Lovely sleep, until nearly 8:30. And a perfect Benedictine day yesterday. Saw no one, part from S who came up for a smoke after her lunch, and Lachlan, briefly in the office, trying to have a “quiet” lunch. Work, cutting the birdbath, which seems to be going well, and cleaning the caravan. Study, listening to Dreyfus’ lectures on Kierkegaard. Reading – finished Steppenwolf. Meditated on my own three times. Writing the blog. Only emailed Belle twice because I only had a signal when I down to the office to upload the blog. Anyway she’s off for the weekend and it’s a Canadian National Day or something. And rest. I had a flannel wash before doing the washing up (half a panful of hot water for the lot) and then watched El Camino, the story of Jesse in Breaking Bad after White was killed, which was much better and more upbeat than I expected. And so to bed and slept the night through after sending and receiving a good night to S. Ate a picnic lunch of ham and boursin and gherkins. Apart from that and my breakfast banana, nothing else but juice and coffee and cups of black tea, and a couple of NA beers. And plenty of time outside (after some rain in the morning it was a lovely bright sunny day) cutting my rock.
I’ve promised Sebastien I’ll go over to Les Tuileries (a house we’ve rented for guest overflows about 10 minutes walk north of here) and fix the fridge and mow the lawn, and S wants to talk to me at 9 about the accounts, which she’s trying to finish up today for Jean Claude (our new boss, hurray).
Dreyfus was very interesting on Kierkegaard. Meshed very much with Rohr on suffering and love, and Steppenwolf too. Hesse wants us to live, to love life, but not take it too seriously, and say yes to its reality, not run away into fantasies of the intellectual life, or enlightenment, not to murder Hermine, but to love her, not to reject life as it is and replace it with daydreams and regrets, to be a whole person. Didn’t find his heavenly ice cold laughter of the immortals very convincing. And Kierkegaard is the same. We are divided, body and soul, and need to resolve the synthesis, not take one side or the other. We are in despair and must experience the anguish of being unable to solve the riddle for ourselves.
Rohr says that only through great suffering, which breaks the mind, and great love, which reveals the spirit, which together force and allow us to accept that we are not in control, and that we have to let go, are we able to escape the dualistic mind
Cutting the rock, letting it speak
Well, in the event I didn’t. Sorted out a couple of accounting queries for S who’s been asked to finalise the paperwork for 2018, and then I went to Les Tuileries at Sebastien’s request and mowed the lawn and fixed / broke the fridge (the door wouldn’t shut, which I sorted out, but now it’s held together with 3 bungy straps as I entirely unnecessarily as it turned out removed the roof to release the door). Came back for a late lunch and then went up to the caravan looking forward to a quiet afternoon of snoozing, you-tubing, reading and / or sculpting, but young Lachlan turned up. He was on the lam, avoiding the furniture removal operation after the end of the French community retreat. He said he’d got very stressed with all the noise and disruption over the weekend. Anyway he came into my caravan and slouched about in various positions on my divan and we talked about community and silence and the search for god, and I told him about Kierkegaard vs the East – he’s very excited about the visit of a famous Buddhist, Alan Wallace, who’s coming to see us next Easter, and is reading a book by him by way of preparation. Also performing Shakespeare with Mia from Denmark, they did mad Ophelia together, him being Hamlet and her Ophelia. S said she caught them at it, great roaring and shouting, which may have been Lear, agonising. Lachlan’s a great fan of Shakespeare but said he got 0% in his A level because he hadn’t actually read King Lear. He did not enjoy his boarding school (Strathallan, near Perth, who used to have dances with Kilgraston, the convent where my sisters Jane and Sarah went). Anyway we had great chat until 6:30 when we went down to supper. And then I came back with S after some perfunctory washing up (I’m on washing up supper duty this week, which was a surprise, as I thought I was washing up after lunch, or rather, not washing up after lunch, so no surprise that no one missed me. Well, Pauline did, one of the good guys, lovely Irish girl from a Zen monastery in India, lately, brilliant cook, who is staying on longer so has been moved out of the Abbaye and up to the Gate House. I am warming to the idea of being caretaker at Les Tuileries, it has an excellent 3G signal and I was actually able to listen to the World this Weekend while mowing the lawn.
S and I had a fag outside on the grass with Minny, one of the cats, by the light of the full moon, listening to owls and deer and sheep and what sounded just like curlews but surely weren't. S said she saw 3 red deer come down to the lake side to drink this morning while she was having breakfast on the wooden bridge.
I had a brief chat with Arnaud. He said that things did not appear to be easy here (S has been talking to him and Pascale) and I think Jean Claude has the same sense. S leaving may have a bigger impact than the departure of Andrew and Delyth – raise some questions at least about how the community is getting on. I said very firmly to Arnaud, and I think he agreed, that the community was the point and most important thing about Bonnevaux, that retreats and conferences and meetings were just froth.
I sent S off to bed after her fag, and am now happily home alone again. She said she’s finding the goodbyes surprisingly difficult. Join the club I thought.
{Much later – 00:36 – after watching a truly grisly film about someone totally losing their marbles and killing their wife and child, and then a few other people too; what Hattrick would call a psychotic episode I imagine}
So I recorded some podcasts,
{links to podcasts}
feeling unhappy with the way I’d treated S, sending her off to bed on her own, and wondering what the truly selfless, loving thing to do might have been. Talking to her, or listening to her, with the talking stone, although we’ve sort of tried that and it didn’t seem to work very well. It didn’t help me anyway. And wondering if she’s having a breakdown of some kind, or I am, or we both are. At least I haven’t had a drink for seven days, so I can’t be completely off my trolley. So instead of starting the Brothers Karamazov, I’m going to re-read my blogs, and send a quick email to Belle.
I’ve promised Sebastien I’ll go over to Les Tuileries (a house we’ve rented for guest overflows about 10 minutes walk north of here) and fix the fridge and mow the lawn, and S wants to talk to me at 9 about the accounts, which she’s trying to finish up today for Jean Claude (our new boss, hurray).
Dreyfus was very interesting on Kierkegaard. Meshed very much with Rohr on suffering and love, and Steppenwolf too. Hesse wants us to live, to love life, but not take it too seriously, and say yes to its reality, not run away into fantasies of the intellectual life, or enlightenment, not to murder Hermine, but to love her, not to reject life as it is and replace it with daydreams and regrets, to be a whole person. Didn’t find his heavenly ice cold laughter of the immortals very convincing. And Kierkegaard is the same. We are divided, body and soul, and need to resolve the synthesis, not take one side or the other. We are in despair and must experience the anguish of being unable to solve the riddle for ourselves.
Rohr says that only through great suffering, which breaks the mind, and great love, which reveals the spirit, which together force and allow us to accept that we are not in control, and that we have to let go, are we able to escape the dualistic mind
Cutting the rock, letting it speak
Well, in the event I didn’t. Sorted out a couple of accounting queries for S who’s been asked to finalise the paperwork for 2018, and then I went to Les Tuileries at Sebastien’s request and mowed the lawn and fixed / broke the fridge (the door wouldn’t shut, which I sorted out, but now it’s held together with 3 bungy straps as I entirely unnecessarily as it turned out removed the roof to release the door). Came back for a late lunch and then went up to the caravan looking forward to a quiet afternoon of snoozing, you-tubing, reading and / or sculpting, but young Lachlan turned up. He was on the lam, avoiding the furniture removal operation after the end of the French community retreat. He said he’d got very stressed with all the noise and disruption over the weekend. Anyway he came into my caravan and slouched about in various positions on my divan and we talked about community and silence and the search for god, and I told him about Kierkegaard vs the East – he’s very excited about the visit of a famous Buddhist, Alan Wallace, who’s coming to see us next Easter, and is reading a book by him by way of preparation. Also performing Shakespeare with Mia from Denmark, they did mad Ophelia together, him being Hamlet and her Ophelia. S said she caught them at it, great roaring and shouting, which may have been Lear, agonising. Lachlan’s a great fan of Shakespeare but said he got 0% in his A level because he hadn’t actually read King Lear. He did not enjoy his boarding school (Strathallan, near Perth, who used to have dances with Kilgraston, the convent where my sisters Jane and Sarah went). Anyway we had great chat until 6:30 when we went down to supper. And then I came back with S after some perfunctory washing up (I’m on washing up supper duty this week, which was a surprise, as I thought I was washing up after lunch, or rather, not washing up after lunch, so no surprise that no one missed me. Well, Pauline did, one of the good guys, lovely Irish girl from a Zen monastery in India, lately, brilliant cook, who is staying on longer so has been moved out of the Abbaye and up to the Gate House. I am warming to the idea of being caretaker at Les Tuileries, it has an excellent 3G signal and I was actually able to listen to the World this Weekend while mowing the lawn.
S and I had a fag outside on the grass with Minny, one of the cats, by the light of the full moon, listening to owls and deer and sheep and what sounded just like curlews but surely weren't. S said she saw 3 red deer come down to the lake side to drink this morning while she was having breakfast on the wooden bridge.
I had a brief chat with Arnaud. He said that things did not appear to be easy here (S has been talking to him and Pascale) and I think Jean Claude has the same sense. S leaving may have a bigger impact than the departure of Andrew and Delyth – raise some questions at least about how the community is getting on. I said very firmly to Arnaud, and I think he agreed, that the community was the point and most important thing about Bonnevaux, that retreats and conferences and meetings were just froth.
I sent S off to bed after her fag, and am now happily home alone again. She said she’s finding the goodbyes surprisingly difficult. Join the club I thought.
{Much later – 00:36 – after watching a truly grisly film about someone totally losing their marbles and killing their wife and child, and then a few other people too; what Hattrick would call a psychotic episode I imagine}
So I recorded some podcasts,
{links to podcasts}
feeling unhappy with the way I’d treated S, sending her off to bed on her own, and wondering what the truly selfless, loving thing to do might have been. Talking to her, or listening to her, with the talking stone, although we’ve sort of tried that and it didn’t seem to work very well. It didn’t help me anyway. And wondering if she’s having a breakdown of some kind, or I am, or we both are. At least I haven’t had a drink for seven days, so I can’t be completely off my trolley. So instead of starting the Brothers Karamazov, I’m going to re-read my blogs, and send a quick email to Belle.
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