The Joy to Serve

          Recently, I had the blessing of reading Matushka Juliana Schmemann’s newest book, The Joy to Serve.  Having grown up in a family dedicated to the service of the Church (my father as a parish priest, my mother as a priest’s wife and choir director, my sister and myself as a chanter and Sunday School teacher, my brother as a subdeacon), I found this book both comforting and challenging.  Comforting, because it showed that the struggles we have faced throughout our church service are by no means unique, and challenging, because it showed that my opinion about how things should be done is NOT equivalent, and in fact can often be radically opposed, to the Truth of the Gospel, which is simply love for God, and love for neighbor.  Below I share an excerpt that particularly moved me, both when I first read it, and especially now as I travel to join family, friends, and assembled faithful in prayer as my uncle and godfather completes his life’s journey.  May God bless us on our own journey to the Kingdom!

“When preparing for a journey, we try to learn as much as we can about our destination; the climate, the history, the special attractions, etc. We buy special clothes, travel books, we explore the internet.  In other words we spend a great deal of time in preparation for the trip with great enthusiasm and anticipation.

            Exactly the same can be said about our life’s journey to the Kingdom.  The same joy and anticipation can and should take place as we prepare for our final banquet with the Lord, with the Theotokos and with all the saints…

Having laid aside all earthly cares, having detached ourselves from concrete petty thoughts and emptied our minds in order to give enough room for the Spirit to fill, I would like to stand with you in silence, stillness and solitude – solitude with Christ.  Then we can concentrate on our journey, the one that is taking place as time moves inexorably forward, upward, and, we hope, towards the gates…

But we know Christ, we partake of His Body and His Blood, we stand at the foot of His Cross, we know His Love…Love Him back! Always and forever, this is the answer: love Him back!

The Church provides all the tools that this journey requires…”

The Joy to Serve, pp. 85-88

Juliana Schmemann

Published by: Alexander Press

Triumphs and "Learning Experiences"

     The interval between my last blog post and this one has been FULL of small gardening triumphs, as well as small (and not so small) "learning experiences" - my College of Ed professor's way of describing those situations that do NOT go as planned.

First of all, the potted tomatoes (store-bought) are doing great! Actually, as of this posting we've already harvested 6, and two more are waiting to get picked tonight :) I learned my lesson last year that, to avoid the awful "bottom-blossom rot" I must water these guys incessantly, and keep the dirt from splashing up on them.  To do this, I used some leftover gardening fabric and shredded newspaper to "mulch" my tomatoes and so far, so good : )

Sorry for the side-ways photo, I'll keep trying to fix it haha...but, anyway, this is (or rather, was) my cilantro. I'm blaming it on the heat, but this poor little guy, who started out rather strong, just did not make it.  It does, however, have a bunch of flowery things (just no leaves), so maybe it'll come back next year?

Ahh, the basil.  In this picture, absolutely lovely, and a great addition to my soups and other summer cooking experiments.  Unfortunately, it currently looks HORRIBLE because the Japanese beetles have decided that yes, indeed, it is tasty :( I have managed to keep the beetle populations somewhat at bay through strategically placed bird feeders (and a good hosing off every once in a while), and I still have hope that I can get a few more good servings off of this guy before winter.

One of my students gave me these potted flowers for my last day of school and it is surviving! I have not had great luck in the past with my potted plants (as my husband and dying indoor orchid will attest to), but this guy seems to be made of some pretty hardy stuff (marigolds, snapdragons, and some other flowers that I'm sure my more gardening-pro friends will recognize but I have yet to identify).

These are two tomato seedlings left over from my seed-starting attempt (see more below).  I am keeping them alive, but am not really sure that they are going to get big enough to produce fruit before winter...we'll see.

Ditto as above (except that it's parsley).  It's hanging in there, but since this is a perennial plant I have much higher hopes for a good future here.

This basil was started from seed, and it still looks this beautiful :) I guess if the beetles terrorize the other one, I should at least have this one left.

Slight break from the vegetables, my newest flowering plant :) I can claim absolutely no credit for the flowers in my garden - they came with the house - but I enjoy them nevertheless.

This is the other corner of my yard, filled with asparagus (front), cucumbers (left), green onions (middle), tomatoes (back), and blue berries (right).

These cucumbers started from seed and have some very nice yellow blossoms.  This was a new plant for me this year, and I learned all about it's need for crawling all over the ground (who knew? Apparently everybody but me LOL).  I'm hoping we'll get some cucumbers out of it this year.

One more cucumber, and a tomato seedling all grown up :) As with the other (even smaller) seedlings, I'm not sure it will produce much fruit before winter, but we'll give it a shot.

Again, a series of sideways photos - blueberries from last year, but recently transplanted into pots (ideally for better soil quality control - we'll see how they like it).  So far, with these guys, not even a blossom much less a berry.  I'm chalking it up to transplant shock or heat or not a cold enough winter...other ideas?? I do know it can't be the soil, since I made it nice and acidic for them.

More teenage tomatoes

Last year's parsley - gone WILD! It's so weird, I've barely even cut any leaves for use.  The stalks are huge too! I was really excited that it came back, but now I just don't know what to do with it.  Definitely open to ideas.

This year's parsley - much better :) except that a few chipmunks (at least 3, unless it's the same guy coming back after getting trapped) have decided that parsley roots make great burrowing places.  I've tried moving them, but those guys are crazy good at getting into the pots.

So, that's about it on the gardening front.  I have another blog I want to post soon on more spiritual matters, so keep your eyes open for a new consecutive posting record!

Summer Vacation - and Gardening lessons

Ok, so apparently I did not have quite as much free time as I was hoping to... no matter, summer has officially begun for those of us in the teaching profession, and I plan to make the most of my "free" time :)

As I noted in my previous post, I embarked on the rather new adventure of growing plants from seeds.  This adventure turned into rather a misadventure and I failed to realize that, when accustoming seedlings to life outside, one should not leave them outside...all day...in the sun! Needless to say, my first batch of seedlings died.

However, not to be discouraged, I replanted and now have a nice new batch of seedlings which I am introducing to the outdoors in a much more methodical and gradual manner:

 As you can see, these poor late starters are probably not going to provide much summer produce (maybe by the fall? we can hope).  So, I also took some time this Memorial Day weekend to purchase slightly more mature plants, which I hope to tend over the summer:

We have here blueberries (mine from last year are still alive, but still struggling in our less-than-ideal soil), raspberries (a new one for me), tomatoes, parsley, cilantro, and basil.  Yummy!

I can never garden without remembering my time at the Antiochian Village Summer Camp.  Every year, it seemed, the campers were required as part of our Christian Education to weed/remove rocks from the camp vegetable garden (we used to say the counselors spent their training session putting them all back, since every year there seemed to be the same number of rocks).  While we were doing this, our Christian Ed. leaders would teach us how gardening is such a wonderful analogy for the spiritual life: in order to make our hearts fertile ground for our Lord Jesus Christ, we must root out from it all of the weeds and rocks (sins, passions, earthly desires and attachments, etc.) This process takes time - a lifetime, in fact - and requires much patience, attention, and vigilance - much like growing seedlings! If we leave our souls unattended for too long, as with young plants, we too may wither from lack of the Living Water and Spiritual Nourishment.  Let us not neglect such a great task.  May God strengthen us all in this holy endeavor!

Springtime newness

I'm baaaack! After a long hiatus, I think I've finally found enough routine to begin blogging again. The topic of today's post is - gardening! Last year, I discovered how much I enjoy tilling the earth and watching the fruits of my labors grow into something I can then use in my kitchen (although Frank says I just use this as an excuse to play in the dirt - haha). This year, rather than go the store-bought plant route, I started off my own seedlings in the house. Here is step one, demonstrated visually:

Washing the little seeding pots

Filling them with seed starter

All our seeds :)

Half-way done!

Last box!

All done :)

Step two coming soon!!

Road Trip!!!

So, contrary to common sense and both of our husbands' best judgment, my mother and I recently undertook a 700 mile (1400 round trip) road trip to visit my sister in Chattanooga, Tennessee. While extremely long, the trip was definitely worth it as we had some well-needed reconnect time with my sister and also got to spend some time with her fiance. In addition, we got to play wedding planners and help my sister with flowers and invitations for her upcoming wedding. Below, find some cool pics from our little tour of downtown Chattanooga. Unfortunately, no pics of the restaurant where she works or the fiance, as I am a little out of practice in remembering to take photos. Hopefully I will remember next time! LOL.

https://picasaweb.google.com/julianadancer1/Chattanooga2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCLP6sJLjhNCkhQE&feat=directlink

Direction

My drive to school the other day was met by an exceptionally foggy morning. At one point along my commute, there is a windy road which follows a river. Even on a good day, I must slow down significantly to manage the tight curves and avoid driving off the road. On this particular day, however, I knew I would have to be even more careful, as I could not see the road more than about 10 feet in front of me at any given time. Thankfully, some forward thinking city planner must have realized that foggy weather conditions and a windy road would be a treacherous combination, and so signs were installed at every curve, directing drivers as to when they would need to begin to turn. While I still could not see the road, I saw the sign, and was able to trust its guidance to get me around each and ever turn safely.

Even while driving that morning, I thought of the uncanny connection between those signs along that foggy road and the spiritual life. Many times, we have no idea where God is leading us in life. We cannot always see the road ahead. Sometimes, we may not even know how close we are to falling off the Way completely. Those daily temptations and choices we make are each a turn in the windy, narrow road that we must navigate. But, as the most thorough planner that He is, God has foreseen these treacherous circumstances and given us signs - godly family and friends, priests and spiritual guides, the saints, the Scriptures, the services and teachings of our Church - who tell us: "Watch out for this turn", "Slippery here", "Slow down". If we only have the faith to trust what God has given us, we too can safely arrive at our ultimate destination - His Kingdom.

Loss

It’s strange how the people we love the most, we often keep in touch with the least. We often take our relationship for granted since, whenever we meet, it’s as if the last time we spoke was yesterday - even if it's really been years.

Perhaps some of this attitude is due to overconfidence, and some due to laziness, but what I have learned is that no reason makes up for the pain of realizing that, when our friend or loved one is no longer with us, it’s been months, or even years since we last spoke to them, and that we never did get the chance to tell them what a difference they have made in our lives.

This reflection stems from news I received early Wednesday morning that my dear friend, Christine, had passed away from breast cancer in Santiago, Chile. Christine was an American emigrant that had married a Chilean iconographer and was the choir director at the Orthodox church I had attended while studying abroad in Santiago. She was energetic and always busy with one church activity or another. Her kindness and openness helped me to feel at home away from home. She and I would constantly discuss music, St. Vladimir’s Seminary (where she received a Masters degree), and the U.S. to Chile transition. Singing with her was one of the most enriching activities I have ever participated in. Since being back in the States, I had emailed her a few times, but quickly the business of a new marriage, house, and job overtook my already few opportunities to keep in touch.

This last Sunday, my family sang at a wedding for another dear friend. Because the bride’s goddaughter was from Guatemala, I offered to sing “What Shall I Render to the Lord”, in Spanish. Christine had taught it to me in Chile, and I thought it would be appropriate. The entire time I was singing it, I was thinking about how I couldn’t wait to email Christine to tell her about it and how cool she’d think it was. However, too quickly the business returned and I didn’t even check my email until Wednesday morning.

As I was getting ready to leave for school, I stole what I thought would be an innocent 5 minutes to look at my inbox. However, what I read were 2 emails from the past week that contained the shocking news that 1) Christine had been admitted to the hospital with cancer, and 2) she had passed away on Tuesday.

I’d like to think that somehow Christine knows about the hymn that we sung unknowingly in her honor at my friend’s wedding, and I pray to God that somehow my thoughts for her that day transcended time and space to give her comfort in her final hours.

The lesson I learned, which I hope I am articulating well, is that we, or more specifically I, should never be too busy to call a friend just to say hi. That I shouldn’t wait for Christmas, or a major life event to communicate how much I care about my friend or family member who is physically far from me. It is my goal that those of you who read this, my dear friends and family, will be receiving a phone call from me soon, just to say hi, and to let you know how dear you are to me and what a difference you have made in my life.

God bless you all!

¡Que la memoria de Christine sea eterna!