Hello world!
I know it's been a while, and first I would like to say that I just discovered that people emailed me back from the blogs that have been emailed to them. I did not realized, and I am so sorry if anyone felt ignored when I did not email them back. That was certainly not my intention. The posts go out with the email associated with this account, which, until now, was not forwarded to the email account that I check.
Anyway, I have a wonderful story. The moral of it is cliche - stick to your instincts, and things will work out for you in the end. The story goes something like this:
My Uncle Ric has teased me about having gone off to do a volunteer year, especially after he found out that I had considered doing the Alliance for Catholic Education Masters in Teaching Program at Notre Dame. He couldn't understand why I would come to Camden instead of go to Notre Dame. More to the point, he wanted football tickets.
"What can you get me from a soup kitchen in Kensington? I want football tickets!"
*N.B. At the time of this comment, I had only seen the ministry at the Inn, and I did not know that I would be coming to Camden.
Fast forward to my volunteer year. Fr. Jud, pastor of St. Anthony's, is a Notre Dame alum and very involved with the local alumni association. They had a Notre Dame service day this past fall, and again one this past Saturday. Steve, the husband of the cook at the Friary, is himself a Notre Dame alum, and was raffling off football t-shirts at the end of the service day.
When you ask for other people, I'm told, you are more likely to get it, but even still, my ticket was not pulled. After the raffle, I pulled Steve aside and asked him what I could do to get one of those shirts. I explained the story about my Uncle, and Steve gave me a shirt. For free. My day had been made.
"I can get him football tickets, too, but he would have to pay for those..."
I couldn't believe my ears.
I called my Uncle, left him a message, and he called me right back. "What's wrong? You never call."
I told him about my day, and how, if he wanted, I could secure him tickets to the game of his choice. He was pleased, but certainly not as excited as I was.
"What would make me happier is if you told me that you were going to be there in school, too."
Not quite, Uncle Ric...
I came to Camden, and in the end, my Uncle will still get Notre Dame football tickets.
Ask and ye shall receive.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Sunday, April 22, 2012
"You aren't messing up today!"
At 6:20 this morning, my alarm went off, and I uttered the requisite groan of exhaustion. Why am I getting up right now? Every Sunday, I have the same sluggish attitude, but I am almost always rewarded for my efforts, and today was no exception.
I arrived at the church, began setting up the projector, only to find that my limited tech knowledge, which had been sufficient, was no longer enough to get the slides to appear on the screen.
I spewed a few expletives, rebooted both the projector and the computer, and thus having exhausted my battery of tests, gave up.
How many parish workers and parishioners does it take to get a projector to work? At least six. The whole system finally worked, with many adjustments, for the noon mass (unfortunately, not soon enough for 8 am mass), and I breathed a small sigh of relief. The process had cost me precious rehearsal time, however, and I was skeptical of how the rest of the mass would go.
As we gathered to "All the Ends of the Earth," the children and the third grade teacher, Mrs. Martins, filed in to fill the rest of the choir, which was supplied by the parish's English Bible Study group, Quest, and a few regulars. There were nineteen of us in total, a record number. I can't even begin to emphasize how good that felt.
When it came time for our Easter psalm, Bobby Fisher's "This is the Day," I was nervous and excited. It was only the second week we had done it, and I still wasn't sure that I had engaged the congregation as much as I had hoped on that first Easter Sunday. I was, and am, convinced that if any hymn or psalm was going to engage this congregation, it would be that one.
We started off strong, and the kids joined in with me on the first verse. In the middle of the following refrain, I heard someone clapping, and before I knew it, the entire congregation was clapping.
I couldn't stop smiling. Finally, after eight months, I found a small measure of success.
The entire congregation was clapping.
During our rehearsal, I made a point of telling everyone that when we sang verse four, everything had to come to a quick stop on 'house': "the stone which the builders rejected has become the foundation of our HOUSE!" Like that. (In my own past, a drum solo would go there, but we were not prepared for a drum solo today.)
And it happened. The tambourines stopped, the choir stopped, the clarinet stopped. The clapping did not stop, and I take that as the St. Anthony's version of a "drum solo." I couldn't believe it. I couldn't stop smiling.
Eight months ago, if I had arrived here, and this had been my first mass, this is what would have happened:
1. I would have pulled my hair out in frustration, realizing how far the music at this parish was from anything I had every known.
2. I would have thrown my hands up at the "disorganization," which seems wholly organized relative to where I started, but certainly not organized relative to what I was accustomed.
I appreciated today SO MUCH. The music sounded wonderful; there were so many voices, all working toward prayer. It was phenomenal, and I also know that I couldn't have appreciated how phenomenal it was until now. I needed to know what it was like to start from square one, I needed to build relationships, and I needed to learn who the people are that I am serving. I am constantly daunted by and grateful for the learning curve that my job presents, and I know I am better for it.
The part of Thomas Merton that I am often guilty of quoting is the first paragraph of his Letter to a Young Activist, but the part that resonated with me today was later in the letter. (I will reproduce it in its entirety, for completeness):
"The real hope, then is not in something we think we can do but in God who is making something good out of it in some way we cannot see."
After all of my attempts at "success," however narrowly and broadly defined, God made good of all of it. When I really began to focus on the truth, the people, not the work, but it's implication, only then did I finally move toward that goodness.
And, then, the highest compliment of all. Annaliah, one of the third graders, said to me in the middle of mass: "You aren't messing up today!"
See, I am making all things new...
Peace and all good,
Rachel
I arrived at the church, began setting up the projector, only to find that my limited tech knowledge, which had been sufficient, was no longer enough to get the slides to appear on the screen.
I spewed a few expletives, rebooted both the projector and the computer, and thus having exhausted my battery of tests, gave up.
How many parish workers and parishioners does it take to get a projector to work? At least six. The whole system finally worked, with many adjustments, for the noon mass (unfortunately, not soon enough for 8 am mass), and I breathed a small sigh of relief. The process had cost me precious rehearsal time, however, and I was skeptical of how the rest of the mass would go.
As we gathered to "All the Ends of the Earth," the children and the third grade teacher, Mrs. Martins, filed in to fill the rest of the choir, which was supplied by the parish's English Bible Study group, Quest, and a few regulars. There were nineteen of us in total, a record number. I can't even begin to emphasize how good that felt.
When it came time for our Easter psalm, Bobby Fisher's "This is the Day," I was nervous and excited. It was only the second week we had done it, and I still wasn't sure that I had engaged the congregation as much as I had hoped on that first Easter Sunday. I was, and am, convinced that if any hymn or psalm was going to engage this congregation, it would be that one.
We started off strong, and the kids joined in with me on the first verse. In the middle of the following refrain, I heard someone clapping, and before I knew it, the entire congregation was clapping.
I couldn't stop smiling. Finally, after eight months, I found a small measure of success.
The entire congregation was clapping.
During our rehearsal, I made a point of telling everyone that when we sang verse four, everything had to come to a quick stop on 'house': "the stone which the builders rejected has become the foundation of our HOUSE!" Like that. (In my own past, a drum solo would go there, but we were not prepared for a drum solo today.)
And it happened. The tambourines stopped, the choir stopped, the clarinet stopped. The clapping did not stop, and I take that as the St. Anthony's version of a "drum solo." I couldn't believe it. I couldn't stop smiling.
Eight months ago, if I had arrived here, and this had been my first mass, this is what would have happened:
1. I would have pulled my hair out in frustration, realizing how far the music at this parish was from anything I had every known.
2. I would have thrown my hands up at the "disorganization," which seems wholly organized relative to where I started, but certainly not organized relative to what I was accustomed.
I appreciated today SO MUCH. The music sounded wonderful; there were so many voices, all working toward prayer. It was phenomenal, and I also know that I couldn't have appreciated how phenomenal it was until now. I needed to know what it was like to start from square one, I needed to build relationships, and I needed to learn who the people are that I am serving. I am constantly daunted by and grateful for the learning curve that my job presents, and I know I am better for it.
The part of Thomas Merton that I am often guilty of quoting is the first paragraph of his Letter to a Young Activist, but the part that resonated with me today was later in the letter. (I will reproduce it in its entirety, for completeness):
Do
not depend on the hope of results. When you are doing the sort of work you have
taken on, essentially an apostolic work, you may have to face the fact that
your work will be apparently worthless and even achieve no result at all, if
not perhaps results opposite to what you expect. As you get used to this idea,
you start more and more to concentrate not on the results but on the value, the
rightness, the truth of the work itself. And there too a great deal has to be
gone through as gradually you struggle less and less for an idea and more and
more for specific people. The range tends to narrow down, but it gets much more
real. In the end, it is the reality of personal relationships that saves
everything.
The
big results are not in your hands or mine, but they suddenly happen, and we can
share in them; but there is no point in building our lives on this personal
satisfaction, which may be denied us and which after all is not that important.
The
next step in the process is for you to see that your own thinking about what
you are doing is crucially important. You are probably striving to build
yourself an identity in your work, out of your work and your witness. You are
using it, so to speak, to protect yourself against nothingness, annihilation.
That is not the right use of your work. All the good that you will do will come
not from you but from the fact that you have allowed yourself, in the obedience
of faith, to be used by God’s love. Think of this more and gradually you will
be free from the need to prove yourself, and you can be more open to the power
that will work through you without your knowing it.
The
great thing after all is to live, not to pour out your life in the service of a
myth: and we turn the best things into myths. If you can get free from the
domination of causes and just serve Christ’s truth, you will be able to do more
and will be less crushed by the inevitable disappointments. Because I see
nothing whatever in sight but much disappointment, frustration and confusion.
The
real hope, then is not in something we think we can do but in God who is making
something good out of it in some way we cannot see. If we can do God’s will, we
will be helping in this process. But we will not necessarily know all about it
before hand.
Enough
of this…it is at least a gesture…I will keep you in my prayers.
All
the best, in Christ,
Tom
"The real hope, then is not in something we think we can do but in God who is making something good out of it in some way we cannot see."
After all of my attempts at "success," however narrowly and broadly defined, God made good of all of it. When I really began to focus on the truth, the people, not the work, but it's implication, only then did I finally move toward that goodness.
And, then, the highest compliment of all. Annaliah, one of the third graders, said to me in the middle of mass: "You aren't messing up today!"
See, I am making all things new...
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
"I have ninja skills and I am not afraid to use them!"
I continue to be humbled by the people here.
Today, Chris, Alex and I were tasked with transporting the Clavinova, a glorified electric keyboard, to the Reyes family's home. What ensued was that Chris, Alex, Rodrigo and Jose, the two oldest boys (12 and 10, respectively), were heaving the keyboard into the back of our van, while I supervised Maria and Jesus (8 and 7) in the church van, waiting to leave. Estela, their mom, was supervising the movement of the piano.
A suspicious man appeared in the church parking lot, in the midst of all of this. Maria felt compelled to get out of the van, but I ushered her back in. I told her that she needed to stay in the van, and I had Jesus lock the doors in case I needed to close them in to protect them from the man. Maria was having none of this, however.
"The most important thing to me right now is that you are safe," I told her.
"I have ninja skills and I am not afraid to use them!" exclaimed Jesus.
Everyone was fine - Chris swooped in and redirected the man away from the church van. We arrived safely at the Reyes family home, and I brought Maria and Jesus upstairs while everyone else brought the keyboard in. The kids were all so proud to show us their house, and I was so excited to see it. We helped them move in in November, and it was wonderful to see them having settled into their new home. It was also eye opening. Rodrigo and Jose sleep on the couch in the living room, and Maria and Jesus share a room with Estela. It's really a two person apartment, and somehow it's become a five person home. As small as our house feels (which is quite often), it's so much more than what all five of them have. I have my own room. Estela doesn't even have her own room. She's a rock, Estela. I would have gone crazy by now...
With the piano successfully moved, Rodrigo turned to me and asked, "Miss Rachel, now that we have a piano, will you teach me?"
"I could certainly teach you, but maybe we can talk to Ms. Kisada about the Friends of Music program, so that you could get a real piano teacher."
"Okay."
Then, later, I returned to Estela's bedroom, which has become home to the piano, in addition to three people. Jose was sitting at the piano.
"I love this piano with all my heart." I had never heard anything more genuine in my entire life. I could have cried.
As we both headed toward the kitchen/living room/Rodrigo and Jose's room, I mentioned to Jose, "Maybe now that you have a piano, you can get a real piano teacher."
"But you're my real piano teacher!"
"You could get a better piano teacher."
"But you're a better piano teacher!"
"Well, then maybe you could get two piano teachers."
Jose Reyes thinks that I am a good piano teacher. We validate each other. It reminds me of a bit of Teilhard de Chardin that I love: "We are one, after all, you and I, together we will suffer, together exist and forever will recreate each other."
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Today, Chris, Alex and I were tasked with transporting the Clavinova, a glorified electric keyboard, to the Reyes family's home. What ensued was that Chris, Alex, Rodrigo and Jose, the two oldest boys (12 and 10, respectively), were heaving the keyboard into the back of our van, while I supervised Maria and Jesus (8 and 7) in the church van, waiting to leave. Estela, their mom, was supervising the movement of the piano.
A suspicious man appeared in the church parking lot, in the midst of all of this. Maria felt compelled to get out of the van, but I ushered her back in. I told her that she needed to stay in the van, and I had Jesus lock the doors in case I needed to close them in to protect them from the man. Maria was having none of this, however.
"The most important thing to me right now is that you are safe," I told her.
"I have ninja skills and I am not afraid to use them!" exclaimed Jesus.
Everyone was fine - Chris swooped in and redirected the man away from the church van. We arrived safely at the Reyes family home, and I brought Maria and Jesus upstairs while everyone else brought the keyboard in. The kids were all so proud to show us their house, and I was so excited to see it. We helped them move in in November, and it was wonderful to see them having settled into their new home. It was also eye opening. Rodrigo and Jose sleep on the couch in the living room, and Maria and Jesus share a room with Estela. It's really a two person apartment, and somehow it's become a five person home. As small as our house feels (which is quite often), it's so much more than what all five of them have. I have my own room. Estela doesn't even have her own room. She's a rock, Estela. I would have gone crazy by now...
With the piano successfully moved, Rodrigo turned to me and asked, "Miss Rachel, now that we have a piano, will you teach me?"
"I could certainly teach you, but maybe we can talk to Ms. Kisada about the Friends of Music program, so that you could get a real piano teacher."
"Okay."
Then, later, I returned to Estela's bedroom, which has become home to the piano, in addition to three people. Jose was sitting at the piano.
"I love this piano with all my heart." I had never heard anything more genuine in my entire life. I could have cried.
As we both headed toward the kitchen/living room/Rodrigo and Jose's room, I mentioned to Jose, "Maybe now that you have a piano, you can get a real piano teacher."
"But you're my real piano teacher!"
"You could get a better piano teacher."
"But you're a better piano teacher!"
"Well, then maybe you could get two piano teachers."
Jose Reyes thinks that I am a good piano teacher. We validate each other. It reminds me of a bit of Teilhard de Chardin that I love: "We are one, after all, you and I, together we will suffer, together exist and forever will recreate each other."
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Sunday, February 5, 2012
"I fought a little boy..."
Don't worry. I didn't actually fight a little boy. It's a quote from one of the third graders, Annaliah. In the third grade, Mrs. Martins, their teacher, has her students write sentences with their spelling words. The sentences have to be at least nine words long, to show that they understand the meaning of the word. A few weeks ago, I was sitting with Annaliah as she wrote her sentences. As she plowed through her words, she came upon the word "fought." She spoke that sentence out loud, like she had done with the others, to make sure that it was nine words before she wrote it down. She began, "I fought a little boy..." I don't remember what the rest of the sentence was, but I was so taken aback by how she had started it.
I'm often guilty of being hopeless, and chalking things in Camden up to the fact that "it's Camden." For instance, with this sentence, I would have never expected to hear it from kids in my school district growing up, and certainly it took me by surprise to hear Annaliah speak those words: violence here is so much more common than I could have ever imagined. That doesn't make it right, but right now, that's the situation.
It doesn't have to be like this.
The church had a bowling fundraiser tonight and, although I desperately wanted to bowl, a sprained ankle kept me from the lanes. Instead, I continued work on a knitting project. Annaliah, the same third grader, was there with her mother and her brother. She kept me company for part of the evening when she was not bowling, and she wanted to learn to knit. She helped me with a couple of the stitches, but I knew that it was going to be difficult to let her work on the project, so I made her a deal:
"Annaliah, I have another pair of knitting needles at home. When I finish this project, I will give you these knitting needles and I will use my other ones so that I can teach you how to knit."
The proposal was accepted without hesitation.
At the risk of sounding cheesy, I have to find the hope in those little moments. Annaliah's smiling face and constant enthusiasm motivate me to be more for her, to be more for all of the kids there. It's really easy to get frustrated and give up; believe me, those kids are no walk in the park, but I know that I am helping them to grow into themselves, and I can only hope that these kids will be better off for what I have done. At the very least, I remember the Hippocratic Oath, and I try to live by that: "first, do no harm." My housemate, Chris, describes it as "harm reduction."
One of the reasons I wanted to come to Camden, in the beginning, was because I wanted to be somewhere where I felt that I was effecting change, or could be effecting change. Well, I am here to tell you that it certainly does not feel like that. Who knows what the city will look like twenty years from now, when these children are in charge? It's hard to tell. All I can hope is that I have helped them to want a brighter tomorrow, and that I have helped them to be more capable of working toward it. Antoine de Sainte-Exupery said it best: “If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”
I hope I can lead them to long for the sea, and perhaps even to find their own starfish.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
I'm often guilty of being hopeless, and chalking things in Camden up to the fact that "it's Camden." For instance, with this sentence, I would have never expected to hear it from kids in my school district growing up, and certainly it took me by surprise to hear Annaliah speak those words: violence here is so much more common than I could have ever imagined. That doesn't make it right, but right now, that's the situation.
It doesn't have to be like this.
The church had a bowling fundraiser tonight and, although I desperately wanted to bowl, a sprained ankle kept me from the lanes. Instead, I continued work on a knitting project. Annaliah, the same third grader, was there with her mother and her brother. She kept me company for part of the evening when she was not bowling, and she wanted to learn to knit. She helped me with a couple of the stitches, but I knew that it was going to be difficult to let her work on the project, so I made her a deal:
"Annaliah, I have another pair of knitting needles at home. When I finish this project, I will give you these knitting needles and I will use my other ones so that I can teach you how to knit."
The proposal was accepted without hesitation.
At the risk of sounding cheesy, I have to find the hope in those little moments. Annaliah's smiling face and constant enthusiasm motivate me to be more for her, to be more for all of the kids there. It's really easy to get frustrated and give up; believe me, those kids are no walk in the park, but I know that I am helping them to grow into themselves, and I can only hope that these kids will be better off for what I have done. At the very least, I remember the Hippocratic Oath, and I try to live by that: "first, do no harm." My housemate, Chris, describes it as "harm reduction."
One of the reasons I wanted to come to Camden, in the beginning, was because I wanted to be somewhere where I felt that I was effecting change, or could be effecting change. Well, I am here to tell you that it certainly does not feel like that. Who knows what the city will look like twenty years from now, when these children are in charge? It's hard to tell. All I can hope is that I have helped them to want a brighter tomorrow, and that I have helped them to be more capable of working toward it. Antoine de Sainte-Exupery said it best: “If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”
I hope I can lead them to long for the sea, and perhaps even to find their own starfish.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Thursday, February 2, 2012
That's not a secret!
Every Wednesday, I have the privilege of volunteering with a program called Volunteers Engaging Neighborhoods, or VEN, for short. My work entails helping students who have a lower proficiency in English with their homework. What it boils down to is that I help Alejandro, a sixth grader, learn the meaning of "complete sentence." I am determined that he will know what one is and be able to write one by the time he enters seventh grade, which I think is reasonable. However, any sort of my own judgement of what is "reasonable" is completely thrown out the window here, usually. And that just means I need to grow. A lot. And so it goes.
My growth also includes my continued misadventures as I learn Spanish. I told someone a few weeks ago that my "aniversario" was February 11th, which does not mean birthday, like I thought, but wedding anniversary. "Cumpleaños" is the word for birthday.
So, yesterday I was in helping Alejandro, and my housemate, Alex, was helping Maria and Alma, two third grade girls. Alex had to step out for a moment, so I was supervising the girls a little (probably distracting them more than anything else). I tried to say something to them in Spanish, that, of course, did not make any sense.
"We don't understand you," remarked Alma. I squatted down next to them, as they were sitting in their desks.
"Let me tell you guys a secret," I whispered loudly. "I don't know how to speak Spanish."
"That's not a secret!" exclaimed Maria. "You're telling everybody!"
Leave it to third graders to tell it like it is.
And as for growth, two things that I constantly remind myself:
The first is from my Jesuit Education, Teilhard de Chardin:
Patient Trust
By Pierre Teilhard De Chardin
Above all, trust in the slow work of God
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end withour delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something
unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of progress
that it is made by passing through
some states of instability ---
and that it may take a very long time.
And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually --- let them grow,
let them shape themselves, without undue haste.
Don't try to force them on,
as though you could be today what time
(that is to say, grace and cirsumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give Our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.
And the second, which I saw on a sign on the side of the road earlier in my year of service:
Don't be afraid of growing slowly. Be only afraid of standing still.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
My growth also includes my continued misadventures as I learn Spanish. I told someone a few weeks ago that my "aniversario" was February 11th, which does not mean birthday, like I thought, but wedding anniversary. "Cumpleaños" is the word for birthday.
So, yesterday I was in helping Alejandro, and my housemate, Alex, was helping Maria and Alma, two third grade girls. Alex had to step out for a moment, so I was supervising the girls a little (probably distracting them more than anything else). I tried to say something to them in Spanish, that, of course, did not make any sense.
"We don't understand you," remarked Alma. I squatted down next to them, as they were sitting in their desks.
"Let me tell you guys a secret," I whispered loudly. "I don't know how to speak Spanish."
"That's not a secret!" exclaimed Maria. "You're telling everybody!"
Leave it to third graders to tell it like it is.
And as for growth, two things that I constantly remind myself:
The first is from my Jesuit Education, Teilhard de Chardin:
Patient Trust
By Pierre Teilhard De Chardin
Above all, trust in the slow work of God
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end withour delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something
unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of progress
that it is made by passing through
some states of instability ---
and that it may take a very long time.
And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually --- let them grow,
let them shape themselves, without undue haste.
Don't try to force them on,
as though you could be today what time
(that is to say, grace and cirsumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give Our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.
And the second, which I saw on a sign on the side of the road earlier in my year of service:
Don't be afraid of growing slowly. Be only afraid of standing still.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Monday, January 30, 2012
Simple, but not easy.
It's easy to get caught up in problems.
I know, firsthand, from nearly twenty-three years on this earth, and especially having spent the last five months in Camden, New Jersey, that it's easy to see what went wrong, or what one does not have, or every problem as a bad problem.
All problems are not bad.
Two Sundays ago, we were blessed with some extra musicians: Kevin, a guitarist, and Janet, a violinist. They are the son and daughter-in-law of the third grade teacher, who helps out at the 12:10 mass on Sunday. Kevin and Janet are also fabulous musicians, each in their own right. However, rehearsal time was minimal, by which I mean that all four of our musicians were together to practice for about 15 minutes. We didn't have time to practice all of the songs.
But we had four fabulous musicians (counting Betsy and Isidro), and I couldn't see past all of the chaos to be grateful for it in the moment.
It's all about perspective.
This year, for me, has been an entire shift in perspective that is still in process, without an end in sight. The idea is simple: I must change what I focus on so that I can be positive in the moment and toward the future. In practice, this is not easy. It completely goes against my fruitless attempts at perfection, or even the adjusted levels of "acceptable" that I continue to revise.
It's about finding joy in the little moments, like tonight at rehearsal. Betsy had accidentally hit Isidro in the face on Sunday with the head of her guitar, and remarking on that, Isidro said that if it had been any worse, "it would have been a gory scene." I laughed, because I was so taken aback by such a funny and wonderfully made sentence.
I am reminded of Thomas Merton, who got me this far: "In the end, it is the reality of personal relationships that saves everything."
I have also been recently reflecting on the parable of the widow with the two coins. She gives much less than other givers, but she gives all that she has, and that means so much more.
Today, Estela Reyes gave us a bag with several books either in Spanish or both English and Spanish. She is the single mother of four beautiful children, and the Reyes family was one of the first that I was able to meet here in Camden. I teach her son, Jose, piano (insofar as one can do that sort of thing with only minimal piano ability), and Jose, Maria and Jesus are all in the school choir. Estela is one of the people who motivates me most to learn Spanish, because I would love to be able to carry on conversations with her in full sentences. Right now, I speak in broken Spanish, and in her broken English she replies. And so, she gave us these books, knowing my, and my communities, efforts toward learning the language. She was so proud to show them to me, and I was so humbled to be able to accept them from her.
It doesn't seem like much, but it's HUGE.
Last night, I had dinner with Vinny, a man who lives down the street from us. About four or five years ago, he had a stroke that left the left side of his body paralyzed and has relegated him to a wheelchair. He has gained some function back, but he can only use his one hand, and he can't bend his arm. Because of the stroke, he cannot work, and he is as strapped as anyone in this city. Money, for him, is tight.
Last night, Vinny had a friend of his bring him over Popeye's Chicken, and Vinny shared his fried chicken with me. For someone who occasionally doesn't have enough money to eat anything at all, this is a huge deal for him to have Popeye's. It was as though all he had was two coins, and he just gave me one of them.
I am guilty of falling into the trap of "I serve the poor" and "I am such a good person for doing this or that." It is moments like this that show me who really is poor: me. I am so chained to all of my things, to my standard of life, and to what end? Ita Ford, a Maryknoll sister who was martyred in El Salvador, captures what I hope to continue to reflect on far better than I ever could.
“Am I willing to suffer with the people here, the suffering of the powerless? Can I say to my neighbors, ‘I have no solutions to this situation; I don’t know the answers, but I will walk with you, search with you, be with you.’ Can I let myself be evangelized by this opportunity? Can I look at and accept my own poorness as I learn it from the poor ones?”
Can I look at and accept my own poorness as I learn it from the poor ones?
Simple, but not easy.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
I know, firsthand, from nearly twenty-three years on this earth, and especially having spent the last five months in Camden, New Jersey, that it's easy to see what went wrong, or what one does not have, or every problem as a bad problem.
All problems are not bad.
Two Sundays ago, we were blessed with some extra musicians: Kevin, a guitarist, and Janet, a violinist. They are the son and daughter-in-law of the third grade teacher, who helps out at the 12:10 mass on Sunday. Kevin and Janet are also fabulous musicians, each in their own right. However, rehearsal time was minimal, by which I mean that all four of our musicians were together to practice for about 15 minutes. We didn't have time to practice all of the songs.
But we had four fabulous musicians (counting Betsy and Isidro), and I couldn't see past all of the chaos to be grateful for it in the moment.
It's all about perspective.
This year, for me, has been an entire shift in perspective that is still in process, without an end in sight. The idea is simple: I must change what I focus on so that I can be positive in the moment and toward the future. In practice, this is not easy. It completely goes against my fruitless attempts at perfection, or even the adjusted levels of "acceptable" that I continue to revise.
It's about finding joy in the little moments, like tonight at rehearsal. Betsy had accidentally hit Isidro in the face on Sunday with the head of her guitar, and remarking on that, Isidro said that if it had been any worse, "it would have been a gory scene." I laughed, because I was so taken aback by such a funny and wonderfully made sentence.
I am reminded of Thomas Merton, who got me this far: "In the end, it is the reality of personal relationships that saves everything."
I have also been recently reflecting on the parable of the widow with the two coins. She gives much less than other givers, but she gives all that she has, and that means so much more.
Today, Estela Reyes gave us a bag with several books either in Spanish or both English and Spanish. She is the single mother of four beautiful children, and the Reyes family was one of the first that I was able to meet here in Camden. I teach her son, Jose, piano (insofar as one can do that sort of thing with only minimal piano ability), and Jose, Maria and Jesus are all in the school choir. Estela is one of the people who motivates me most to learn Spanish, because I would love to be able to carry on conversations with her in full sentences. Right now, I speak in broken Spanish, and in her broken English she replies. And so, she gave us these books, knowing my, and my communities, efforts toward learning the language. She was so proud to show them to me, and I was so humbled to be able to accept them from her.
It doesn't seem like much, but it's HUGE.
Last night, I had dinner with Vinny, a man who lives down the street from us. About four or five years ago, he had a stroke that left the left side of his body paralyzed and has relegated him to a wheelchair. He has gained some function back, but he can only use his one hand, and he can't bend his arm. Because of the stroke, he cannot work, and he is as strapped as anyone in this city. Money, for him, is tight.
Last night, Vinny had a friend of his bring him over Popeye's Chicken, and Vinny shared his fried chicken with me. For someone who occasionally doesn't have enough money to eat anything at all, this is a huge deal for him to have Popeye's. It was as though all he had was two coins, and he just gave me one of them.
I am guilty of falling into the trap of "I serve the poor" and "I am such a good person for doing this or that." It is moments like this that show me who really is poor: me. I am so chained to all of my things, to my standard of life, and to what end? Ita Ford, a Maryknoll sister who was martyred in El Salvador, captures what I hope to continue to reflect on far better than I ever could.
“Am I willing to suffer with the people here, the suffering of the powerless? Can I say to my neighbors, ‘I have no solutions to this situation; I don’t know the answers, but I will walk with you, search with you, be with you.’ Can I let myself be evangelized by this opportunity? Can I look at and accept my own poorness as I learn it from the poor ones?”
Can I look at and accept my own poorness as I learn it from the poor ones?
Simple, but not easy.
Peace and all good,
Rachel
Monday, January 16, 2012
Please don't stop the music...
Greetings!
This post marks a few milestones:
1. It is my first post of the new year! Happy 2012 everyone!
2. It is my first post in a long time, which is a milestone insofar as I have been able to sit down and get time to write the post.
3. It is the first post where I believe I have figured out how to auto email people that it has been posted. I don't know if it will work, and if it does work, I don't know if it will take more than ten, but I am excited to see. :-)
4. It is the first post where I think that I have a firm idea of what my job description is, or at least one that will make sense to other people.
So, here's what I have been up to:
Music, music, music.
It's funny, I remember saying at the beginning of the year that I would get up only once for 8 am mass, the time that we were presented as volunteers to the parish. I have eaten my words; every Sunday I get up at about 6 am, and head over to the church by 7:30 to rehearse the choir. I am profoundly grateful for my role in working with them; I just wish it was later in the day!
Monday nights, however, are by far my favorite night of the week. It is then that I have rehearsal with Betsy and Isidro, 14 and 11, respectively. They are sister and brother, and the cornerstones of the musical accompaniment to the 12:10 mass. Betsy plays guitar primarily, but she also plays clarinet and alto saxophone. Isidro plays the clarinet primarily, as well as the piano, and the alto saxophone. They played all four Christmas masses in my absence, and have contributed immensely to the music. Their skill and their commitment both amaze and humble me.
(I should say that, as of right now, the 8 am mass is done completely a capella. It's not by choice, but we are doing pretty well, all things considered.)
In addition to Sunday mass, I have been helping with the school children's choir, which sings every Friday morning at 8:30 mass (I think God was getting me extra good with that whole 'I don't want to get up early bit.' He always gets the last laugh.) It is primarily made up of the third grade, because Mrs. Martins, the third grade teacher, is in charge, but we are growing the number of students in other grades little by little. :-) The kids have a hard time focusing. I have a hard time handling that, especially this past month with Mrs. Martins out of town, visiting her family and friends in India. Luckily, my housemate, Alex, stepped right in to help me keep them under control, or as under control as one can get the children. I was VERY excited to see Mrs. Martins this past Friday, her first day back.
My proudest moment this year, in my own estimation, however, was last Wednesday. Here's the background. Jose is a fourth grader at St. Anthony's, and in December, he asked me to teach him to play "Seek Ye First" on the piano. Well, I had to oblige, and then somehow got sucked into also agreeing to give him piano lessons. It evolved further as soon as Jose told his friend, Jakob, about his lessons, and Jakob wanted lessons, too.
Here's the caveat. I don't know how to play the piano, not well enough to teach someone else to play. Jakob and Jose didn't care. So, in my continued efforts to do the most sustainable thing, I decided to teach them together and start with music theory first. I know plenty about that, and they need to learn to read music anyway if they want to play the piano.
Next caveat: Jakob is a big ball of energy. Almost uncontrollable. And so I thought, how can I make this exciting for them? In a stroke of brilliance, I decided to do music theory on the pavement in the parking lot. And that's what we did. We drew our staff and began learning notes. FACE rhymes with SPACE, and Every Good Boy Deserves Fun. And fun did they have. Hopefully this week, some of it will have stuck.
More to come, but for now, please don't stop the music... ;-)
Peace and all good,
Rachel
This post marks a few milestones:
1. It is my first post of the new year! Happy 2012 everyone!
2. It is my first post in a long time, which is a milestone insofar as I have been able to sit down and get time to write the post.
3. It is the first post where I believe I have figured out how to auto email people that it has been posted. I don't know if it will work, and if it does work, I don't know if it will take more than ten, but I am excited to see. :-)
4. It is the first post where I think that I have a firm idea of what my job description is, or at least one that will make sense to other people.
So, here's what I have been up to:
Music, music, music.
It's funny, I remember saying at the beginning of the year that I would get up only once for 8 am mass, the time that we were presented as volunteers to the parish. I have eaten my words; every Sunday I get up at about 6 am, and head over to the church by 7:30 to rehearse the choir. I am profoundly grateful for my role in working with them; I just wish it was later in the day!
Monday nights, however, are by far my favorite night of the week. It is then that I have rehearsal with Betsy and Isidro, 14 and 11, respectively. They are sister and brother, and the cornerstones of the musical accompaniment to the 12:10 mass. Betsy plays guitar primarily, but she also plays clarinet and alto saxophone. Isidro plays the clarinet primarily, as well as the piano, and the alto saxophone. They played all four Christmas masses in my absence, and have contributed immensely to the music. Their skill and their commitment both amaze and humble me.
(I should say that, as of right now, the 8 am mass is done completely a capella. It's not by choice, but we are doing pretty well, all things considered.)
In addition to Sunday mass, I have been helping with the school children's choir, which sings every Friday morning at 8:30 mass (I think God was getting me extra good with that whole 'I don't want to get up early bit.' He always gets the last laugh.) It is primarily made up of the third grade, because Mrs. Martins, the third grade teacher, is in charge, but we are growing the number of students in other grades little by little. :-) The kids have a hard time focusing. I have a hard time handling that, especially this past month with Mrs. Martins out of town, visiting her family and friends in India. Luckily, my housemate, Alex, stepped right in to help me keep them under control, or as under control as one can get the children. I was VERY excited to see Mrs. Martins this past Friday, her first day back.
My proudest moment this year, in my own estimation, however, was last Wednesday. Here's the background. Jose is a fourth grader at St. Anthony's, and in December, he asked me to teach him to play "Seek Ye First" on the piano. Well, I had to oblige, and then somehow got sucked into also agreeing to give him piano lessons. It evolved further as soon as Jose told his friend, Jakob, about his lessons, and Jakob wanted lessons, too.
Here's the caveat. I don't know how to play the piano, not well enough to teach someone else to play. Jakob and Jose didn't care. So, in my continued efforts to do the most sustainable thing, I decided to teach them together and start with music theory first. I know plenty about that, and they need to learn to read music anyway if they want to play the piano.
Next caveat: Jakob is a big ball of energy. Almost uncontrollable. And so I thought, how can I make this exciting for them? In a stroke of brilliance, I decided to do music theory on the pavement in the parking lot. And that's what we did. We drew our staff and began learning notes. FACE rhymes with SPACE, and Every Good Boy Deserves Fun. And fun did they have. Hopefully this week, some of it will have stuck.
More to come, but for now, please don't stop the music... ;-)
Peace and all good,
Rachel
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