October 14, 2006
Last week I celebrated my 69th birthday with a party that included six children ages 5 to 12. The day came bearing feelings of delight and gratitude that it came at all, and it was beautiful. I constructed a Treasure Hunt for the children that took them down one path after another through the pasture and forest. Watching them running ahead of us looking for the next clue and observing their delight at the final discovery of the treasure provided a wonderful allegory for life; their exuberance and energy gave the celebration far more than any quiet gathering could have mustered. The treasure included apples and little animals wrapped in gold paper – the children seemed very pleased and continued onward into the evening in a merry mood which spread to all of us making the party an unqualified success.
This month has been a season of change – Alphie is apparently not morphing into Wonderdog because the trainer says that “he sure has a lot of puppy in him” and “he really is a big dog!” meaning, I think, that he is bounding around with his 100 pounds of unbridled and uncontrolled energy. I assured the trainer that we were not expecting a Lassie but just hoped to have some behavior modification so that we would be able to have dear Alphie meet other people with a modicum of good behavior. We work with him next Tuesday. The colors at Sanctuary have already faded to muted hues, and with the harvesting of the corn and beans, the fields around us are brown. This will become gray as winter advances, and it will take a bright imagination to find beauty there, though the grasses retain some color and texture to provide visual relief.
Another change beginning in November is that Charles will move from the position of Associate Organist at First Plymouth Congregational Church in Lincoln to Organist at First Presbyterian Church just a few blocks away. The new director of music at First Plymouth is planning to go in a different direction with the music program there, and when the position at the Presbyterian Church became available it seemed prudent to take that since it is also a very fine venue for making music with a large and good organ. The city of Lincoln is not big enough to have many of these places to play, so Charles was very pleased at the way things fell into place. I will likely worship at both churches because we made many friends at Plymouth and our children are members there. I will then go to the Presbyterian church for my music “fix” since I am convinced that Charles is the finest presenter of hymnody that I have ever experienced and a splendid player of organ literature as well.