Retreat and Advance

I'm sitting in the Atlanta airport. Feeling amazingly calm. Not surprised, but amazed and glad to see it lasting in this beehive of activity.

I've just spent the last 2 1/2 days at a Trappist monastery. No special retreat, no special program. Just reading, resting, reflecting, rejuvenating. The impulse to quiet is strong in me, and always has been. Growing up I lived in a boisterous family with lots of activity and very little room to spread out or quiet down.

When I look back on it now, I can see that it was an excellent learning opportunity. If I had not been forced to learn how to survive and thrive in chaos I doubt I would have chosen to challenge myself that way. I used to long for orphan-hood or at least to be an only child. I wasn't particularly into having my family die - I just wanted them to not exist. Perhaps not in the first place.

Science wasn't my strong suit. Or maybe I was just before my time.

At any rate, I pretty much always felt out of the groove of my family and rather like the ugly duckling -- who simply didn't fit or belong. My childhood journals and diaries are filled with prayers and pleadings for the impossible. I guess that was my view of my life - an impossibility.

Now, 50 years in I discover that there are actual geographic places that I can go to that fulfill my deepest needs. This particular bit of Springtime I am filling two highly dichotomous needs.

Solitiude ... spending time in retreat at the Monastery. A gorgeous idyll.

Humanity ... spending a remarkable 10 days in New York City and immersing myself in Wagner's Ring Cycle at the Metropolitan Opera.

Can life really get any better than this?

I don't think so.