Sorry about the silence. You know what Sigourney's adverts says, "in space..."
I've been working on rewriting an old fairy tale from another perspective and going to skool.
band names: hi8us
TVBhindURI
Dvotion
too much time thinking about words ;-)
Over dinner that evening, George told again about the blue Toyota.
“I got the first two letters of the license this time,” said George.
“Have you called them in to Officer Chang?” asked Stephen.
“Yeah, as soon as I got home,” said George. “I called and left the message,” George said with disappointment in his voice.
“I hear you,” said Stephen.
Barbara made another call to the pre-arranged number.
“Hello, Jimmy,” she said.
“Hi, again hun,” a man replied, whose voice revealed no particular age nor race.
“What do you think about the ongoing situation, Jimmy?” Barbara asked.
“I don’t know, hun. What do you want me to do about it anyway?” he answered.
“I know you can’t do anything yourself, but if you knew someone who could work something out for me, I’d appreciate a little assistance,” said Barbara, her voice remained lifeless, with no inflection.
“I know what you mean, but that is going to be even more difficult for me to initiate now that the first part’s still not completed.”
“Cut it out, Jimmy,” Barbara’s voice lost, if possible, any remaining sense of human interaction and became purely cut and dried.
“I hear your frustration, hun,” the last word was slightly more emphasized, a reminder that Jimmy was more to Barbara than a contact upon whose resources she was relying, even if she was paying for the service. “But you understand my situation as well. I have already committed myself to another schedule.”
Barbara paused. She knew she was treading on thin ice, even making another call to the number her nephew gave her. It was to the man who “kept the books” for a nationwide trading group. The trade was mostly in illicit supplies- meaning drugs and prostitution Barbara expected, from the rules that were set out by her nephew for contacting this number. She had looked up the area code and prefix. They led to some Minneapolis suburb called North Hudson.
“Jimmy, let me say it this way: I need a favor,” said Barbara. She had crossed the line. No turning back now. These people would be expecting payback from her. Hopefully they wouldn’t reach beyond her workplace.
“Well now, since you put it that way, we can talk some more about the details of your problem and see if I can spare someone to help you.”
Barbara thought she could almost hear a smile on the lips of the man’s face at the other end of the phone as she hung up. Her problem would be addressed. Someone would call her in the next couple of days to find out some details of the next step – the payment.
George went to see his spiritual director for his monthly appointment.
Sr. Estella greeted George with a warm cup of tea and an invitation to come and sit down in the ‘direction’ room. George didn’t know what to call it, because it was really too small for anything but a large closet or a tiny sitting room or office. The sisters had outfitted it for meeting privately in this sort of situation. There were two old leather chairs, not too comfortable, sitting at roughly ninety degrees from one another. Their arms were separated by an off-white marble-top wrought iron table that held a lamp and a small houseplant.
“How are your prayers, George?” asked Estella.
“Pretty good considering the situation,” answered George.
Sticking with the issue George had come to see her about Estella asked, “And where have you found the Divine in your prayers lately?”
George smiled slightly and stepped up to the challenge of sticking with the agenda of the meeting. “I have actually been really surprised with what I’ve been seeing in my prayers.”
“Hmmm. What have you been seeing in your prayers?” Estella caught George’s revelation, he was again seeing in his prayers. Much of George’s prayer life had been about words and emotions and memories, but in the last several months he had been describing visual experiences. Sometimes these were accompanied by sensations or even words, but the images were powerful enough to keep them occupied for an hour and a half discussion each month.
“Well, I’ve been trying to keep the pattern we have talked about in the past, but I’ve actually been having some trouble as I get caught up in the images,” said George.
As he looked at Estella, he saw the note of concern flicker across her eyes, and so he offered, “I know, I read at least one Merton book in which he says the lights and sounds are some of the easier distractions to transformation and more significant learning through meditation or prayer. I don’t think that this is what I’m experiencing. I also find that, as in other things in prayer, they come to a end every single time.”
“Okay. That’s a helpful observation, but let’s stick with talking about the images for now,” redirected Estella.
“After I do my regular settling in, I usually find myself sitting quietly and then there is the sense of someone beside me. Sometimes she is even holding me,” said George.
“You are sitting and someone is beside you, even holding you?” repeated Estella.
“Right,” replied George.
“What is her presence like?” she asked. “What is it like to be held by her?”
“I feel held.”
“What else can you say about what that’s like?”
“It’s as though my skin is held up; my head is held. My heart is held – I mean the organ inside of me – so that it is light weight,” said George.
“What is that lightness, or holding like?” Estella asked.
“It’s… I don’t know. I feel touched into my understanding, or the place where my emotions start from,” said George. “I think what is happening is that I feel carried up, almost out of myself.”
“But that’s more about thinking than noticing on a more open or contemplative level. Let’s try to stay there. How do you notice that you are in this place? Or, what do you notice first about being there?” said Estella.
“Oh, that’s the name of the Merton book, Contemplative Prayer,” George knew he’d be distracted trying to remember the name to Estella unless he blurted it out right away. Then he went on, “When I am sitting and meditating, I begin to notice I am not alone. That is what I realize first.”
“So, what is that presence like? What’s it like to be in that Other’s presence?”
George was silent for a while as the presence surrounded him again in his recollection.
“Hello, Officer Chang?” asked George.
“Hello, Reverend,” the officer responded, “What can I do for you?”
“I am calling to make sure we have talked about everything that seems to be happening about the case of Henry Isaacson’s murder.”
“Oh? Is there more that you can tell me about?” said Chang.
“I wanted to make sure you got the message about the tires up in the foothills this weekend-“
“You mean the tires being flat? Yeah, I got that message the other day,” Officer Chang cut in.
“Yes, and this week on Tuesday, I was driving and realized I had to back home for something and saw a car behind me, which, after I had turned around, was behind me again in a couple minutes. It followed me to within three blocks of our house,” said George.
“Really. Did you get a license number?”
“No, I didn’t think of that, and they were pretty far back after I had turned around. I did get a pretty good look at the person in the car as he made the last turn we made together.”
“Okay, we’ll get to that. Did you see the make and model of the car?” said Chang.
“I only saw that it was a blue Toyota and it looked like it was a pretty recent model, maybe two or three years old,” said George.
“Okay, now tell me about the person driving.”
“I am pretty sure I recall seeing somewhere,” said George.
“Maybe from church? Is he a… what do you call it, a ‘lazy’ member? Or did you meet him at another church function?”
“I… hmmm. You know that sounds like it might be right, but I cannot place it. Maybe he was part of a baptismal party, or the child of an older member… I just can’t remember.”
“Can you give a description to an artist? We can try to get a picture of him for other people to look at as well.”
“I can describe him pretty well. I recall his face from that last turn,” said George. “Does the fact that you are going to ask an artist to help mean that you think I may have seen Henry’s murderer?”
“Father, all I can tell you is that we are working very hard to find out how and why Mr. Isaacson was killed. And one line of investigation we are pursuing is that you, or maybe your community, might have been the intended target for the perpetrator. We don’t know why, yet.”
Iliana Morrison’s niece, Barbara got up from her desk, and took out her purse from the filing cabinet. She locked her desk drawers with a key from her purse, and went out to her car. Vincent’s car was still parked at the end of the lot. She hadn’t seen him inside though.
“Probably out with Tony down at the ‘Tenner Pub’ watching rugby again,” she thought. “He’d better be careful or his mother is likely to shorten the leash she kept him on.” And a moment later, “Did I? …Oh damn, I forgot to pick up the security deposit check to bring back to Pr. George.”
Barbara got out of the car and went back up to the office and retrieved the check, got in the car and drove home, shaking her head one last time as she drove past the blue Corolla near the street.
Tim had much to tell about the meeting with the religious community event planners, but had to wait until the following Tuesday unless he could get George for a few minutes on Saturday afternoon. Saturday morning he knew George would be back at his haunt, the Green Café, doing some sermon writing for the next day. Tim caught George after the morning meeting just as George was putting together the ingredients for their soup dinner.
Leaning against the door frame in the passage by the Dali Last Supper, Tim poked his head in and asked, “Hey George, do you have some time later today? I’d like to touch base with you about what went on at the meeting on Tuesday with the ‘event planning group.’”
“Sure,” George said, looking up from the knife with which he was slicing vegetables. “I think I will be around this afternoon, probably between two and four. I’ll need to be back in here to work on the bread for tonight after four.”
“Great,” said Tim.
“What’s new, George?” asked Rosie. Rosie gave George a very nice smile and wink.
“Not much, Rosie. How are you?” George asked this to remind himself that he was a representative, in a certain role. He had chosen a lifestyle that precluded ‘special’ relationships for himself.
Rosie nodded, “It’s going pretty well. This place is booming and I’m happy about that. I am still working out how to live without you though.”
George almost choked, but Rosie laughed, “Got you! But good!”
George laughed hard, once he got past the idea that seemed good to him as well, “Oh man! Rosie, you’re killing me!”
“What would you like to drink, George? The usual, and two in a row?”
“Yes, please,” George tried to give Rosie his biggest smile and it wasn’t difficult.
Several hours later, with a ‘good idea on paper’, but less than finished in his mind, George packed his things away and made his way out past an early afternoon rush and down to his car.
The way home was marred by the blue Toyota again….
Thursday could not have happened too soon for several reasons. George was going to see a counselor he had been seeing for a long time, but finished up with several years ago. Tim and Jack’s commitments had shifted slightly, so that they had arranged to help Stephen get to and from his meeting downtown, and all this in the same space as a big preparation meeting for a national assembly of ‘religious,’ people who lived in committed communities, mostly from the Episcopal Church USA (CORAL). Next year, Seattle would host the national meeting of representatives from (non-Catholic) religious communities. Tim had gotten placed on the planning team for this event through his contacts in the Spiritual Direction network. That afternoon and evening meeting was going to take place on Capitol Hill.
All this meant that Jack could pass his car to Tim, picking Stephen up along the way, so everyone could use a car after all. George passed his on to Jack for the afternoon work.
George’s morning is worth hearing about though.
After prayers, breakfast, the morning meeting, and dressing for the outside world, George left for Mercer Island by 9:30 am. His appointment was for 10 am, and he arrived at Susan’s office ten minutes early, having driven against the rush hour traffic.
“George, it’s been a long time,” said Susan. “What brings you over here at this time?” Dr. Susan Snelling’s long brown hair was beginning to streak with gray. She wore glasses and looked as though 20 years ago she was every bit the librarian who would let her hair down outside of work. She was distinguished and clearly in her fifties. George knew that Susan was at least seventy, had worked with several other protestant ministers and specialized in working with adults with child abuse circumstances in their background.
“Susan, I have had some disturbing things happen lately. I want to check in with you to see how I am doing, hearing what I am thinking about and my situation.”
“Sure, I can be in that role again. Maybe it would be helpful to tell me about what has been going on in your situation.”
“Did you hear about the murder over near Green Lake about a month ago?” asked George.
Susan nodded, allowing George to fill in the details about which he wanted to talk to her.
“First, that was a member of my congregation, of Green Lake Lutheran where I am one of the pastors. Second, it was supposed to be me walking the dogs that morning. Third, I (and some of the other brothers) think maybe there is someone trying to hurt us- the community as the motive for this murder.”
“Wow. George, that’s a big list. What can you tell me about what the police are saying?”
“It was the police who suggested that it might be me that the man targeting someone was trying to hurt, I mean murder,” said George.
“So which of the things you have mentioned do you want to talk about right now?” asked Susan.
George sighed and began, “You know, I guess I want to check with you on the perceptions that I have been having that otherwise seem paranoid to me.”
“What do you mean?” Susan asked.
“I mean just the other day I was out on a community errand and forgot something I needed at home and I remembered just a few minutes away from home, so I turned around and went back the same way I had come.”
“Yes...” said Susan, encouraging George to go on.
“And when I did the u-turn a blue Toyota was behind me and let me pass. I looked in my mirror a few minutes later and the blue Toyota was behind me again. I decided to test my anxiety, thinking maybe they just happened to need to do the same thing – turn around. I decided to go home another way – a little further on, not as convenient, but sometimes I have driven that way. Anyway, I slowed down and made the turn and the blue Toyota followed me to within three blocks of our house,” said George.
“Hmm, is there anything else?”
“Yes, well, two things. I have gotten two phone calls from a woman who seems to have seen and heard something about what at least one man had done. The first said there had been a car in the neighborhood watching me take the dogs out for walks on Tuesdays before the murder. The second call said we ought to be careful on the retreat we just returned from this past weekend and she had overheard someone saying he was going to get me and the community out of the congregation.”
“That sounds either like something to be concerned about or rubbish,” said Susan.
“Yes, I agree. But as I heard somewhere, ‘Usually paranoia is not caused by people wanting to hurt you, and sometimes it is, or something like that,” said George.
“You said there were two things that made you wonder about actually being followed,” said Susan.
“Yes. The second one is from the retreat this past weekend,” George began again. “We had scheduled ourselves some time to get away this fall, but weren’t going for another couple weeks or so. But with the news we got last week from the police, when they interviewed me, that perhaps I was in fact the target of the murder, we decided to get out of town to get our bearings and maybe some space from the situation. It was a good event, I suppose. Our time was interrupted by a plumbing problem at the place we had rented. We still got to study and pray and worship all together. Now it seems like too great a buildup for the next thing, but Sunday morning when we were packing up, the two tires on the right side of the rental van were flat – not ‘popped,’ but flat. Someone came out and pumped them up and then we drove home.”
“George,” Susan said quietly, “What do you think about all this now that you’ve spoken it out loud to someone outside the situation?”
“I… I think that there is something to be concerned about. I think I have been careful to measure my responses in almost every interaction around this. The reason I thought to call you the other day was that I had a twinge of some of the same feelings of anxiety I used to have around the feelings of being abused. I was standing in the kitchen finishing the dishwashing when I heard the news about the tires, and a few minutes later it hit me the impact that had on our schedule. I felt the edges of the abyss, and depression, and total loss of control that I used to feel.” George glimpsed them again as he spoke to Susan now.
“You are in another place now, George. You are in control of your life choices,” Susan repeated statements she and George had come up with to encourage him live into a wider sense of personal safe space long after the situation in which the abuse had happened had ceased to exist.
“Still in that new place, George, I would think you ought to make sure the police have all the information that you just told me. Perhaps they already have other information that this would add to and help clear up the question – whether or not you or the community ought to be concerned,” said Susan. In her head she chose not to mention that she was worried for them, especially her patient –and not because of his struggles with historic issues. “I hear you using good reasoning to check things out, not jumping to conclusions, and checking in with someone who knows about your past struggles. I’d say you are smart and a deep thinker, who has a serious faith which you are working out in your life choices. Unfortunately, right now, circumstances are giving you a challenge most people never have to face.
“Your mental health is just fine. I want you to do what you need to do to be safe in other areas of your life,” concluded Susan.
George drove away at the end of the session with the sense that he was first of all, not crazy. Second, he had reason to be anxious about his safety, he wasn’t exaggerating in his mind or reporting. Finally, he had determined that pursuing the police in this matter was a good course of action.
As he drove away, George did not see anyone following him in a blue Toyota.
“Yes, well, it was a very interesting place, very attentive care-taker,” explained George, “but unfortunately he had to help us a lot. A pump off the basement bathroom acted up and a plumber had to come out and deal with it. Then today, as we were packing up, we found the two right tires deflated.”
“That’s… interesting, isn’t it,” offered Travis with no real understanding of how this could happen.
“Yes, it is…”
“How do you imagine it happened?” asked Travis.
“I have no idea,” said George. “The community is divided about what it means. Two of us think it’s nothing to be concerned about – just a coincidence that two tires went flat on our rental vehicle. Two of us think it’s actually something that is part of something related to the murder. We have a case number to give to the Seattle PD.”
Travis agreed that was a good idea and he and George hung up, to go take care of things in their respective areas of responsibility. George first phoned Officer Chang and left a message, then called someone he hadn’t been in touch with for four years.
Tuesday, the day of the morning meeting about scheduling cars and visitations, George had gone to walk George and Kenya at the Simpson house and talked with Sheila briefly.
“George, Travis told me something that is very disturbing,” said Sheila.
“Yes. You mean about me being perhaps the real target of the attack in your… I’m sorry, in your garage.” George choked out the last words, realizing that he was afraid, but also that all this was happening at Sheila’s home. Taking another look at Sheila, George saw the statuesque older woman’s eyes a little more red around the edges, and more tension in her hands which were just beginning to fight arthritis.
“I’m sorry Sheila. I apologize. I think I have been treating this a bit too pastorally – like just another concern and I haven’t connected up what this all means for me, much less for you and your house and your home.”
Sheila and George had been standing outside on concrete path between the empty autumn garden and dog run and the house. The path to the garage broke away fro the one they were on just a couple paces away.
Sheila asked George, “Did you know I’ve had someone over or I have gone out every evening since the murder?”
“No, I hadn’t realized that,” answered George quietly.
“I find I have used my coupons at many places over the intervening month and I have a vacancy this Wednesday. Would there be any chance I could come by for a meal that evening? I know it is typically your community night, but I wonder if I might impose on you this week.”
“I will have to ask the other men, but I think that this week we could do something. You are not everyone by any means! I’ll ask this morning and get back to you later today. Is that alright?” said George.
At the meeting, all four men were requesting a car on the Thursday. When they realized this they each both argued for their priority and began trying to figure out alternative methods. George was one of the first to say he really needed to use a car, since he had an appointment on Mercer Island in the morning. Eventually, the biggest fight was between Jack and Stephen over who needed to come pick the other up from one thing to go to the next, which in Seattle, is partly about parking and partly about cross town travel. Both grown men agreed to make it happen smoothly. Tim agreed to take the bus over to the university district if George could pick him up at 1:30 to make his downtown meeting at 2pm.
Later that day, George was on his way over to the bank to withdraw some money for the community purse. When he drove by the Green Café for a cup of coffee he realized he had forgotten his wallet at the house. Turning the truck around at the first opportunity, George saw a blue Toyota slow down and pull over to let him complete his u-turn at a four-way stop near Stone Way. Passing again by the Green Café, he realized that the blue Toyota was behind him again, going back the exact opposite direction they had each been traveling moments before.
The cool air blowing from the air vent in the truck felt suddenly cold as it blew over George’s neck and lip. Not really noticing, he turned the fan to low, and drove slowly back towards the house. There are really three ways to get back to the community house from this point. One passes Sheila Simpson’s house, the other goes around near the church, and another goes on the main road around the lake, then cuts back a little.
George second guessed himself several times, then he chose the third option. If someone was following him they would reveal it clearly by going the third way. It was not the way he normally went for all kinds of reasons. He drove on, reaching over to the radio, to turn off the Kate Bush song that had been in heavy rotation lately.
Slowing down at the corner, to get a better look at the blue car in the rear view mirror, George thought he saw someone inside that he vaguely recognized, but couldn’t place. The blue car made the same turn and then at the first street made a left turn again.
Was the car following him? Or was it a coincidence, maybe him turning around jogged someone else’s memory. Perhaps they had forgotten something as well. It could have happened that way.
band names: dip llama
The four had gone down into the basement sitting, or ‘games’ room just for a change of scenery and so as not to have to heat the entire large, high ceilinged ‘great’ room. Jack was getting into the second presentation on St John of the Cross.
“As I began this morning, the two poems, the Spiritual Canticle and Dark Night of the Soul, provide a place to just begin a whole realm of prayerful study, not to mention study of Spanish poetry. The Ascent of Mount Carmel, though, is even more useful for us as we continue to figure out individually, and for the life of our community, what it means to pray. It could even be helpful to use the Ascent of Mount Carmel as a way to talk to people who are thinking about becoming part of this community, not the visitors, but serious inquirers and postulants.”
“A discussion of what St. John vehemently points out as being against the God-ward life, is like the premarital counseling conversation we ask a couple to have based on the questionnaire of things-you-might-talk-about-now-so-as-to-get-it-out-in-the-open. In our situation, how a person views their body, their bad choices, and God’s involvement in the world…”
A half an hour into the discussion, Stephen left for a minute and came back. A moment later there was a loud and annoying buzzing sound which began and did not stop. Stephen got up again, this time Jack paused and the others all looked down the hall to where Stephen was standing. He opened the door and the sound got louder, a red light spilled into and across the hall.
Jack, whose experience of working in a shelter meant that he had many different skills in making stuff work a little longer, or get fixed without making investment decisions, came over to look.
“I have no idea what it’s for, but it looks like there is a pump that is not working.”
“Is that what that noise is?”
“Apparently it’s an alarm, to tell someone that the pump isn’t working.”
“Can we-“ Tim asked, as George leaned over and pressed first one and then the other buttons. The second button stopped the noise, but the red light kept shining.
“There,” George said redundantly.
“We need to call Sally?” asked Jack.
“Actually there is a local number for problems. Let me go call now. Why don’t you finish up what you were saying, Jack, and then we can take a coffee break a little early,” said George.
“That’s sounds good. I’ll make an amendment, though, that we’ll go do an exercise when we ‘finish’ the coffee break, so we don’t have to come back together until 3:45.”
“Hello, is this James? Hello, my name is George Anderson and I’m over at the Horse Ranch this weekend.”
“Hello. Yes. I heard from Sally Ames that you’d be there. What can I do for you?”
“Well, it seems there is a pump just off the basement bathroom that isn’t working.”
“Oh damn that thing. I knew it would act up again, as soon as I got it fixed,” said James.
George was amused to hear the man swear. He probably didn’t know what group was in the house. Most people who didn’t know a professional religious person believed that they never swore, or that it even hurt their ears to hear it. Why else were there apologies nearly every time that useful four letter words were breathed?
“You know what? I’m going to call the plumber and have him come over and fix it and stop messing around myself. The Morrisons will just have to deal with it. I’m going to call John over at Foothill Plumbing. He ought to be able to come over in the next little while.”
“Is there any way you can supervise him? We really need this time that we came to do some work here.”
“Yes. Yes. I will tell him to call me when he’s coming over and I will look over what happening. Can you meet upstairs. Sally said something about you were a smaller group, right?” said James.
“Yes. We can do that. There isn’t going to be too much noise is there?” George asked.
"No, no, shouldn’t be much, if any. I don’t think you will even be able to hear it upstairs.”
The frustration continued in that the noise was loud enough to hear, and James did not do a good job supervising the man, he kept going in and out of the big house. Needing tools is not an unexpected thing, but each time he went out, a wind ran around the house like a bunch of ghostly four year olds spilling chill all over the rooms. Finally, the exercise completed early, the brothers tried to gather in the great room… and then the drilling began.
It was decided to suspend the rest of the afternoon’s work. Maybe the community would take it up again that night.
For now they would go up to town for a visit to the local grocery store and prepare their supper of appetizers and soup. There was enough of everything except bread. Perhaps they were spoiled, but it was a way to connect with people, to go into town and find out what kind of breads were available.
Of course the name of the next nearest town was more interesting, so they had to go to Index, Washington. Now, if the plummer would be done by the time they got back, past the logging trucks at the end of their day…
“You are a despicable person! You have no right to come up to me and shake my hand. You have behaved abominably and with malicious intent. I do not recognize your presence.”
“I was standing in an aisle in a big beverage store near the Seattle Center.” The previous speaker was talking to someone else, while she was pushing his shopping cart with a small child in the seat facing her. George realized it was a parishioner of his who was doing the talking. Then he recognized the child, it was a girl George and Travis had baptized a few years back. The person that George knew was not in the habit of speaking that way. Kay always seemed very measured in her interactions. The situation slightly alarmed him, what would cause such an outburst of ill description to pour from her?
Then all of a sudden George was the person standing at the shopping cart. And it was his child sitting staring at him in wonderment at the words and language he had used.
The last thing he remembered before waking was that he had avoided making eye contact and was relieved to see the antagonist leave the building. Then he pushed the cart ahead, talked with his daughter and slowed in front of a display of holiday foods. Then George woke up.
He looked at the clock, the red lights showed 4:23. George couldn’t throw off the feelings of the dream encounter. He had seen the actual store before, had walked by it, but had never gone in. What was that about: a sticky, broken nutshell texture in the heart of the emotions against that man in the store? George felt his stomach tightening, and sweat on his neck turning cold, even as he woke, revulsion and something else.
Returning even more to his room, George’s body creaked and did actually crackle as his feet reached for the floor, He was thankful that the community had agreed good beds would make them better monks - and human beings – at least as far as being able to live together.
George dressed and went down to the chapel, knowing he would not be able to get back to sleep. Since he had a whole hour before his regular schedule, he brought his prayer beads. An old friend, who had joined a monastery in England long after they had met, had rolled the clay into large pea-sized salmon colored balls, pierced and strung them for him, unfired. George spent the next hour inhaling to the words, “Have mercy on me,” and exhaling “Jesus Christ, Son of God,” dropping one bead after another through his increasingly dusty fingers.
“Tim, that is… I’m sorry you feel that way,” Stephen said.
Jack jumped into the fray, “I understood we were here to talk about the death of a friend the other day.”
“I am here to talk about everything that led up to that!” said Stephen, his face turning red and an artery almost looking like you could see it pulse, standing out on his neck.
“What?” Tim and George both asked, while Jack sat up in his chair at the end of the table and opened his mouth and left it hanging there.
“I mean… I want to talk about,” taking a breath to calm himself, said Stephen, “how Henry was always trying to help, and how he was part of our whole community – not this one, but Green Lake Lutheran. Henry was always involved, not like Ted, who’s only gotten involved recently. And Ted is only around to grouse and complain. Henry was one of the people the whole ministry is going to miss.
“There are whole lists of things that no one else knows how to do at the church, groups that met and Henry unlocked the door, meetings that enjoyed coffee that Henry made, things that the janitors didn’t have to worry about because Henry took care of it!”
George imagined the waves the murder was wreaking on the church community. They were spreading out further than he’d first thought.
“Stephen, you are right. There are going to be long term adjustments that will have to be made, just for the church to be able to function… Is there anything else you want to mention?” George asked when Stephen did not seem to be going further.
“No, really. I just wanted to make sure this community, this house, at least was prepared for what this murder really means for us and the people of the congregation. I am a little worried about how the synod is going to view us after this.”
“Mmmm,” said Tim. “Yeah, I didn’t think of that.”
“Yeah, well my status as a rostered person is up before yours unless our community is recognized somehow,” said Stephen.
George, finally began to see where Stephen had been coming from – his concern about ‘falling off the roster-‘ not being recognized any more as a pastor. They hadn’t heard from the bishop in all of this. George wondered if the bishop’s office had heard from anyone.
There was some more discussion about how to handle the situation, the “this” that hung over like a cloud heavy with lightning and rain. Finally, it was Jack who suggested one way to help the brothers be better able to handle things better.
“What if we were to move up our quarterly retreat to two weeks from now?”
“Whoah!”
“What? How can we do that?”
“Before you immediately discount that option, look at your schedules. We’re going up to the Horse Ranch on Highway 2, so it’s a matter of finding out if the big house is being used during the week in the pre-ski season. It might be open and Sally Ames, the manager has been really helpful in making things welcoming for us. She might be able to get back with the information about if it’s even possible within a day. We could ask and find out if the site is open, while we check our schedules.”
“This must be something that comes in handy with the shelter, Jack” said Tim.
“Flexibility?” Jack asked.
“That, and coming up with out of the box options,” Tim was the first one to smile out of the whole discussion.
“I am not sure if it’s going to be possible for all, never mind. I’ll check.”
“What were you going to say, George?” asked Stephen.
“I was thinking in terms of the congregation. I forgot for a moment that I was free to take time off where and when wanted to,” he said.
“Okay, then, I’ll find out and we’ll check our schedules,” said Jack.
“Thank you, Jack. Would you be prepared to lead a program on the first day, with some of the material you were going to present tonight?”
“Sure, I’ll look forward to it.”
“Then we will have something to look forward to working on, not just separate meditations, or our own perniciousness to occupy ourselves,” said George.
“Good. Yes,” agreed Tim and Stephen.
“George, how are you doing?”
“Good, Estella.”
“Have you been using the things we talked about since last time?”
“Yes, but it’s been hard.”
“What about the exercises have been difficult?”
“No, it’s in the rest of my life.”
“Oh?”
“Yes, you’ve perhaps heard about the woman in whose garage a man was killed the other week?”
“Yes.”
“He was a parishioner of mine, and she is a close friend – the benefactor of my community, actually.”
“Oh. I can see how that would disturb your prayers. So what did you do about it?”
“About the disturbance you mean? “
“Yes.”
“Well… I guess I chose to focus on the activities I felt I needed to get through in order to make it to today.”
“And how did that work for you?”
“It was less than what I hope for regularly.But I was able to include some of my dreams in the meditations.”
“So you did pray, and you did some of what we talked about?”
“Yes.”
“So let’s focus on that today.”
“Okay. I especially enjoyed the time I spent on the Jesus Prayer with the meditations on the images of the Divine…”
After the spiritually renewing and relaxing meeting with Sr. Estella about his life in prayer, when George got home, he was utterly unprepared for the phone call.
“Hello, Community House, how can I direct your call?”
“Hello, is this the pastor who walks the dogs?” Not even waiting for complete confirmation of the right person, she plowed onward, “I was at the store this morning, and I heard a man talking about how he was terribly upset with how you were handling the situation in the parish – about the murder. You know I was the one who called about the red truck that other week…” There was a slight pause.
“Anyway, the man was saying how he was going to make it his business to get you and your community out of the parish. He said he was angry about your whole involvement in the life of the congregation and he-“
George interrupted, “Excuse me. Excuse me! I need to ask you if there is something you want to tell me. I cannot keep listening to your side of the story. I lay myself open to all kinds of things, including accusations of gossiping! I will not be party to that, or any other destructive group behavior.”
“I… I just want to say watch out at the retreat.” Then she hung up.
“How could she even know that the dates of the retreat had been changed? Wait, she didn’t say that. She said watch out at the retreat. She didn’t necessarily know anything about any change in dates, or the location of the event, just that such a thing was happening,” George mused to himself. “Still, it was weird. People who got the parish newsletter already knew about he retreat. They just didn’t know it would be happening earlier than announced – even more reason not to worry about it, since it was now an unexpected event.
next week: more dreams and a meeting
