April 26, 2007
Thursday

Never did I think that I would go away for ten days in pursuit of private, interior spiritual growth and wind up posting to my very public blog every single day. Maybe it’s the structure of this program, which has a half-hour input session at 9:30 and another at 3:30 but nothing in the evening. The rest of the time we are free to use the talk and the guided reflections in whatever way seems appropriate. I’ve been able to sustain intense focus for eight or ten hours a day. By evening I think I am due for a break, and so I take two elevator rides and roll my laptop in its wheeled case (people passing me in the hall probably think I’m either arriving or leaving) down two long halls to a parlor where the network cable lies incongruously along a carved Oriental rug between two traditional wing chairs that have seen years of friends and relatives come to visit their young Jesuit novices.

A lot of people come to retreats such as this when they are in crisis. They’re trying to discern God’s will about a decision or they’re struggling with some unwanted life change or they’re broken in spirit by a hurt they’ve received or inflicted. This can result in a lot of people wandering around with long faces, sighing and clutching boxes of tissues. And anyway, prayer is (in the minds of many) serious business. You’re talking to God, supposedly listening as well, not downing Snakebites at Molly Branigan’s with your friend Erin. I’ve been here under all of those circumstances and shed my share of tears.

Not this time.

I’m walking around full of joy and optimism, but then I’ve been doing that since Thanksgiving, when I determined that I would not let another day go by without reminding myself of all the incredible wonder in my life, without bringing to mind and speaking the names of the people I love and, if it wouldn’t weird them out, letting them know how much they mean. The work I’m doing this week is just an extension of that.

Maybe I’ve come to this ten years too early. It’s easy to say Yes to aging when you have excellent health, a strong support system, and meaningful work. Oh, I see some changes on the horizon, but that horizon still seems very far away.

One of the tasks today was a “life review” of the things that you have been called to and the ways in which you responded. Ouch. That can really get you into murky waters, a swamp even. For some reason, however, the guided reflection seemed to call for reviewing moments that brought great happiness. I made a list and discovered that in the last twenty-four years, most of my moments of transcendent joy came about because of Lynn, from the moment I learned I was pregnant to the far-reaching effects on my life of the young energy she and her friends and the people I’ve met because of her have exposed me to.

The only two prayers I really ever pray are “Let it be,” taught to me by British theologian Paul McCartney, and “Praise God from whom all blessings flow,” the doxology I learned when I first sought to reclaim my faith in 1980. Today I’m putting that thought in the words of my retreat leader:

Thank you for so much so often.