Liturgy and the thinning of the veil

I sat in a park near the Seattle zoo with my friend Wendy last week. I was still brimming with Scotland, cows, life on the road. She’d just returned from a long backpacking trip with her boyfriend in the North Cascades. They’d ended their hike at Holden Village, a former mining village, now Lutheran retreat  center where Wendy and I had spent some time together last spring.

“Do they still have morning and evening prayers? Did you attend at all? What did you think of them?”  

“They were alright, but I didn’t get much out of them.” Wendy, like myself, grew up in the evangelical Christian background. “They’re pretty different.”

“Let me guess, was it the liturgy?” Wendy’s nod reminded me of me, or rather, the me of the beginning of the summer.

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I struggled in the beginning of my time on Iona with following the words in the worship book. The concept of worship in the liturgical context is entirely different from my evangelical American construct. I used to think ‘worship’ was simply the singing of songs. But I understand it in a fuller way now: worship is the entire act. Singing, yes, but also reading prayers in unison with the body of people around me. Sitting in silence. Hearing the names of Iona community members read out loud in prayer. It’s passing a communion cup to my neighbor and hearing more prayers about crucial issues, like the riots across England. Worship is all of us.

I was uncomfortable, in the beginning, with liturgy, too. Like Wendy, I wrinkled my nose at the thought of it. This was a concept I also needed to relearn, and in fact, I brought it up in meal-time conversation frequently throughout the week.  I had childhood images burned into my brain of visiting my granny’s Catholic church in Miami as a kid. We’d stand up, sit down, shuffle through prayer books, kneel, and take communion (which I actually wasn’t allowed to take because I was both young and not Catholic). I recall always being a step or two behind everyone around me, the blush of embarrassment burning my cheeks. Where was God in all of that? The discomfort of the unfamiliar clung to me. I thought that reading nearly the entire church service from a book, back and forth between the congregation and the minister was uncreative and stuffy and left no room for the Holy Spirit to speak.

I brought this darkened, complicated view of liturgy to the worship services on Iona. But evening though the morning and evening worship services were optional—and initially uncomfortable, I attended every one.  Something about the green, well-worn covers on the worship books compelled me to keep returning.

Within a day or two, I got over my feeling of being a lost tourist in a big city, map spread wide open on the city streets, locals walking confidently all around me. Repetition brought familiarity and growing comfort. And as I stopped being worried about which page to turn to next in the green worship book, I actually paid attention to the words. Phrases, different ones each time, jumped out and spoke to me.  Phrases about the forgiving myself for the harm I do to both myself and the world. Prayers for people in the community. Calls to remember the God of creation as well as the God of people.  

Finally, by the end of the week, liturgical worship had become something I could lose myself in. Here’s what I mean: the words printed out in the green worship book were the framework on which the experience hung.  My physical participation kept my mind engaged enough to pay attention to the words. And even though the morning prayers were nearly the same every day, different words resounded each time.

Here’s what I learned: the beauty of liturgy is that everyone participates. We stand, we sit. Half reads, then the other half responds. We listen, we sing. The teacher in me gives a a great nod of respect to whoever came up with that idea hundreds of years ago, because I know that in order to keep the students engaged, you have to keep them involved.  And what I’d previously thought was stuffy and uncreative, allowed huge space for the Holy Spirit to breathe life into me.

I miss the rhythm of morning and evening prayers. I miss the communal reading of powerful words. Margit the song leader led us through so many new songs, many in three- or four-part harmony. To sit in the Iona Abbey, packed with people staying at both the MacLeod center and the Abbey, singing old hymns, new English ones, and African praise songs in harmony, felt as though the veil between heaven and earth momentarily blew open.  I learned that the high crosses on the island were erected in places where people had experienced the presence of God in palpable ways. If I could, I’d plant one in the middle of the transept of the abbey.

Transition

I walked to the only pub on Iona for the last time with Bruce and Ellie, a middle-aged couple from Colorado chaperoning a group of college students. Our Iona community was disbanding the next day, never to be together again in that same, special context. I remember our conversation:

“I’ll ride the train with you guys for a bit tomorrow, but I’m heading up to Fort William. It’s supposed to be the adventure capital of Scotland, but I’m not all that excited. I’m ready to go home. For me, the trip is over, but the journey isn’t complete yet.”

Ellie: “You know, you may really need that transition time before you return to your life back home.  Time in between for processing could be a good thing for you right now. We’ve just had an intense week.”

As we parted for the very last time on the train the next day, they again reminded me to live boldly into the coming days of transition, and see what God had in store for me.

I guess what I feared most, after leaving Iona, was the complete vacuum of people that I’d come to love as we’d spent the last week together.  Splitting up was hard enough, but facing the next five days completely on my own again was daunting. I was also not excited about being a transitory backpacker again: changing hostels and cities every one to two nights, repacking my bag (which got heavier at every city or town I stopped in, and my least favorite, sharing hostel dorm rooms with up to twenty people.

The next five days (two in Fort William, three in Edinburgh) did indeed become valuable transition time. I stayed in a small hostel just outside of Fort William, in a town called Corpach. And as Brianne, the manager of the hostel told me, there was nothing to do in Corpach except walk or bus the three miles to Fort William. Perfect. The rain and my exhaustion that first night forced me to stay in, ruminate over photos, reintroduce myself to the world via the internet (it’s amazing what one week on a remote island sans internet will do for that little addiction), and talk to Alex, the chatty Finnish guy who’d just moved there for three months to attend commercial diving school.  Had I stayed in Fort William, I would have missed all that.

 I realize now, that I needed those first few days on my own again to be quiet. I needed to not be surrounded by a million things screaming for my attention, ie, the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh. It was tough and sort of scary to step into that space of reflection, to face the pain of longing and missing. I’m glad I wasn’t surrounded by such interesting, numbing distractions. It made that choice to enter into reflection easier.

And so I wandered around Corpach and Fort William for two days doing nothing but that, wander. Okay, I toured a whisky distillery, too. But Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in all of Scotland and England stood in my front yard, and I didn’t climb it. There were adverts everywhere for river rafting and canyoneering, and I didn’t do those either. I just took long walks in the sun, caught glimpses of the Highlands through the low-level clouds, explored the ruins of an old castle, took a nap in the sun in a park by the lake, ate mediocre fish and chips, and cooked for myself for the first time in two months in the hostel.

I somehow managed to book a hostel in the epicenter of all things festival in Edinburgh: a block away from the Royal Mile and a view of the castle from the front door. I could hear the bag pipes, marching, and fireworks from the Tattoo on the castle grounds every night. The road in front was blocked off each evening so the pipe bands could march by. (I never did catch them, so don’t ask! J ) Fringe Festival events (comedy, music, acts) swarmed all around me. All I had to do was hang a right from the hostel door, and I was met by street performers and musicians and plagued by people handing out leaflets for performances. (I quickly learned to say a polite, “No thanks” to the leafletters. Some looked surprised to be turned down) I’m sort of sad that in my transition to Edinburgh, I didn’t carry that peaceful, melancholy remembering. Once I got to that spot, I guess I wanted it to continue.  But I know, too, that to expect that was pretty unreasonable.

Quiet reflection and mediation on my summer experiences vanished, but God filled in the gap pretty creatively. In the masses of people, I began to see familiar faces and hear voices I knew. Or think I did. A second glance, every time, proved each person was just another stranger. But instead of choosing to think I lost my mind, I decided to live into the weirdness.  I heard the voices of Mike and Matt, a father and son on Iona. I saw Karen, one of our week’s leaders.  I even did a triple take on a man who was so very clearly not Ruth, one of the daughters on the farm. He just sounded so much like her, and was even wearing Wellies, those indestructible rubber boots I wore for a full month in North Yorkshire. And finally, I saw these three men who reminded me of no one I knew, but gave me a glimpse of the kingdom of God on earth, and a glimpse of what is to come.  One was an old guy in a kilt playing a bag pipe. Another was an African man playing the djembe. The third was a man I’d seen before playing the pipes and dressed up as a fawn. He wore pointy ears and little stilts that were covered with fur. He even had tiny black hooves peeking out from under the fur. This time though, he was playing the drums. All three were jamming together. I thought to myself, so this is what heaven will be like. People of all nations gathered together, making a joyful noise for the Lord.

It was indeed strange, “seeing” so many familiar faces all over Edinburgh, and then the airport, and even now occasionally in Seattle. It’s been pretty awesome, though, because I felt like I was carrying these people I care for in my heart.  I never felt lonely in Edinburgh, which was what I feared. Ready to go home, yes, but not lonely.

Home is where you take your backpack off

After extensive field studies in towns and cities across England and Scotland, I’ve developed a few thoughts on hostels.  Not one where I stayed in York, Grasmere, Stirling, Corpach, or Edinburgh met all of the following criteria for my ideal:

-sturdy bunk beds that don’t wiggle or squeak when your bunkmate rolls over (the one in York had bits falling off of it!)

-individual reading lights (York tried, but the hinge was broken and it kept flopping into the wall)

-a sink in the room

-no more than ten people sleeping in one dorm room (twenty in Stirling was a bit much)

-free wifi, and with a fast enough connection to upload photos (it took an average of five tries in Stirling to even get online, and when I tried to upload a video in York, it initially said the upload would take 20 minutes, but then kept getting longer. I gave up around seven hours)

-free breakfast, or at least cheap ones (it was only 70 pence in Edinburgh for a massive bowl of cereal)

-free coffee and tea, AND milk provided for the tea (I’ve developed this little afternoon tea habit…)

-loosey-goosey cleaning schedule (the hostel in Corpach asked all guests to vacate the premises from 9:30-4:30 every day for cleaning. Really? Not cool when it pours on a regular basis and there’s nothing to do in town. Or if you just want to take a nap.)

-lockers in the dorm rooms (in Edinburgh, there were even little lockboxes inside the lockers)

-no snoring! (there was stereo snoring in Grasmere for all three nights I was there. Several of us were awake for hours. I could even hear it with the volume cranked up on my iPod. Surprisingly in Edinburgh, the city where three different festivals were going on concurrently, no one snored in my room, that I could tell. Maybe I was just too pooped to hear)

-no one steals my food from the fridge (ie, most of my blueberries in Grasmere and my milk in Corpach)

-a manager who will flirt with you, then arrange for you to meet a retired American professor of English literature living in town because he thinks you miss talking to Americans (Grasmere)

-lower bunk with enough room to actually fully sit up without danger of braining yourself

-pillows that are thicker and softer than communion wafers (Corpach, York, Edinburgh...)

-roommates who don’t wake up at 5:30 and proceed to pack all their belongings in crinkly plastic bags (Edinburgh)

-roommates who don’t wake up at 6 and proceed to have loud conversations in Lithuanian before finally leaving (Corpach)

-cool guests who like talking to the other ones. I met travelers from Russia (Ivan was getting a PhD in physcis in London. Just a little smart), Finland (Alex was living in the hostel in Corpach for three months going to commerical diving school), Austria, Australia, the Philippines, America, Canada, England, France, and Scotland. I met some ladies from Manchester when I was staying in Grasmere. They couldn’t believe I was actually working on a farm. They recommended I completely skip visiting Manchester. I had an interesting conversation with a bunch of colorful, middle-aged Scottish men staying in my hostel in Corpach. They were part of a hiking club, and had just climbed Ben Nevis, the tallest mountain in the British Isles, along with several of the other Munros that day, 22 miles in all. I’m pretty sure they were Glaswegians, in other words, people from Glasgow whose accent is so broad you need a translator. Of all the people I met over the last two months, their accent was the most difficult for me to understand. They seemed to like me fine, though. One guy had visited Seattle a few years ago, and I could understand him fairly well. He translated the others for me. I got a little worried, though, when I said I’d worked on a farm in England for a month. These guys do not like the English. In fact, they taught me what they like to call Englishmen: F.E.B.s. (I’ll give you a hint, the ‘E’ stands for English). I guess they liked me well enough to give me a bowl of their homemade stew, called “stovies.” I’d already eaten a full dinner, and I only wanted a little. But they dished me up a full bowl, and swore I’d eat the whole thing. I did. It was delicious. Apparently, stovies is any sort of stew with meat and potatoes and whatever else the cook decides to throw in. When I asked them the question I asked as many Scots as possible—“Is haggis really worth it?”—they gave me a resounding “Yes.”  I think they may have also invited me out for a drink in Fort William too, but I’m not sure. Even with my translator, I only got about 80% of the conversation.

 (this was the label outside one of the rooms in the York hostel which was a former mansion owned by super-rich people)

Simple Offerings

I’ve been thinking a lot the last day or two about what I bring to the table. What I mean is this: I spend a lot of time beating myself up. Much of my processing this summer has been to realize and re-realize aspects of myself that aren’t all that healthy, for example my tendency to drive myself into the ground with busyness before I stop for self-care. But as I’ve been living in this short-term intentional community these last few days, I’ve begun to consider the things that I add to a community. Not the sort of things I ‘work at,’ but that I naturally bring because I am who I am.

So when Karen, one of our leaders, asked the other day for several people to act as “supporters” on our 7-mile pilgrimage around the island today, I volunteered. I thought, I’ve led lots of hikes. I’m fit and strong. I can do this! She didn’t give any details in her asking, but I suspected it would be related to helping Timothy, a young man living in the community this week who is blind.  His father David, for this week at least, has served as his eyes. It’s a full-time job, and I’m sure he appreciated the break.

 I was right. I and the five other volunteers paired up to guide Timothy on our off-road pilgrimage today. We took turns being his eyes, telling him about turns in the path, mud puddles and cow pies to avoid, and stood ready to catch him if he stumbled on the steep, wet path.

(I took this picture on what was the steepest bit of the day. Even with two working eyes, it was muddy and slick. Guiding a blind guy down that narrow, rocky path was a challenge.)

But here’s what I discovered: I may be an experienced mountain guide and I may be fairly fit right now, but those things were irrelevant.  I needed a set of working eyes. But more importantly, I needed a willing spirit.  That other stuff really wasn’t important.
In reflecting with Karen after supper just now, I remembered the definition of ‘pilgrimage’ that was given us at the end of our journey around the island. It’s a trip people go on together, yes to a specific place, but for the sake of the experience together as well. I could have walked to those places on my own, as I’m prone to do, but in traveling with a group of forty-odd people, but then in a smaller nucleus of “Team Timothy” as well, I had a different experience altogether. This day’s pilgrimage, for me, was about giving the simple abilities I have to someone who doesn’t.

Seeds of Community

Iona is a place that upon arriving, I knew I’d be coming back to.  It’s really not the place that assures me of this, though it is indeed beautiful and breathtaking on this island. It’s about five miles long, and the rain, thankfully, has held off for my stay thus far. It’s very green here, with cows and sheep that seem to wander at large. The terrain is either very flat or very steep; there doesn’t seem to be much middle ground.  It’s a beautiful place, but it’s really the people gathered here and our common bonds that would bring me back.  Even though I don’t know anyone here, I feel like haven’t yet met a stranger.

 There is a growing sense of community here. We gathered for our first meal together Saturday night as strangers. Over the next several meals, I quickly tired of asking and answering the same questions: Where are you from? What brought you to Iona? How did you hear about it? But while the questions felt repetitive and tiresome, they were essential.  For what is now in the germination stage, just two days into our week’s journey together, is a community. While I still ask and answer those same questions, the seeds of some of those early conversations have begun to sprout.  I now mark a meal or the passing of an afternoon by the significant conversations I’ve had.

 I believe others are also going through a similar process, such that I’ve been able to skip the entry-level questions with some, and go straight to the deep stuff.  Just this evening, I had an awesome conversation with Graham, one of the week’s leaders, and Fran,  another guest like myself. Graham started the meal by asking me the un-boxable and flattering question of “What’s your story?” We talked about travel, the faith communities I’ve come from in both Seattle and New Hampshire, and now the idea of community on Iona.  He helped me try to wrap my mind around the Christian churches in England and Scotland, and the role liturgy plays in them.

 I am learning the meaning of an ecumenical community. I am learning about the beauty in it. People have gathered here at the MacLeod Center on Iona from many different countries: the U.S., Canada, Ireland, Scotland, England, Australia, Germany, the Netherlands. We come from many different faith traditions. We speak a common language, though, of adoration of our Creator, a desire for building community, seeking justice and peace, and sharing good meals together.

Fear Not

“Darling do not fear what you don’t really know.” Words from a Brett Dennen song have been cycling through my head all morning as I’ve begun the last leg of my pilgrimage: Iona. The unknown, for me, can be so intimidating sometimes. Intimidating, yet magnetic and enthralling. Why else, then, would I heave off for the entire summer to travel around the UK all by myself?

What once was unfamiliar becomes known, and thus, comfortable. After a full month on the farm, I was ready to push on into the glorious unknown. I was sad, though, to leave new friends and my temporary home behind. Even the small caravan that had been my sleeping and personal quarters had become dear. What I initially perceived as a leaky tin can that recently had mushrooms growing around the windows, was a haven. Who wouldn’t love being able to reach all of one’s possessions without having to get out of bed? I’ve missed Whistle the Wonder Dog, who when seeing me each morning, would flop on her back at my  feet, paws in the air, because she knew I’d give her a belly scratch. I’ve missed John with his super-dry sense of humor that usually caused delay-reaction laughter in me. And Rachel, too, my new good friend who was excited to hear about Vampire Land—Seattle—and took very little convincing to return to the pub in Robin Hood’s Bay with weekly folk music.

With both nostalgia and excitement, I’ve pushed through the screen of comfort into the unknown. A day and a half in York to soak up Roman, medieval, and cultural history.  And then my first foray into Scotland was to the town of Stirling, home of the castle where “he who holds Stirling, holds Scotland.” The castle is currently held by Historic Scotland; I’m not sure what that says about the country.  Unfortunately, the weather matched a Seattle spring day, cold, gray, and rainy. My mood matched the weather, and the bird of loneliness had come to lay some eggs in my heart. (I wish I could claim that wonderful word picture as my own, but I must give the credit to the author of one of my favorite books, Bryce Courtnay)  I passed the day overwhelmed by new things and knowing that everyone I met was a stranger.

But it’s a new day today. I approach Iona, finally. The sun peeks through the gray and I’m excited once again to be riding the rails. I woke this morning having slept surprisingly well, considering the hostel was on a busy street and the dorm room held around 20 beds.

It might just be me, but it seems like there are far more strangers chatting on this train car than any other I’ve traveled on in Britain. It makes me wonder how many others voyage to Iona. Are they strangers? Or old friends seeing each other after a long absence? Maybe that will be me again someday. Once again, I head into what I don’t know. Today, though, I have the hope that comes from being called to this place, to a community that gathers under the common heraldry of heaven.

A solitary, rolling stone

I met a young woman from Salzburg, Austria last night. We were bunkmates, actually, in our hostel in York. We discovered several things in common right off the bat: she is a teacher and has lots of time off that most of her friends don’t share. She was in Seattle just a few weeks ago, on a trip to Vancouver that she’d won in the lottery and Seattle was just a day trip.  She thought it was cool that I’d lived on a farm in the Alps a few years ago. She too is traveling solo through England, though her trip is only 17 days long.  We reflected for a moment on the idea of traveling alone versus with a companion.  She has recently been on two different big trips with her sister, after which they both decided they needed to part ways for a while. Her sister kept complaining that my bunkmate was moving too fast; she wanted to slow down.

 I reflected that traveling solo is easier, in some ways. I don’t have to deal with the communication challenges that traveling brings out. What do you want to do? Why are you frustrated with me? Was I snoring again last night? Solo travelers are also more approachable. I had a lovely chat with a Turkish man in his sandwich truck in York two days ago. It was raining and I was hungry, so I sought shelter under his canopy. He wanted to know what life in America was like. I wanted to know what parts of Turkey I should visit. He was grateful for the American invasion of Iraq in ’03 because, according to him, it enabled the Kurds to finally have some rights.

Traveling alone can indeed be lonely business at times, though. I enjoy getting a good meal in a restaurant, and slowly lingering over it while reading and people watching. But sometimes, I’d just like to have a conversation with someone I know well.  Or experiences seen through two sets of eyes just make more sense. I spent way too much money yesterday to get into the York Dungeons. I spent an hour in the queue to then go through a 70 minute-long gory experience that was intended more to frighten than to enlighten.  Having someone like my big brother, for example, to poke me in the ribs from time to time would have helped me feel like I’d gotten my money’s worth.  As an antidote to the York Dungeons, I saw “Legally Blond: the Musical” last night. It was entertaining and rather inane, but like any good chick flick, best seen with a girlfriend. 

Here’s what I believe: God has not made us to be alone. Rather, we’re created to live in community, and a life shared together is really far sweeter than life alone.  Just as a large, home-cooked meal tastes even better in the company of others, so does traveling.

Cows and other deep thoughts

A beautiful Jersey bull calf was born this week. He must have been born right after evening milking, because by the time I met him the next morning, all the birth goop had been cleaned off and he’d figured out how to use his legs. I first met him when he poked his head into the milking parlor after his mother, Rose Marie, had come in. He stuck his wet pink nose in the door, then solid brown eyes with long eye lashes.  He hopped right in, then slid in the muck on the milking parlor floor, much like a child’s first time in ice skates. The little guy seemed to think that escaping outside was a much better option, so hightailed it out the door. I followed him out, hoping to herd him back inside, but instead, the little bugger bolted up the lane. Visions of chasing this wobbly legged, 12-hour old calf all over North Yorkshire flashed before me. First chance I could, I picked the calf up, and carried him back to the farm. I could feel his heart racing, pressed against my arms. His fur (the part that wasn’t sopping from the holding pen muck) was soft and thick. I had to catch and carry that feisty little bugger once more before we were able to really secure him.

The tragedy is that the farm has no use for male dairy cows, and it’s really not financially worthwhile to hold on to them.  The meat on dairy cows is perfectly good eating, but they just don’t bulk up like beef cattle do. By the time small-time farmers (in essence, small business owners) have fed and raised dairy cows for meat, they’ve lost money. They can occasionally give them away, but even that is difficult.

 On the morning the knackerman came to collect the Jersey bull calf, we all went about in a state of silent mourning. The knackerman is the bovine version of the grim reaper. When called upon, he comes to the farm, quickly and mercifully kills the cow, then disposes of it. Apparently, Harry is a really nice man, but he smells quite bad. I’ve avoided meeting him the two times he’s visited the farm during my stay. Not because of the smell, I just haven’t really wanted to see him do his job. I avoided visiting the calf, too, even though he was right next to the milking parlor. It was a heavy knowledge, knowing this beautiful new creature would have such a short life.

I avoided the knackerman’s other visit to the farm as well. Days before I arrived, a cow had a difficult time giving birth, and the calf ended up being still-born.  John thinks a nerve in the cow’s leg was pinched during the birthing process, and consequently, she wasn’t able to stand up again. After two weeks of feeding her, turning her over because of her ‘bedsores,’ and even trying to help her stand up with the aid of a tractor and huge net borrowed from the vet (that was a pretty interesting experience, trying to get a net under the belly of a lame, unwilling and heavy cow…), she showed no progress. John and Eileen finally gave up on her. I guess this happens about once a year. Either the cow recovers and eventually stands and walks again, or it doesn’t. That was the case with #18.  It’s interesting to see John, Eileen, Ruth and Rachel’s reactions to having to euthanize cows in the herd. Yes, these dairy cattle are their main source of income, but they also deeply care for the animals.

Despite the knackerman’s two visits to the farm in the last month, not everything cow-related has been  cause for mourning. I’ve developed quite an affection for calves. Just days ago, another calf was born—a female, thankfully! I was the first to get to meet her. I’d gone to collect the cows for the afternoon milking, and she was still rather goopy and very trembly. Sadly, I didn’t get to see the cow give birth, which would have been interesting.

Older calves are kept in a small pasture across the lane from the house. They’re weaned from their mothers, but we still feed them milk from buckets.  Anyone and anything that comes into the pasture will be subjected to their trying to suck milk out of you, it doesn’t matter where from: each other, fence posts, fingers, kneecaps, hamstrings. I love watching the calves; one will sometimes get spooked by something, like a fly, and they’ll all go galloping to the end of the field. When they run, calves will arch their tails and stick them straight in the air. It’s really quite funny to see them running and frolicking in a pack, tails up.

I spend most of my quality cow-time with their back half. I’ll give you a little tour of that region, as I’ve come to know it quite well. Rumps I smack with a stick when I need to get the stubborn ones moving in the field. For the first two weeks, they all treated me like the student teacher, as John liked to tease me.  They’d look at me when I called them in from the field, then go back to eating. I quickly learned that sticks speak far louder than yelling at them.

 Udders are for milking, of course. Some cows have really warm, furry udders. Rachel says in the winter, she likes warming her hands by jamming them between the udder and the cow’s leg. I don’t blame her. Teats come in sets of four, though occasionally, there’s an extra one to confuse people. Some cows seem to flop down in goopy muck just before milking, coming in with their teats and udders dripping with it. I bet they do it on purpose.  I’m proud to say that I can milk a cow with my own two hands! (Before we put the milking units on, we get a milk sample from each teat to check for infection) Some cows are definitely easier to milk than others. I call them the beginner cows for rookies like me.

Some of the girls really don’t like to be milked, and will kick up a storm as I clean their teats and put the milking units on. The really wily ones will kick the milking units off while I’m tending to the other cows. Getting kneed by a cow in the milking stand isn’t really so bad as long as my face is out of the way, though it usually just means that I get even more smeared with muck.

The business end: I very nearly got baptized with urine last week as I was fiddling with getting the units on. I caught the tail going up just in time to move my head.  It’s only a matter of time, I know it. I’ve narrowly missed slipping in deep muck in the holding pen and falling right on my backside. It was really soupy after a week of rain my first week here.

Rachel is the family’s trained AI (artificial insemination) expert, the “surrogate father,” as she likes to call it. Cows who are ready to be "served" are held back after milking, then have a date with the straw. Bull semen is kept in short straws, frozen with nitrogen. Rachel uses this really long metal tube that she jams pretty far up the cow's backside. I’ve watched her do it enough times now to not want to put the long, arm-length gloves on. The vet came a few weeks ago to do a bunch of pregnancy tests. It was pretty amazing to see little cow fetuses on her portable ultrasound. Rachel felt like a proud father. 

I helped deliver this little guy. He was huge and had gotten stuck and we had to pull him out. Sadly, he was a bull calf, but luckily, Rachel was able to convince her friend Lee to take him to raise for beef.

                                                                                                                                                                          

Writer's Block

My stay on Priest Garth Farm has been wonderful. I'm really enjoying the Gibson family. John is witty and punny. He just completed the Coast to Coast walk across the width of the England last month, and we've had lots to talk about concerning long walks, pilgrimages, and retreats. He's pretty excited to hear about my time on Iona. His wife Eileen, is a fabulous cook, and as I've learned, doesn't like to deal with leftovers. Consequently, John and I get to finish the main course off every night. And, she makes a pudding every night (British for dessert), which I don't have the 'moral fiber,' as John calls it, to turn down. I haven't had to leave the top button of my pants undone yet, wish me luck! Their daughter Ruth has two sons and lives on the other side of the village, which is approximately 100 meters away. That, perhaps, gives you somewhat of an idea of the size of Gillamoor. She's in charge of the poultry on the farm, chicken and ducks, whose numbers seem to grow daily because those pesky chickens like to lay their eggs in secretive spots, which we don't discover until new chicks are walking about. Just this morning I discovered two brand new chicks who are still cute, which means they're not very old yet. Ruth often does the morning milking, but also tutors  rich foreigners in English over in York (about 45 minutes away), so I haven't seen much of her lately. Rachel, the younger daughter who is about my age, lives here on the farm with her husband, Russell. They're living the 'simple life' out behind the big tractor shed, which means they're gleefully living in two small, glorified sheds fitted out as a kitchen/living room and bedroom. Rachel and I get on quite well, and it's usually the two of us who do the afternoon milking chores. One of the first things she asked me when I first came to the farm was whether I'm a Harry Potter fan or not, and if I wanted to go see the premiere for the last movie with her and Ruth.

My tasks over the last two and a half weeks have been diverse, enjoyable, and instructive. I'll save those descriptions for another day.

But the reason for my long silence upon arriving on the farm has been writer's block. (That, and I simply don't have much spare time) I've sat down at least four times over the last two weeks to try to write a blog entry. This is a writer's block I've come to recognize as being two-fold: I'd stare at the computer screen and the words just wouldn't come. But in the greater scheme of things, I was also experiencing a sort of 'writer's block' with God. For the first couple weeks on the farm, I really struggled to see God at work in me and around me.The far-too-familiar "should" voice in my head condemned me for not staying up to speed with the things I thought I should be doing: "You should read your Bible more, like you told everyone. You should blog more so people know how you're doing. You should wake up earlier and go for a jog. You should..." Consequently, I passed my first weeks here tied up in knots because I couldn't live up to my own expectations. I took off for this summer adventure wanting to hear from God in some sort of revelatory way. I wanted that spark of intimacy that I've experienced so incredibly in the past to be rekindled.  But all I kept hearing was those shoulds.

I took off last weekend for four-days of traveling to York and the Lake District. I'd decided to come to North Yorkshire primarily for its proximity to the Lake District, a place I'd heard about from other travelers and seen in movies. I left in a state spiritual angst: my body was well-rested and content and I was having a great time with the Gibsons, but I was so frustrated with God. It was through wandering through the ancient city of York, climbing stone staircases built into steep mountainsides, sampling some of the Lake District's best micro brews, and figuring out the bus system in a rural tourist area that I remembered again the pure joy I get from traveling. Stepping out on my own for those few days freed me from all those things I thought I should be doing.

Here's what I think: God was feeling so very distant and silent because I got so caught up in the cycle of what I thought I should be doing, then failing, then feeling bad about it. When I stepped away from that cycle by literally leaving the farm for the weekend, I cut myself a break. The freedom was so liberating! What I realize is that while these individual things I'm driving myself to do are inherently good, like reading my Bible more regularly or not having seconds on pudding, I lose sight of the ultimate goal. Interestingly, a Bible verse I read last night simplified this sentiment beautifully:
"For you alone, O God, my soul waits in silence, from you comes my salvation." Psalm 62:1
So the question remains, how can I allow my soul to wait in silence? How do I balance the things I need to do with those I think I should? How do I keep the "should voice" at bay whilst on the farm? And this question begs an even bigger question, of course: how do I replicate this at home?

Peace be with You

A few things I’ve learned about London: a weekend in the summer is not a good time to visit. There are crowds of tourists everywhere. Lines are long and many, though quick-moving.  If there’s a short line for the toilet anywhere, take advantage! (the toilet lines at the Tower of London: non-existent. Westminster Abbey: don’t waste your time.) If you mistakenly buy the wrong train ticket, the man in the black jacket making you pay the very big fine will not have mercy, despite pleadings of ignorance. Cornish pasties are only good upon consumption, but later? Gut bomb. Despite multiple, daily, scientific testing of various brands of espresso from street stands, none compare to what I get in Seattle for twice the price.  You can avoid the worst crowds in the popular places if you go just before closing and wait to get kicked out by the staff. The downside, of course, is that you don’t actually have time to see much.

Here’s something else I’ve found: despite the teeming crowds seemingly gathered from all the nations, it is indeed possible to find peace. Solitude.

I had an epiphany sitting on the edge of the fountain in front of Buckingham Palace, slowly digesting my Cornish pasty and burning time before the production of Wicked began. Threads of the song “I Will Exalt You” ran through my head, so I plugged in my iPod. I will exalt you; you are my God. My hiding place, my safe refuge, my treasure Lord you are. Anointed One most holy. Because you’re with me, I will not fear. Suddenly the frantic sounds of traffic, horns honking, and humanity faded. It was just me and God, alone together, sitting in the sun, surrounded by hundreds of people.

I had a similar experience in the British Museum the next day. That famous home of antiquity, accompanied by the soundtrack to Out of Africa became a place of transcendence and art.  It was yet another place mobbed by tourists like myself. The Rosetta Stone, my main reason for hunting down the museum, was surrounded by a multi-lingual crowd four people deep. In went the earphones, though, and I gradually felt my body wind down from the tension of being in such a place.

It’s interesting, and somewhat surprising I guess, that these places so filled with crowds and noise can actually be ‘thin places.’ I love this term—it’s one I only recently learned—that defines places where the veil between heaven and earth is quite thin. I left on this pilgrimage just over a week ago with the purpose of seeking out thin places, just not expecting to find them in the city.

My friend Leah, an old high school chum who’s just been ordained in the Anglican church, reminded me over breakfast this morning that people go on pilgrimages to places. So where am I going? A farm in Yorkshire? Iona? No, those are just stops along the journey. I’m not really sure yet, but I am excited about this journey I’m on.

Delight. Rest.

A central quest in my life seems to be re-learning lessons I've already learned. Case in point: school got out just over a week and a half ago. I spent the following week preparing to exit the country for two months. (Who'd have thought it would take so many errands to make that happen? That's a blog for another day...) I packed in as much activity as possible--seeing friends, a barbeque on the beach, extra workouts to make up for the ones I'd miss... In other words, by the time I left Seattle, I needed a vacation from my vacation preparations. I found myself in my first destination, the Netherlands, exhausted and drained. But in classic Lindsay fashion, I jumped into the next activities that presented themselves.

Don't get me wrong, the last three days in the Netherlands have been pretty amazing. I went to the birthday party last Saturday evening of a friend of my Dutch host, Sjoerd. I chatted it up with friendly people who speak great English. I talked for a while with the mother of two pre-teens, comparing teenage life across two continents. I spoke with a British ex-pat from Yorkshire, where I'll be heading in another week. (He warned me that I'm going to have a really hard time with their accents!). I really like the Dutch; they're warm and witty and so welcoming.

Sjoerd and I spent all Sunday at a festival on stilts in one of the oldest towns in the Netherlands, Deventer. (Check it out!) Who knew that stilts could look nearly natural? I was delighted by the edgy, weird acts that passed through the tight,  ancient streets, pulling by-standers along magnetically. I stood in the main town square, packed with people, in awe at the creativty on display. One group of performers were completly painted in blue and rolled blue oil drums down the streets, banging on them and lighting off small fireworks, while their band followed on a massive truck. My first reaction was to dimiss everything as too strange, but God said to me, "This is weird; it's not normal for you. Delight in it!" Another act had two dancers suspended from ropes off the edge of a building, doing flips and twists and steps completely perpendicular to the ground.

We toured Amsterdam yesterday. Huge cities are always both exhausting and exciting to me. There were tourists everywhere; street performers in every square; I risked my life on every street corner while I figured out that bicycles and scooters don't slow down for street lights or pedestrians. We packed in lots of actitivity: the Van Gogh museum, a tour of the canals by boat, walking through the Nine Streets shopping district, Thai food in a small restaurant down a side street. The Red Light District didn't shock me as Sjoerd had predicted, but rather just grieved me.

But here's the thing: I'm wiped. I'm doing lots of cool stuff, but it's really difficult to take delight in these things around me when my battery's empty. The lesson I have to keep learning--well, one of them--is that I slowly grow more and more miserable to harder I push myself. How is it that Sjoerd so clearly saw in me this morning that I needed a 'quiet day,' when I could neither recognize nor admit it myself? I admit, this is a weakness of mine. Period. I'm perpetually caught in this cycle of work, play, work, burn-out.

So today, I rest. Three cups of coffee on the patio. Reading. Blogging. Not sure what's next. A nap? More reading? More coffee? Bliss. Rest.

Onward and Upward

My bootcamp class ran through Discovery Park at 5:30 this morning. Whenever my trainer says we're doing something "new" or "fun," I know I'm in for it. This time she meant we weren't going to run the relatively "flat" loop as usual, but instead run all the way down to the beach. (Chris says that whenever we roll our eyes and groan, she knows she's hit a nerve ). Running to the beach, meant, of course, fun calisthenics in the sand and on logs and stuff. And when you run down to the beach at Discovery Park, you have to run back up. Running up, thankfully, can take on the appearance of walking up the endless stairs, pumping, pumping, pumping my arms, and then running on the flats. But only when my trainer is watching.

My good friend Robbie inspired me months ago to spend intentional time this summer reading my Bible. He'd recently quit his job and as he says it, took on the "part-time job of studying the Bible" everyday in a cafe. I was jealous of that consecrated time he had, and what better opportunity to dive back into the Word than on my own European pilgrimage this summer? I realized the other night, that while I haven't actually left yet, I'm never going to get into the Word for that prescribed hour if I don't actually start. So I did. Yesterday.

I read Psalm 63:1-4 just now:
            "O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; I will lift up my hands and call on your name."

I was in the sanctuary this morning. As I arrived on the beach at the park, huffing and puffing, all of Puget Sound lay in front of me, in all of God's glory. The wind whipped at me in gusts. The clouds parted over bits of the Olympic mountains to reveal the snow-capped peaks in stark clarity. The sky was like a temperamental teenager: clouds shifting and moving, part sunny to the north, with tankers lit up in the morning light, and dark and brooding to the south.

I'm embarking on an epic pilgrimage in two days. I'll see old friends and make new ones. I'll see new parts of the world, hear some great music, fall asleep on cross-country train rides. I may very well shovel lots of cow manure again on the farm where I'll be working and hopefully defend myself with courage against barnyard chickens--as opposed to four years ago on an Austrian farm. But God also reminds me that He's indeed in the details. Just like He spoke to me at 6:08 this morning in fine detail on the edges of Puget Sound, He'll speak to me in different lands, too.

I love this poem written by Mary Oliver (and I read it wistfully, knowing it's one of the many books I won't be taking along this summer:

"This World"
I would like to write a poem about the world that has in it nothing fancy.
But it seems impossible.
Whatever the subject, the morning sun
glimmers it.
The tulip feels the heat and flaps its petals open
and becomes a star.
The ants bore into the peony bud and there is the dark pinprick well of sweetness.
As for the stones on the beach, forget it.
Each one could be set in gold.
So I tried with my eyes shut, but of course the birds were singing.
And the aspen trees were shaking the sweetest music out of their leaves.
And that was followed by, guess what, a momentous and beautiful silence
as comes to all of us, in little earfuls, if we're not too hurried to hear it.
As for spiders, how the dew hangs in their webs even if they say nothing, or seem to say nothing.
So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe they sing.
So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe the stars sing too, and the ants, and the peonies, and the warm stones, so happy to be where they are, on the beach, instead of being locked up in gold.

Sufficient Grace

Most school days remind me of the endurance workouts I used to choose on the StairMaster at the gym, where there's this endless block of flashing dots showing that I'm going to be sweating, dripping, heart pounding for the next thirty minutes with no let-up. Yesterday was the usual endurance workout, but with the Pike's Peak interval training thrown in for good measure.

I'd had a rough week: intense meetings with intense, frustrated colleagues. A meeting with a parent that took so long to get started, that we never got anywhere by the time it ended. Students still bonkers after a week of state testing. Kids asking, "When's my project going to be graded? My parents keep asking!" Stuff going on in the evenings that required yet more brain power and smiles--neither of which I had much of.  And then that cloying exhaustion that I never could kick.

I woke exhausted yesterday, and felt just as groggy post-shower as I did before I climbed in. My thirst for a latte before school was so strong (and, okay, foolish) that I stopped at two different coffee shops before finding a third that was both open and whose line didn't snake all the way out the door.

I got slammed as soon as the kids rolled in: the student of the week was a repeat from this winter, we just all forgot. I tried to cover my tracks by telling Richard that while he may have forgetful teachers, he really should feel honored to be nominated twice. And then the news that made me want to cry right in the middle of the hallway: "Miss Wike, my dad died last night." BAM! My day thrown into a tailspin as I broke the rules and gave the girl a real hug, not just the 'legal' side one.

The day progressed at the same, frenetic pace. And when I finally thought I'd shooed them out at 2:35 for the weekend, I got called in by students to break up a scuffle on the stairs. Followed by a girl with a 'grade emergency' who didn't want to be 'grounded for another weekend' because she hadn't come to me earlier so she could take care of her grades. Followed, finally, by the girl from the morning who had lost her father. She was in tears because a cruel classmate had bullied her about her dad's passing.

When everything was done, referrals written, principals addressed, emails sent, the door finally shut, I sat at my desk and cried.

I was reminded of Paul's wisdom this morning, as I read 2 Corinthians 12:8,9: "Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.' So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me."

If there's any job that will open your eyes to how weak you indeed are, it's teaching 7th grade. It's on weeks like this that all human-bound energy, creativity, wisdom, and endurance is stripped from me. And in that naked state, I can only trust that God is perfecting His power through me.

Spring time ponderings

I went for a quick walk this early evening, a respite between a hectic day at school and a busy planning meeting tonight. It's one of those gorgeous spring Seattle evenings when it really, in fact, could be summer. I'm wearing sandals and rolled up jeans (always a tell-tale sign). Birds sing. The sun shines and the view over Puget Sound is finally clear. It almost smells like summer. Is it really only spring?

But rather than siding with the empirical knowledge that tells me what season it is--trees are still budding, flowers haven't yet completely bloomed, I have to go back to school again tomorrow--I'm going to go with the poetic. Because we haven't yet passed into summer, I'm still filled with the anticipation of it. Dreams yet to be fleshed out loom large in my imagination. What will I see in my travels? Who will I meet? What will I smell? What new foods will I discover? What stories will I carry home with me, that will cling close?

Koinonia

Church today was far sweeter than usual. Dear friends of mine had their young daughter dedicated before the congregation. I share in a larger community with this couple, a group of people bound to one another by our love of God, love for the outdoors, and the earnest desire to bring disadvantaged youth outside on adventures. We meet every other week to share a meal, share our lives with one another, pray, and occasionally do some event planning. I love these people dearly, but as we attend many different congregations, I don't worship with most of them.

Several of us laughed together as we watched the father bounce his chubby eight-month-old up over his head as a banner saying, "Here are the Sierra pews, come join us!" Shortly, the first three or four rows were filled with the Sierra contingency. I turned around to see my Peak 7 friends, people I see nearly every week, but never within my own church.

I decided that this may be a little of what heaven will be like: being saturated in the presence of God with songs of praise and words of instruction. Praying together as a body who cares for one another. Being surrounded by my koinonia in the joyful celebration of dedicating a new life to being brought up to be a woman of God.

The experience was all the sweeter because of two things: a Sunday gathering like this doesn't come often. And I'll see these dear friends in another week for our usual gathering.

Glorious

There are songs that make me yearn for heaven. Sometimes, quite suddenly, like I'm scooped out of my present life into the other one. I was sitting today in my favorite local coffee shop grading papers. It was late on this Sunday afternoon, a sunny sort of day that reminds me that spring will actually arrive sometime soon. I chose a table tucked into a dark, back corner. I'd cranked my iPod cranked up in order to wash out the flood of conversations and loud coffee shop music all around me.

It wasn't until I was half-way through Brett Dennen's song "Oh the Glorious" that I actually heard what I was listening to. Or rather, I'd been hearing it all along (and perhaps even surreptitiously mouthing the words), but it didn't click.  I love this song. It brings me back to road trips through mountainous places. Or simply sitting on my bed journaling. The words and melody remind me of my deeper streams of heavenly yearning.  

I had to stop my work, press repeat, and breathe. Well, I tried, anyway. What makes it so difficult to sit and do nothing in a coffee shop for 4 minutes and 38 seconds? The magnetic pull of the stack of papers yet to be graded was too much. Better luck next time.