Stoppage Time Thursday. When Every Day Is A Beautiful Day

Dr. Oz was right. Joe came after Christmas and we moved from the Beck bedroom to the Bay bedroom so he could have my bathroom for his week’s visit. Linda made the Bay bedroom pitch black, and it worked so well that we decided sleeping in here is permanent. What “works” is that in the darkness, sleeping from nine to six is now a commonplace after my, well I guess it was a lifetime, rising daily long before dawn. All those Navy years, and the predawn roosters crowing all over Apalachicola, and the truck changing dumpsters at LandMark. But here it’s quiet and black. A bonus, Father Nature is afraid of the dark, because he doesn’t come in and wake me up.

A ship’s fog horn woke Linda at halb fünf and she went out on the porch to watch BBC Manitoba 453x69 arriving in predawn darkness and thick fog with a load of general cargo, but I didn’t hear it.

Of which speaking, as I write there goes — above -- looks like BBC Chartering to me but the Vessel Schedule says BBC Colorado 454x69 — on her way to Singapore. I wonder if any of these ships take on freighter passengers? I’m not really going but I can dream, can’t I.

Not counting those in the kitchen cooking up two enormous pans of delicious yellow rice and shredded chicken for our supper, we had 69 (60+4+3+3-1 nevermind) people at Wednesday Evening church last night, at least that’s how many wafers and broken bits were handed out as the Body of Christ by the paten servers. Will and Bennett gave out the crackers and I had to keep going back to the Altar for more until they were all gone and one last wafer to break into tiny morsels. Starting from zero, then a few folks, Wednesday Evening has become a larger service than eight o’clock Sunday morning, majority often children and middle-schoolers. To my utter amazement, nobody raised their hand and complained “Where’s Father Steve?” and, because they couldn’t answer my gospel questions, I didn’t tell them.

But my wandering mind has returned to Stoppage Time, when the Thursday at Cleveland Clinic I wandered around all alone finding my way from this lab to that, being stuck and poked and listened-to and prodded; and ultimately stuffed into a tube for 45 minutes, which instead of a claustrophobic nightmare I kept my eyes closed and stirred into a memory dream lying on the sand at the Jetties in May 1953, final exams done, and only graduation, summer, and the rest of my life ahead of me.

From Stoppage Time — Thursday, 2010 

Stoppage Time is liminal, a threshold upon which one is not what one was, but not yet what one will become. This liminality is vague, a twilight zone in which what will be is unknown.

The total change in physical setting for my Stoppage Time could not be more appropriate. Far different to Ordinary Time in Florida, Stoppage Time is overcast, heavy grey sky, sun never seen, dirty snow on the ground, ice, occasional flurries, bitter cold. For a Native Floridian it might be a foretaste of Hell except that for so many of our Navy years Linda and I lived and loved in northern January winters. Newport, Rhode Island. Ann Arbor, Michigan. Columbus, Ohio. WashingtonDC, Northern Virginia. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Cleveland in January could be long ago Ordinary Time. But it isn’t Ordinary Time, is it, it’s the twilight zone. Physically, emotionally, psychologically, mentally, ineffably twilight zone, liminal Stoppage Time. 

Stoppage Time is for remembering realizing reflecting resolving. It is incredibly peaceful relaxing carefree. Growing time. Maturing. Father Commander lets go at last. A few months after arriving at Trinity, Apalachicola in 1984 I found out that people were calling me “The Field Marshall” and perhaps I was but that was Ordinary Time. Stoppage Time is space to let go of being In Control and allow kind people to take charge. Time to be constantly astonished at how kind and how helpful they are. Ordinary Time was the power of giving. Stoppage Time is the humility of receiving

In Ordinary Time life was taken for granted. Stoppage Time is simultaneously more intense yet more peaceful more contemplative. Not sad Not scared Not anxious. Time to discover, let be, and enjoy changing. Stoppage Time is for realizing that Ordinary Time is permanently ended, and consciously, deliberately helping that be so. Becoming aware and embracing and enjoying transition. Ordinary Time was good. Stoppage Time is very good, very good indeed. 

Thursday Jan 20, 2011 4:00pm

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

 My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

         Robert Frost, New Hampshire 1923

A major event of every year, springtime as I recall, was that Robert Frost stopped in Gainesville to read and comment on his poetry. The university lecture hall was always jammed, standing room only, a crowd outside. At least one year I got a seat inside to see and hear him read. “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” was always a favorite, and I watched the Great Man himself say personally that people always think there is death in the poem but “there is no death in that poem.” It was, rather, quite mundane: he would love to stay and watch the snow, but had other commitments and had to go on.

At Cleveland Clinic all day Thursday, I had five pre-op tests. EKG, Lab work, MRI, Echocardiogram, and Carotid Sonogram. Halfway through the day I met with a cardiologist who, based on the first two tests, was hopeful that the surgeon would operate as scheduled. However, the remaining three tests would provide definitive critical data that wasn’t known when we met with the cardiologist. We won’t know until Friday afternoon when I meet with the surgeon himself. However, we left the clinic Thursday afternoon feeling encouraged. We’re still walking on eggs, so please don’t count chickens, but I wanted to say this now for those who are hoping and praying.

It’s snowing in Cleveland as I write this, infinitesimal, not big pretty flakes but infinitesimal snow like a white haze falling. Going to the teens tonight and a few inches of snow accumulating. 

TomW+


Every day is a beautiful day.

Thos+ in +Time+