Fog... and Mystery

We don't often get fog in Ottawa as we are far from the ocean...


















But the last few days have started out foggy...














... as warm air hovers over ice on the rivers and our still-frozen ground...














And it does add an air of mystery to our everyday world!

What is Church?

On Sunday mornings, as I head off to church, a weekly ritual, it is sometimes good to remind myself what church is (and isn't). Here are some thoughts about church from The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris.

***

A student once asked Kathleen Norris how she could stand to go to church - there are so many hypocrites there.

Kathleen replied: "The only hypocrite I need to worry about on Sunday morning is myself."

***

"... Christian worship is not, in the words of Margaret Miles, 'primarily a gathering of the like-minded' but a gathering of people 'to be with one another in the acknowledgement that human existence originates in and is drawn towards love.'

"Even when I find church boring, I try to hold this in mind as a possibility: like all the other fools who have dragged themselves to church on Sunday morning, including the pastor, I am there because I need to be reminded that love can be at the center of all things, if we will only keep it there..."

"... Cecil Williams, the pastor of Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco,... insists that 'the church is not just for believers.' In his book..., No Hiding Place, he says, simply, 'When people come to Glide, we don't ask them if they are atheists, Methodists, or Buddhists. We ask them what their names are and how they are doing.'"

***

".. This is why St. Augustine is so precious to me. He helps me see, in the lengthy story of his own conversion - with its fits and starts, its meanderings and its deep desire for faith - that mine has been a traditional Christian journey. When I'm in church... I often think of the Augustines in our midst, who are still wandering in and out of the faith. I think of my own inconstancy in prayer, my own hypocrisies that I know by now are among the reasons I go to church: to burn them off in singing hymns, and in listening and responding to scripture."

My New "Circle Scarf"

My daughter mentioned a "circle scarf"... so (not wanting to appear ignorant) I went online to see what she was talking about...

I found this informative description on Style website. (howtobecomeastylist.com) Another blog (Little Black Dress) had a cute illustration showing how to wear them... Google also led me to several Youtube videos with demos.


















Intrigued, I decided to make one myself... using this hand-knit scarf (a gift from my daughter).


















So - using a needle and black thread to sew the ends together... that's just what I did!


















Unlike the ones in the Little Black Dress website, mine can only be worn two ways: hung around the neck once...














... or wrapped around twice to make a collar!

Marion's Knit Cuffs

My neighbor Marion was outside the other day. A strong wind chilled us as we helped Terry take down his winter "garage".














I'm going to go in and put on my "cuffs," she said.














And came back wearing them.

They make all the difference in the world, she said, especially if you're wearing a coat without a cuff in the sleeve.

I was impressed! They look so warm... Now I want to try making myself a pair! I didn't ask how many stitches around they were, but I'd guess 50 or 60. (I usually use 60 when making the leg part of a pair of socks.)

Harvesting Magazines

One of my many books on "de-cluttering"...














... suggests that the way to read magazines efficiently is to go through them once and tear out the articles and pictures that are interesting and throw away (or give away) the rest... It sounds so simple!














So one of my winter projects has been to go through the magazines that have been piling up. Not only am I trying to go through new magazines, but also old ones. (I have quite a few!) For years I have subscribed to magazines... GOOD, INTERESTING ones... But often I hadn't finished reading one when another arrives...!

I eventually move my pile of "unfinished reading" to a basement shelf, planning to get back to it when I had free time... When I was working, I envisaged doing it during my summer vacation... or in my retirement...

But there they have stayed... until this winter! Slowly I have been moving them upstairs and trying to re-read (and harvest) them... It has been interesting...














But it has also been HARD WORK because I have to THINK! Magazine reading is supposed to be RELAXING, but harvesting articles makes it HARD WORK! (Which is probably why I've avoided doing it!)

Mind Game

My father loved his Rubick's Cube - a Christmas gift he received when he was in his 70s. He read the instructions and mastered the steps to solving it, though he marveled that four or five moves to mix up the colors required dozens of moves to return them into place! He even bought me a cube and shared his method for solving it... But it didn't have the same charm for me.

I'm going to exercise, he would say after breakfast. But he didn't mean going for a walk! Instead, he'd sit down with his Rubick's cube, to work at it for an hour or so, moving the colors out of place and fitting them back again.

You know, my memory has improved since I began doing this, he'd say. I can remember people and names I had long forgotten. That's why I call this my exercise. I'm exercising my mind!

I don't know if any studies have proven him right...














Surprisingly, I can't find any of his Rubick's Cubes around the house. But I did find these other puzzles he received as Christmas gifts in later years. Yet none of them interested him as much as his Rubick's Cube!

A Thought To Ponder

"Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants."

(This saying of Epictetus, who lived almost 2000 years ago, from the years 55 to 135, reminds me that some truths never change - though we sometimes forget them!)