A smattering, this will be.
Oh, I miss books. Not school books, I get those all the time. I miss fun books, books that require no work, but still have so much to teach. I went to Barnes and Noble tonight for the first time in a long time and soaked up a few first chapters. First chapters are always my favorite.
I recorded a song today. One I didn't write. You can download it here for a week, if ya like. It was a great way to spend a day. Every time I record a song, I like it better than anything I've ever done. It's strange to me that I am more satisfied with the songs I record on Garage Band than the songs I've recorded in studios with professionals. Maybe I just set the bar lower for myself. Or maybe I just like being able to experiment and not having someone looking over my shoulder.
I want to visit a monastery. Shannon visited a monastery a couple nights ago. She met all the monks, Brother Augustine and Father Anthony and Brother Frank. They make fruitcakes and picturebooks. grow eggplants and so on. chestnuts. I want to be somewhere silent and old. and natural. I never get anything like that in Atlanta, and my heart misses it. Shannon says she will take me soon enough.
"Every simplification is an oversimplification." -Alfred North Whitehead
9 comments:
Come! Come and visit! And we will go to the redwood forests and meditate where it is old and silent and natural!
I miss your guts. Likewise about the meaning-to-call-for-weeks-and-weeks thing. Have oh-so-much fun in Atlanta...wish i could be there. Love you.
Jen-- there's a monastery in Conyers... I went there when I did my first major "leaving"...
http://www.trappist.net/
Love you.
Yeah, I think that's the one I want to go to. One of my friends goes there a lot, and has been trying to get me to go for months, but we just haven't worked it out. But hopefully I can get to one soon. Or I could just visit Beth and go to the Redwood Forests. That would work too :)
I downloaded the song.
It was very beautiful :)
Well thanks, Pete.
Is this a Pete that I know?
Ah, no. Not really.
Well, sort of. I rediscovered your blog - and, indeed, you, although you probably always knew where you were - last night when I read a comment you left me on my old expectant one nearly 3 years ago.
Once upon a time we discussed theological matters, when I suppose we were both more inclined to believe. It is interesting for me to read some posts here and see the changes. I neither write nor think much any more, except occasionally in circles, but I'm glad to see you continue to write, think and sing delightfully.
Not sure if this has been too cryptic to give any useful indication of who I am, or why I'm writing in this strangely obtuse, ponderous style, but I wanted to check in and wish you well in any case :)
Ah, Pete. Yep, that's the Pete I was hoping for. I tried to visit your blog a while back, but wasn't allowed to see it. So glad you stopped by.
Yes, lots of changes. Last I returned to that place we used to speak, I was shunned as a heretic and told to seek the discipline of my pastor, and that was when I still had belief to spare! You've wandered from faith too, have you? It comes and goes in me, but in entirely different forms than the old days.
Anyway, hope you are well :)
Aw, thank you. I'm glad to be the hoped-for Pete.
Yeah, I've wandered pretty far. For a big part of the wandering I wanted to wander back and believe, but not any more. I can barely remember what even wanting to believe felt like.
Like you, I guess I am "not a person given to faith"; although, less like you, I don't feel "drawn to spirituality" either. I thought I would be, but I find few signs of it in myself. I'm mostly drawn to over-thinking, to incredulity and to science. I get to work with scientists now (cells and blood vessels and stuff) and I like them better; the good ones spend their days trying to prove wrong even the things they want to believe, suppressing temporarily their natural desire that they fail to do so. The few truths they painstakingly uncover are accepted only tentatively. I admire their attitude and the startling universe they are teaching me about. But I can't quite perceive any personal god of religion within that universe.
Last time I returned to the place we used to speak, something similar happened to me. I got embroiled in arguments that upset and annoyed me way more than they should have been able to. I lost a lot of lingering respect and optimism that, if one just explained as carefully and patiently as possible, one would be understood. And I annoyed myself with my own attitude towards others.
I'm rather glad to see how you think now, from what I've glimpsed of your thoughts here. I hope you are also glad.
For what it's worth, I always thought you were one of the good 'uns.
I am certainly also glad. I do my best to only change for the better. Sometimes the something-better hurts for a while, but things turn out alright. At this point, spirituality is mostly a hobby for me. I do believe I would have left it by now, if I wasn't putting myself through more years of theology school. We'll see what sticks once I am done. I do know that I have no energy left for believing in a personal God (though he haunts me still) and no devotion left to give to a religious system. But I also feel a significance in things that spirituality helps me express. sometimes.
Science! I do love science. A startling universe indeed. I have been learning about it little by little in the past few years.
Ah, yes, the webboarders have a way of crushing optimism. I had the same experience. not worth fooling with, I suppose.
You know, I always thought you were one of the good'uns too.
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