November 29, 2022
Thought for Today
"Lafayette, we are here."
Charles E. Stanton
Address at the tomb of Lafayette,
Picpus Cemetery, Paris, [July 4, 1917]
"The remark has also been attributed to
General John Joseph Pershing [18601948];
in My Experiences in the World War [1931].
Pershing denied having said 'anything so splendid.'"
November 28, 2022
Reflection
ESCAPES
I watched a movie last night.
The title was Wetherby - a 1985 British film.
The only actresses or actors in it that I recognized were Vanessa Redgrave and Judy Dench.
The last scene in the movie took place in a bar [Cf. video above]. It's a British pub or restaurant. A guy is sitting at a wall seat. A little table is in front of him. Jean Travers - a schoolteacher - played by Vanessa Redgrave - is sitting next to him at the same table. Both are facing out from a wall.
A waitress is pouring wine. She's younger - much younger than Vanessa. He is looking at her - but it seems like he is thinking about something else.
Vanessa asks the man how his wife is doing. There is small talk.
The movie is about loneliness - and small talk - and faking it - and the decisions we all make. It's about hurt and confusion and trying to figure out another's motives.
The plot centers around John Morgan - a character who commits suicide - by shooting himself in front of Jean Travers. The police are investigating the why.
This meeting with the man who kills himself triggers all kind of memories in Jean [Vanessa Redgrave.]
Vanessa is living a life with the experience of the man she loved. He had gone off to Mandalay for 7 years. They went to get married when he gets back or was it if he can get an apartment there for them?
He is killed - when a buddy of his and he go to a place to gamble. His throat is slit. You see the plane flying the body home.
The police detectives send a young girl - who was connected to John Morgan - but snubbed him - to see Vanessa who is an odd duck. The detectives are trying to figure out the dynamics of what happened.
The line in the movie that grabbed me was right at the end when they toast each other and the guy says, "To all our escapes."
I wondered: What are mine?
November 27, 2022
Reflections
PROCRASTINATION
I put off what I don't like to do.
I put off what I don't really know how to do something - usually.
I put off what I feel I'm being forced or manipulated to do.
I put off what I feel will hurt another - or trap another somewhere down the line.
I put off hard work because I'm lazy and I like my time and comfort. Sorry if I caused you inconvenience.
I put off the big stuff.
I put off the little stuff
I put off a lot of stuff.
I put off having to tell someone "bad news" - so they can't do something the church won't allow - at present - or I'd like to be able to do it - but I just can't do it.
I put of making the decision or the practice of eating better.
I put off doing things - that if I did them - I wouldn't really know what I'm doing.
I put off doing difficult things.
I put off doing things for people whom I feel are simply using me.
I don't like to address my procrastination habits.
November 27, 2022
Thought for Today
"Philosophy is written in this grand book - I mean the universe - which stands continually open to our gaze, but it cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and interpret the characters in which it is written. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles, and other geometric figures, without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these, one is wandering about in a dark labyrinth."
The Asssayer in The Controversy on the Comets of 1618 [1960],
translated by Stillman Darke and C.D. O'Malley.
November 26, 2022
Reflection
COMPLAINTS BEGET COMPLAINTS
Yesterday was June 19, 2008.
We were a parish get together.
A lady read a section from the book The Marian Movement for Priests. It was by a priest named Father Gobbi. Thousands and thousands were sent through the mail.
It was fine - in my opinion - till he started to complain about sacrilegious communions.
The reader finished.
Someone asked, "Any comments?"
A series of comments - complaints were voiced by different ladies at this meeting of this Parish Group.
We were at Hank and Mary Lee's place.
First comment: "There are people who go to communion who are not Catholics."
Next comment: "There are people who go to communion who have no clue where they are."
"There is a priest in Georgetown who invites everyone to communion."
"There was a little kid who received communion - or went up and took communion and was walking away with the communion in the palm of his hand - and someone said to him, 'You have to eat it.'"
After a series of comments and complaints they asked my thoughts about all this.
I paused and thought inwardly, "I'm not going here or there."
I said, "There are rules and regulations - guidelines - in the Missalette."
Afterwards - I'm an afterwards thinker - I got thinking, "This is not my experience in giving out communion."
There are pickers - picking communion right out of your hand - definitely different than those who receive Jesus in the palm of their hand - as if in a throne.
There are those who we joke about behind their back: "A few people who made their First Communion today. That might be at a wedding or a funeral."
Sorry to those who want rules announced right before communion!
It's my experience and desire to show respect, sacredness, calm - when receiving the Body of Christ - and I like to pray to and at every person receiving, "The Body of Christ!"
It hit me driving home from that meeting yesterday: Complaints beget complaints. Gripes beget gripes. Negativity brings forth negativity. Niceness begets niceness.
I'm glad I went where I went when I went there.
