The Convent Diaries 11-20
 
 
The Soundtrack!
 
1. Shatter: Troubadours of Divine Bliss - Off the Cuff (Live at the Winchester)
 
2. Don’t Let The Man Get You: Fatboy Slim - Palookaville
 
3. My Madrigal:Patti Smith - Gone Again
 
4. She Moves in Secret Ways:
Polly Paulusma - Scissors in My Pocket
 
5. Somewhere: Tom Waits - Asylum Years
 
 
 
days - eleven to twenty 30th January 2006 Today I saw 3 black deer run past the boundary fence - so beautiful, so strong. Last night, I blew up... because I knew in my heart that I should be home... there is nothing I can do now but apologise... and focus on the celebration of a good life - anger has no part in this day of love, and losing. The 1st Office today was relevant...I have been “like a babe in my thinking”... I can find ways of justifying my own actions to support my own desires and needs. But, love is unity, and we are divided at this time. Kick up the bum time. And a little humility... Sometimes, like now, I learn not what I want to know, but what I hide... In session with Pat I spoke of my wish to let go of the past hurts... of how my determination to will happiness into my life when there was none has given way to a desire to embrace the happiness that is - to release the need for reassurance, the tendency to watch for tricks (how I felt tricked when I lost the baby) - she spoke of my compassion coming through my poetry - my willingness to turn pain into inspiration, hope, for others... I have learnt from the absence at the funeral how I have carried through life this tendency to fight for my joy, instead of trusting, accepting... a core selfishness that I forgive myself for, but also learn from. I should have been there. I rationalised my fears into courage but ignored my true voice. 1st February 2006, 3am I came here with the call “I turn my face to the lord - never be ashamed”... I will shed my skins, shed my shadows and my dreams in order to be one - whole, beautiful, wild. But your words, this Bibled life - it speaks to me, yes, of that first step...but layers on the rules of guilt and shame, despite that call, despite that love which is so embodied here - do not be ashamed.... question: - if God loves us as we are, if we are made beautiful - why the original sin? Why all this hemming in of all that glistens - this ecstatic bliss? I believe we each hold ‘god’ inside - we each have a deeper knowledge - a way of listening, of witnessing, of inviting and embracing miracles...There are other dimensions to what is known... Yet so much of this dogma goes against what I know of love, of body and soul. I celebrate my bliss, yet shame, deep-rooted, and forgotten words of rule, keep me bound. Why deny the beauty and pleasure of sex? Why try to hold such expanse as love in a paper cup?...I feel frustrated at the absolutism of this faith... Even in its forgiveness and acceptance, even in its heaven, it is based on obedience to the rule - the doctrine keeps opposing its core - it speaks of love yet that love, which is supposedly unconditional, is wholly conditional to this obedience, this doctrine...This religion puts obstacles in the way of me and the divine. Maybe in the walls of a prison, the prisoner finally understands the true freedom of the soul... 31st January 2006, 5.25am - another 5am rising - the world is still in dark... Today we read the Office of the Dead. Yesterday, I mourned Simon’s Dad, and all those I have loved and lost to death... and those still alive but from whom I am distant... I am adjusting, and not - the routine of prayer is hard for me - sometimes I feel overwhelmed by the Catholicism - especially in the morning office - too close to dream-time - I need to write at that hour... I arrived angry, full of close-to-the-surface tears, doubtful, on my guard. I passed through tears and hot rage... I faced my own arrogance and surrendered, taking blessing, kneeling in chapel, because I knew I had to, because I needed to give some sign of willingness to surrender that hard-headed will to something greater. A peace came then, and more tears and a vulnerable strength... Then shock... a stir crazy wolf howling to be with her loved ones... Learning once more to release, surrender - realising I have held onto selfishness by way of old survival but, to truly love...there are some times when the right thing to do in love is an act of selflessness...and I do not have to be afraid of that... The hardness came from feeling that I had to fight to be me as I grew up... to look out for myself when no one else was. But I am not there any more...am I now accepted?... I am unfolding, revealing... The miscarriage stripped me of my will, my belief - and now I am surrendering my will again, deeper - not to rule, but to love...and growing supple, strong. 3rd February At the 5.45am Office, Graca spoke of ‘finding God’...of allowing ‘god’ to find you...to look at the times ‘god’ has spoken in your life and you have hidden. The Office also spoke of needing no teachers, only Jesus...Did anyone here, hear that? I am exhausted, bone broken and half wild with frustration but I am here. And surely, coming to a convent is a clear call of “hey, yoo -hoo, God, look - I’m here in one of your most saintly houses. You can find me now!” It is sad to see everyone struggle, but necessary. I hope the nuns see that this is important...how they can learn that there are other ways to god...and we can recognise our own reluctance, rebellions, demons. At the moment, there is a battle of sorts, quietly waged with smiles...What is happening though? First the sudden let go, of worries, because all was ordered - and tears, the aching, the emptiness, the need - but also, the wonder, the peace, the joy. Then the rebellion...the assertion of the individual against the authority - a certain type of despair in that...it was necessary, in order to assert in the world my own path, voice, truth. In the past I have been mocked, bullied for my beliefs...so they got buried out of sight and I grew afraid...And now, maybe some will mock, ridicule or condemn. Does that matter? But that catch - I so want to be good, loving - and the sin and the god stuff scare me into thinking I might be bad...
 
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