A House Blessing

My house blessing from Kel (I love it SO much! Thank you Kellie!)

May you listen to your longing to be free

May the frames of your belonging be large enough for the dreams of your soul

May you arise each day with a voice of blessing whispering to your heart that something good is going to happen to you

May you find harmony between your soul and your life

May the mansion of your soul never become a haunted place

May you know the eternal longing that is at the heart of time

May there be kindness in your gaze when you look within

May you never place walls between the light and yourself

May your angel free you from the prisons of guilt, fear, disappointment and despair

May you allow the wild beauty of the invisible world to gather you, mind you and embrace you in belonging

~John O’Donohue

of kale and catastrophe, greens and grace

My blogger/chef/poet/friend Milton took my breath away this morning. Enjoy:

If you were speaking in parables
this afternoon, would you still talk
about seeds and birds and trees?

You see, what we know of farming
are supermarket shelves of Costa Rican
bananas and Peruvian asparagus;

a flower box of basil in the yard,
summer trips to the farmer’s market.
(Why is it so expensive?)

In our world of uniform tomatoes,
our apples sit, shiny and stacked in rows,
our Blackberries know nothing of time.

We fly so fast down the highway
we fail to see the clusters of muscadine
on the fence line, wild onions in the ditch.

I’m answering my own question. True
theology isn’t thirsting for a technological
upgrade: it’s still God 1.0: Christological kudzu.

Tell me the story again, in this summer
of kale and catastrophe, greens and grace;
and I will do my best to see and hear.

Peace upon you Milton, please keep linking thoughts, phrases, food, theology and grace together - you are a master blend of Wendell Berry and Ted Loder and a true Guerilla of Grace for me today! Thank you!

Enjoy Milton's blog here: Don't Eat Alone

Of roots and foundations - An Invitation

Can't stop thinking about the house, and it's rendered me totally ineffective until our appointment with our lawyer at 4:00 today (we're signing papers today, transfer of $ happens on Monday - yikes!)

One of the things that I want to do echoes something my blogger friend Kel did as they built their glorious artist retreat/home, Anamrae, in Australia these past few years. They built from scratch, and so we can't do exactly what they are did - but our version will be very similar.

Kel asked all her family and friends (even those of us who were from far away) to contribute prayers, blessings, poems and notes that they could write on timbers and beams, drop into the walls before they were closed in and say over their home. Our basement in our new home is high and dry and one of our first projects will be to insulate the walls. Before that happens I will be letting our community loose with markers to christen and bless the foundation of our home here in St. Stephen. Words, art, smiles and prayers will literally be written upon the bricks and mortar of our home.

It has been 14 years since we have owned a home. 14 years of moving, transferring communities, leaving friends and family behind, 14 years finished. We, all four of us, long for roots. Deep roots, good foundations in this community that we call already call home. We truly love it here and it suits us well. It is not perfect, but neither are we, and it is real. We long to establish ourselves here to grow and work and live our lives.

We invite you to share a story, blessing, poem, joke, photo or anything you can think of that will add to the foundations of our lives.

You can email me at heiditurnerATgmailDOTcom or write me for our snail mail address if you'd like to mail your contribution.

We have also been wracking our brains for a name for her. She is an 85 year old craftsman/arts & crafts home with lovely woodwork and tons of character. Kel's Anamrae takes two celtic words for Soul Space and links them together. So far I haven't gotten that creative, but would love a name that speaks of roots and growth. My dear friend Anj calls her craftsman Sojourn. A prize will be awarded if a suggested name is chosen.

Thank you for celebrating with us!

There's no place like home

The SOLD sign is up and we close on Monday!

I can hardly believe it's true. I haven't blogged about it because I just couldn't stand the thought of having to blog about it falling through. There have been few things in life I have allowed myself to admit I wanted - a home was one, and when this process started to move forward THIS HOME was THE HOME I longed for. It hardly seems real.

I am going to document the process because it has been so amazing, but really need some mind space (and quiet) to do that in. With the kids home from school now that has been hard to find this past week. I know it will come, but this morning isn't it.

I have created an online photo album if you want to peek inside:

20 Queen Street East

Love Story

God made man because He loves stories.

Elie Wiesel
US (Romanian-born)
activist, novelist (1928 - )

Bay of Fundy - Wonder of the World

UPDATE #2 - Vote My Fundy.com

UPDATE: Vote here for the Bay of Fundy

Did you know that more water passes through the Bay of Fundy in ONE DAY than goes over Niagara Falls in a year? Niagara Falls powers much of the eastern seaboard & Ontario - can you imagine if the tides could be harnessed (with total respect to habitat)? Natural energy just waiting to be resourced.

Living here in New Brunswick, 3 blocks from a river that is a tidal estuary we see the affect of the tides here two times a day. It's magnificent. 20-30' in 12 hours - two times a day, every day.

I just found out that the Bay of Fundy is in the running (again) to be listed as one of the 7 Natural Wonders of the World! You don't have to be from Canada to vote, so show your support and take a look at all of the places you need to add to your travel dreams. You really need to see this place at least once in your life. It's like nothing else in the world.

Here's the update email I got from my friend Jude at Culture Pass:

The Bay of Fundy is back on the international stage in the New7Wonders of Nature contest. In an unprecedented turn of events the Bay of Fundy, which placed 2nd in the first phase of the contest that concluded January 7, 2009 is now representing Canada!

The New7Wonders of Nature organization, based in Brussels, reinstated the Bay of Fundy this week. "We can confirm that Dinosaur Provincial Park did not meet the Phase II participation requirements" said Tia Viering of the New7Wonders. "Therefore, it is with great pleasure that we announce that the Bay of Fundy is now officially Canada's national representative.”

“As 2008 came to a close, we knew we were in an extremely close race to represent Canada in this phase of the contest,” said Terri McCulloch, Manager Bay of Fundy Tourism. “We were honored by the incredible number of votes the Bay of Fundy received in the first round of the contest. We are very passionate about the Bay of Fundy and believe it is truly a beautiful wonder of nature. We are privileged to represent Canada and we hope everyone will be as enthusiastic again and vote for the Bay of Fundy. We only have until July 7th to get as many votes as we can for this next stage of the contest.”

The Bay of Fundy is best known for the highest tides in the world and has been compared, in marine biodiversity, to the Amazon Rainforest. The Bay is the summer feeding area for half the world's population of endangered North Atlantic Right whales and 12 other whale species. It is home to the world's most complete fossil record of the "Coal Age” (300 million years ago) as well as the world’s oldest reptiles and Canada’s oldest dinosaurs. UNESCO recently recognized the upper Bay of Fundy as a Biosphere Reserve and Joggins Fossil Cliffs as a World Heritage Site.

Go online to vote to place a vote before July 7, 2009, when the top 77 international sites will be short listed. Between July 7 and 21, an independent committee will select the top 21 to continue into the fourth and final stage of the campaign. These top 21 sites will also be part of a 2010 New7Wonders world tour bringing tremendous international attention to the selected sites. Phase four is the last voting component of the New7Wonders of Nature campaign until the final announcement is made on who has been selected the New7Wonders of Nature.

“We only have a few weeks left in this phase of the contest so every vote is important and interested voters can go to Votemyfundy.com. We are really excited to be back in the running and we hope we can succeed in getting Canada’s Bay of Fundy into the next international phase of the campaign,” said Terri McCulloch. (Sending with thanks to Maureen for forwarding from Terry.)

Vote, vote, vote!!

Redemption in the form of a bobby pin

Remember my friend Nicola, the girl riding the elephant and thinking BIG thoughts about redemption in Thailand? She was on a bus trip with a columnist and he writes about his interaction with her here:

Nicola Gladwell gave me a bobby pin.

During a long bus trip this April, I got out the handwritten draft of a short story and my AlphaSmart Dana word processor.

I balanced the Dana on my lap, then realized there was no comfortable--or even uncomfortable--way to prop up the sheets so I could type them. On the back of the seat in front of me was a tightly screwed-on strip of plastic that held the chair cover in place. I tried forcing the edge of a page under that, but had no luck.

Bother.

It was then that Nicola, seated across the aisle from me, came to the rescue. She removed a bobby pin from her hair and handed it over. I was at a loss what to do with it.

"What do you suggest?" I asked.

She took the flat prong and worked it under the strip of plastic, creating a clipboard. I slid a few pages into the bobby pin and they held.

Brilliant.

Read the rest here - John Governale

Thanks John - and btw - I LOVE MY AlphaSmart too! :D

Reading List

I have scads of little pieces of paper, index cards and emails I've sent to myself with books recommended or talked about by people I admire, I try to toss those little tidbits on my desk and then regularly do amazon searches and add them to my wish list so that at least somewhere I have a searchable record of those books. I began doing this when one of my favorite people in the world made his recommended reading list. I grabbed a few of those books and they changed my life forever. Nothing I had read up to that point had touched me as deeply as those books. I guess that's because the man who recommended them touched me more deeply than anyone else had before.

His name was Mike Yaconelli. He is no longer with us physically, but his writing and talks still pay forward in my life, and since I was only graced to see him once a year, it's almost like he's still around practically influencing my life.

I was doing some research for the talk I'm giving at church on Sunday and saved a transcript for the Bill Moyers Journal he had with Parker Palmer back in February - 17 minutes you will never regret - but don't listen until after Sunday if you go to my church! :) (Parker Palmer's Let Your Life Speak was the first book I read on that list and things shifted so dramatically within me that I will never be the same again) When I saved the transcript I found Mike's book list and I'm going to copy it here so that I don't forget again - there are so many books on this list I still get to read and I thought you might enjoy a couple of them too.

Here's Mike's Recommended Reading List (with a bit of advice thrown in) The only thing I'll add is Mike's own book Messy Spirituality:

• Read like a madman.
  

• Most youth workers don't read. Yet reading is absolutely essential to your spiritual growth.
  

• Ask people you admire and respect what books they read. If you're drawn to someone, chances are they have the same reading interests you do, so trust them to get you on the right reading track.
  

• Note those authors you resonate with, then get all their books. I have my own group of authors, who through their books have become my reading-world friends: Eugene Peterson, Barbara Brown Taylor, Walter Wangerin Jr., John Claypool, Earl Palmer, Henri Nouwen, Calvin Miller, Frederick Buechner, Alan Jones, Will Willimon, Evelyn Underhill, Philip Yancey. I read everything they write. Somehow, they know me, they name what I am struggling with, they put into words what I have been unable to find the words for. Put those few books that have really affected you in a bookcase close to where you work. In my study I have all my favorite books——my friends——just to the left of my desk, in arm's reach. I have lots more books in my study, but my friends are right next to me.
  

• Interact with your books. Mark your favorite passages, make notes, mark then file the quotes that grip you. Books are made to be marked——and stained with tears, too. Reading is more than gathering information——it's a relationship.
  

• Don't worry if you take a break from reading now and then. Sometimes your soul needs space and time to process what's going on in your life. At such times reading can actually distract you from soul work you should be doing.
  

• Whatever you do, don't limit your reading to religious books. Read recent novels, old classics, biographies, short stories, essays, articles. Christians aren't the only ones speaking truth. Truth is truth, regardless of who says it.
  

• Stop impersonating yourself.
  

• For what it's worth, here's my recommended reading list. Let it start you making your own book list.
  

• Robert Bensen, Between the Dreaming & the Coming True (HarperCollins)
• Bob Benson, Disciplines for the Inner Life (Word)
• Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination (Fortress)
• Thomas Cahill, The Gifts of the Jews (Doubleday)
• Christopher DeVinck, The Power of the Powerless (Zondervan)
• Jacques Ellul, The Presence of the Kingdom (Seabury)
• Suzanne Farnham and others, Listening Hearts (Morehouse)
• Arthur Gordon, A Touch of Wonder (Jove Books)
• Thelma Hall, Too Deep for Words (Paulist)
• Abraham Heschel, Man's Quest for God (Scribner's)
• Abraham Heschel, The Prophets (HarperCollins)
• Alan Jones, Passion for Pilgrimage (HarperCollins)
• Alan Jones, Soul Making: The Desert Way of Spirituality (HarperSanFrancisco)Thomas Kelly, A Testament of Devotion (HarperSanFranciso)
• Sue Monk Kidd, When the Heart Waits (HarperCollins)
• Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies (Pantheon)
• Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude (Noonday Press)
• Johannes B. Metz, Poverty of Spirit (Paulist)
• Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith (Riverhead)
• Kathleen Norris, The Cloister Walk (Riverhead)
• Kathleen Norris, Dakota: A Spiritual Geography (Houghton Mifflin)
• Henri Nouwen, In the Name of Jesus (Crossroad)
• Henri Nouwen, The Inner Voice of Love (Doubleday)
• Henri Nouwen, The Road to Daybreak (Image)
• Parker Palmer, Let Your Life Speak (Jossey-Bass)
• Parker Palmer, To Know As We Are Known (HarperSanFranciso)
• Eugene Peterson, The Contemplative Pastor (Word)
• Eugene Peterson, Living the Message (HarperCollins)
• Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction (InterVarsity Press)
• Eugene Peterson, Subversive Spirituality (Eerdmans)
• Barbara Brown Taylor, The Preaching Life (Cowley)
• Barbara Brown Taylor, When God Is Silent (Cowley)
• Evelyn Underhill, The Spiritual Life (Morehouse)
• Evelyn Underhill, The Ways of the Spirit (Crossroad)
• Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines (HarperSanFranciso)
• Philip Yancey, The Jesus I Never Knew (Zondervan)
• Philip Yancey, What's So Amazing about Grace? (Zondervan)

Are there any you'd add to this list?