Grace Upon Grace

At the Feeder This Morning

There just to cheer me up, I'm convinced -- well, okay, also because they'd like to survive -- a pair of Black-Headed Grosbeaks.

I went swimming in the Bear River yesterday. There's a deep-ish spot near a picnic area where Wanda and I baptized a young man a few years ago. (You can only do this in July and maybe August; otherwise you'd freeze.) It was lovely to bob around in the cold water, looking up at the sky and trees.

Today, a day off for me, I had lunch with my friend Bill Heersink, professor and currently interim President of Salt Lake Theological Seminary. We met at Taggart's Cafe, a wonderful place tucked into one of the canyons between here and Ogden, Utah. Not only did they have great food, but they had a pair of peacocks walking around the garden. This thrills me no end.

I found myself thinking on the drive home how I might fashion a headdress for myself that looks like a peacock's headdress. This is either a sign that the stress has taken me over the edge (of what exactly, I don't know), or just a sign of returning imagination. I had a vision of using a headband and attaching frond-like stalks to it ... then it came to me:

Where could I possibly wear my peacock headdress?

I told Guy about this; he was not at all surprised, and in answer to this pressing question he said, "Around the house. Maybe to church?" Somehow I'm thinking not on the last one.

Bill and I talked about the possibility of my doing some writing and teaching for the Seminary, which I would love. Just the thought of new possibilities helped me feel better after an absolutely awful week at the hospital.

Before I drove over to meet Bill, I delivered flowers and cards from the hospital patients to the funeral home where the service would be held for our patient who killed herself on Sunday. I met the parents and the young woman's brother. They were really touched by the effort of their daughter's fellow patients to reach out in this way. Their tears moved me to tears. I cried halfway to Taggart's. Thanks, God, for Bill's pastoral presence -- and the peacocks. 

Exhausted

I conducted the memorial service today for our patient who died on Sunday; it was apparently a suicide but we're not 100% sure (99.5%, from my point of view). We had a good turnout for the service and one patient took it upon herself to find a big sheet of paper and a box of colored pencils which she invited everyone to use to write a message to the dead woman's family. I always do a "shared eulogy," allowing staff and clients to comment about the person. Not only do we get a better picture of the person than we would if I alone spoke, we also do some ventilating of feelings, an important step in healing. We had lots of participation today, including one staff member who offered to play a song he wrote for his father as a tribute to the young woman who died. The music really was better than the words.

Last night I was at the hospital until 9:30 in my role as a member of the Critical Incident Stress Management team, joining my colleague Dr. Pamela Fuller in doing notifications about the critical illness of another patient. There is something very strange about telling (accurately, precisely) over and over again what happened to somebody, but that's part of the CISM process. The patient fell ill around 3:00. By 6:00, rumors were flying, including, "He was DOA," "He'd been falling down all the time for the last week," "I saw blood on his face," "It was a heart attack" -- none of which was true. I know because I was there as our docs and nurses worked on the man. It's really important to get accurate information to everybody as soon as possible.

The sick patient is alive but not in good shape. We will learn more tomorrow.

I am wondering what it would be like to work in a place where you don't have to go into overdrive to try to prevent copycat suicides when something like this takes place. Or where you don't have to do debriefings because staff got beat up or patients witnessed another patient do some serious self-mutilating. The world I live in at the hospital has become almost routine to me, and I wonder sometimes if I have been warped by it as well as deepened.

I was so stressed out myself today that I had a hard time stringing words into sentences. That's when I know I'm reaching my limit, when I can't do words. Thanks be to God, I was restored long enough to say some comforting things to close the shared eulogy. God really does give you what you need to do God's work for God's people.

Here endeth the lesson for today, and so to bed.

Please keep praying for us!

Pray for Us at the State Hospital....

We've had a patient die (likely suicide) and one come close to dying (apparently from natural causes) in the last three days.

Many of the other patients are very upset. Many staff members are, too.

I'm working 12-hour days. So please pray for all of us! And I'll be back to regular blogging as soon as I can.

More on Addiction

Here's a dispatch from the U. of Utah Alcoholism School -- my weekly column in the Salt Lake Tribune.

On the last day of the week-long School, we found ourselves trying to put our new-found knowledge to work. A friend relapsed. It was heart-breaking. I can't say much more for fear of breaking confidentiality. I'll just ask my readers to pray for all people affected by addiction, please.

It's hot today! But a breeze is blowing and the humidity is low. My garden is a-bloomin' away. I hope to have a picture of it to post soon.

Off to the nursery to buy more plants .... The gorgeous, salmon-colored poppies I'm seeing all over town are calling to me!

Alcoholism School

Guy and I are at the University of Utah's annual School on Alcoholism and Other Drug Dependencies this week. I am psyched already at what I'm learning about brain structure/chemistry and how it plays into addiction. It's good to learn that the understanding of addiction in medicine/psychology and related fields is coming out of the dark ages. The experts are adamant that punishment (e.g., prison, jail) does not work, that addiction is not fundamentally a character disorder but a brain disorder, and that offering help, support, and lots of coping techniques works best.

The spiritual component of recovery remains central. Good news for chaplain types like me.

I'll post more as I learn more!

It's Too Beautiful ...

... to be inside today. Summer in Wyoming: 83-85 degrees, low humidity, breezes, clear sky. This is what we call "hot." Coming from Virginia, I know it's not. And I am grateful!

I should be outside right now, given this week's column in which I promised I would be. I had to work at the hospital this a.m. finishing things up before being out a week. (Guy and I will be attending the University of Utah School on Alcoholism and Other Drug Dependencies next week.) I heard a 5th Step, picked the hymns for tomorrow, got irritated at a colleague's e-mail, and bought doughnuts for the Bible Study hosted by my helper, James.

I just finished my sermon for Holy Communion, Rock Springs, where I will be the supply priest tomorrow. And there are still three (at least) hours of daylight left!

Friday Five, June 22

1. Favorite summer food(s) and beverage(s)
Iced tea, unsweetened. Grilled fish. Fresh fruit.

2. Song that "says" summer to you. (Need not be about summer explicitly.) "Hot Fun in the Summertime," Sly and the Family Stone, or "Good Morning, Starshine" from way back when (the musical "Hair" was its source).

3. A childhood summer memory: Going to the beach -- Colonial Beach, a small beach town on the Potomac River near its widest point (over a mile). My aunt, uncle, and cousins (10 of them, almost all redheads like me) lived there and they were so much fun! We played baseball in the backyard, played at the beach, and probably terrorized the neighborhood.

4. An adult summer memory
Beach once again ... this time Kiawah Island, South Carolina, outside of Charleston, with "the kids" and their mates and our friends Angela and Zino .... the year before we moved out here, 2002. A big, beautiful house on a golf course -- alligators easily visible from the deck. About 1/4 mile to the almost empty beach. The young people doing most of the cooking and just in general making life very fun. I miss them!

5. Describe a wonderful summer day you'd like to have in the near future. (weather, location, activities)
I'm itching to go to San Francisco again. Weather -- probably cool, maybe foggy. Activities: Guy and I in a room at the Hotel Nikko, sleeping late and having coffee from the Starbucks downstairs for breakfast; exploring the city or driving up to Point Reyes; sushi for dinner.

Optional: Does your place of worship do anything differently in the summer? (Fewer services, casual dress, etc.) It couldn't get much more casual dress than we have in the chapel, where people are welcome to wear their pajamas as far as I'm concerned. No, nothing different really either at the chapel or St. Paul's. There's not a lot of frou-frou to pare away at!

Yo Mama?

I have received some correspondence recently from the national Episcopal Church and other church sources in which I am addressed as ... Mother Clark. Or Mother Connie.

The truth is, I am nobody's mama. And never will be. Oh, except the mother of my dogs, and late lamented cats. And then only in a manner of speaking.

I have, on the other hand, often been called "Mom" or "Mama" by psychiatric hospital patients who need a nurturing, kind mother figure. This is not something I've encouraged. Sometimes I've actively discouraged it. Sometimes I let it be. Always I accept it as a compliment.

Though I lived in a "Father/Mother" parish for 12 years, I just don't know if I can be Mother Connie. Less still, Mother Clark -- a name some family members called my paternal grandmother, a lady with whom I would not like to be identified for the rest of my life. Yes, there's a story there.

"What shall we call you?"

How about .... Connie?

Or, and I know this doesn't sound very Episcopalian, I do love the title "Pastor."

Fresh and Sassy

Tonight I took two new-ish church members, Cheryl and Joe, down to Salt Lake Seminary with me for the third of four classes on the Book of Amos. Cheryl and Joe did not come to faith easily or out of childhood habituation. Their journeys have been hard and dangerous, yet here they are, full-fledged members of St. Paul's Episcopal Church and now summer students at a seminary!

We had a great time on the drive to and from tonight. First we stopped in Park City on the way down, where I picked up my first week's worth of fresh produce from an organic farm called Zoe's Garden. We have a subscription to receive a portion of their organic produce throughout the summer. It is gorgeous! Haven't eaten any of it yet, but it looks fantastic.

On the way back, we talked about our dreams for St. Paul's. Cheryl and Joe want to see us reach out to unchurched people. This is an idea I've floated from time to time in the congregation. It has been met with a stupendous "ho hum." But here are these two new members who really want to make it happen and have great ideas about how to focus the effort (reaching out to single parents and their children, specifically) and how to make it attractive (free home-cooked meal for the whole families then child-care afterwards so the single parents can talk to fellow adults for an hour or so).

We were laughing about ways to sneak this idea over on the more change-phobic members of the congregation. Joe is on the vestry, and so is my husband Guy, so there are two infiltrators right there. We got a bit irreverent in our discussions of how to "sell" the idea and wound up doing imitations of the old Phil Hartman routine from "Saturday Night Live" -- "I've just stepped in a steaming pile of SASSY!" Also, when we got a little too irreverent, we started singing: "They'll Know We Are Christians by Our Love" and somehow segued to "My Boyfriend's Back" and "The Leader of the Pack." Don't know exactly how that happened!

I personally just feel grateful for (a) fresh organic produce and (b) sassy, spirited, smart, and dedicated new church members. Fresh and sassy -- sounds good to me!

Random 8

I've been tagged by RevKim. Here are the rules:

1.I have to post these rules before I give you the facts.
2. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
5.Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they are tagged and to visit your blog.

1. I would rather be dancing than just about anything else. Not formal dancing or line dancing or any kind of organized dancing, mind you. Dancing like we did in the old days (60s-70s). Music: Motown, disco, some rock (e.g., Eric Clapton's "Let It Rain").

2. Gardening is a new passion for me. It figures I would wait till I moved to hard-to-garden, frigid, dry, short-growing-season Zone 4 before this passion hit me. I have a 5' x 5' perennial flower garden and a couple of other little spots in the yard I'm working on.

3. I am currently experiencing a reoccurrence of the terribly annoying, Connie-specific condition known as Stress Nose. Don't ask.

4. I make homemade dog food for the three mutt princesses, Sally, Bernice, and Cookie, and I don't mind a bit, and neither do they.

5. I can't seem to get into reading much of anything these days except memoirs, poetry, and the Bible. For one who consumed fiction constantly for years, this seems strange.

6. I miss playing the piano seriously as I did in my childhood and early adult years. I had to ask Guy recently not to play a recording of sonatas by the French composer Casadesus because it would be too emotional for me; I worked very hard on one of his sonatas and played it in recital in my 20s. This unwillingness even to hear a piece that gave me such joy (and hard work) tells me my soul needs a return to the piano, and not just on Sunday morning.

7. I am struggling with guilt over wanting a more pleasurable and slightly more sophisticated lifestyle. My professor and mentor, Tom McClenahan, pointed out to me last week that enjoying life = worship, and that these lovely things I miss are not bad in themselves but only a problem if they become the motivating factor in one's life, thereby taking the place of God. What do I want? Some city amenities nearby (and "nearby" means nearer than the current 1.5 hour drive through the mountains to Salt Lake City), or living in a more sophisticated small town than Evanston; a deck or porch; a dining room. Now that I write this down, it really doesn't seem that I'm going over to the dark side, does it?

8. It's easier for me to blog when I'm feeling up and energetic, and a lot harder when I'm lacking energy and struggling with discouragement. I bet I'm not alone on this one!

I'm tagging:Seeking Servant, EpiscoSours, A Prodigal Blog, and everybody else I know in the blogging world has already been tagged!