I’m Not Ready

 I’m not ready for summer to be over. It’s still a few days until the autumnal equinox, the “official” end of summer. The two days this week when the high temperature was 45º did portend the arrival of autumn.  The fireplace roaring felt really good on those chilly nights when I just could not get warm.  

The week has sped along with no medical problems. I’ve felt good except mood-wise when the sun is virtually invisible. There were no memorable events occurring. I seem to have been busy nearly all day most days. Sleeping has been good. I’ve done some of that but not nearly as much as Sophia.  

I think she and I both suffer from SADS. On rainy, cloudy days she sleeps and sleeps and sleeps some more. She then releases all the energy she’s built up mostly by running full speed to the basement to the second floor to the basement to the second floor ad infinitum. My friend and I refer to this activity as zooming even though “zooming” has another meaning in this time of physical distancing. Sophia, by the way, makes regular appearances on Zoom meetings. She can be sound asleep in some far corner of the house but somehow intuits the beginning of a meeting at which time she makes herself present.

Sophia's way to spend a cloudy day.

I include prayers for the faithful departed at the conclusion of Morning Prayer. Today as I interceded for the members of the Guild of All Souls the name of my good friend and former college roommate was amongst those listed. He departed this life seven years ago today.  I vividly remember sitting by his bed in the Dougherty Hospice House all day reading the Gospels to him. He left this life in the evening. 

Today I went to the same facility to visit another college friend and next door neighbor who is preparing to enter the church triumphant. We were in the same college class, both taught in the Sioux Falls school system and both worked with the Singing Boys of Sioux Falls for years and years. She has touched so many lives through her work with students at the elementary, middle school and high school levels. Nearly one hundred of her students have put together a virtual tribute for her which I am eager to view.  

I’ve said farewell to so many classmates in the last few years. I still think of myself as fairly young, but I’m not. Being “young at heart” makes a difference. It doesn’t change the fact that we are all mortal and at some point in time, determined not by us, we will return to the earth from whence we came.

I love the words of the Russian Contakion for the Departed which is included in the Burial Office of the Book of

How much longer will the front garden
look like this?

Common Prayer: “Give rest, O Christ to your servant with your saints, where sorrow and pain are no more,  neither sighing, but life everlasting. You only are immortal, the creator and maker of all mankind; and we are mortal, formed of the earth, and to earth shall we return. For so did you ordain when you created me, saying, ‘You are dust, and to dust you shall return.’ All of us go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.”

I’m told that I really can drive to the single park I’ve missed so far, so I will try to accomplish that visit this coming week. Then my summer project will be complete!

Thank you for your prayers, your thoughts, your comments, and your presence.