Christ's mass

     Now that he season that celebrates Christ's birth has finally arrived, many of the secular lights will be extinguished and trimmings taken down and the trees discarded or mulched. What of the other remembrances celebrated by the Church at this time? St Stephen, the first Christian martyr; St John the Evangelist; the Holy Innocents and the Epiphany and childhood of Jesus?

     I continue living in my own little world, that flow of the Church year learned as a choir boy and continued as sacristan at the parish church where I grew up. Christmas began for me then at 3pm on Christmas Eve with the live broadcast of the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols from King's College Chapel, Cambridge.

     David Wilcox's musical influence seems to remain strong . . . and each year one new musical piece is commissioned . . .

     I wondered when I was little, "Who is this Mary? And what's a virgin?".

     I don't worry much about the pagan origins of some of the things we do at this time of the year. The time of year in the northern hemisphere when the long dark nights begin to shorten is a cause for celebration. A time to anticipate the first aconites and snowdrops . . .

     So, what did I do with the day? Mass to hear the Gospel . . . ultra-traditional goose for dinner, traditional carols to listen to and to play and sing;  and Kathy likes to watch lots of Christmastime themed movies . . .

The remainder of a white Christmas

From the bookshelves 62 ?

I will attempt to finish or rather continue to read and re-read this work . . . one day.

I walked this

morning along the Little Colorado river, part of the Becker Lake riparian wildlife area. I remembered my camera to take some snapshots . . . here are some of the results.

 

 

 

Life  is often described as a journey.  On this journey we experience many things and collect mementos, items which may not have any intrinsic value but are  valued none the less as reminders of past events or people we have known who have made the journey lighter.

    Along the way we fall in with companions who share the journey.  Geese fly in company when they journey south from northern climes in the autumn to warmer areas, avoiding the wintry conditions further north.  They fly in a 'V' formation.  They do this because the beating wings of the leading birds creates lift for those behind.  The flying range of the flock is greatly increased over that of a bird flying alone.

    People who share a common direction and sense of community can get where they are going quicker and easier, because they are traveling on the thrust of one another.

    Whenever a goose falls out of formation, it suddenly feels the drag and resistance of trying to go it alone, and quickly gets into formation to take advantage of the lifting power of the bird immediately in front.

    If we have as much sense as a goose, we will stay in formation with those who are going the same direction as we are.

    When the lead goose gets tired, he rotates back into the formation and another goose takes the lead point.  It pays to take turns doing hard jobs.  The geese honk from behind to encourage those up front to keep up their speed.

    What do we say when we 'honk' from behind?

    When a goose falls out of formation and goes to ground because it is sick or injured two other geese will follow it and stay with it until it recovers or dies.  They resume their journey with another formation or catch up with the original group.

    If we have the sense of a goose, we will stand by each other like that.

    I found this story amongst my school notes, a much copied anonymous piece, one of those mementos imbued with extrinsic value if only the analogy can be learned and put into practice.

Silence

More reading . . .

I'm reading the stories from Notwithstanding by Louis de Bernières. BBC Radio 4 recently broadcast several of the stories.

Still awaiting The Life of Insects to arrive. This is an allegorical novel by Victor Pelevin which the reading group will be discussing next year . . . January.

Tempus Fugit

     So what have I been up to this past week? The usual which for me means walking with a neighbour who likes the company; collecting the mail, most of which is for Kathy as she manages to get on so many mailing lists from buying from so many catalogues, and getting lost playing music nearly everyday. There must be some sleeping, eating and household chores and the occasional honey-do each day, too.

     Oh, and reading. I received my Folio Society selections this week which included Kevin Crossley-Holland's The Seeing Stone.

This is an award winning book, a retelling of the Arthurian legend from the perspective of a thirteen year old boy at the end of the twelfth century when Richard Cœur-de-Lion is off on Crusade and Prince John is lusting after the throne of England. This is the first book of a trilogy written for young people.

The chapter 41 heading is Mouthfuls of Air. And that segues into Antony Burgess:

I haven't read this for a very long time. I was sent to the dictionary to look up hebetude. And that leads to the venerable O.E.D. Is this the only dictionary with a users guide?

 Simon Winchester has written about the making of the first edition of the O.E.D.

 

And before that he wrote The Professor and the Madman; an account of the extraordinary contribution to the dictionary of an inmate of Broadmoor and his correspondence with James Murry . . .  

I am become a wraith . . .

catching up on Stuart's blog:

Remarkably Clear Insight of the Day

If you spend your whole life working to avoid making a scene, you will wake up one day to realize that you are no longer in the play, and nor should you be- you've ceased to be worth watching.

. . . . do you . . . .

dream monochrome . . .

or colour?

From the bookshelves 60, 61

A painstakingly made book . . . then a movie. I read this at a time I was doing a clinical-internship in a nursing home as part of an occupational therapy assistant course. This relates obliquely to the story of the man in Brussels who recently reported that he was conscious for the past twenty odd years; not in a coma.

     I mentioned in a previous post I occasionally miss John Ciardi, or rather his pieces about words on All Things Considered (or was it Morning Edition?). I re-read an excerpt from Invisible by Paul Auster in GRANTA 106 which makes reference to Bertran de Born, a poet condemned to carry his own severed head like a lantern for causing a bitter rift between a prince and his father.  He appears at the end of Canto 28 of Inferno.