Rituals

I regretably made an appointment to have my car in for its 1000 mile service at 6:30 this morning, so I need to leave the house around 5:30 a.m. to 5:45 a.m. I'm reacting with some stress over having my nephew as company, I don't feel well suited to entertaining a 10 year old.

Yesterday we went to the movies and saw Get Smart, shared a huge bag of popcorn then walked over to Amy's Ice Cream and had a large scoop of Belgium Chocolate ice cream (one of my favorites). We got home around 5 and then I had to prepare dinner for all of us, hence we didn't eat until around 7 p.m. I began to feel the need to have some space and privacy after barely having him here for over 24 hours! What a wimp I am when it comes to giving my time and routine over to taking care of a 10 year old! I've always known I could never be a parent! But I did make it to practice yesterday morning and that was sweet. I stopped at Umlauf Garden to check out the hours and sure enough they are closed Mon and Tues, so the idea of taking Zach there was out of the question for the day. Still, we do have fun, acting silly and laughing at all the craziness portrayed in that *movie*....

I managed to make it to bed last night by 8:30 so I had some time to myself (plus the wonderful morning time that I so enjoy, all to myself as Dale and Zach tend to sleep late compared with my routine) and read the following passage that particularly rang true for me:

rituals and reality

"Rituals and forms in spiritual practice can be useful, but in themselves they have little to do with seeing the truth. We must question whether we use the forms and rituals to connect with what is, or as a way to hide in familiar security. The longer one practices in a particular tradition, the easier it becomes to hide in the routines, in doing it "right," and--especially--in the jargon. Thus we trap ourselves in the protected cacoon of comforting predictability, unable to experience the reality of what our life really is."

excerpted from Saying YES to Life (Even the Hard Parts) by Ezra Bayda with Josh Bartok.