[Magdalen] Life's blessings

[Marion Thompson]

Mostly I'm there, James, but we never know when something, when poked 
just right, might open the door a crack and let out some pain that lurks 
in the shadows.  Isn't this all why people go to therapists and talk 
things out?  I could keep one busy for a very long time.

Marion, a pilgrim


On 10/21/2016 3:43 PM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford wrote:
> Your post brought back a host of memories I try not to deal with anymore.
> Acceptance is very hard when something I've set my heart on, and have
> worked toward for years is denied. I've come to try to have more charitable
> feelings for the person who made a decision that I not proceed, and then
> sent me a brief canned letter to that regard, but just recently a
> conversation turned to it again, and I found myself still hurt, angry, and
> humiliated.
>
> We do our best. Perhaps some matters are so important and powerful for us
> that true acceptance only happens in that place where we shall know even as
> we are known.
>
> Why is it, I've wondered, that some students always just seem to float
> placidly and easily through the process, while others struggle each day
> just to keep going? I guess it's just grace.
>
> May you find peace. And even acceptance.
>
> James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
> *“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
> except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy
>
> On Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 2:22 PM, Marion Thompson <marionwhitevale at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> The last day or so has brought news of deaths, some closer than others,
>> one being our student spiritual adviser at Trinity, a fine elderly man who
>> was firmly in my corner and even wrote to the Bishop to protest my
>> rejection.  Anyway,   these things raise the ghosts.  So this morning
>> seeing on FB that a classmate will be an assessor at ACPO pressed my
>> buttons, even as I was lifting her in prayer.  I have an awful lot of
>> unfinished business tucked away behind my defences and this one got past me.
>>
>> What a blessing then, to be toddling along to the Rectory for Morning
>> Prayer, a new introduction, just the three of us at this point, and HAVING
>> to carry on regardless of snotty nose and tears which overflowed unbidden.
>> The best medicine.   I am beyond grateful for the presence of our priest
>> and his partner, and the twist in life that has brought me to this.
>>
>> Marion, a pilgrim   ... todayt my sail I lift ....
>>
>>