It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.

There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

-- Alfred, Lord Tennyson

...but in battalions

My daughter is being tested for cancer. This is the daughter with the twins, and the miscarriage. The problem is one of a feminine nature, and may very possibly result in a hysterectomy. She's only 24.

Farewell, Cuddles

Our sweet wuddley-bug is leaving us tomorrow. She is seventeen years old, and the last survivor of the menagerie of cats, dogs, rabbits, birds, and assorted rodents and reptiles we had when I was still married and the children were small.

Cuddles went crazy when she was young, and has spent her entire life suffering from what I can only describe as feline agoraphobia and paranoia. She had a litter of kittens, and we gave them away, as one does. But Cuddles somehow took it to heart like no other kitty mother I've ever known, and her poor little mind snapped. It's indescribable how bad I've felt about it for all these years. She's lived in my daughter's room, hiding under the bed all day, every day, except for when someone she trusts is in there with her with the door closed, at which point she'll cautiously come out, eat, use her box, and get some affection. But she is now deteriorating fast, mentally and physically, and my daughter has decided that it will be kindest to let her go peacefully rather than try to eke out a few last weeks or months living in torment and pain.

Back during the time I've described to you before, when I hit bottom and God softened my heart, it was Cuddles who was the catalyst that night. I was keeping her while my daughter was living in the dorm, and I'd go in there once a day or so and just sit on the floor so she wouldn't be alone for a while. One night, as I was holding her, it struck me how much like her I'd become, and I broke down and wept for the first time in decades.

So, Goodbye, sweet kitty. I will miss you so, but I hope to see you in a happier place one day, reunited with your babies and your mind.

Truly my Utmost

"Belief is not an intellectual act; belief is a moral act whereby I deliberately commit myself. Will I dump myself down absolutely on God and transact on what He says? If I will, I shall find I am based on Reality that is as sure as God’s throne.
In preaching the gospel, always push an issue of will. Belief must be the will to believe. There must be a surrender of the will, not a surrender to persuasive power; a deliberate launching forth on God and on what He says until I am no longer confident in what I have done, I am confident only in God. The hindrance is that I will not trust God, but only my mental understanding. As far as feelings go, I must stake all blindly: I must will to believe, and this can never be done without a violent effort on my part to disassociate myself from my old ways of looking at things, and by putting myself right over on to Him.

Every man is made to reach out beyond his grasp. It is God who draws me, and my relationship to Him in the first place is a personal one, not an intellectual one. I am introduced into the relationship by the miracle of God and my own will to believe, then I begin to get an intelligent appreciation and understanding of the wonder of the transaction."

-- Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest

"Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him" -- Job 13:15

St. Claude de la Colombiere on God's Mercy

"I glorify You in making known how good you are towards sinners, and that your mercy prevails over all malice, that nothing can destroy it, that no matter how many times or how shamefully we fall, or how criminally, a sinner need not be driven to despair of Your pardon...It is in vain that your enemy and mine sets new traps for me every day. He will make me lose everything else before the hope that I have in your mercy." -- St. Claude de la Colombière

Little Women

I'm reading Little Women now. I did Wuthering Heights in the meantime, between this and Jane Eyre, but wasn't impressed enough to write about it. I mean, it was moderately interesting, but I wasn't very moved. Had a hard time caring about any of the characters: they're all pretty horrible people.

I had to struggle through the first couple chapters of Little Women, and I didn't have much hope for it. It just felt overly prim and affected. But now I've just finished reading the part where the neighbor gives Beth the piano, and I lost it. I mean, totally lost it: drool dripping on the ground.

I'd give anything short of my soul to live in a world like that: a world where a man can show love and kindness and receive, in return, gratitude and trust. In the world in which we live, if the old neighbor gentleman gave a young girl living alone with her mother and three sisters a gift like that, he'd be rewarded by gossip and suspicion that he was some kind of creepy pervert, and his life and reputation would be destroyed. And if he tried to apologize and explain to them that he'd meant no harm, he'd be given a restraining order.

Believing the Impossible

Have you ever seen a miracle? Or had a prayer or wish answered after long years of hoping and struggling, wanting to believe that it's going to happen but not really daring to get your hopes up?

There's this weird thing that happens: this thing has been looming over your consciousness for so long, or this assumption has been firmly in place all your life. And then, suddenly, there's the thing, right there, and it's actual reality. And it's sort of anti-climatic. You're like, "Huh. Well, okay then."

My daughter was just talking to me about this with having lost weight. She's been chubby since she was a child, and now she's finally passed that point where she looks completely normal in clothes. It happened to me when I'd been fighting the government for my disability for something like five years, and praying fervently and desperately the whole time. And also, when I saw actual miracles and answered prayers--ones that couldn't be explained away rationally. And spiritual beings. Yeah, literally saw them with my waking eyes. You accept the reality with which you are presented.

So it seems like, once you've experienced this once, or twice, or several times, you'd be always ready to believe for the next one. But for some reason, no. Apparently it's human nature. Look at the Israelites. They saw waters turn to blood, frogs raining from the sky, all the firstborn in the land except their own die in one night, the sea parted, the pillars of cloud and flame moving with them, the rock split and water pouring forth. But still, every time it got a little difficult, they doubted and grumbled and whined.

And I am just as guilty. I've seen all kinds of things in my life: been told by God to pray for things, then watched them happen. Been miraculously healed. Had prayers answered which seemed impossible, after long times of waiting and struggle. Seen God Himself. But still here I am, bitching and moaning, terrified and full of unbelief because the thing which he told me is his will, and is going to happen, seems impossible by human standards. Well, okay. It's impossible. But that doesn't mean God can't do it. He even told me ahead of time that this time was coming, in which I would lose all my hope and everything I was relying upon. But even though I knew that, it still doesn't stop me from falling to hopelessness and despair.

So this is me, professing my faith and trust in God, in spite of the fact that I know it can't happen. But I believe in spite of my unbelief.

This is the point in the story when Sam has to pick up Frodo and carry him, because Frodo has lost all hope and strength, and the will to go on, but knows he has to go on anyway.

"The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." -- Jesus

Back to War

Just got off the phone with my son, and his orders are confirmed: he's definitely going back to war. This is the son with the baby who was premature a few months ago. It's a good career opportunity: he's going to be deploying with the Special Forces. But it's in a seriously hot zone, and he's got a new family, so it kinda sucks too. He hasn't got travel orders yet, so doesn't know whether he's leaving before Christmas.

I wish I could go instead of him. We were just talking about how there should be a volunteer corps of worthless old men with no point to their lives, whom nobody loves. We could do high-risk missions--get killed, nobody cares, and it'd be doing us a favor.

Fiona Apple - Every Single Night

Tiny Addison opened her eyes today, and her mother got to hold her for the first time. Thank you for your prayers. And thanks to the Lord, for answering.

The Tree of Life - the Way of Nature and the Way of Grace

"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him."

-- J.R.R. Tolkien

"As far as I am concerned, the greatest suffering is to feel alone, unwanted, unloved."

-- Mother Theresa

Mother Theresa on Love

"Love, to be real, must hurt."

"Jesus, in order to give us the proof of His love, died on the cross.
  A mother, in order to give birth to her baby, has to suffer.
  If you really love one another, you will not be able to avoid making sacrifices."

-- Mother Theresa

The Feast of St. Nicholas

Today is St. Nicholas Day. And, incidentally, the anniversary of my birth, making him one of my patrons. (The other being St. Michael. Obviously.)

I feel a close affinity to the good bishop, beyond just having been born on his feast day. He was a defender of women: when a poor father near his home was considering selling his three virgin daughters into prostitution, Nicholas provided dowries for each of them so they could marry honorably. Also, a fierce defender of the truth: at the council of Nicea, he punched Arius, author of the Arian heresy which split the church for centuries, in the head.

St. Nicholas clocking Arius the heretic. Yeah!

When he wasn't beating heretics, he was known as a very kind, devout, humble, and generous man, who always remembered the poor and those in need. I like to think of him as a reminder that one can be a Christian and still be a man.

Another Sick Baby

This is Addison. Will you pray for her?

She is my granddaughters' father's sister's daughter. :P  So, my daughter's niece, I guess. She is 8 weeks premature, and it's been touch and go, but she is not doing well today. Also, her mother is suffering complications from a botched delivery.

Mystery Sonata No. 1 - Biber

<sigh>

Another visit with the Lord

I had another visitation. This time, it was when I was asleep--not like the other time when it was...I don't know what to call it: a vision? theophany? epiphany? Anyway, this time I guess it would technically be classified as a dream. But it was still him. "The Lord appeared to him in a dream" is found throughout the Bible. Christ appeared to me in bodily form, very much as we expect him to look: white robe and all that. He put his arms around me, hugged me, and said, "With repentance, even your wrong answers become right." By which, I think he meant something along the lines of, "all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose," but specific to me. I've been worrying a lot about what I've written here: did I say too much, or not say enough, or say the wrong thing, or say it at the wrong time?

This is the second time in my life he's appeared to me like that. A long time ago, during a very difficult time in my life, he appeared to me and we walked for some time  through the streets of a beautiful city made of white stone. We talked, but I was not permitted to remember what we talked about when I woke. I think he was putting things into my spirit to help me get through the times ahead, but that my mind wasn't prepared to understand.

Chesterton and Handel

Here's an experiment in finding the Presence of God that you should try: Read G.K. Chesterton's The Everlasting Man. Then, while the images of cruel pagan civilizations and demon-gods, and the general darkness of the world before Christ are still fresh in your mind, sit down and listen to the complete Messiah. Do nothing else: just close your eyes and listen, and meditate on what you're hearing and what you've been reading.

A Glimpse of Aslan's Country

Further up and further in....