this is ground control to major tom...

Perhaps that is the wrong message, I haven't been strung out and floating in space. We moved to Portland, OR and are here. We have three chickens, baby chicks now, soon to be big hens. The kids love the hens....

We are now part of Holy Rosary Parish--a great place. The kids are so big. T is almost 8, and V will be 5 in two weeks. J had a lovely 2nd birthday right after Christmas. And she is totally out of diapers now. Yeah cloth! So I (kind of) sadly (kind of joyously) pack all her little diapers and woolies away. I guess I'll hold onto them for a bit here, for maybe #4?

I'm getting ready for Lent. I really need Lent this year--after moving and all the upheaveal,, I want to get refocused (sp?). Because we aren't eating dairy except for the occasional sheep cheese, I'm cutting out olive oil and wine as well. I'm basically following the Eastern Orthodox Great Lenten Fast--I don't think I can fast for a complete 3 days in a row because J is still occasionally nursing (for comfort). I hope to go to Mass at least 2 times per week. Daily would be great, but with 2 little ones and limited funds, that might not work.

Which brings me to my big part--Lady Poverty. lovely Lady Poverty. We are considered economically poor in this country. We live below the 200 per cent above the povery line ( I won't say exactly where, but it is down there ;) ). And I have mixed feelings about telling people this. I feel like it is show what shameful--but then don't the poor have a special place in the Heart of Jesus? Isn't poverty something to strive for?

So why do I feel so weird about it, in this land of the protestant work ethic and calvanistic predestination anxiety? When did capitalism invade my conscious and begin to inform my ethics?

I;d like to really give away what we don't need/use and be content with the bare minimum if stuff. So I'm perging the things. We gave away a lot of stuff before moving, but we are kind of nostalgic pack rats, and well--you know writers... it is hard to pry stuff out of their hands.

So that will be a task. To embrace Lady Poverty, and reconnect with Him.

So I plan to spend little time on line. I'm going to refocus on my place here, and live poor.

sorry this is kind of wacky and disjointed, but I just need to get it all out before my bread is done baking in the oven.

Yeah! Lent.

the politics of babies...

So, I'm trying to type this out as my 19 month-old is dumping the few remaining clothes we have left here (everything else is packed up to move) and jumping on me, so I might miss a key.

But I'm thinking about the election for President of the Stati Uniti, and how I would like to vote for Obama. I'd really like to vote for him, because he inspires this crazy hope in people, and it feels like we need that now. I like a lot of his policies.

But he seems to have unwavering support for that amorphous choice. After a great deal of thinking and praying, I can't vote for him, but I can't vote against him, either. And I know that conservative president don't always make conservative Court appointments (hello Nixon!), and that even if Roe was overturned, abortion would be legal in the states (such as California) that are liberal.

Nothing will change unless we change people's minds.

The only really pro-life thing I do is try to be a good mama, and make parenthood look as good as possible. So I don't complain about the normal stuff that happens when little ones are around. I just offer it up.

But that doesn't seem to be enough.

So I though of this idea, that is basically making a shrine and inside are these really beautiful icons of aborted babies (they are little saints, right?)... where it isn't put in people's faces unles they enter the shrine. But we can "see through this window into Heaven" and see these babies, and pray for them, just be with them... It seems like a start.

Who will help me with this project?

Via Crucis

from the work of Inos Biffi and Franco Vignazia, by Eerdmans press.

Saint Joseph, pray for us!

my baby entered the One, Holy and Apostolic Church today.

This was a comment

I made on anther blog. But I liked it so much I thought I would share it with you:

Halloween is not celebrating witches and demons (at least that's not how we do it here). It is All Hallows Eve-it is the eve of All Saints Day. I think that people focus on death because dying is how we become saints. You can't be a saint unless you die.

And that is scary--to everyone. So we dress up in death, and focus on spooky things (the changing of season seasons and the shortening of the day helps, too).

There is nothing demonic about death. In fact, Satan wants you to never think about death. But it is a fact that most folks who because saints, thought about their end a lot. Monks dig graves right outisde their from doors to remind themselves of this end. Satan would be happy if you never considered death--because then you would never really repent anything.

So we dress up and laugh, yes laugh at death--because it is terrifying. We laugh at death and say, "Christ has defeated you, Evil Scary Stuff, so we need not fear you. We cannot escape death, but we don't have to be afraid of it. Would you like a snikers?"

All Hallows Eve allows us to face our fear of the dark--and find out where it is sweet.

orange revolution

Although I do not vote for one side or the other in the politics, I cannot help but be in touch with current events. I feel a responsibility as a citizen of the world to try to understand what is happening. Most of the time I just feel this ache in my heart.
The attempted Orange Revolution in Burma reminds me of something Thomas Merton wrote in his journal, "Christ is where men are beaten and starved."

So I sit here, and watch these events unfold across the world as a stage, and I am usually left disheartened or muttering. I try to teach my children how to be have, and to be a moral agent in the world, only to turn on the radio ad hear about all of these powerful adults across cultures and timezones behaving like... selfish, evil, petty-- what is the word? I almost wrote animals, but that doesn't quite cast the image properly.

So although I listen to the events of the world, and try to make sense of them, I do not know where to begin to write about them. It mostly makes me sad.
And so I will end with a quote by Léon Bloy, hugely admired soul:

Man has places in his heart which do not yet exist, and into them he enters suffering in order that they may have existence.

Stranger than Fiction (2006)

I saw this film for the first time the other night and was surprisingly impressed. The Dustin Hoffman Character, much like the Metaphysical Detective he plays in I Heart Huckabees, I think is my favorite, but the freaky author (played by Emma Thompson) reminds me of one of my best friends, whom I miss very much. Will Ferrell, is Will Ferrell.

Complete with Italo Calvino quotes, see it if you haven't already...