays it was made by my Mom who really got it.  She knew that we needed a time when the normal was put aside.  The important thing was to be together.  To look at shiny.  To bake some sweet.  To be together.  To play.

We had a beautiful (to my little eyes) nativity set that came out.  It had this filmy white material that was, surely from heaven, that we placed on the roof.  It was cool.  It was snow.

It disappeared after the first fire, I think.  I haven't opened the box with the one Mom replaced it with many years later.  I have my Advent wreath and candles out.  I've not lit the candles.  On the little trea is an ornament I made in 1977 - a paint it and bake it shrinky dink of the nativity.  It's childishly colored and glaringly tacky.  It will have to do and it does.

my favorite christmas comic

in the category of "light the lamp, not the rat!":

oh those savage chickens. 

meg fowler wants to know what you love

Meg Fowler: a cool blog.  With cool questions. 

Such as

Things YOU Love?  Here's my list for today. 

Song you love: Sing Mary Sing (as sung by Jennifer Knapp)

Food you love: Ice Cream. Oh, yes, Ice Cream. In fact, I love ice cream so much that my niece didn’t bring any with the birthday cake because she assumed I’d have some. But I didn’t. Sigh.

Thing you love to look at: the faces of people I love.

Sound you love: The sound of the coffee pot’s final whoosh of coffee preparation.

Thing you love to laugh at: witty movies

Gadget you love: Addi Turbo circular knitting needles

Person you love: Rose Marie

Software you love: Google Chat

Word you love: Wisteria

Thing you love on the internet: Google Images Search

Place you love to go on vacation: Denise’s house

Sensation you love: cashmere yarn through my fingers.

Animal you love: generally, a cow; specifically, a black and white cat named Boots.

Book you love: Guadalupe: Mother of the New Creation, by Virgil Elizondo

Emotion you love: Tenderness

Occasion you love: There’s a part of each of our sister’s funeral that I love – the singing at the end of the Hail Holy Queen by our sisters. It’s so beautiful. And poignant.

Quality you love in people: Humorous perspective

Thing you most love to shop for: presents for others

And finally…

What you love about today: pumpkin flavored cream cheese at the Friendly Friday Feast this a.m.

GO!

LOVE!

I swear, you’ll feel better just for having thought of it all.

nine months

That Certain Number of Planets (minus one)

A Show I Sort of Liked

A Book I'm Not Going To Read (though I bet it's interesting.)

The Channel I Should Watch More

The Type I Am

A Yarn Shop I'm Soon To Visit

Baby Time

Like Climbing A Mountain Through Water

right brain or left?

This is amazing...  Are you right  or left brain dominant?

Clockwise or Counter-clockwise?