A Pilgrim's Journey

Has anything so great as this ever happened? Deuteronomy 4. 32 - 40

In the midst of her struggle with cancer (lower case intended because there is nothing proper about this disease!), my sister/friend CT reports from her most recent visit to Mayo with the voice of a joyful child. Her story is one for the ages about peace in the face of battle.

My favorite thing these days here is to sit in Peace Plaza between my hotel apartment and Mayo Clinic 

  I watch the children playing in the water. Running and splashing about 

    Brown families speaking different languages from all over the world watching their earth colored sunlit children toss the water over  to the white children.  All is laughter and water .

   Same at clinic and in elevators going up to my apartment nest.  The melodic  languages. The colors and fabrics of their clothing...  

They share a  mission to come here for clarity and maybe a sense of healing. It all washes over me like that water washes over the children 

  Yesterday at the healing service at Calvary Episcopal Church. I met a ( gay) man who will become a long time friend.. hes here w a rare cancer. Hes beautiful. Funny. vibrantly alive. Showed me photos of the run down no access former retreat where Thomas Merton died ( mysterious circumstances as u know ?)  My new friend was determined to go there  flying in from China..  he found someone who knew someone who knew someone. To guide him in and through ...  he has photos of the now abandoned   koi  ponds and low buildings...the canopy of trees across the long entrance road..  the abandoned retreat house. And Merton's room on the end. ..

Mark  had stories of how it felt to walk silently there .Hes staying at a monastery here in Rochester in small room with 4 am arising ...and paths to walk ..   His partner had just left him after the cancer diagnosis...he has a phrase woven into conversation

" I have a dyslexic heart"   ...  puzzled  .. I asked??? What??

He said. " I fall in love too easily"

....    soooo as u can imagine. The conversation took many turns. He walked me half way back to my apt. Then   peeled off for the monastery

    The Sermon was by priest who is a great story teller ..  3 minutes of it were a silent meditation..  he asked  us to  imagine ourselves in the boat in the storm on the Sea of Gallilee....   and see the ghostly figure of Jesus walking across the waves toward our fearful selves

..  I decided I was a little girl in the boat ... ..

     I stayed there in prayer and watched  anxiously as the waves poured over me ... and I imagined Jesus walk towards me..across the waves  in the storm

  The Rembrandt painting stolen from the Gardiner Museum came to mind... 

The priest is a reader of James Finley and recommended his you tube on the Mystics.  Which Caroline recommended too..  I must sit still to watch and learn. Caroline thanks for Jim Finley. !! 

 A full day indeed .  I must admit 

  Im fearful of the outcome of the tests on that right breast.. and of pelvic area ....but im trying to  keep my eyes on that figure coming across the waves.

   May you too allow time in the boat. ... knowing He always walks toward you as you walk toward others.

Again I ask "has anything so great ever happened?" Who is this that can calm even the chaos of disease?