Janathan Grace Reflections   This is my journey of self discovery shared with you

Berly’s sister Kristen is here for the weekend, so I don’t get to see her much.  It has been snowing all day and I guess will snow all night… several inches of accumulation so far.  I saw two really great videos recently.  How do you post those little pictures of the book or movie you watched to your website?  I went biking in the snow today… didn’t wipe out as you might expect.  I would rather go biking in the snow than on an overcast, dry day (because I like the snow).  But the temperature was a little above freezing, so it was soggy and my socks got wet.  They were VERY cold by the time I got home.

Berly was co-director of a group home called L’Arche.  She felt very stressed by the job: all the responsibility, feeling the expectations exceeded her energy, etc.  The one person that made the job worth it for her was the other director.  He died last night suddenly of a heart attack.  He was both an emotional support for her and an occupational support–taking most of the heat for difficult things.  He and his wife had started to really click with us as good friends–we went out for dinner and a movie the night before he died.  

Now the likelihood is that she will be pressured to carry on the job on her own, at least in the short-term, which would include doing things that she hates doing and wipe her out emotionally.  Of course, she can’t just quit or the house would probably come apart.  Please pray for her, the home, and me as I try to support her.

I’ve started helping on a volunteer basis at L’Arche where Berly works.  L’Arche is a group home for those with disabilities, ‘core’ members, who live together with ‘assistants’ who have fewer disabilities (or ‘normal’ as the world at large wrongly calls them).   There are 4 (soon to be 5) core members in this large house and 4 live-in assistants (plus a few like Berly who come in from outside during the day).  Kimberly is a co- house-manager (L’Arche has over 100 of these homes world-wide).  I go in Thursday afternoon to assist the core folk while the assistants have a team meeting .

Okay, so what’s the protocol for responding to comments to a blog?  If I just add another comment to the comment, the original commentor may not go back to read the new comment, especially if it has been a couple of days between.  How do you guys handle this?

It is great having email connection again.  The weather is beautiful this morning (isn’t it interesting that how I feel effects how I see the weather and not just the other way around)… the fact is it’s a bit chilly, but I’ll take sunny with any temperature rather than cloudy.  It has been mostly cloudy all winter here.  “Partly cloudy” where I come from means the day alternates between sunny and cloudy, but here it means sunny till 10 or 11 a.m. and then totally overcast the rest of the day (I noticed the same in Arlington).  I will be travelling to Europe to speak the second and third week of April and may be going through D.C. and catch up with some of yous guys.  Have a great day!

Berly has to work today.  I’m writing emails to my family members… thank you notes along with some personal dialogue about the book I gave all of them for Christmas, The Dance of Anger.  A book I highly recommend.

Okay, I’m now officially connected to the internet as well!  I started getting telemarketing calls within 24 hours of getting a phone connection.  I guess they are getting desperate for phone numbers with the do not call registery in effect.  Next time I am going to sign up on the registry as soon as my phone number is assigned, even before I get it connected.  Happy birthday to me, by the way (23rd).  Berly gave me an mp3 player with songs that commemorated our year and a half together.  Things are going well between us.  I attended a small group from our church for the first time last night and enjoyed it.

Thanks, eddie, for the smoke signal idea with Kimberly!  Actually we tried walkie-talkies, cause we’re close enough, but then we have to leave them on all the time, which would mean replacing the batteries every day.  I now actually have a dial tone! 4-345-280-280 (easy to remember with those hyphen placements), but as of yet no answering machine… voicemail is still with my cellphone which I hope to drop soon.  I’m not sure if my dial-up internet connection is workable yet (haven’t tried it).

Okay, so am I cursed or something?  I canceled my DSL two weeks ago because it was as slow as dial-up and ordered just an ordinary land-line.  It was supposed to be activated last Thursday.  Of course it wasn’t.  I tried calling the phone company twice Friday, and guess what… the phone tree told me that their phone lines were too busy and to call back later… it’s bad enough to be on hold for 45 minutes waiting for a real person, but when even a computer refuses to talk to you….  Of course, I was at home where I have very poor cellphone reception anyway, so I got in my car to drive a half-mile away to phone again (yes, any time I make a call lasting more than 2 minutes, I have to drive to make it).  I passed a verizon repairman on the way, so I pulled over and told him my problem.  He said he would come by and help.  He showed up a little while later and with me standing there spent 1 1/2 hours on his cellphone trying to straighten things out unsuccessfully.  Finally he left me with his supervisor’s number, telling me that Jeff would work it out for me.  I got through to another person later in the day who claimed to have worked out the problem and that I should have phone service by 7 p.m.  Now it’s Monday, I phoned Jeff and he said they worked out the problem and I should have dial tone.  I don’t, of course.  He promised to send a repairman by 5 today.  I’m not holding my breath!

More problems with internet and phonelines as usual.  I finally decided just to get an old fashioned land line, which I should be getting by thursday (cross your fingers), and I signed up for netzero as a pop3 account so I can use outlook on my computer.  for those who don’t know, my email address is kent_mcquilkin@yahoo.com.  It’s good to hear updates on everyone.  Not much to report here.