may I learn to count my days, O Lord, so that my heart might know your wisdom...

This week was slow for me. Slower than normal. Mostly because of a lingering head cold that is nearly over, but also because I needed the quiet. The solitude. The absence of conversations. Over the past two weeks the quiet routine of my new life became full: there were spiritual direction conversations and hospital visits, music rehearsals and loving family celebrations to honor. Each was and is a blessing to me; each nourished me, too. And now it is time to be still. Time to sit with these blessings and let them rise up within like yeast in the dough.

So today I'm baking. Two weeks ago I got my whole wheat bread to rise thanks to Uncle W's insight about adding a pan of hot water to an already warm oven. Now I am working on a simple unbleached white loaf. We'll see, but it looks like kneading it for a full ten minutes might create a winner. I like the order bread baking brings to my quiet days: not only does it demand sustained attention, but the pay off for patience is usually so satisfying. One of my bread books gets it right with this quote: "If the divine creator has taken pains to give us delicious and exquisite things to eat, the least we can do is prepare them well and serve them with ceremony." Amen to that! The poet, Richard Levine, puts it like this:

Each night, in a space he’d make
between waking and purpose,
my grandfather donned his one
suit, in our still dark house, and drove
through Brooklyn’s deserted streets
following trolley tracks to the bakery.

There he’d change into white
linen work clothes and cap,
and in the absence of women,
his hands were both loving, well
into dawn and throughout the day—
kneading, rolling out, shaping

each astonishing moment
of yeasty predictability
in that windowless world lit
by slightly swaying naked bulbs,
where the shadows staggered, woozy
with the aromatic warmth of the work.

Then, the suit and drive, again.
At our table, graced by a loaf
that steamed when we sliced it,
softened the butter and leavened
the very air we’d breathe,
he’d count us blessed.

The past two days have been dark and damp. Portends of our immediate future. Today, however, the sun was bright so we walked for a few miles with Lucie. The trees were stunning. The sky was clear. The air was warm. Soon it will all be MIA - stark, cold and dark for months - best to bask in this beauty while we can, yes? Kathy Galloway, leader of the ecumenical community of Iona, Scotland, captured the ebb and flow of creativity and balance in her poem, "...Maker of Heaven and Earth..."

It is a good thing to be a maker.
Bread-maker, pounding breath into dough
on a flat stone;
cake-maker, for celebrations, or chocolate
for times of indulgent misery;
dressmaker, cutting, patterning, fashioning,
fitting to a shape;
toolmaker, the maker's maker;
love-maker, skill-sharing artisan of
pleasure, trust, delight;
baby-maker.

Woods and words, stone and steel,
clay, lace, brick, flower, flour, microchip -
whatever the medium
it is a good thing to be a maker.
Substantial, 
material,
concrete,
the exchange of energies
changing the world.

It is a great thing to be a
maker of heaven and earth,
is it not?

The Psalm for this past Sunday, Psalm 90: 12-17, attributed to Moses, asks us to learn from God how to count our days so that we might grow a heart of filled with wisdom. Watching the first holy word in nature, I see a time to be present and a time to hide away. A time to speak and a time for silence. A time to walk and a time to rest. A time of warmth and a time of cold. A time  to bake, a time to wait and a time to eat. I am in control of so little. But I can pay attention. I can be present. I can learn to count the days and seek God's presence within them. Like Joy Mead puts it in her prayer, "Spirit of Lightness and Life," I can be a maker:

Be with all makers and dreamers, o Lord:

all who make bread
   and long to share it;
all who make music
   and long to dance;
all who make words
   and long for poetry;
all who are born in flesh
   and long to be human;
all who make love
   and trust their longing
      for life.