The sting of Death

I haven't written anything since last March, shortly after Dad died. I realize that there was something healing about his death, something that allowed me to close the book of grief over my mother's death that overwhelmed me since she died four years ago. Its a mystery...

But death is everywhere. In just the past couple of months, my cousin T died. Poor T, who made all the wrong choices, always comparing herself to her sister and never thinking she measured up. Poor T who at the core of her felt that she was unlovable. Poor T, who was so afraid of doctors and hospitals and pain, yet died in cancer ridden agony, and so afraid of death, but died anyway. Poor T.

Another piece of my childhood and of my heart gone.

And then there is E. We chatted on the phone just the day before she went into the hospital where she died a couple of days later. E, who never told a soul that she was failing, and that cancer was choking her insides off. Such a shock to hear of her death. I've picked the phone up a dozen times, thinking that I needed to tell her something, and then remembered that she's dead. Its hard to take in. Its hard to believe that there are no more emails and no more phone calls from her.

So, I keep in touch with her husband instead. He is such a mess, but he won't say it. He says he's great, and that things are going swimmingly, but then you hear him tear up on the other end of the phone and he suddenly has to go, so you hang up. This is the most emotional man I have ever met, yet he is trying to remain stoic, living alone in that beautiful house.

We all grieve in different ways.

I've decided to stop grieving. There is so much good in my life, that I'm wasting it with grief and depression. So many good things.... and am I truly grateful for them? I spend so much time looking at the spaces in my heart and my life where people used to be and now there is nothing, that I think I'm missing the goodness that is there instead. I do have so much to be thankful for: my daughter, my family and friends, my health, my pets, my job. Its all a gift really.

Sometimes I wonder why God allows us grief? I think I "get" death.... but I've been wondering about why God allows us to hurt and mourn the one who has gone, the way that we do. That I do. Its so painful. I can truly believe that we will meet again at the resurrection, and I do believe that, but it feels like forever. The forever of the missing seems almost cruel. But we know that God isn't cruel - how could He be? He created us!

Maybe it has to do with us understanding the depths that He went to to save us by sacrificing His only son. I wouldn't do that - I can't conceive of it - my heart stops beating if I even think of sacrificing Elisabeth.... Yet, that is exactly what He did for us. For me.

Its all almost too much to bear.

I keep meeting with my spiritual father, and that has got to be the reason that I don't spend hours writing in this blog any more. He has been wonderfully patient. Its weird, because I really want someone to know me even more than I want to know myself, and he seems to be the chosen one. But sometimes I think to myself, who am I kidding here? Spiritual direction is more than me blubbering all about myself week after week. Somehow it doesn't seem "hard" enough and then there is the odd meeting when it seems too hard to continue. I struggle during these meetings to remain real and honest, and not over dramatize as I am wont to do, or sink into telling a good story which I sometimes do, or whine. I hate whining. But he never complains...

I think I can see a few changes over time. My spiritual father says he can, and I guess I just have to trust his judgement. I know its hard to be objective about yourself, but I think I can see some changes from when we started meeting. For one thing, I am much calmer and I think I'm a little happier and more content. I see more patience and love in my heart for everyone, even people who drive me crazy. This is a definite improvement.

But the more we talk, the more I realize that we are taking the tiniest of baby steps in the spiritual life. I've been thinking about this for a long time and I can see that we are taking baby steps because I really can't handle going any faster. I'm too comfortable in my cocoon of competence to do anything more than stick my baby toe in the water. Pretty sad commentary, really.

Is it wrong to keep thinking about death? Is it pathological? I don't feel like I'm grieving hard anymore, but I understand that death happens all the time, and eventually, it will happen to me. I need to be ready for that day. That's the whole point of the spiritual life, isn't it? To get ready to die? Not that I'm constantly contemplating death and not truly living, because that's not what I'm doing at all, but death seems to have an immediacy to it, a nearness, that really brings me up short. Will I be ready?

Simple Woman's Daybook for March 23rd

For March 23, 2008

Outside my Window…dusk is falling

I am thinking… that my life is changing, but I don't know if its for the better or not, at least not yet

From the learning rooms… I am reading the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) in preparation for my new work assignment

I am thankful for… my spiritual father

From the kitchen… I am missing cheese in the worst way! Especially brie!

I am wearing… flowered capris that DD says look like pajamas and a white tee shirt

I am creating… a new vision of myself

I am reading… ADA

I am hearing… silence

Around the house... the floors need sweeping

One of my favorite things… sleeping

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week… Tonight: laundry and sweeping; tomorrow: Akathist in the evening; Wednesday: My Feast Day!!!!

A Picture Thought I am Sharing:

"In Church" by Nikolai Bogdanov-Belsky

Simple Woman's Daybook for March 9th

For March 9, 2008

Outside my Window…A beautiful, warm and sunny day

I am thinking… and praying about my parents, and a coworker whose father died today

From the learning rooms… Dear daughter says that she is finally caught up with her schoolwork from the week she took off when my father died

I am thankful for… the free and easy communication between my daughter and me

From the kitchen… tonight I had veggies with olive oil and garlic, with jalapeno corn bread

I am wearing… flowered capris that DD says look like pajamas and a pink tee shirt

I am creating… a new life for myself

I am reading… Orthodox Psychotherapy

I am hearing… my little doggie snoring by my feet

Around the house... the floors need sweeping

One of my favorite things… relaxing with a good book

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week… Tomorrow, DD will take her driving test (I hope, I hope, I hope), then dinner with her two "evil aunties". Wed we will probably go to Fernandina Beach for the day, with Presanctified Liturgy in the evening. Thursday, DD has plans with a friend and I will go to work, then we'll watch a movie in the evening. Friday, after work, I will meet with my spiritual father, followed by Presanctified Liturgy. Don't know what DD is doing yet. Saturday, DD is going to a birthday party, and I will go to Vespers. Sunday, we will go to church, followed by trapeza, followed by choir rehearsal, and then DD will return to college while I go home to my cats and little doggie.

A Picture Thought I am Sharing:

Still Life with Lilacs by Nikolai Petrovich Bogdanov-Belsky. It reminds me of the lilac bush/tree in my back yard on Shute Street.

Memorial Wheat Meditation

My father, Edmour Joseph Babineau, died January 23, 2009, and tomorrow we will celebrate the traditional 40 day memorial (in greek: parastas, in slavonic: panikhida) for him at church. We Orthodox remember the dead at every service, and on specific "soul" Saturdays in Lent, but tomorrow is special. There are special prayers for the soul as it departs from the body at the moment of death, and we hold what is called a memorial service on the 3rd, 9th, and 40th day, as well as at the 3 month, 6 month, 9 month and one year mark, and every year following. The 40th day is a echo of Christ's Ascension into heaven, and we will pray that Dad will also ascend to Heaven to spend eternity with God

I just finished making the memorial wheat for this service. This is variously known as koliva, hilbee, or kutia, depending on your ethnicity. A plate of this sweet wheat rests on the memorial table throughout Divine Liturgy and during the Memorial itself, after which all the congregation will partake of it. We boil wheat as a remembrance that mankind is placed in the earth like a seed, only to be raised up and blossom forth again through God's plan and power. This is a powerful reminder for Orthodox Christians of the words of St. John 12:24 "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." The symbolism of death and resurrection, between that which is planted in the ground and that which emerges, is deeply embedded in the making and eating of koliva.

My father really loved memorial wheat and sometimes I would make it for him and mother as a breakfast treat. As I was chopping and toasting the nuts and seeds, I remembered happy times around that very same kitchen table: the four of us laughing and eating, or helping Elisabeth with her school work, or doing the crosswords, or just sipping coffee and deciding where to picnic the next day. Happy times, gone now.

But I'm not sad, I'm really not. My father was trapped in a body and a mind that failed him, and he's free now. I miss him, but that is nothing new - with Alzheimer's, the missing starts very early. And its not forever, you know. We'll meet again at the last. I am thinking a lot of him today, though. Here is the eulogy that I wrote for him and which was read so very beautifully by my dear friend, Carla McCurry:

Edmour Joseph Babineau
April 25, 1916 - January 23, 2009

Here are some remarks that Denise wrote about her father, which she has asked me to read to you today.

How do you measure a man’s life? Is it in the days, months, years? If so, at 92 years old, my father was rich. Is it in his possessions? If so, then I look at my father’s few mementos, the fishing poles, handles worn smooth through many years use, or maybe his trusty camera with all the lenses and filters and tripods, and think that perhaps my father was poor. Is it in the memories that a man leaves behind? Over the last few days, I’ve heard from countless people who knew my father, all of whom had their favorite, funny “Eddie” story. Maybe it was the one about the tomatoes that were so big that he had to cut them in half to get them in the door, or maybe it was the liver Popsicles, or maybe it was a memory of going fishing or golfing with him. Always, the memories were of laughter and fun. If memories measure a man’s life, then my father was rich.

Those of you who met my father when he was an old man missed out on so much. He was a real character - a great storyteller, unfailingly good humored, very smart, funny, loyal, brave, loving, a steadfast champion of the underdog, and could fix anything. He had a gluttonous love of cherry ice cream and Boston baked beans, though not together!

He loved his family more than anything. He passed his love of yardsaleing on to his granddaughter, Elisabeth. Together, they would hit the yardsales early on Saturday mornings, and haggle over prices, bringing home their treasures.

All his life, he loved traveling to new places and meeting new people. His Sunday drives for ice cream – to another state! – were legendary. He always said that someday he was going to buy a trailer and travel around the country. How many people get to live their dream? Well, my father did. He loved traveling in his motor home and did so for 15 years before settling down in Savannah. In that 27 footer, he traveled throughout the US, Canada and Mexico with my mom. He loved fishing and golfing, and was a seeded tennis player and professional boxer in his day. He was a real war hero, decorated in WWII and written up in the newspapers of the time.

My favorite memory of my parents is creeping downstairs early in the morning to the kitchen, and finding them dancing all alone to music only they could hear. He took tender care of my mother for many years, and never once complained.

He was a wonderful, loving, devoted husband, father and grandfather. He was a true gentleman, a charming raconteur and practical joker. He was honorable and true. He was everything a man should be and seldom is. He was one in a million, and we were so very lucky to have had him in our lives for almost 93 years. The world will be a sadder place without him. My daughter and I will miss him very much.

But right now, I think he’s standing just inside the pearly gates, the host extraordinaire, greeting newcomers as St. Peter’s right hand man, saying as he always used to at the Inn: “Welcome! Come on in. I have a special room just for you.”




Here is my recipe for Koliva, enough for home. For my church, I usually double it. I do not like it to be dry, so I leave out the zweiback or graham cracker crumbs.

Koliva

1 C soft wheat (very important - it must be soft, not hard, wheat)
1/2 C chopped nuts, like walnuts, toasted
1/2 C sesame seeds, toasted
1/2 C golden raisins
1/2 C chopped fruit (I like to use craisins)
1 heaping tsp ground cinnamon
1 C powdered sugar
zest of one orange
1 tsp anise seed, crushed a little

Simmer the wheat in 4 cups of water for 1 1/2 to 2 hours until very tender and cooked all the way through. Drain well and place in a large bowl with all the other ingredients. Stir very, very well to make sure that all the ingredients are mixed well. Let cool.

Once it is cool, place it in a flat serving platter. Smooth the top and decorate with silver dragees, jordan almonds, or other white candies in the shape of a three bar cross. I've used yogurt covered raisins when I couldn't get jordan almonds here in Savannah, and these work very well.

Enjoy. And if you make this, please, say a little prayer for my father as you eat it.

Fr. Alexander Schmemann on the Prayer of St. Ephrem the Syrian

The Lenten Prayer of St Ephrem the Syrian By Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann

Of all lenten hymns and prayers, one short prayer can be termed the lenten prayer. Tradition ascribes it to one of the great teachers of spiritual life - St. Ephrem the Syrian. Here is its text: O Lord and Master of my life! Take from me the spirit of sloth, faint-heartedness, lust of power, and idle talk. But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Thy servant. Yea, O Lord and King! Grant me to see my own errors and not to judge my brother; For Thou art blessed unto ages of ages. Amen This prayer is read twice at the end of each lenten service Monday through Friday (not on Saturdays and Sundays for, as we shall see later, the services of these days do not follow the lenten pattern). At the first reading, a prostration follows each petition. Then we all bow twelve times saying: "O God, cleanse me a sinner." The entire prayer is repeated with one final prostration at the end. Why does this short and simple prayer occupy such an important position in the entire lenten worship? Because it enumerates in a unique way all the "negative" and "positive" elements of repentance and constitutes, so to speak, a "check list" for our individual lenten effort. This effort is aimed first at our liberation from some fundamental spiritual diseases which shape our life and make it virtually impossible for us even to start turning ourselves to God. The basic disease is sloth. It is that strange laziness and passivity of our entire being which always pushes us "down" rather than "up" -- which constantly convinces us that no change is possible and therefore desirable. It is in fact a deeply rooted cynicism which to every spiritual challenge responds "what for?" and makes our life one tremendous spiritual waste. It is the root of all sin because it poisons the spiritual energy at its very source. The result of sloth is faint-heartedness. It is the state of despondency which all spiritual Fathers considered the greatest danger for the soul. Despondency is the impossibility for man to see anything good or positive; it is the reduction of everything to negativism and pessimism. It is truly a demonic power in us because the Devil is fundamentally a liar. He lies to man about God and about the world; he fills life with darkness and negation. Despondency is the suicide of the soul because when man is possessed by it he is absolutely unable to see the light and to desire it. Lust of power! Strange as it may seem, it is precisely sloth and despondency that fill our life with lust of power. By vitiating the entire attitude toward life and making it meaningless and empty, they force us to seek compensation in, a radically wrong attitude toward other persons. If my life is not oriented toward God, not aimed at eternal values, it will inevitably become selfish and selfcentered and this means that all other beings will become means of my own self-satisfaction. If God is not the Lord and Master of my life, then I become my own lord and master -- the absolute center of my own world, and I begin to evaluate everything in terms of my needs, my ideas, my desires, and my judgments. The lust of power is thus a fundamental depravity in my relationship to other beings, a search for their subordination to me. It is not necessarily expressed in the actual urge to command and to dominate "others." It may result as well in indifference, contempt, lack of interest, consideration, and respect. It is indeed sloth and despondency directed this time at others; it completes spiritual suicide with spiritual murder. Finally, idle talk. Of all created beings, man alone has been endowed with the gift of speech. All Fathers see in it the very "seal" of the Divine Image in man because God Himself is revealed as Word (John, 1:1). But being the supreme gift, it is by the same token the supreme danger. Being the very expression of man, the means of his self-fulfillment, it is for this very reason the means of his fall and self-destruction, of betrayal and sin. The word saves and the word kills; the word inspires and the word poisons. The word is the means of Truth and it is the means of demonic Lie. Having an ultimate positive power, it has therefore a tremendous negative power. It truly creates positively or negatively. When deviated from its divine origin and purpose, the word becomes idle. It "enforces" sloth, despondency, and lust of power, and transforms life into hell. It becomes the very power of sin. These four are thus the negative "objects" of repentance. They are the obstacles to be removed. But God alone can remove them. Hence, the first part of the lenten prayer; this cry from the bottom of human helplessness. Then the prayer moves to the positive aims of repentance which also are four. Chastity! If one does not reduce this term, as is so often and erroneously done, only to its sexual connotations, it is understood as the positive counterpart of sloth. The exact and full translation of the Greek sofrosini and the Russian tselomudryie ought to be whole-mindedness. Sloth is, first of all, dissipation, the brokenness of our vision and energy, the inability to see the whole. Its opposite then is precisely wholeness. If we usually mean by chastity the virtue opposed to sexual depravity, it is because the broken character of our existence is nowhere better manifested than in sexual lust -- the alienation of the body from the life and control of the spirit. Christ restores wholeness in us and He does so by restoring in us the true scale of values by leading us back to God. The first and wonderful fruit of this wholeness or chastity is humility. We already spoke of it. It is above everything else the victory of truth in us, the elimination of all lies in which we usually live. Humility alone is capable of truth, of seeing and accepting things as they are and therefore of seeing God's majesty and goodness and love in everything. This is why we are told that God gives grace to the humble and resists the proud. Chastity and humility are naturally followed by patience. The "natural" or "fallen" man is impatient, for being blind to himself he is quick to judge and to condemn others. Having but a broken, incomplete, and distorted knowledge of everything, he measures all things by his tastes and his ideas. Being indifferent to everyone except himself, he wants life to be successful right here and now. Patience, however, is truly a divine virtue. God is patient not because He is "indulgent," but because He sees the depth of all that exists, because the inner reality of things, which in our blindness we do not see, is open to Him. The closer we come to God, the more patient we grow and the more we reflect that infinite respect for all beings which is the proper quality of God. Finally, the crown and fruit of all virtues, of all growth and effort, is love -- that love which, as we have already said, can be given by God alone-the gift which is the goal of all spiritual preparation and practice. All this is summarized and brought together in the concluding petition of the lenten prayer in which we ask "to see my own errors and not to judge my brother." For ultimately there is but one danger: pride. Pride is the source of evil, and all evil is pride. Yet it is not enough for me to see my own errors, for even this apparent virtue can be turned into pride. Spiritual writings are full of warnings against the subtle forms of pseudo-piety which, in reality, under the cover of humility and self-accusation can lead to a truly demonic pride. But when we "see our own errors" and "do not judge our brothers," when, in other terms, chastity, humility, patience, and love are but one in us, then and only then the ultimate enemy--pride--will be destroyed in us. After each petition of the prayer we make a prostration. Prostrations are not limited to the Prayer of St. Ephrem but constitute one of the distinctive characteristics of the entire lenten worship. Here, however, their meaning is disclosed best of all. In the long and difficult effort of spiritual recovery, the Church does not separate the soul from the body. The whole man has fallen away from God; the whole man is to be restored, the whole man is to return. The catastrophe of sin lies precisely in the victory of the flesh -- the animal, the irrational, the lust in us -- over the spiritual and the divine. But the body is glorious; the body is holy, so holy that God Himself "became flesh." Salvation and repentance then are not contempt for the body or neglect of it, but restoration of the body to its real function as the expression and the life of spirit, as the temple of the priceless human soul. Christian asceticism is a fight, not against but for the body. For this reason, the whole man - soul and body - repents. The body participates in the prayer of the soul just as the soul prays through and in the body. Prostrations, the "psycho-somatic" sign of repentance and humility, of adoration and obedience, are thus the lenten rite par excellence.

42 Things Italians Grew Up With

01. You have at least one relative who wore a black dress every day for an entire year after a funeral.

02. You spent your entire childhood thinking what
you ate for lunch was pronounced "sangwich."

03. Your family dog understood Italian.

04. Every Sunday afternoon you eat lunch at nonna's house

05. You've experienced the phenomena of 150 people fitting into 50 square feet of yard during a family cookout.

06. You were surprised to discover the FDA recommends you eat three meals a day, not seven.

07. You thought killing the pig each year and having salami, capacollo, pancetta and prosciutto hanging out to dry from your shed ceiling was absolutely normal.

08. You ate pasta for dinner at least three times a week, and every Sunday, and laughed at the commercial for Wednesday is Prince Spaghetti day.

09. You grew up thinking no fruit or vegetable had a fixed price and that the price of everything was negotiable through haggling.

10. You were as tall as your nonna by the age of seven.

11. You thought everyone's last name ended in a vowel.

12. You thought nylons were supposed to be worn rolled to the ankles.

13. Your mom's main hobby is cleaning.

14. You were surprised to find out that wine was actually sold in stores.

15. You thought that everyone made their own pomodoro sugo

16. You never ate meat on Christmas Eve or any Friday for that matter.

17. You ate your salad after the main course.

18. You thought Catholic was the only religion in the world.

19. You were beaten at least once with a wooden spoon or slipper.

20. You thought every meal had to be eaten with a hunk of bread in your hand.

21. You had pet rabbits and chickens in cages in the backyard that always dissapeard in winter...

22. You have at least one relative who came over on "the boat."

23. All of your uncles fought in a World War.

24. You have at least six male relatives named Tony, Frank, Joe or Luigi

25. You were taught to call people Zio even though they weren't even your REAL zio

26. You can recite all the names of the saints off by heart

27. You drank wine before you were a teenager.

28. You relate on some level, admit it, to the Godfather and the Sopranos.

29. You grew up in a house with a yard that didn't have one patch of dirt that didn't have a flower or a vegetable growing out of it.

30. Your grandparent's furniture was as comfortable as sitting on plastic. Wait!!!! You were sitting on plastic.

31. You thought that talking loud was normal.

32. You thought sugared almonds and the Tarantella were common at all weddings.

33. Your Dad owned 4 houses,10 acres of land and drove a caddie but still drove a 1964 impalllla ( still pimmmmmp)

34. Your mother is overly protective of the males in the family no matter what their age.

35. There was a crucifix AND/OR a picture of Padre Pio in every room of the house.

36. Wakes would be held in someone's living room.

37. You couldn't date a boy without getting approval from your father. (Oh, and he had to be Italian)

38. You called Canadian kids Cakers (Not in MY house, we didn't!!!! We called them relatives!!!)

39. You dreaded taking out your lunch at school.

40. Going out for a cup of coffee usually meant going out for a cup of coffee over Zia's house.

41. Every condition, ailment, misfortune, memory loss and accident was attributed to the fact that you didn't eat something.

42. Those of you who get this...YOU KNOW who to pass it on to!

CIAO!

What's in a Name?

What's In A Name

1.YOUR REAL NAME
Denise Marie Babineau

2.WITNESS PROTECTION NAME:(mother and fathers middle names)
Elena Joseph

3.NASCAR NAME:(first name of your mother's dad, father's dad)
Vincenzo Edward

4.STAR WARS NAME:(the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first name)
Babde

5.DETECTIVE NAME:(favorite color, favorite animal)
Red Dog

6.SOAP OPERA NAME:(middle name, town where you were born
Marie Everett

7.SUPERHERO NAME: (2nd fav color, fav drink, add "THE" to the beginning)
The Black Vodka Shot

8.FLY NAME:(first 2 letters of 1st name, last 2 letters of your last name)
Deba

9.ROCK STAR NAME:(current pets name, current street name)
Poochie Montclair

10. PORN NAME: (1st pet, street you grew up on)
Maybelle Shute

11.YOUR GANGSTA NAME:(first 3 letters of real name plus izzle)
Denizzle

12.YOUR IRAQI.. NAME:(2nd letter of your first name, 3rd letter of your last name, first two letters of your middle name, last two letters of your first name then last three letters of your last name)
Ebmaseeau

13.YOUR GOTH NAME:(black, and the name of one of your pets)
Black Kyo