Little Retreat - 7: Oregon

Amazing photography here.

Mount Angel Abbey (Oregon)

Ten Things

1. The beginning of the third week, and I finally feel pretty much better after getting really, really sick in Oregon.

2. Going to spend the next three days plowing through my last paper (on which, thankfully, I had had the foresight to request an extension) so that I can maybe enjoy at least one long week-end (instead of the 10 days originally planned) before . . .

3. Summer Hebrew starts a week from today. Two quarters worth jammed into 8 weeks, and we all know how gifted (far from it) I am in ancient languages. Kiss this summer good-bye, until . . .

4. Two months from today I will be on an 8-day silent retreat, back at Guelph. I am torn between apprehension in memory of having been on retreat when Chicago Son died and a longing for the silence, the river, the sunrises, the labyrinth, the wide open spaces, the prayer, and ~ did I mention the silence?

5. Gregarious Son is taking the LSAT next week. Too late for law school this fall, which is a very good thing in a life ~ all our lives ~ which will be filled with tumultuous memories at the end of the summer, but who knows what it may lead to later?

6. The Lovely Daughter is at home and has begun her job search in earnest. It's beyond wonderful to have her around.

7. The yard is looking nice. All cleaned up and some flowers in ~ quite a change from last year, when I rushed from seminary to Chicago to CPE and then was too steadily exhausted from those overnight on-calls to think beyond the occasional lawn-mowing job.

8. The house is a disaster. I'm hoping that we will get the guest room re-plastered and painted this summer. So far it has taken about two months to pull down a couple of lengths of wallpaper and clean up the plaster dust, so the re-do plan might be a bit too ambitious. I have no idea how people like Quotidian Grace actually build an entire house.

9. Also ahead this summer: movement toward candidacy status in the ordination process. I have about finished the six essays (thanks to help from a RevGal!) and meet with my Session in two weeks, my CPM at the beginning of July, and the Presbytery at the end of July. All Presby-speak for The Process.

10. I think a great deal about a comment my friend Julia left over on Desert Year some time ago: about how sometimes things happen that you think you cannot possibly survive, and yet somehow you endure and move forward. Apparently that is the case, at least most of the time for most of us. I wish it were true for all of us but, for those of us who are left, there is increasing energy and laughter and ~ each other.

My Favorite Haystack Rock Photo

Cannon Beach Images

Oregon: Haystack Rock Birds

Unless the puffins are the same as those in Scotland (don't know, too lazy to look up), I saw all life birds on our last day in Oregon!

Tufted Puffins (here)

Pelagic cormorant (here)

Western gull (here)

Pigeon guillemots (here)

Black oystercatcher (mine)

Congratulations, Willamette '09!

The Lovely Daughter

Cum Laude

Honors in Sociology

Phi Beta Kappa

The Housemates!

The Campus!

More Gardens

I posted a little about The Grotto in Portland over at Desert Year; the final picture above was taken there as well.

We also visited the Chinese Garden, which fills a block in the heart of Portland. It is exquisite, with so many small, intricately designed spaces, each one different from the last. And quite inspiring, given the miniscule size of our own yard at home. One of the most interesting aspects of the garden is the way in which sunlight is incorporated onto the multitude of patterns and textures by means of window design and tree placement -- you almost feel as if the sky itself is being redesigned. The effects are somewhat apparent in the image of the courtyard tile design called "Cracked Ice"~ just what it looks like.

Just for Fun

As a former attorney for Chessie Railroads (another life, eons ago), I remain fascinated by trains, and the UPAC was in evidence throughout our travels. I really wanted a picture of a train winding through the Columbia River Gorge; this one enlarges more or less OK with a click.

The Bridge of the Gods is, as Gregarious Son says, a human erector-set-like version of what was, according to Native American legend, a "natural" bridge across the Gorge formed at one time by a logjam of debris at a turn in the Columbia. A mural -- too faded, alas, to photograph -- on the bridge foundation depicts its long history in its various forms. I took some photos for Chicago Son, who was fascinated by engineering and architecture, and would have loved to have photographed the bridge himself. We used it to cross to the State of Washington, so the grandparents could say that they have been there.

Columbia River Gorge

I'm sure I posted similar pictures five years ago (can it be that long?!) after the Lovely Daughter and I made our trip out west to look at colleges. But those images have vanished into the stratosphere, so why not some new ones?

I didn't get any further than the bridge at Multnomah Falls on that venture. This time I made it to the top -- a hike of 1.5 hours up and 45 minutes down. The final photo is from about halfway.

Old Town Cafe

If you're headed for Portland, Oregon, then I suggest a meal in Scappoose!

Lisa and I "met" on AOL Journals back in the old days, four or five years ago. She's a wickedly incisive writer, whether about the pitfalls of the Republican Party or the pitfalls of small business ownership ~ and she's a fabulous cook. I've missed her writing since it's taken a back seat to the restaurant, so I was grateful for the chance to relax after the plane trip west and catch up a little.

That's the Lovely Daughter with the proprietors in the top photo, and the Lovely Daughter with her momma in the bottom -- and, oh, yeah, her dad and brother and grandparents, too.

Graduation Summary

Fabulous lunch at the Old Town Cafe with Lisa (one of my oldest blogging friends) and Matt.

Columbia River Gorge - I hiked to the TOP of Multnomah Falls!

Gardens all over the place.

Lauds at 6:30 am with the monks at Mount Angel Abbey.

Phi Beta Kappa Luncheon.

The Lovely Daughter is a cum laude college graduate!!!

Haystack Rock and birds, birds, birds ~ including harlequin ducks (here).

And then ~ Gregarious Son and I caught the Lovely Daughter's little tiny cold and got so so so sick. All we can figure is we got a ten-fold wallop from an Oregon virus we hadn't encountered before.

So . . . when I get better: pictures of my own.

Over the River and Through the Woods

Well, ok, over the Grand Canyon and through the airports . . .

to graduation we go.

The Lovely Daughter graduates on Sunday. We leave for the great state of Oregon on Thursday, where we hope to see Lisa, the Columbia River Gorge, Cannon Beach, and ~ oh yeah, a few important events at Willamette University!

It will be tough, to make this trip that for four years I had looked forward to sharing as a family of five. But it will be wonderful, too, to help our beautiful girl celebrate friendships and achievements that began with that fateful hurricane four years ago.

Back in a week or so ~

A Week

Wow, I don't usually miss an entire week.

I guess I've been busy, but I don't have a lot to say.

I do seminary stuff: my Matthew paper, my Calvin research, another sermon ~ year almost over.

I dread summer Hebrew. Thank God for good friends with whom to trudge through it.

I do spiritual direction stuff ~ midyear review coming up.

I try to deal with internship possibilities and I procrastinate Presbytery stuff.

I ponder whether I should try to look forward to Guelph in August.

I talk to the Quiet Husband and Gregarious Son about daily life and to the Lovely Daughter about her graduation, two weeks from tomorrow.

I look forward to walking the beach at Haystack Rock, something the Lovely Daughter and I did together five years ago when college in Oregon was just a fantasy.

I take a lot of long walks.

I read a lot of stuff about discernment and spiritual desolation.

I miss my Chicago Son.

I want my other life back.

Communiques from The Lovely Daughter

Landed safely in Chicago . . .

On the plane for Portland . . .

In the train station in Portland, where it is SUNNY AND WARM.



We so live in the wrong place.

In Which The Thing With Feathers Is Detected

We were wandering around Oregon, the four of us: The Quiet Husband, The Lovely Daughter, The Best Friend Who Also Goes to College There, and Gannet. The Best Friend said that there was supposed to be a Benedictine monastery nearby, one with a Thomas Merton collection she would like to investigate for her senior thesis on his early poetry.

"I'm up for a visit to a monastery," I said.

And so we went, east through the countryside and up a winding hillside road, to Mount Angel Abbey. I'm linking to the page with aerial photos, which are the only way of truly doing justice to what we discovered. If you poke around, you will also find images of the spectacular library.

If you were to explore the Abbey, you would be forgiven for thinking that you had landed in The Sound of Music, or in the original Benedict's Italy, as you gazed down at the surrounding fields and pastures and at Mount Hood in the distance. The quiet grounds seem to go on forever, the mustard brick buildings arranged around a spacious grassy quadrangle are meticulously cared for, and the interior of the chapel is magnificent. As I wandered alone through the chapel, with sunlight filtering across pale violet and green walls, a monk settled in to practice on the organ and music filled the space.

Icons hang at wide intervals along the walls of the chapel. I started at one end, planning to make the rounds of the walls as if I were in an art museum, as an interested observer with nothing more than a desire for a few moments of distraction.

I had not been able to pray for weeks. You look at the icon and the icon looks at you, my professor and spiritual director had often said, offering without fanfare wisdom from the ancient church gleaned from decades of experience across Christian culture. I had written his words down in a notebook, repeated them to my students when I taught high school world history, and given them little thought otherwise. You look at the icon and the icon looks at you. I found the one that looked at me. Or, perhaps, it found me.

Anyone who has grieved long and hard has known the feeling that you cannot let go of the sorrow, not without a sense of betrayal of both the one who is gone and of yourself. The transformation of that kind of torment is a lifelong task, and it begins with the most tentative of steps. Perhaps sometimes that beginning is realized only in unfamiliar places, and through unexpected gifts.

I know very little about icons, but I've learned a little about Christ Pantocrator, and this version in particular (which I eventually discovered was written by one of the monks, Brother Claude Lane), since returning home. I am told that although the icon is usually referred to in English as Christ the Ruler or Christ the Teacher, Sustainer is also a valid translation of Pantocrator. I am quite sure that Christ the Sustainer is the one who has been looking for me.

A Thank You, via Willamette Unversity

I am extremely fond of beautiful Willamette University, where the Lovely Daughter is a senior. Recently named one of the best urban walks in Oregon, the campus boasts magnificent sequoias, numerous gardens, and a small stream running through the center:

One of my favorite Willamette places is the rose garden on State Street, just across from the capital building. As I wandered there ten days ago, I thought of my new blogging friend ~ master gardener, gifted teacher, Ignatian co-conspirator, and artist ~ who had sent me a handcrafted stained glass piece as an offer of consolation in this bleak time. If the winter light around here ever co-operates, I'll post a photograph. In the meantime, images of roses in gratitude for a gift of light:

Oregon Coast

The week-end brought other pieces of news, either of which under more usual life circumstances would have sent me reeling far from any sense of repose.

Herewith, in response, views of the ocean which, I have been gently reminded, is the one whose name means peace.

Silver Falls State Park - Magis

If you are inclined to pay attention to St.Ignatius, you'll get the magis. If not, let's just say that in the fall it seems that the earth always offers more.

And, to my personal way of thinking, the moss-encased branches so prevalent in Oregon seem to belong to a stage set for Wicked. One expects to see Elphaba behind every tree trunk.

Silver Falls State Park - Photo Petite

South Falls

October 2008

When we were in Oregon last week-end, we took The Lovely Daughter and one of her friends (one of her lifelong best friends from home, who also attends college out there) to Silver Falls State Park for a little waterfall walk.

The Oregon rain forest is a lot like the North Carolina rain forest, except that the Oregon trees are a LOT bigger than any tree anywhere in North Carolina.

(Apparently the technology of BIG PICTURES remains beyond me. I gave it a couple of hours this afternoon and it looks like I need a couple of weeks. Eventually, I suppose. In the meantime, this one enlarges nicely with a click.)