Sunday Quiet Time

When I teach about prayer to my RCIA students I compare it to falling in love.  At first two people in love have so much to say to each other because they are getting to know one another, but after being in love for sometime words are not as important.  Like my parents who after fifty years of marriage enjoy being silent in each other’s company.  My dad will be going through the mail, while my mom is mending a pair of jeans both in the same room enjoying each other.  In this time of so much noise and business, I grew-up in a home where we like hanging around each other, especially in our backyard basking in the warm sun.  It’s almost our Sunday routine to gather together in the yard and after catching-up just sitting together quietly.  Sometimes, I have wondered if I were to bring a significant other into these Sunday afternoons with my clan if that person would understand the importance of togetherness without much activity- in fact usually in silence? 

Though nothing is happening in terms of exchanges, when I sit with my family something beyond happens that connects us together.  It is in these quiet gatherings that I feel their love and the power of our connection.  I come from a family that rarely says “I love you” – yet, I have always known that I am loved by them.  Because it takes intimacy to be comfortable with silences and also a high level of care. When I sit with my family and watch the sunset, I would purr if I were a feline -satisfied that even in my rest I love and am loved.  I think in terms of finding a significant other I want someone who will sit with me for a while.  I used to have these conversations with Dollar because he used to love quietly laying next to me, satisfied with us being together in the same room relaxing, I would say especially on low days, “I want to find someone who will just lay with me and forget the world.  Someone who loves me simply because I exist and not the sum of my strengths and weaknesses.” 

In contemplation that’s what we do with God, just sit and enjoy being in His presence.  He looks at me (at rest when I am completely unimpressive) and loves me because I am His beloved.  Thankfully, my parents have passed this great practice of the importance of silence - of quieting the mind to be able to hear love and to understand not only God, but also each other.  It was only until recently that I realized how special I am to have a group that loves me enough to spend quiet times with me.  In quiet, demands get cancelled and being just me is enough- I like that feeling of complete acceptance.  

Finding the Right Bible Study Group for You

Tonight, I am going to my bible study on King David.  I have been taking the class for the past five weeks and I am really enjoying the experience.  Though, I am involved in many ways in my faith- I have been wanting to locate a group where I can have deep theological discussions that are also relevant to my everyday trials.  Finding the right match for me has been a long quest… I think finding the right study group is as difficult as trying to find the right therapist – it takes time and a few misfits until perseverance pays off and you find the right one.  Maybe I am difficult, but not all bible study groups work for everyone and that’s ok- the fact that there’s different kinds is a richness in our Church, we just have to have patience in finding one that suits each of us.  As I am aging out of the young adult groups, I feel like the YA groups are not as interesting to me as they once were; which I think is healthy- a sign of maturity. 

In my Monday night I am the youngest person in the course, but I feel like our discussions are really intellectually stimulating.  Or maybe it’s the way the group is organized, or the material we are studying; but what I think it is, is the people.  I feel like I have a found community.  The Monday night group, meets every Monday and once a video series ends, they all continue to the next one together.  They have been doing this for sometime so they know each other well and even bring cake to celebrate birthdays – which to me feels like family.  Though I am the new member, they have received me with opens arms quite warmly.  I am assigned to a small group for faith sharing, but I am not just part of those eight people- the whole group gathers together so everyone in the session knows one-another.  Sometimes we break into our small groups and other times we share as one large group.  This ability to have a small faith sharing group, but still belong to the larger body is what I find unique.  We study together, pray together and fellowship as one large family.  They’ve also gone on various pilgrimages together, which excites me since I love to travel.

I have been asking God for sometime for a group just like this, and though it has taken quite some searching I feel like I have found a nice place to grow.  It’s a good sign that I get excited as the night approaches to attend my group.  Thus, if you are still searching for the right bible study group don’t get discouraged- keep praying and actively searching.  I used to look at all the bulletins from parishes in my area to see what they had happening – after attending many different groups I finally landed on the one fitted for me. So pray and actively search (smile).

New Adventures

“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end,” were the lyrics to our senior class song, quite mature lyrics for teenagers with pockets full of dreams.  As I was thinking of what to write this week those lyrics jumped at me because I am at a transition in my life, a fork in the road and while it’s easy to sulk about the end of things I am actually really optimistic about my future.  So, what now? Tabula Rasa, I have a blank slate to start over and the first thing that I plan to do is go visit my grandma.  After settling my unemployment, health care and all those logistics that a lay off brings – I decided that before I commit myself to new employment, I want to travel to Mexico and spend a couple weeks with my grandma in the town I was born in.  I have the opportunity to see her and it might be our last time together since she hasn’t been doing that great lately- so am looking at this free time as a blessing in disguise.

This free time has also given me the opportunity to do things that I normally didn’t have the time to do.  For some years now I have been wanting to take the ten-week course on the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises and hadn’t because I didn’t feel like driving to Hawaiian Gardens to take the classes.  Now, I found a morning class that is not only convenient because I don’t have to worry about being stuck in traffic, but it’s also going to take me through the season of Lent.  Today, I had my first class and it’s going to be a period of intense learning and prayer.  These next ten weeks I am going to be working on learning the why of my existence, proper care of creation and holy indifference.  The last though challenging is the one I am most excited about:     

1. To not prefer a long or short life 
2. To not prefer health over sickness 
3. To not prefer richness over poverty 
4. To not prefer honors over humiliation

When one loses a job, I feel like it’s a disturbance of peace and to be studying Ignatian Spirituality during this time when I am seeking order after a ten-year employment routine is such a great gift from God.  Ignatius believed that peace comes not from having all your needs met, but from a desire to do God’s will in every situation in life.  I have sometime off from work, and even though I was not the one that asked for the time off I have the financial security to be able to go spend sometime with my grandma who just had surgery and is in bed rest.  I also have the ability to take courses, to go to Mass daily and to transform my prayer life.  God is keeping me so busy that my days fly by without the time to think of negative thoughts, but if those nasty thoughts do come I use a quote from a cheerful saint, “Tristeza y melancolía fuera de la casa mia.”  What a great way to fight negative thoughts, “Sadness and melancholy outside my house!”  Because am finding that putting things in order also requires making sure one’s mind is also on check.

The Last Adios

At seven Wednesday night, I received Dollar's ashes- it was quite a difficult moment to go home with my little wolf in a small wooden box.  The people at the animal hospital were very sweet and gave me his paw print stamped in clay, a dog tag heart with his name engraved on it and seeds to plant flowers in his memory.  Dollar is my first pet so this whole process is my first  time and am not sure how I am supposed to act.  I know he's just a dog, but I feel like I need to give him a proper burial to get closure. Today, I have plans of laying him to rest in a sunny place in my yard and having his tombstone be a statue of Saint Francis.  

The loss of a pet, is different for people in terms of how they get closure.  Some leave the remains at the vet for the hospital to get rid of them, others save the cremated remains in a special place at home, others buy a plot at the pet cemetery... There are many options and each is chosen according to what the owner of the pet feels like doing. For me I needed to bring Dollar's ashes home and lay him to rest.  The thought of leaving his body at the animal hospital felt like abandonment.  I was told that I would get his remains sometime in a two week period and Wednesday night I got the call that my beloved wolf was ready to be picked up.  It was too dark to burry him that night so I decided to wait until the following morning.

I thought that I would ask dad to help me dig the grave and that would be that, but my immediate family asked to be present.  My brother and dad helped me with the burial, I read Neruda's poem, "A Dog Has Died," and we planted my little wolf beside the rose bushes.  After that brief ceremony we gathered in my living room and recalled a few favorite memories.  I had been restless these past few days and when the burial was over I felt joy that I took care of Dollar until the end. I felt satisfied and the pain of losing him was replaced with peace.  I think what I wanted to say yesterday in this post is that we all mourn differently, for me it was important to be there when Dollar closed his eyes, to be the last face he saw and to bring him home and lay him to rest.  I didn't expect my family to want to take part of it, but they surprised me asking to be present.  I realized that though Dollar was mine, he was equally my family's dog and they too needed closure.  We closed a loving chapter in our lives with Neruda's words:

"So now he's gone and we buried him,
and that's all there is to it."

Seeing the Goodness in Times of Trouble

I recently finished reading a novel by CS Lewis, Till We Have Faces, a retelling of the mythological story of Cupid and Psyche.  The story is told from the perspective of one of Psyche’s sisters, Orual, who opens by saying that what she’s about to share is an accusation against the gods for the terrible life she has led.  Then she begins to list her misfortunes; her mother is dead, her father hates her for being a girl and ugly, she loses her sister (the person she loved the most), she’s in love with a married man that doesn’t reciprocate her feelings… And the list goes on.  She’s so focused on the negative that she can’t see goodness and that’s really what touched me most about this novel because it’s so easy to focus on the things that suppress light. 

I lost my job, then my grandma fell and we were worried about her not surviving the surgery, then my neighbor (a close friend) suddenly passed, then I lost my dearest companion (Dollar)…  I could remain so focus on the challenges that I don’t see the goodness that also happened during those difficult times.  I have a new opportunity to change careers, my family came together to help grandma, my neighbor’s wife has become a close friend too, with much kindness friends and family have helped me through the death of my pet. I am learning that even in the darkest moments there is light seeping through, God’s way of showing us that difficult moments are not void of Him. AND when we focus on Him, on those small details that show us goodness getting through the challenges are easier and make our hearts resilient in hope that all is not lost.

On Saturday, my neighbor came over with a quilt she made covered in hearts and she told me, “I know you have been sad over Dollar and I wanted to give you this (quilt) because I want to see you smile.  So, please use it and when you look down at the hearts remember how much Dollar loved you.”  I was so moved by her gift because she has just lost her husband and here she was at my door, trying to help me get through my loss.  Then I understood that difficult moments give everyday heroes the chance to shine.  Thus, I am trying not to look at things as a laundry list of things gone wrong I am focusing on the light that wants to make it in.

In CS Lewis novel, the protagonist eventually understands that she focused on things that embittered her soul and refused to see all the goodness that coexisted around her.  The silence of the gods made her come to the understanding that if she had seen things from a more optimistic point-of-view her life wouldn’t have been as void of light as she made it.  If she had only seen the love that surrounded her…  Thus, as I closed the novel, I decided to take that lesson to heart and focus on the love in my life and not on the laundry list of woes.

O Dollar! My Dollar!

My cousin called me after Dollar passed and said, “you have to be strong and remember how Dollar helped you through your brother’s passing and how he saved you when you were in the pits of depression; thus, you can’t undo the good work he did- you have to be strong in his memory.” I think that was the fear all of my family had, that being bipolar I would have an episode- but this time as I said good bye to my dearest friend, I have God and He’s showing me that I can have peace in the tempest. Sure, I am sad and hurting- but I also have those wonderful memories my little wolf gave me. I’ve been avoiding calls and messages because I don’t want to talk about what happened during his last hours, I don’t want to relive his final days and I don’t want to hear about getting another dog because I still haven’t received his ashes and right now replacing him is just as painful as having lost him…

Dollar was a very special dog, as he got older and his coat changed colors on his back when looking down, he had two patches of lighter fur that reminded me of angel wings.  He must have gotten his wings from all the service he did here on earth.  For years, once a month he would bring great happiness to the elderly women of Saint Francis Senior Home.  I would take him, and he would walk around visiting forty plus women – who would shower him with treats and caresses.  I stopped going for a few months and when I returned, they were like, “why hasn’t your dog been around?” They were so upset that Dollar hadn’t been visiting and not so much by the fact that I had missed attendance too.

When my brother passed mom used to work at night and the house would be empty only Dollar and dad at home.  My dad called him his loyal companion and often expressed, “If I didn’t have this little dog to keep me company, I would get lonely.”  At my dad’s feet my little wolf would remain silently helping dad get through the loss of his son.  And though my parents swore that they would never walk my dog, every day around the neighborhood the three would take treks growing ever so famous around the neighborhood. Especially with the children from the elementary school since on a daily basis mom and Dollar picked up my nephew.  When I would take him on walks, I constantly heard people greeting Dollar by name and mom would explain that they had met him at the school. Even on Halloween night a neighbor would wait for him with doggy treats knowing Dollar would come in costume as we took my nephew trick-or-treating.

I used to joke with my family that Dollar was the first grandchild.  Before my nephew was born when family came over, they would give my dad such a hard time because Dollar’s tags had our last name.  Most of the elders in my family had worked in farms and were unaccustomed to dogs having such liberties as Dollar did, so they would give my dad a hard time… My mom on the other hand spoiled my little mutt and when I wasn’t home, she was the one that he would follow.  Now she finds herself missing his little body as she cooks.

Between tears my sister said, “I didn’t know it would hurt this much.  I didn’t know one could hurt so much over an animal.”  My mind still forgets he’s gone, I hear him throughout the house - when I open the front door I forget that he’s not waiting for me behind it… BUT, I know he’s at peace and that I can't undo the work he came on earth to do; thus, I must go on and try to heal.  Am afraid of the day I get his ashes, but I know God will give me the strength as He has all along.