In Pictures

I am in the fourth week of teaching a class at Aquinas, so I don’t have much time to post.  Okay, so I’m in the first week.  But with a Maymester class, every day equals a week of class in a normal semester.   At the end of the second class, one of the students stood up, stretched, and said, “Second week down!”  So tomorrow is our fourth class.

But I at least have time to post pictures.  You wouldn’t want to read an entire post about any of these things, anyway.  So here we go…

A few weeks ago, I made a killer lasagna for dinner when a priest friend came to visit.  He blessed my new condo and I made him dinner.  Win, win.  The recipe came from a composer-chef friend of mine.  He and his wife had me over for dinner a few months ago, and I fell in love with this Sicilian lasagna and had to have the recipe.  Lasagna with meatballs inside of it?  Score. And the ricotta cheese wasn’t overpowering.  (Trena, remember shuddering while eating the shells at Christendom?) It was deeelish.  While it was pretty labor intensive, it was a good way to spend a Sunday afternoon and the work produced awesome results.

I forgot to take a picture of the actual finished product.  So all I have are pictures of the prep.

Mmm, meatballs.

I was in the mood to make ice cream, so I did that, too.  I was originally going to make ice cream inspired by “Spouse Like a House” at Handel’s (how I miss you) — namely, ice cream with peanut butter-filled, chocolate-covered pretzels —  but I didn’t dip my pretzels in chocolate, and the ones I bought didn’t have enough peanut butter in them.  So  I ended up throwing in peanut butter cups, too.

It was good, but only because you can’t really go wrong with peanut butter and chocolate in ice cream.  I’d buy different peanut butter pretzels next time.  And dip them in chocolate.  Father ate it without complaint.

…

My “house” at school (sort of like a sorority, but not) had a bake sale to raise money for veterans who have had trouble getting back on their feet after coming home.  Since Joan of Arc is the patroness of our house, we thought helping veterans was fitting.  My friend Paul did the posters, and they just crack me up:

One of the history professors emailed me and noted, “Joan of Arc must really hate the English.”

…

Part of my job regularly takes me to Knoxville, TN, where Cardinal Rigali is living in retirement.  Many of his things from the conclave are on display in the chancery, including the prayerbook and Rite book for the conclave, the little briefcase he was given (it had the little sede vacante umbrella embossed on it with “2013″ – it’s no wonder it took awhile to get this conclave going, they had to make all these things!), his little red lap desk with his name card that was waiting for him at his place in the Sistine Chapel, a sample ballot, and the pen he used to vote.  I couldn’t get over the humorous fact that the pen is a simple blue Pilot pen.  After seeing all the special books and the embossed small briefcase, I expected some cool pen.  Or maybe a quill.  Nope, just a blue Pilot.

There were also pictures of him taking the oath and processing — right behind Cardinal Bergoglio. Very cool.

…

A few weekends ago I re-vistited a wine bar my cousin Michael had  introduced me to last year.  It’s in an old house, and in addition to a regular bar area, the different parlors in the house have machines with various kinds of wine.  When you arrive you get a card (similar to a hotel key) that you put in the machines prior to making a wine selection.  Then you choose whether you want a taste, a half glass, or a whole glass.  It’s pretty fun- and can get very expensive if you aren’t careful!  I went down with some friends for happy hour and wondered why I don’t go down more often.  But perhaps it’s a good thing it’s not closer.

…

May 1st is the Feast of St Joseph the Worker.  I happen to work in a building trailer structure named after St. Joseph, and so we decided to celebrate his feast day.  Yes, we celebrated on March 19, too.  But if the Church celebrates him twice, we can too.  In true southern fashion we had barbecue and slaw and chips and invited everyone to come hang out in our building trailer structure for awhile.

Providentially, on that same day, we received the sign for our building place of work that we requested several months ago.  We have formed a nice little community in our portable building (which just means that we’ll probably be split up before too long. Isn’t that the way it works?) and I we decided we deserved a sign on the outside of our building so people would know who we were.  A minor request, really.

Especially since this is the sign on the outside now, just to the right of the front door:

What does that mean, you might ask?  Well I did too-  eventually.  It’s apparently leftover from when the, er, structure was on the property of an explosives testing site in Bucksnort, TN.

You can’t make this stuff up.

So this sign has been on our building for 10+ years.  So leave it to me to be difficult and ask if we can have a sign that indicates we’re the St. Joseph…

But what?  What are we?  Since the philosophy faculty is at home in our structure, they said we can’t be the St. Joseph Building, because by their nature, buildings don’t have wheels.

We couldn’t very well put “St Joseph Structure” on our sign, could we?

So we decided on “St. Joseph’s.”  That’s what everyone says on campus, anyway.  ”Where is Dr So-and-So’s office?”  ”In St Joseph’s.”

But apparently that message didn’t get to the actual order-er of the plaque. So now we’re St. Joseph Hall.

We’ll take it!  Although as our sarcastic selves, we put the sign in the hallway for the first day.  ”Where are you putting the sign?”  ”In the hall.”

Our shrine to our sign.

…

You know what is dangerous?

Homemade Nutella ice cream with Trader Joe’s Ultimate Vanilla Wafers.  I was in charge of bringing dessert to book club last week, and instead of making some elaborate something or other, I made Nutella ice cream and bought those awfully-addicting vanilla wafers from TJ’s.

Too good.  You know what else is dangerous?  Trader Joe’s Oatmeal Cranberry Dunkers. My sister Jill introduced me to them, and they’re deadly.  I bought them without thinking, and quickly took them to work before I ate them all in one sitting.  Everyone loved them. And hated me.

Buy at your own risk.

My week (or two, or three) in pictures.  Food, alcohol, and Catholic stuff.  Sounds about right.

Active Participation

Last night I went to a vigil Mass after a long day of working. Our office had hosted my friend Matt Leonard from the St Paul Center for Biblical Theology to do a Bible study Presenter Training for their awesome parish-based Bible study program, Journey Through Scripture.  I had the honor of presenting with Matt, too, which was a great experience.  It was fun to be quasi-working for the St Paul Center again, while also working for Aquinas College at the same time.

It was a full day — I was expecting 60 people to register for the training, and we had an even 100.  A pretty fantastic problem to have.  I think it was a great day for everyone – evaluations will tell the whole story – but it was a full day. By the end of it, I was feeling the effects of essentially trying to be two people – a host for the event and a presenter for the event.  I could never have done it without the incredible help of my friends Laura, Alan, Rafael, Ana, and my boss, Sr Mary Rose.

Did I mention that I had also chosen that day to not drink coffee?  Partly because Matt is an expert at protecting vocal chords and had warned me to stay away from caffeine, and I know these days my vocal chords are my best asset. (Oh, and stay away from alcohol, too.  I told him he was basically telling me, “And no more happiness!”) It was also partly because I never had time to stop and drink a cup in the morning.  So at the end of the day, I had a pounding headache that was quickly moving into my eyes.  Lovely.

Due to a mixup about Matt’s plane being delayed, we bolted out of the training at the end of the day to make a vigil Mass at the Cathedral.  So we slid into one of the back pews as the opening song was being sung and watched our time the whole way through Mass.

It was then I realized I can never judge someone else’s participation at Mass. The “active participation” that the Council called for did include a more vocal participation in the liturgy, but at its root it was about understanding the rites and entering into them more deeply — not just by saying prayers out loud, but by entering into the mystery by prayer, offering sacrifice with the priest with a full and conscious mind and heart.

So there Matt and I were in the back of the church at a Saturday vigil Mass.  We slid in as the opening song was being sung and we slipped out as the closing song started.  Matt had no voice left, I had a raging headache, and so our singing and vocal participation was at a minimum.  We probably kept looking at our watches to make sure we weren’t going to miss his plane.  It probably seemed to everyone around us that we were punching our time cards and that our minds were a million miles away.

And yet we were actively participating.  We were both engaged in the rites.  I was offering my headache up, trying to imagine what Mary would have done if she had a raging headache when she was cooking Jesus’ dinner, or trying to meditate on the crowning of thorns.  While I can’t speak for Matt, I’d imagine he was participating in a similar way.  I specifically prayed that our time crunch and the long day didn’t impact the way I was entering into the liturgy.

So appearances can be deceiving.  Was it the most mystical liturgy I’ve ever entered into?  No.  I’m not going to say that Matt and I were about to levitate or anything, and you can hold our canonization processes for the time being.  But it was a good reminder to me that you can’t judge a book by its cover.  Two schmucks in the back row, probably looking like they were run over by a bus. But we were trying.

Kentucky Adventures

“We’re on E! And the light is on!”

Yesterday saw my boss and I on a field trip to Lexington, KY to speak to their DREs and principals before launching our program there in the Fall. It’s a beautiful part of the country, and although it’s long day to go there and back, it’s not a bad drive.

On our way up, we were running tight on time, so we decided we would stop for gas on the way home.  We had half a tank, after all.

Somewhere between Elizabethtown and home, Sister noticed that we were on “E”.  Whoops.

“How long has the light been on?!” I asked, whipping out my phone to pull up iExit to see where the closest gas station was.

“I don’t know!  I think it just came on?!”

An exit appeared: Bonnieville.  ”There aren’t any gas stations off the highway here,” I protested as she pulled off, looking at my handy iExit app.

But we decided there had to be a gas station nearby, right?  Where was Bonnieville, after all?

We drove down a country road, nothing but trees and fields on either side of us.  But very soon we came to a T with signs of life.  ”Bonnieville is on the right,” I instructed, checking my map.

Sure enough, there was a big sign: “Gas and Food – 1/4 mile” with an arrow to the right.

We pulled up to the gas station, which seemed bustling with cars and a couple of motorcycles.  The two pumps at the station were the kind with the rolling numbers, so no credit card machines here.  Sister headed inside.  The woman inside asked her how much she wanted. “I don’t know, however much it takes!”  Sister responded, leaving her card with the lady and coming back out to pump.

She looked around to find the nozzle, but couldn’t find it.  The man on the other side of the pump took it out of his car and handed it to her.  ”Here, ma’m.  I was using it.”  Sister joked that she wondered how she was going to get the gas in her car.

“It’s magic.  That’s the way things work here in Bonnieville,” the guy joked. Clearly these people knew we weren’t from around these parts.  He drove off without capping his tank, but realized it before pulling out of the parking lot.  He got out to cap it.  ”I was distracted!” he joked to us.

Yeah, I bet you were.  So you’ve never seen a Sister in a full habit before?

Sister finished pumping and came to the car, reporting that they had soft serve ice cream.  We had been in search of ice cream earlier, and this seemed as good of an opportunity as any.  We headed into the market.

There was a man sitting on a stool at the food counter, next to a sign that advertised hamburgers, hot dogs, bologna, and other delicacies.  The prices were dirt cheap.

“Do you work the ice cream machine?” Sister asked.

“No, m’am.  She does,” he responded, gesturing to the woman working the cash register.  As soon as she was finished ringing up a few customers, she came over to get us our ice cream.

A man walked in the door and greeted the man on the stool by name.  It seems that the residents of Bonnieville all knew each other.  And we were clearly not residents of Bonnieville.

Maybe my red blazer and pencil skirt gave us away. Or maybe it would have, if the fully-habited “nun” hadn’t already given us away.

We got our ice cream and paid for our gas. Sister commented to the woman that she was busy, and asked if it had been a busy day today.

“Well, ma’m, we are the only store in town.”

Ah.

As we left The Store, a man walking into The Store stopped dead in his tracks.  He watched us as we walked away, his eyes large as saucers.

“They’re probably looking out their windows at us,” Sister joked as we drove down the street.

It was a nice place.  Maybe we’ll go back sometime and visit the Bacon Creek Cafe next door.  If they don’t kick me out for being a yuppie.

It’s finished.

Ten weeks ago, I began teaching Church history.  I remember teaching that first night and being hit with the reality that I was going to have to teach again in two days.  A completely different lesson.  And then the Tuesday after that, and the Thursday after that… for ten weeks.  2000 years.  I thought, “This is going to be a loonnng fall.”

And now it’s over.  We had our last class tonight:  World War II, Pius XII, John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI.

I ended with my testimony of John Paul’s death and Benedict’s election, and then told them to be not afraid.  We studied a lot of grim things over the past ten weeks.  We looked at the ups and the downs.  But you know what?  We looked at the same war, the same battles.  Just with different names.

The world is against the Church, as it’s always been against the Church.  But be not afraid.  NOT because we don’t have anything to be afraid of.  We do.  Anyone who has studied history can tell you there are dark days ahead.

We are told “Be not afraid” because we have the answers to those dark days.  Christ.

I may have teared up as I told them it had been a privilege to be a part of their formation.  And I may have gotten choked up with they gave me hugs.  And I may have teared up when I just read their course evaluations.

They’re a great group of guys, and I was honored to teach them something I’m passionate about… the story of our family.

Even though it means getting my life back… I’m really going to miss them.

Lessons learned in sickness

So I don’t have a voice.  And I haven’t had one for over three days.

I suppose I shouldn’t say I don’t have a voice.  It has come back, although not as quickly as I expected.  And since I haven’t spoken to anyone today, maybe it’s back in full force.  But I doubt it.

So please pray to St. Blaise.  I need my voice.  I’m not sure what I would do if I permanently damaged it this weekend, teaching when I knew I was straining it beyond its limit.

But all of this has given me some time to think.  First, it occurred to me that this was a lousy way to begin Advent.  Used to going to daily Mass, I haven’t been to Mass since Sunday, where I stood and prayed silently, following the words along in my hymnal but unable to sing the Advent songs I love so much.

Then it occurred to me that perhaps this was a great way to begin Advent.

I’ve slowed down, unable to do anything – I haven’t been to work and I had to cancel class tonight.  Yesterday I ran a few errands, until I realized that meant I had to talk to people.  So today I’ve stayed home.  I read an entire mystery novel – for fun – and begun work on my Christmas presents.  (The problem with making Christmas presents is that you want to blog about them and you cant, because the recipients read your blog.)  This afternoon, after finishing my book, I decided to clean my apartment.

At first, having two days off was strange.  I felt lazy.  I felt like I should go to work today — after all, I wasn’t feeling particularly sick– I just couldn’t talk.  But after thinking about it, I knew if I went to work I’d end up talking at some point.  I could respond to pressing email here at home.  The rest could wait.

So I fought off feelings of laziness and stayed home.

It was hard to cancel class tonight.  I told myself it was hard because I don’t know when we’ll make up the class (there are only four classes left) and I had stayed up late to prepare last night.  I owed it to the guys to go and teach.

But I suppose deep down, it was pride.  I didn’t want to admit that I was unable to teach.  I didn’t want to let people down.

Someone once told me that I stay busy so that I feel wanted and needed.  I suppose that person doesn’t read my blog, but if he still did, I would tell him he was probably right.  When people ask me to lecture or give talks, I always say yes because I want to help people fall in love with the Church.  But it also helps that when I teach and lecture, people affirm me.  People are thankful because they’re hungry.  And I like feeding them.

Pride is a funny thing.  How do you know when you’re truly humble?  Because once you think you’re humble, you’re not.  I want to teach for Christ, not for flattery.  I want to feed people because they’re hungry, not because it boosts my ego.  But how do you separate it all?  One of the joys of teaching is to see that lightbulb go off, to see your students excited about what you’re saying, to realize that something you’ve said is about to change something or everything.

How does that not tickle your pride?  I suppose because nothing I have can change their lives.  It’s not what I have; it’s what Christ has.

I’m not giving them something that’s mine — I’m giving them the Church; I’m giving them Jesus.  And that’s exciting.  It’s not me — it’s the Holy Spirit.  I have to keep reminding myself of that.

So maybe this quiet time is good.  I have no voice of my own.  A good lesson for a catechist.

a weekend retreat

Two posts in close proximity to each other.  Don’t get spoiled.  But I had a beautiful weekend and thought I’d share it.

It’s pretty fitting, the way my life is right now, that my “weekend retreat,” was actually a retreat I was helping to lead, not one I was on…  But it was still a retreat for me.

As most of my long-time readers know, my job entails teaching throughout the state most Saturdays of the fall and spring.  Sister and I drive to a parish, teach five classes in one day, and drive home.  If five classes sound like a lot in one day (it’s actually four one-hour classes and one half hour class), well, it is.  And people have told us it’s overwhelming, it’s like drinking out of a fire hydrant, it’s like eating a meal before digesting the one you just ate, etc etc etc.  But we can’t really do that much about it — unless the people are willing to come for a longer amount of time.  (Of course, when we surveyed them and asked if we could extend the Saturday schedule an extra hour so that everything wouldn’t be so crammed, they said no.)

For four years, Sister and I have wanted to extend the Saturday schedule over a day and half and provide the option for the catechists to take the classes in the context of a retreat.  Now that the Sisters’ have their own retreat house, this fall that desire became a reality.  After teaching the Saturday schedule seven times over the past two months, this past weekend we taught the same classes in the context of a retreat.  And it was lovely.

It helped that we had 12 fantastic catechists who came eagerly desiring the classes, prayer time, and fellowship.

It also helped that we had an amazing retreat house and a staff of five Sisters who took care of us.  (“We are Martha this weekend, so you can be Mary,” Sister Mary Agnes told us at dinner on Friday night)

The retreat house – “Bethany” – is gorgeous.  It was made possible by Tom and Gayle Benson, who besides being donors to the Sisters, are also the owners of this little football team named the Saints.  The Sisters have taught in the French Quarter of New Orleans for many years, and their school was one of the first to open after Katrina (the Sister quoted in that article is now one of my coworkers in the office.  She’s awesome.)  The Bensons have been quite generous with the Sisters, and in return, the Sisters decided the retreat house should be a gift to the entire Church.  So while it was built for their own personal use, they’ve now opened it for use by the laity.  The first two wings are complete, while the third and final wing – the permanent chapel – is still in the works.  (For now, the dining hall – the refectory- is split in two and half of it is used for the chapel.)

That is the great room.  Since I taught Friday night, I had Saturday morning free and spent a leisurely morning by the fire reading Pope Benedict’s new book.

Not only is the retreat house beautiful, but the Sisters are awesome.  I knew most of them beforehand, but it was fun to get to know them better.  Sister Mary Andrew, who is from New Orleans herself, is the chef behind the incredible meals served at Bethany.  Blueberry pancakes and bacon for breakfast… bbq and cherry cobbler for lunch … It was out of this world.  And all the Sisters were so hospitable and willing to do anything we needed.

One of my friends, newly-ordained (as of June) Father Jayd Neely, came with us for the weekend to say Mass and hear confessions, and he even taught one of the lessons for us.  Along with the classes, we also had time for prayer — which is such an important part of catechesis. We had a holy hour on Friday night, and prayed the Liturgy of the Hours and the rosary.  And after the holy hour on Friday night, we had Catholic fellowship with conversation, food, and wine.

The silence was best of all.  The whole weekend wasn’t silent, of course, although they’ve had silent retreats there this fall.  But most of my Saturday morning was silent, since I wasn’t teaching and everyone else was busy doing various things.  I just got to sit and read and pray and enjoy the stillness.  Before morning prayer on Saturday, we did ask the catechists to remain silent– which meant as we all got ready for the day in our cells and as we all ate breakfast, everything was silent.

As I sat there eating breakfast in the quiet, I marveled at how loud the silence was, and how peaceful the act of eating breakfast had become in the stillness.  It struck me as odd, since I always eat breakfast in silence in my apartment — there is no one to talk to, I don’t listen to music in the morning, and it’s a rare day I turn on the news.  So why was this silence so different?

Because I generally eat my breakfast in front of the computer, catching up on email and checking the blogs.  So despite the aural silence, there is a lot of non-auditory noise in my mornings.  That morning, while I was surrounded by people, the only thing that occupied my attention were my blueberry pancakes, my bacon, my warm applesauce, and my own thoughts.  Not the thoughts of others.  Just mine.

I’m sort of glad our Saturday teaching is over for the semester, because it would be hard to go from this format back to squishing it all in a single day.  That won’t happen now until February.

All in all, a good weekend.

Happy Advent, all!

A few things

I don’t know when the “7 Quick Takes” Day is, because I never can think of quick takes on that day.  But I need to update this thing, and the only brain power I have right now is to randomly state various things about my life in no particular order.  There may be 7.  There may not be.  So this is not 7 Quick Takes, but “A few things.”

1. My life is starting to stop spinning.  Have I mentioned I’m busy?  Have I mentioned that I’ve wanted to teach more and now God answered that prayer by dumping into my lap probably more than I should be handling right now?  One of my classes ended and another one is about to, so pretty soon I will just be teaching on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  But the days of being prepped for class before the day before are long gone (I haven’t seen those days since the second week of class), so every waking moment that’s not at work is still spent reading and trying to get ready for the next class.  I’ve resigned myself to having no life for three more weeks.

2. Tonight’s topic was the Enlightenment and the French Revolution.  We read Voltaire and Hume and Robespierre.  I think we all miss the days of reading St Patrick or King St Louis or the Rule of St. Benedict.

3. I also spoke to some of the girls at the local all-girls Catholic academy this morning before work.  So I left my apartment at 6:45 to go speak, went to work from 8-4, prepped for class from 4-6:45, taught from 7-9, and was back home at 9:30. That’s my life.

4. I had a wonderful Thanksgiving with my sister Jill. Contrary to her wonderings, I never wished I had made other plans.  I did miss my other siblings and Mom and Dad, but I was definitely glad I spent the holiday with P & J and the boys.  Even if I’m now sick. ; )  It was worth it.

5. On my late night flight back, there were 8 guitars on the flight.  And one man wearing a cowboy hat.  I wonder what city we were headed to, hm?

6. My apartment is an absolute wreck.  (see #1)  It’s in the state where you desperately pray no one stops by for a surprise visit, especially your mother.  It’s so bad I’m kind of going nuts — which is big for me.  Piles everywhere.  Ugh.  I realized that I haven’t had friends over since before Labor Day (why?  see #1) and I really want to clean up and decorate for Christmas and have people over.  Maybe after December 18.

7. Sister was planning the calendar for the office today and she asked me to look over the dates to make sure she wasn’t missing anything.  We teach on Saturdays, and we have to plan pretty far out.  So we’re not talking about the 2013 calendar.  We’re talking about the 2013-2014 school calendar.  Which means I was looking at Saturdays in 2014.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t have many conflicts in April of 2014 yet.  When I went into her office, though, she said something about, “So that first Saturday in April, what do you think about teaching in Nashville that weekend?”  I joked, “What if I’m getting married that weekend?!”

She told me I could have off for my wedding.  But I pointed out that I would want her to come.  So she put a note in the email to the superintendent of schools and the diocesan coordinator in Knoxville, “Dates for Spring 2014 (unless Joan decides to get married on one of these days)”  I have a feeling I’m going to get some questions from them. : )

8. I saw Vince Gill two weeks ago.  I was waiting for a friend outside a fast casual restaurant right down the street from work (to eat dinner before- guess what- teaching) and he came out and walked right by me.  I would have missed him except that my friend walked up at that moment and said, “Did you see who just walked by you?”  I probably wouldn’t have noticed him otherwise — he doesn’t stand out like Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman when they walk into Mass.  I’m thinking I’ve probably seen him or Amy Grant before and not even really noticed.  If I ever do run into Amy Grant, and I recognize her, I hope I have the guts to go thank her for giving me the soundtrack for endless hours rollerskating in my garage circa 1992.

8. I realized I have several things I never blogged about, like Goo Goo Cluster Month.  So stay tuned.

a glimpse of my life

This is where I spend most of my “free” time these days.  That is, when I’m not at work and I’m not standing in front of group of people teaching something, I’m sitting in this corner working.

I moved my desk out of my bedroom a few weeks ago, when I began teaching Church history.  Sitting on my couch to research and type out lessons wasn’t working.  It’s not ergonomically correct and I wasn’t productive.  I often went to coffeeshops to work where I could sit at a desk and not be distracted.

That works when you’re writing lessons every once and while… but three two-hour lessons a week… I needed to do something else.

Mom suggested the move, and I’m grateful.  I thought I would hate it, but now I love it.  And I spend my nights in that corner.  Notice the books strewn around, the laptop in its case and ready to go to class (I took this picture right before I packed up to leave). There’s a coaster that is usually supporting a glass of water or a cup of coffee, depending on the time of day.  There’s also a plastic bag that was formerly filled with carrots.  They were my appetizer before dinner tonight. (The vines and the big vase in the corner are courtesy of my landlord.)

Class went well tonight.  I’m glad I don’t have to prep for Saturday’s lesson on the Incarnation — I’ve already taught it four times, so I’ll look it over Saturday morning, but don’t need to write anything before then.  But there’s no time to rest — it’s time to prep for Monday night’s lecture on Lumen Gentium and Tuesday night’s lecture on the Avignon Papacy, Catherine of Siena, the Black Death, and John Wyclif.  Then Thursday is the Renaissance, humanism, the rebuilding of St. Peter’s, Joan of Arc, Columbus, the Reconquista, and then I leave Friday to teach in Kingsport, TN (sixth time I teach the Incarnation), then lecture on Dei Verbum on Monday…

Anyone else tired yet?

Hahaha.

Lookout Mountain and Stress Relief

Every fall and spring, my work takes me around the state of Tennessee.  I teach parish volunteers on Saturdays and travel to them — which means 7 weeks of the fall (8 this fall) and 7 weeks of the spring, my Saturday is spent inside working.  Luckily I love teaching, I love what I teach, and it’s all worth it in the end.  I did have a moment of crisis last Saturday when I reflected on the fact that I haven’t had a free Saturday in October or November for the last four years and won’t have a free one for the foreseeable future.   But I try not to think about it.

This past weekend, in addition to teaching on Saturday, we also were sticking around to teach school teachers on Monday.  Luckily, we were teaching in a city where I have a friend who lives on a mountain nearby.  (My cousin also lives there, but I heard through the grapevine that she wasn’t in the city — so next time, T!)  So the weekend turned into a nice little getaway — Friday night was spent hanging out with Barbara and her husband Steve and a local priest, eating good food and drinking homemade brew.  Saturday was spent teaching, but the evening was filled with more eating good food, drinking wine, and sitting on their beautiful back porch around a fire pit, eating s’mores.  (That’s their front yard, above– so you can see I wasn’t suffering much)

On Sunday, after Mass, RCIA class, and brunch, Steve took me on a tour of Lookout Mountain.  We went on a little walk to their church (where we had left his car to go to brunch) then tooled around Lookout Mountain in his Lexus convertible with the top down.  It was a gorgeous day and Lookout Mountain is filled with stunning views and beautiful houses.  Not all the houses are huge (although there are those), but all of them are unique and well-loved.  Around every corner, there was yet another house with some great feature, whether it was big bay windows, an arch, or even a bell tower– that made me gasp and say, “I want to live THERE!”

Steve does some Civil War reenacting, so he took me to Point Park to show me around.  It was a great personal tour — and he didn’t even know how much of a Civil War buff I am!

They always take pictures of their friends by this cannon — so I had to pose for the obligatory photo.  When we got to the cannon, a young couple was taking turns taking pictures of each other, so Steve kindly asked if they wanted him to take a picture of both of them.  Now, Steve is a bit of a Renaissance man — he’s a photographer on the side, and a darn good one.  So I almost lost it laughing when the girl showed him how to take a picture with her iPhone.  But he was very kind and listened to her lesson.  And then proceeded to take the best photo that’s probably ever been taken with her phone.

Over the course of the weekend, he taught me lots of cool tricks — like how to use the HDR feature on my iPhone so that the city showed up in the picture above.  Pretty cool.

He also showed me the best photo editing apps to purchase.  In the picture below, there used to be a big white warehouse building in the valley below.  Not anymore!  Poof! 

The rocks up at Point Park were so cool.  We saw them in real life, and then we went to the museum and saw the photos of the Union soldiers posing on the rocks after the battle.  A photographer took their pictures up on the mountain, on this awesome rock outcropping, and then he developed the pictures right there!  Steve has been out on the outcropping while reenacting and said you can still see where he mounted his tripod.  Pretty awesome.

Sunday night we … guess what?  Ate good food and drank wine.  And another priest came for dinner!  We watched the sunset from the back porch.
I could get used to this life.  Did I mention that Barbara made me breakfast every morning?  Even when I had to leave at 6:30 am to go teach.

That’s love.

Speaking of love, this guy can’t get enough of it.  Meet Huck:

So all in all… a great weekend.  It was definitely what I needed during this stressful time at work.  In addition to the busyness of work, I’m also teaching twice a week in the evenings… which means a lot of lesson prep the evenings I’m not teaching.  And guess what?  Starting next week, I’m teaching a study on the Vatican II documents on Monday nights.  All of this translates into: Until Thanksgiving, I’m teaching every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.  Each day/night something different.

 After Thanksgiving, it will just be Tuesday and Thursdays.  And I’ll feel like I have tons of time on my hands.

I really wanted to teach more.  And God answered that prayer!

Last week, despite the stress — or maybe because of it? — I went to a Carbon Leaf concert with my friend Manda.  (Don’t tell my Mom. Maybe she won’t read this far down? Haha.)

Manda was a good sport, because it was a late night.  And we both had to work the next day.  We skipped the opening bands and went over there at 9:30 (after I taught.  Hey, you only live once!) and walked into a basically-empty concert venue.  We counted 30 people there!  Eeek!

More people came, but it was still pretty sparse.  It was a week night, after all, and they had scheduled the concert at the last minute.  But it ended up being a great concert — the guys didn’t hold back, despite the small crowd, and it was practically a private show.  We were in the “front row” since no one was standing in front of us, and at one point the lead singer (Barry) and Manda were having a conversation back and forth with eye contact and body language.  The whole thing was really hilarious.  In between songs, Barry would just talk to us.  And we would talk back.  It was great.

After they played their last song, Barry came down off the stage and motioned for the other guys to bring instruments and join him — and they stood right there and sang another song — no microphones, a foot away from us. And when they were done, they just started mingling and we hung out for awhile.  It was so laid back and awesome.

And guess what?  The next day I didn’t regret it for a minute.  Yeah, I was tired.  But I wasn’t stressed and I wasn’t moody.  Because good music, good friends, and an evening where you can let go of the fifty things that are usually occupying your mind is exactly what you need when you’re burning the candle at both ends.

The end.

HHS Mandate

Tomorrow is our campus-wide faculty/staff opening Mass for the school year, which is generally followed by our campus-wisde faculty/staff insurance meeting.  It’s always good to be together as a campus for Mass; the insurance meeting is as exciting as it sounds.  At least they’ll give us bagels.

It will be interesting to see if anything is mentioned about the pickle we all find ourselves in these days insurance-wise. Several years ago, we had a large meeting amongst the schools on campus to learn why  contraception and sterilization were not included in our insurance.  Since we have a number of non-Catholic employees, I thought at the time that the meeting was a great way to treat the topic.  We’re not just going to tell you this is the way it is.  We’ll explain why.  They even had a priest and deacon come speak about marriage.

I remember leaving the meeting pretty happy with my employers and proud to work where I do.

Fast-forward three years, and here we are, finding ourselves basically opposing our federal government over the issue.  While at the time these issues were coming to a head (Belmont Abbey, for example, was getting sued for not covering contraception), I didn’t foresee this day that day.

A friend passed this along to me — courtesy of the Independent Women’s Forum:

 

(click to enlarge)

And while we’re on the topic of the IWF, check out this piece on Sandra Fluke.