An Epoch Summer

Epoch: 1 a : an event or a time marked by an event that begins a new period or development b : a memorable event or date

Finally, I have a chance to post something again!

This has been a very busy summer. We attended the Milwaukee Ballet 3-Week Summer Intensive, which was a great experience. I learned a lot, both ballet related and otherwise! I decided that, as much as I love ballet, I would never have the dedication to it to do it as a career. It was a rather painful decision, but I know it's the right one. Now I'm also so much freer to just enjoy ballet, without worries about not being the right size for a company, or the fact I'm a bit behind my peers as far as technical capability goes. I love performing, and I will just enjoy ballet and performing as much as I can in the next few years. I'm sure that opportunities that have not even occurred to me will come up.

I also finally decided why I do ballet, and that it is perfectly justifiable to spend so much time, money, and effort on it even though I don't plan to do it professionally. I love dancing and performing, other people love watching it, and by it I'm helping to make the world a more beautiful place. I think that certainly makes it worth it! I also gain all the personal benefits such as staying very much in shape, learning a beautiful art form, improving my musicality, gaining grace and good posture, and having something enjoyable to do.

Now I'd like to share a few experiences I had when we were in Milwaukee.

One day we decided to drive in to the city and go to the lake and then to Mass. Before leaving Brookfield we stopped by Panera Bread and got soup and sandwiches. It was a fairly dark day with a promise of rain, but we nonetheless stopped near the beach and ate on a bench near a very large group of very friendly seagulls who were most interested in our food. They crept up on us, eyeing our food with their beady eyes, and uttering alarming squawks. They were very cute.

When we had just a bit of food left, it began pouring rain. We quickly packed up our food and ran towards the car. I paused and threw bread to the gulls - it had scarcely left my hand and they were already in the air, crowding close to snatch it out of the air. Once two gulls caught the same piece and just pulled it in half!

We sat in the car while it rained - it was only a little after 5 pm and Mass wasn't until 6 pm, so we had a bit of time to kill before we had to go anywhere. It only rained for about 10 minutes, and when it stopped I asked if I could go down by the water. I'd really wanted to and had been quite disappointed when it began to rain before we had a chance. Mum said I could and that she would join us in a little while, so I started down towards the water.

My sister Bailey and I walked along the shore and picked up the smooth, white rocks - some round, others flat. The sky above us was a deep, dark azure; the lake teal broken with ripples of turquoise. I walked right into the water, flip-flops and all, and as the water splashed over my feet I could see the turquoise fade away from it.

As we walked towards the large rocks near the water, Bailey pointed out the rainbow arching clearly through the still-darkened sky. Each perfect end landed in the water, and a boat sailed beneath it - to Tir-na-nog, perhaps?

Behind us, the darkness in the sky was breaking, and white clouds separated themselves from their darker counterparts. Seagulls shrieked hungrily as they trotted busily among the rocks. The world felt sparkling and new and exciting - just walking along the shore seemed to me an exciting thing of epic proportions.

I reached the huge white rocks and began to climb on them, carefully throwing my weight and maintaining my balance. Climbing on rocks is an interesting sort of dance between you and gravity. It was not easy to do in flip-flops, a knee-length skirt, and holding a handful of rocks, but I finally reached a rock that directly overlooked the water. I sat down on it and looked into the distance, watching the water ripple under the sun that had just come out. I also looked down and watched the water lap up against the rocks.

Looking at it, I thought, "This is a perfect moment for a profound thought! But why is it that people feel so obligated to have profound thoughts every time they have a quiet moment? Sometimes it seems futile, like every idea has already been thought up. It's funny, someday each one of us will be gone and perhaps our profound thoughts with us, but Lake Michigan will still be here, washing up against the rocks." Perhaps not the most pleasant or enlightening of thoughts, so it's just as well that I took my own advice, stopped trying to think, and simply enjoyed the beauty and thanked God for it.

Bailey had also been climbing on the rocks, and she climbed down to a rock I hadn't even noticed (but I'm not surprised that she did), that was shaped like a couch. She immediately lay down on it, of course. Lying on her side, she held one hand as if she were holding scepter, as she whispered, "Poseidon!" That's an inside joke with us...don't even ask where it started or what its significance is, because I'm not sure!

Looking over to where our car was parked, I saw Mum and stood up and waved to her. She made her way across the beach and joined us. We noticed a young man walking slowly down the beach, obviously enjoying the day and place as much as we were. It's always so nice to see people like that. We had to show Mum the couch rock, and then she told us we had to get going so we wouldn't be late for Mass.

As we walked back towards the road, all the happiness I'd been feeling sprang up in me. I skipped and held my arms out, feeling the wind like a bird (it doesn't look or feel as crazy as it sounds - really!), and laughed out loud. The young man we'd noticed earlier heard me and turned, and we smiled at each other. It was one of those amazing moments when you look a stranger in the eyes and see a piece of their soul. You know you'll probably never see them again, but you've shared a moment where you knew beyond any doubt what the other was thinking.

As we drove to St Stan's, I jotted down in my notebook some of the sentences I just typed above. It was one of those beautiful days that you know is an epoch in your life. Things are never going to be quite the same after it, and its beauty will linger with you forever.

I went to confession when we reached St Stan's (after some difficulty trying to get the confessional open!), and then knelt in the quiet church. After being in the big city (another exciting and different experience! There is nothing quite like a big city...) the church truly seemed like a quiet oasis.

Not many people assembled for Mass - perhaps a dozen. As Mass began, a beautiful thing happened. Bells from churches all over the neighborhood began to ring. I love the sound of church bells, there's something indescribably beautiful about them. They bring God into our everyday lives.

Have you ever noticed that attending Mass or anything in a church other than your home church will often renew your faith and zeal? Perhaps it's because it becomes removed from your every day routine, the familiar surroundings of your church. You realize how beautiful your Faith really is as you notice different facets of it that are highlighted by a different church. Perhaps you notice a painting, a statue, a stained glass window, and it makes you think of something that usually isn't brought to mind by your own church. You also aren't distracted by recognizing people around you...despite all your efforts, it can be hard to avoid thinking about people you know when you see them. It can be easier to concentrate at an unfamiliar church where you don't know anyone.

All in all, it was a very nice Mass. After Mass we went and lit some candles. I knelt at the feet of the statue of Our Lady and prayed. I realized that my desire for holiness and union with God can be carried out in the world, and also that I did not need to worry so much about my life after high school. I'm planning to go to college, and after that, may God's Will be done! At this point in my life, I really have very little inkling of what that will turn out to be.

I thought of what my friend Sr Justina wrote to me, "If you entrust everything in this regard [vocation] to Jesus and Mary, you will be happy and things will be better than you can imagine ahead of time. Pray to Jesus that you will be open to whatever He calls you to, wherever that may be - both now and for the future - for in this is your happiness and your holiness, dear Ivy! One thing is sure, He always rewards those who seek Him and His will, so I know He will bless you." That is wonderful advice.

So yes, as we left the church I thought that this was one of those days where suddenly everything is just a little bit different. Never again would I look at things quite the same as I had before that day. I'll remember it as an epoch.

A few thoughts...

Some thoughts I had on vocation that I wrote in my journal...perhaps they'd be interesting to others who are also trying to figure out God's will for their lives.

March 29, 2009 - One good thing about all this, however [see-sawing between feeling called to marriage or to religious life] - I receive a greater understanding of all the graces and beauties of each vocation every time I consider it. I've received the grace of understanding a religious vocation more fully, and now I'm understanding the holiness of matrimony and family life as well.
Because I'm realizing it can be holy - not just can, but should, and must be! The family is the domestic Church, the image of the Trinity, the place where the future saints and scholars, popes and martyrs, religious and priests, parents of other families, are raised. The parents are entrusted with the incredible privilege of participating in the very act of creation, and the care and formation of souls destined for God alone. The husband and wife see the goodness of God in one another, and they will help one another reach the fullness of perfection.
I'm realizing that married life is every bit as much a spiritual and mindful thing as a physical and sensual one. The main purpose of marriage is you, your spouse, and your children reaching your God. And it is such a very beautiful vocation.
...Becoming a saint and serving God faithfully and truly and well need not be any more difficult here in the world than it is in the religious life.
...Every time I consider the religious life it brings me closer to God, and every time I consider marriage, it brings me closer to God's people and His world. And every time, the two become more closely entwined. Perhaps I will be able to do more for God by raising up more people to be His valiant defenders, by defending His truth through my writing, and by loving Him wholly and living only for His glory.

The Truth Sall Set You Free

I wrote this story when I was about 12 years old, and I think it is one of my better ones. I was inspired to write it during Mass one morning when I read: "My brethren, if any one of you err from the truth and one convert him, he must know that he who causeth a sinner to be converted from the error of his ways shall save his soul from death." That would make a wonderful story! I thought. So I wrote this story. I think it has a certain beautiful simplicity that reminds me a bit of the stories of Hans Christian Andersen. I've been wanting to write some more short stories that were inspired by lines from Holy Scripture...none have jumped out at me lately, but I hope they will sometime again!

Once, long ago, in a great city there lived a man. He was neither young nor old. He lived a most holy and exemplary life. Everything he did glowed with his holy love for his neighbor and his God.

In this same city there lived a boy. He was in that time of life between childhood and manhood. He was an outcast, living in the streets, and leading a life of great ignorance and sin.

By chance, the boy and the man met. They befriended each other. In time, the boy’s life changed. Inspired by his friend’s holy life, he gave up his life of a street urchin to better his position in life. He enrolled in a good school with the help of his friend, and was soon at the top of his class and loved by all for his virtues. However, he lost track of his good friend who had helped bring about this change.

Now it is 20 years later. We are in the same great city, and entering a house in the slums. A house – nay, a tumbledown shack that seems to be falling at every wind.

On a hard, narrow bed, covered with a thin, dirty blanket, lies an old man. He is dying. On his face you see the marks of a hard life, filled with sin and distrust. But there is a heartbreaking sorrow in it as well.

Seated beside the bed, on a rickety old chair, is a priest. He is young, and on his face you read a life that has known pain and suffering, but knows the love of God and trusts in Him, bringing Him all his afflictions.

Let us listen to the words spoken between the two.

“Ah, Father, once I believed in a loving and merciful God. But how can it be true? All the pain in life, how could there be a God if He permits it? Yes – (here the man gave a bitter laugh) I have despaired. What if there is a Hell? I shall go there, and what of it?”The priest listened, a pain gnawing at his heart. As he gazed upon the man’s face, he remembered a time when it had been neither young nor old, but glowed with a holy love for his neighbor and his God.

Yes, the priest was the former street urchin, and the man was his old friend!

The priest grasped one of the thin, cold hands. He looked into the man’s eyes.“Do you remember me, my friend?”

The man looked into the priest’s face. After a while he said, “Why, weren’t you that little street urchin I knew 20 years ago?”

“I was,” said the priest, “and you have given me the greatest gift that one could give, that if carefully treasured, will never fade or break. You have given me the gift of faith.”

The man looked into the priest’s face, and the priest now read in the eyes of the man a pained, longing remembrance. A remembrance of when he had possessed that beautiful gift, that when treasured, will last for eternity – a strong faith in God.

“I would like to read you something,” said the priest, opening his Bible. “Listen. ‘My brethren, if any one of you err from the truth and one convert him, he must know that he who causeth a sinner to be converted from the error of his ways shall save his soul from death.’

“My friend, I was once a sinner and you converted me. But God, in His great mercy, will not let your soul be lost. He loves you with a special love, for you brought back to Him one of His lost sheep.”

“How can He love one so wretched as I?” the old man muttered.

“It is the truth,” said the priest softly. “’Know ye the truth, and the truth shall set ye free.’”

Many moments passed – long, hard moments for the priest. He knew that a precious soul hung in the balance between Heaven and Hell. He had done all he could – now he would leave it to the grace of God.

“’…will set ye free,” repeated the man. “I am locked in the fetters of sin. Time is short. Death! I used not to fear it. It was only death of the body, but now it is the soul as well!”

Tears ran down the old man’s cheeks. He grasped the priest’s hand.

“I believe in God," he exclaimed fervently. "He was only joy in my life, and life was hideous without Him. Thank God for you, you little urchin! Father, please hear my confession.”

The priest heard the man’s confession and then gave him Holy Viaticum and Extreme Unction.

The old man clutched the crucifix the priest had given him. He was silent for several moments and his breathing became even more laboured. The priest knew his friend was in his last moments. Then the old man grasped the priest’s hand.

“Thank you, Father,” he whispered. “I…gave you…faith…you…gave it…back. To… love… God… to…love…Him…”

The old man’s voice faded to a whisper and he breathed his last, one hand holding the hand of the man he had brought to the Church, and who, in return, had brought him back. In the other hand was the only hope in this land of exile – a crucifix.

And the priest sat with bowed head, holding the lifeless hand of his friend. He pondered on those words.

‘Know ye the truth and the truth shall set ye free!’

Truly, when you know the truth, live the truth, share the truth, believe the truth, the truth that is faith, hope and charity, the gathering of all the good of the world, the truth that is God Himself, the Truth shall set you free from the fetters of sin and the darkness of death.

Quo Vadis

A lament for all our friends...I'm sure we all have some...who have left the Truth to pursue the World.


Where are you going? she said to him softly.
Where are you going? I cannot find you.

I'm seeing the world - I'm tasting its pleasures.
And I'm going alone - you're not coming too.



Quo vadis, quo vadis,
Our world seems to cry;
Where have you gone, our brave young souls?

We're off to see the world - we'll be back, maybe never
We're going off, and you're staying here.



But don't you remember,
Remember the summer,
The sunlight, the laughter, the sky, and the trees.
Remember our voices,
Our hearts knit together.
Come back, oh come back.
Oh, please remember me.



Quo vadis, quo vadis,
Our world seems to cry;
Where have you gone, our brave young souls?

We're off to see the world - we'll be back, maybe never
We're going off, and you're staying here.



Brave selfish young souls!
There are no laurels on your brows.
What are you doing, seeing the world?
The world is good...but home is better.
You have deep roots here, though you may not know.



Ah, so you miss us? You miss your people?
You miss your life before the world came?
You can come back, but you'll always be different.
But our love is unchanging, as thick as our blood.



Quo vadis, quo vadis,
Our world seems to cry;
Where have you gone, our brave young souls?

We're off to see the world - we'll be back, maybe never
We're going off, and you're staying here.

Defendebo (I Will Defend)

Love...and it could apply to many different sorts of love. I think we all have that desire to defend and protect those we love, and to receive the same in return.

Where the sea meets the sky
Where the stars collide
There I will find you
There will I search

The old order passes
The world around us changes
But my love remains
In the falling rain

I will not leave you
In the darkest night
I won't leave you alone
Where the sun dare not go

You're in my arms
Though the whole world is changing
I am protecting you
And holding you closer

The Vase

A song I wrote recently, trying to express the longing to know what your true calling is. I've also tried to write music for it...I'll have to keep working on that.

Broken pieces,
Pieces of a vase.
A vase from your grandmother
Long ago.
The pieces are lying
So lovely and still.
Waiting and wondering,
Crushed and beautiful.

The bits of a soul,
All the ragged edges,
Are waiting and wondering,
Waiting for their cue.
For the night to end,
The dawn to break.
Breaking is painful,
But then it's beautiful.

Singing where
Where do I go now.
Something hold me together,
Bring the pieces back together.
Hold me tight
Don't let me go.

A prison can be beautiful,
Dedication.
A story is told
On the cold bleak walls.
A thousand voices,
A thousand more echoes.
They sing
And why can't I.

Singing where
Where do I go now.
Something hold me together,
Bring the pieces back together.
Hold me tight
Don't let me go.

And the broken pieces,
The memories are there,
The sweetest foundation,
Sweet roots of a tree.
The vase has been mended.
The pieces are singing.
They are echoing.

Echoing.

Modesty - An Issue of Respect

Written July 2007 and published in my newsletter "Servants of the Queen"

Here in the midst of the summer months seems to be an appropriate time to address the touchy but nonetheless very important issue of modesty. I hope to show you some interesting points on this topic that you may not have considered before.

Modesty, as we all know, has a lot to do with what we wear, especially among ladies. It is important to realize that why we dress modestly has a lot to do with respect. We want to respect our own bodies, and not leave them on display for anyone and everyone to see. We also want to respect men, who see and think differently from women when it comes to certain things. They respond more then women do to visuals, and it is important to realize and respect that, and not make it any harder for them to safeguard their purity. Any sin against purity is very grave, and we certainly do not want to be the cause of someone’s mortal sin and possible loss of Heaven!

This may seem harsh, but it is true! That is one of the reasons it is so important to dress modestly and appropriately. But dressing modestly certainly does not mean wearing a sack or looking like a slob! To do this would, in fact, not be dressing modestly at all. The Vatican’s guidelines for decent dressing are that the neckline should not extend more than two fingers’ breadth beneath the pit of the neck (the little dip in the center of your collarbone in the front) or on either side of the neck, the sleeves should cover the upper part of the arm, and the skirt should reach at least two inches below the knee. These are really quite sensible and doable guidelines. Of course, we must also be careful to not wear clothes (skirts or shirts) that are too tight and revealing. These are not only inappropriate looking, but also uncomfortable!

A word on pants – I personally find nothing wrong with wearing pants on some occasions (i.e. when you’re going to be playing some sort of game that requires running, when doing outdoor work, etc) when a skirt would be down right impractical and possibly immodest. However, they should be modest, nothing like the skin-tight jeans common today. One kind of pants I’ve found to be both modest and to look nice is cargo pants, which are quite easy to find at pretty much any store. But for the most part, skirts are preferable. Not only are pants inappropriate for the reasons mentioned earlier in this
article, they also de-feminize women when they wear them. It is very interesting – you really do feel different, more feminine, when wearing a skirt! In our culture, which is attacking and demeaning women on all sides, all under the cover of “women’s rights”, “women’s liberation”, “feminism”, it is very important to maintain who we truly are – women, what and who God made us to be!

Upholding the dignity of humans and showing respect for all life is a big part of modesty. The point of being modest is not only avoiding making ourselves into near occasions of sin (although this is a big part!), but also to show respect to the fact that we are women, human beings with dignity, and not objects. When we dress in an appropriate manner, we are showing that we respect our body, we respect others around us, and we respect God Who made us.

So, please consider these thoughts. How you choose to respond to them is up to you, but I do think that if we bring back more wholesome styles, one person at a time, we will begin to see a difference in our world. People will recall the sacredness of their bodies and we won’t see so much blatant irreverence for God’s gifts to us. Women will recover their lost femininity – in essence, who they are, and perhaps, someday, the world will regain some of the order it lost towards the middle of the last century.

One last point. It is well put in something that champion boxer Muhammad Ali once told his daughter: “Where do you find diamonds? Deep down in the ground, covered and protected. Where do you find pearls? Deep down at the bottom of the ocean, covered up and protected in a beautiful shell. Where do you find gold? Way down in the mine, covered over with layers and layers of rock. You’ve got to work hard to get to them… Your body is sacred. You’re far more precious than diamonds and pearls, and you should be covered, too.” (I found this quote in “Dressing With Dignity” by Colleen Hammond) By not showing very much of our bodies, we are showing how much we value them. I repeat, this does not mean wearing sack-like clothing. That would not look nice, and wearing beautiful clothing also shows great respect to our bodies – another important thing to remember. But rather, our bodies should be hidden like the great treasures that they are. Look in our churches; the greatest of all Treasures is hidden – within the tabernacle. Our bodies are one of the most precious treasures that this great Treasure has given us, and we should respect them.