CORN CHOWDER and CRUSTY BREAD

Cold day - hot soup – warm bread.

Corn chowder is a family favorite, the kind of soup you like to smell on a day when your skin is chilled and you walk into a warm house.

Here's how I make it.

Ingredients:

1 lb bacon, cut in ½” pieces (one package, sometimes 12 oz, is fine)

1 yellow or sweet onion, chopped

4-6 Russet potatoes (4 small, 6 large or thereabouts. Other spuds will work too.) peeled and chopped into ½” cubes

2 cans sweet corn or 1 16 oz bag of frozen corn

1 can creamed corn

Celery innards (the bitter ribs and leaves in the middle of a stalk of celery) chopped (about 3 T chopped)

1- 2 cans Evaporated milk (not sweetened condensed!) cream will do, too

Salt and pepper

Cook chopped bacon in a heavy pot until crisp. Remove bacon with a slotted spoon and add chopped onion to the hot bacon fat. Cook till tender. Add chopped potatoes and just barely cover with water, maybe ¼” above the top of the spuds, so they are covered. return cooked bacon to pot. Salt and pepper water (roughly 2 T salt, depending on how salty the bacon is) Your best tool is your taste buds. Boil until spuds are tender, maybe 12-16 minutes. If you are using frozen corn, add the corn after boiling ten minutes and continue to cook till spuds and corn are tender. Turn off heat and add creamed corn and evaporated milk (or cream) and stir. Taste to see if it needs more salt or pepper.

Serve with crusty bread.

Super easy crusty bread.
It steams in the heavy cast iron pot
to give it the crispy crust.

Crusty bread:

6 ½ c flour

2 t. salt

1 ½ T dry yeast

3 C very warm water

Mix all dry ingredients then add warm water. Stir till well blended. Cover with towel and let rise a few hours.

Put one large or two small covered heavy cast iron pots in the oven and heat to 425. Meanwhile, turn out dough onto floured surface and either form into a round or into 2 rounds, depending on your pot.

Sprinkle corn meal (or flour) onto a piece of parchment paper.

Set dough round on parchment, cover with a towel, and let rise while pots are heating up in oven.

When oven has reached temperature, with the pots in it, slice the top of the dough with a serrated knife.

Lift dough by the edges of the parchment paper and set into hot pot. 

Cover with hot lid and place in oven. Set timer for ½ hour at 425.

In ½ hour remove lid and let cook an additional 10-15 minutes until crispy golden.

Carefully remove the hot pot and turn the bread onto a cooling rack. Do not cover or put hot bread in a bag as it will lose its crispy crust. (But if you don't eat all of it, put the cold leftovers in a plastic bag or the whole thing will end up dry.)

Cool enough to slice easily.

 

 

MARSHA BRADBURY - TRIED AND TRUE

There’s an image fixed in my mind where I am sitting in our old green mission style recliner back in the room that used to be our TV room. My arms and legs are swarming with freezing hot electric teeny tiny worms… at least it feels this way… and I am exhausted and scared. My friend Marsha Bradbury (affectionately known as Mush) sits on the couch across the room. I doze in and out, wrapped in a warm blanket, until the jerking of my electric legs wakes me. Sometimes there’s conversation. Sometimes not. Mush grabs a blanket and flops over on the couch. Time does its thing, and we endure it. That was years ago now. My arms and most of my legs have recovered full function.

There’s something magical about a friend who can sit with you for long stretches of time and say nothing. Her presence is a balm. 

Mush helped me through my bout with Guillain Barre Syndrome, and I helped her through her deep dive into Pancreatic Cancer, which she miraculously survived, and the residual ripples that floated around her for nearly two full decades after her diagnosis. Something transformative happens when people walk hand in hand through scary things.

While we both saw the door to the Hereafter creaking open before us, that’s not necessarily where we dwelt. I mean, really, who wants to stay there? We both had lots to do with what remained of our human capabilities. What started as an almost co-dependent need to be together evolved into fairly sweet autonomous lives. We both started having grandchildren. Our kids moved to faraway places and we found other demands pulling at us. She found energy when her hands were in the dirt. Her gardens became her haven. Her husband Rob built her a fabulous henhouse, and she became Mother Hen to a whole roost of chickens. A couple weeks ago when I stopped by for a visit she lamented that she had 9 dozen chicken eggs out in the kitchen with nowhere to go. Beautiful, multicolored eggs from happy hens. 

Marsha knew that the product of her labors was less important that the labor itself. Not that she did not celebrate the bounty. The evidence of this eternal philosophy sat on the counter, and on the table in her front yard at harvest time with a sign: FREE FOOD. Gorgeous, organic, fresh produce for the taking from a master gardener. In the most divine way Mush was no respecter of persons. If you were hungry, she fed you.

Marsha Bradbury, before I knew her, was an athlete, a high school coach, and a renowned Special Ed teacher. She literally saved people. I’m talking “for real”! Kids who had frustrated the compassion out of pretty much every other adult in their lives found safety in Mrs. Bradbury. Her room was a haven, especially for misfits. Everyone fit in her space. Everyone fit in her massive heart. She had been blessed with an ability to see beyond what is socially appropriate and into the ancient spirits of kids who were troubled. She lived with outstanding success the commandment “Judge not.” She understood that when someone’s brain, or body, does not function in an average way, they needed us to help them, full faced and unapologetically, navigate society.

Yesterday a friend texted my sister Libby with a frantic sentence: “Did Marsha die????!!!” Marsha had literally taken her hand and walked her through to graduation from high school. This scenario was repeated so many times no-one, but God, would know. Her gift as an educator was a rare and beautiful thing. She used that gift for nearly four decades. That’s almost two full generations.

Libby’s thumbs quivered when she texted back: “Yes. She was a miracle to us, but she finally got to go Home.”

One of the ripples of that Pancreatic Cancer was diabetes, which is a natural effect of removing the pancreas. Her body stopped processing food, which I find ironic since she grew and raised the most healthy food possible. In the end there was not much left of her in the flesh. But the spirit, that’s the thing. The sprit remained true. Luckily, she was never not “her”. She remained hopeful until her body said, “Hey, let’s be done now.” And even then, it took sheer physical exhaustion to make her say uncle and let go. Our super-strong athletic girl held out until the body could no longer survive. Then she finally exhaled, surrounded by the people to whom she gave life and who shared her life with her. Rob, her husband of 42 years, redefined himself in the last few years. Because of Covid he retired from his job so he would not risk bringing illness to Marsha. His gentle ways were easy on her and comforting for her and for us who cared about her daily existence. He is currently trying to exhaust himself with work, trying to process what just happened.

Marsha was like a cat with nine lives. Over and over again she triumphed when it was completely expected no-one could survive. Pancreatic cancer, diabetes, liver cancer, endocrine issues…so many enemies that any other human I know would have pulled out the white flag and surrendered. It’s not that she did not trust God. She understood his will prevails. But she also knew that if she had any say in it, she was going to fight. We were so accustomed to her overcoming, and bouncing back, that it wasn’t until the very end that we ourselves surrendered her to the Lord she loved.

It's a great comfort to me that she loved the Lord. Like the rest of us, she didn’t fully understand Him, but in her soul of souls she trusted him. 

So do I.

A few years ago, before Covid hit, there was a little red-headed girl who stood directly in front of me in the Heavenly Choir of children who sang at my Christmas concert. She sort of stole the show, throwing her whole heart into singing in a charmingly animated yet reverent way. I stood from my vantage point on the stage and looked out into the audience as the children sang. The light from one of the spots reflected off my guitar and onto the face of that little girl’s grandmother, my friend Marsha. It felt like that same warm light bounced back off Mush’s face onto her little Millie, the child of her child. I recognized in that flash of time, before I started singing along with the kids, that we were in the heart of a miracle.

Millie, the mini-Mush.

There was a time, when Mush and I sat quite still, hours on end, in the space where we shared our worries and pain, back when we were both sick, when the greatest wish of her heart was to be able to live long enough to see her first grandchild born. That child, Jack, is now 17. She was here when Charlie came. Then Lillie, and Millie and darling caboose Ryker. They have all been held in her arms. They have all gathered eggs with her. They have felt the wind and waves of Flaming Gorge in their hair, then returned to their cabin for a warm meal and some games, all with their grandmother. When Mush and Millie walked through a store, people smiled at the image of a “before and after” manifest in the two of them. She has been able to see all her children become skilled in their educated professions, All three of her children have become professional therapists in various forms. Becky is a gifted Occupational Therapist. Robby does psych evaluations in the ER in Portland and leads troubled youth and their families on wilderness adventures. Her youngest, Laura, is currently earning her doctorate after having directed programs on grief therapy for years. We are going to need her help this next little while. It is perfectly fitting that all three of Marsha and Rob’s kids chose professions that aim at helping individuals understand themselves in relation to the world and the people who inhabit it. They learned at the knees of the best.

We are trying to process the thought of her not being here. Its almost unfathomable. But there is evidence that part of her remains with us. She is in the people and places she loved. She is in the songs and stories that will be repeated through generations. And she is in the earth; the soft brown earth, starting now, at her passing, to burst with life. Seeds she planted are just about to awaken. At least there’s that.

It's hard to imagine this world without her in it. Heaven, on the other hand, is getting lovelier every day.  

Marsha celebrated more than most
the privilege of being a grandparent

Four generations of Limburg women.
Marsha and Rob cared for her mother until her dying day.

The Bradbury girls.

The Bradbury clan.

Marsha with her grand-daughters.

All the Bradbury women were swim teachers and coaches.
Marsha also coached gymnastics and tennis.

Last summer's bounty preserved.

Marsha was a young teenager when her father died
unexpectedly at the age of 42.

Such a cute couple.

Her favorite spot to be.

VIEW MARSHA'S OBITUARY HERE,

4-16-22 REPEAT - REPEAT - REPEAT

First thing this morning I made fifty cupcakes for Easter Dinner tomorrow. The recipe I use for the cupcakes is an old family chocolate cake recipe. A bit of family lore has given the cake a beloved name: Garbage Cake. No, its not one of those dump-a-bunch-of-ingredients-in-at-once recipes. It's called garbage cake because its good enough to eat out of the garbage. (You can find the story and recipe HERE.)

Garbage cake is one of those recipes that I no longer need to look up. I have it locked in my memory, and it sort of falls out without thinking when I need it. It's so natural, in fact, that I instinctively set the butter and eggs out the night before to let them come to room temperature.

Bunny ear Garbage Cake cupcakes.

Recipes, for me, are evidence of the power of repetition. We not only remember what we repeat, we also begin to own it in a strangely autonomous way, like we have a responsibility to each part, like the eggs and butter and bitter cocoa are letting themselves be used in a pleasing way. It feels, and I know this sounds weird, like the ingredients and I are in sync with each other and we all agree to work toward the same delicious goal.

I just realized this might make me
a piece of Garbage cake.

Today marks the end of Lent, the 40 days before Easter. I can now take a rest from my daily writing exercise. I have to admit I look forward to not thinking for a minute. During the Lenten season, because I have committed to writing something that takes effort, my brain tends to go into overdrive. Every. Day. Symbols swirl around me, concepts consume my thoughts, any spare moment that isn't taken up with demands for my attention is swept up in what I might write about that day. It wasn't quite this hard 14 years ago. But sometimes I feel like I'm running out of things to say. I am certain there are topics I've addressed repeatedly, and stories I've re-told multiple times in all these years of Lent writing. But the real reason I set out to do this is two-fold. When I pause and think about it, I feel satisfied that my efforts have fulfilled those reasons.I began writing every day of Lent for these reasons:

1. I recognized that the Lord blessed me with a love for the power of words. While the religion I embrace does not officially observe Lenten practices, I felt there was value in sacrificing "easy time" and committing myself to stop, think, and write. I sincerely consider this daily exercise a form of sacrifice. But I am also a believer that few sacrifices are purely selfless. There are inevitably benefits that come to everyone because of sacrifice. It often takes divine vision to see them. Because I shamelessly practice my religion, my writing comes out spiritually based. This is a natural byproduct of trying to align myself with my power source, whom I believe to be my Savior, Jesus Christ. (Thus, pre-Easter prep happens fairy organically.)

2. In my quest to become a better songwriter, I believed I needed to become a better thinker, and user of words in general. Daily writing helps me feel safe with words. The biggest problem I see is that I tend to overwrite. That probably comes from my propensity to overthink. I've tried to talk myself out of this, but my brain does not listen. If I want to become a wordsmith then I'd better learn how to wrangle words. Songwriting is an exercise in chipping away and boiling down words. These Lenten essays free me up.

When you've lived enough decades that it starts taking two hands to count them, you start realizing that repetition is what brings all of us to our end. We become what we repeat. I repeat this practice every year, for over forty days in a row, except for the Sabbath, which is not counted as a day of Lent since the day is already set apart. This observance feels to me like a sacrament for the year. I feel blessed by it in ways I may not logically comprehend.

Speaking of repetition, I hope to get better at repeating a lot of skills I have not yet honed. I will resist, however, spilling my thoughts here, like milk on the kitchen table. There is no need right now for me to beat myself up for the things I am not doing, that I should be doing. Just as it will not serve me well at 1 a.m. to reprimand myself for repeatedly doing things that are not good for me.

What this daily Lenten practice has done for me is made me use my mind and marry it to my heart, even when I haven't felt like doing it. It's sort of like gym for my brain. There are days you just plain don't feel like going to the gym. But in the end, the muscle is better for it. (not that I would know this in a literal "gym" sense.) 

The ingredients in my recipe for life lay out on my proverbial counter and wait for me to combine them. Sometimes we work together to create something wonderful. Sometimes, not so much. But I figure anything that leads me to love more deeply, have more compassion and less judgment, to sustain kindness, to motivate to positive action, and to direct me toward what will eventually be my eternal home... these are the things I want to know so well I do not need to look up a recipe. I will only need the whisperings of the One who journeys with me to tell me how and when to use them. I pray I have the courage, the intrinsic motivation, and the wherewithal to do my part... repeatedly.

A blessed Easter to all.

4-15-22 JOY IN SORROW

Every Wednesday I pick up my four-year-old granddaughter Tessa from pre-school, then drive her to ballet class. Afterwards she spends the rest of the day with me. Sometimes I get giddy on Tuesday night when I am getting ready for bed and start thinking about what I need to do the next day, then I realize it will be my Tessa Day! 

Tess dressed herself for ballet this day.

I recognize it is a rare privilege and blessing to be able to spend weekday time with my grands. I thank my Lord for it. Tess seems to always be so happy to see me. I know that this will wane as the years progress, so I am soaking it up as much as I can. She showed me, when I picked her up, her pre-school artwork for the day, a caterpillar named Clay and a butterfly she named Vernal. As we walked out she told me it was going to be Easter this weekend. I asked her if she knew how Easter started, and she said nope. I actually think she knows more than she says she knows. Nonetheless, I told her that the holiday started with Jesus. Without getting into too much of the troubling details that baffle the mind and alter the mood of old ladies and children alike, I told her  the story of Jesus leading, teaching, loving, dying and then that he received a new body. "And that's what Easter celebrates, that all of us will also get a new body for our spirits to live in." 

"And then the caterpillar became a butterfly."

"Did you know, Tess, that before you got your body... you know how you came out of your mama (I was there, and it was so cool!)... your spirit lived somewhere else and didn't have a body. Then, ta-da, you got A BODY! And I got mine that way too. Everyone did. Then when our bodies are done living they die, but our spirits don't die, they go on living. But guess what? Because of Jesus we get to have a body again that will not die, and that will be so awesome! Jesus' body died on Good Friday, and he was resurrected, or got his new body, on Sunday, and that's Easter."

Tess shouted from her car seat behind me: "You mean Jesus died on FIRST FRIDAY? That is so cool! I LOVE First Fridays!"

I repeat...Tessy is four. This spirit-body-life-death stuff is for sure pretty complex and confusing. Four-year-olds learn to disregard info that is overwhelming and focus on what they can understand. To her, there was mention of a first Friday, not Good Friday, and to her First Friday is the day she and her siblings get to sleep over at Gummy and Gumpa's.

Sometimes we hold whole conversations
with only the words "Meow."

So I've been thinking, this Good Friday, about not insisting that my Tess fully understand the heavy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I cherish that any hint of it might represent joy to her. We should all be four years old sometimes.

Good Friday can get heavy and sorrowful to me, if I let myself go there. I can feel the physical and emotional pain of the Lord I have come to love. And I can really empathize with the emotions of the women who loved him and saw him suffer and die. I imagine the confusion of the masses of followers, confused that he did not save himself the way he had saved so many others. I have stopped myself from going so deep I cannot lift out of it. (Empathy can be so distressing. My Annie suffers from an excessive amount of empathy. She's Tessa's mom.) Tessa is teaching me, in her innocence, to bathe in the joy as much as I cover myself with compassion and empathy. We need joy. I need joy! Not just the prospect of joy. I need to find some portion of it in the moment.

Her dress is on backwards,
and inside out,
and she is full of joy!

I recognize that earthly life is a pendulous experience. We must have opposition in all things. It does not only mean good must counterbalance evil. It also means light counterbalances darkness, laughter provides equal weight against sadness, truth swings with even measure against falsehood. Like the pendulum on the clock in our entry hall, the pendulum swings back and forth, back and forth, and this moves time forward. Perhaps in the next realm we will not need that counterbalance, because we will not need time... but that is getting old-lady-deep and today I seek joy!

I've discovered that most often joy comes to me when I recognize the bounty that surrounds and embraces me and mine. It's literally everywhere. I cannot move through a day and not be effected by it. Running water, electricity at our fingertips, cars, roofs over our heads, friends and family to share energy and communicate... So much. SO much! When I start naming in my head the wonders of my daily existence, simple things, I find joy starting to bubble up through the heaviness.

When I think of Jesus saying "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do, I think that he was not just talking about the people in front of him. He was also talking about me. He jumped out of himself and his agony and into his deeper purposes. He came to save. He came to save even those who did not realize they need to be saved. None of us really know what we are doing.

This Good Friday I have determined to let myself acquire a bit of my Tess. Think of this as First Friday. He got to go to His Father's house for a long sleep-over.

Whatever emotions come to me, or to you, this day, I honor Him  in my joy and sorrow. He could not have been raised had he not first died.

4-14-22 LEAVENING

I live in a body that deals with ADD, Attention Deficit Disorder. I did not know this about myself until I was old. I'm sad about that, because I think I might have been much more gentle and forgiving with myself had I known. When I was young the kids with ADD were the ones who were bonkers in class, who bounced around the room and talked incessantly and had difficulty staying on subject. They drove the teacher crazy. I was not a room bouncer, so I never gave myself the benefit of thinking there might be something awry in my body as opposed to faulty will-power. Why are we all so hard on ourselves? This morning it took me trying to remind myself what I was doing seven times before I finally decided it was a day for medication (I am careful of that.) I could not walk through a single doorway and remember what I had intended to do. It's mentally exhausting! My days are filled with "I should's" and "Maybe I'll's". It's really hard to stay focused on anything that is not super-interesting, and even then, I struggle.

 Then again, I thought that maybe because I am impulsive and easily distracted, I will allow myself to muse and research leavening instead of mopping the floor. Dirty floors will always be with me. They can wait while I focus on Jesus. He himself alluded to such when he rebuked Judas for complaining about Mary Magdalene's impulsive use of holy oil.

Mark 14:7  

For ye have the poor with you always, and whensoever ye will ye may do them good: but me ye have not always.

Anyway, I digress (because I have ADD. Duh.) I spent some time this morning studying up on leavening. I had made bread last night, easy artisan bread with crunchy crust and soft insides. Then this morning I started thinking about Passover and the unleavened bread that serves as a reminder of the Jews leaving Egypt before their bread had time to rise. My thoughts went back to Middle School where my friend Betsy always brought Matzoh bread to school for lunch during Passover. Matzoh with peanut butter was her go-to Passover meal. She was generous to share not only her unleavened crackers, but her family religious practices and traditions with me. Religious practices eventually become traditions when belief wanes.  (I digress again.)

Unleavened Matzoh bread.

Because I carry this little virtual library around in my pocket, I searched the history of leavening. Then I searched Passover. And then at what point in the religious year did the Last Supper take place? Today marks Maundy Thursday, the day Christians commemorate the Last Supper and the washing of the apostles' feet and the giving of the New Commandment (Maundy means mandate or commandment.)

The Gospels are not consistent about when that Last Supper took place in the upper room. Some say it was the great Passover feast. Others say it was before Passover, and that Jesus would have died before Passover, because the ones who convicted Him wanted it all to be over before the holy day. Some believe he died as Passover began, his blood spilling as the true Sacrificial Lamb, foretold with blood that was brushed over the doorways of faithful Jews.

The Last Supper by DaVinci

This is one of those times when the Holy Spirit inside me whispers, don't get stuck on the timeline. Get stuck, instead, on the gift. Rejoice in the gift.

We no longer need to go without leavening. He offered, in that Last Supper, newness. A new commandment. A new Sacrament. He is the leavening that helps me rise above myself. He works in me to lift me. He breathes air into my flesh. His purposes are without meaning without us. His presence is activated with warmth (The Holy Spirit)  and water (Baptism)  and the passing of time (Our limited earthly existence, regulated by time.) His sacrament represents all of this to me. Every Sabbath I lift my hand and choose the bread, freshly made in the ovens of my sister Ann Marie. I take it in remembrance of His power and perfect love. It is light and tasty and nourishing.  He gives us beauty for ashes, light for darkness, new life for what is passed. 

My sister, Ann Marie, bakes bread every Saturday
for our church congregation to use in the Holy Sacrament.
She consecrates herself unawares as she does this.
Here's a photo of my family assembling Orphan Care Packages
 to sell at my Christmas concerts. Fresh bread
and home made raspberry jam, cocoa and more.
Ann Marie made 100 loaves last year.
(That's her in the white shirt in the middle.
Masks for the pandemic. In 20 years when my
great-grandchildren read this they will wonder
what's with the masks?)

4-13-22 HOLY OIL

When I was young and got curious about something, I had to go to the bookshelves in our living room, drag a stool over and climb up to reach the colorful row of matching books set side by side in alphabetical order. Thinking back on it, I wonder where mom came up with the money to purchase those books? In those days, they were sold door to door, like vacuums and cleaning supplies were. I imagine it took her months to pay off the set of Encyclopedia Britannica. It's likely that by the time the publication was paid off the information therein was already outdated. 

Nowadays all those pages and pages of information are easily accessed and updated online. It's literally at our fingertips in a never ending flow, pictures and sounds and everything but the charmed scent of printer's ink on musty old pages. 

If I were a child today, my small arms would have reached up for the first book in the set, starting with the letter A for Anointing.  I've been pondering, for days now, the ritual of anointing: what it means, its history, its practice, and where it fits in the part of me that tries to decipher truth.

This whole patch of pondering started last week when I was studying the events of the Holy Week for a church lesson. I was intrigued, once again, by the fact that Mary, the sister to Martha and Lazarus, believed by many to also be Mary Magdalene, anointed Jesus with oil. I am a sucker for symbolism, so I often need to pause and ask the Holy Spirit within me to help me know what's true and what isn't, as well as what matters and what doesn't. I am still learning how the Holy Spirit communicates with me, so I rarely draw absolute conclusions. But I do find myself traveling on very long trains of thought if the landscape is interesting. 

I've recounted for years the tender act of Mary falling at the feet of Jesus during his final days, her tears bathing his feet. She wipes his feet with her hair, and anoints him with fragrant and expensive oil. But for some reason this year, in the recounting, I fixed my mind on the fact that the writers of the Gospels made note of her wiping his feet with her hair. Why would that even be noteworthy, that she used her hair and not a towel? Why would they even make the effort to give us that detail? And why did it matter what oil it was that she poured on him, or how much she used, or what it might have cost?

Luke 7:38 

[Mary] stood at his feet behind him weeping, 

and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them 

with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, 

and anointed them with the ointment

.

The idea of Mary's hair being exposed was most compelling to me. Why was her head not covered in the company of anyone other than family? My fingertips searched repeatedly for information to come to me through the light of my laptop computer. There are natural conclusions that come from those thoughts.

From various sources it appears to be widely believed that Jewish women in those days covered their heads except in their homes in the presence of family. This was a token of their fidelity to their husbands and devotion to their Lord. If Mary was comfortably in the presence of Jesus with her hair uncovered, they must have been something more than casual acquaintances. At least that is what I keep thinking. And interestingly, the thought of it comforts me, for the sake of Jesus. I want him to have had some affectionate tenderness at this pivotal time. I want him to have had some kind of feminine compassion and genuine sorrow at the thought of losing him, not only because he would not be there to teach and lead, but that he would not be there to love.

It's pure conjecture on my part, but I imagine Jesus entering the home, embracing the people there, and whispering to Mary through their embrace: 

"Mary, it's time. Do you have the oil?" 

He refers to the alabaster vessel that contains Spikenard, or Nard as the scriptures call it, a very costly oil used for preparing the dead for burial. I imagine Mary looking in His eyes, reading words unspoken, and falling at his feet, crying,

"No, not yet. Please, not yet!" 

And she weeps, her tears causing streaks in the dust on his feet. She wipes them with her hair, which has gathered on the floor around them. I imagine her getting the oil and, rather than waiting for the actuality of his death, she pours it over him, all of it, anointing him either symbolically, or possibly in an expressive use of the divine priesthood she may have shared with him. I imagine her begging him to save himself, because he had the power to do it. She had seen him raise her brother from the dead. She knew what power he had. I imagine the aroma of the woody, earthy oil filling the space of their home, covering everyone there, reminding them that all of us are buried, and will only be raised up by that singular Force of Power. I feel the emotion of the interchange. I feel the throbbing of my heart, pretending I am her. I feel her anger at Judas mocking her for wasting the oil, and I feel the comforting whisper of Jesus telling her she has done a good thing, this oil has filled the measure of its creation. I have an increased tenderness for the man Jesus, who loved as I try to love, and ached as I ache, and wept as I weep. If I knew I was dying, I would sorrow not only for myself, but for my David, and my children, my sisters and brothers. We share our pain because we love. 

Last week, when I was preparing a church lesson on the events of the Holy Week, I wanted to have something tactile for my students, to stand as a little witness of the power of these consecrated events. I made large plastic eggs with small reminder tokens in them, things like a piece of palm for Palm Sunday and a coin for Judas' betrayal and a cross for Good Friday. I got it in my head to find some spikenard and tiny vials to put it in, so that the students could open it and actually smell what Jesus and Mary smelled at that pivotal moment. I found some online and ordered it. They guaranteed it would arrive early enough to use in my Sunday lesson. By Saturday it had not arrived, so I searched and called every store within 100 miles of here; every herbal and essential oil outlet, every health food store and even funky hippie-like establishments.To no avail. Most clerks answered, "What was the name of that oil? I've never heard of it. Could you spell it for me?" Finally, I saw online that Doterra made Spikenard, so I messaged two friends who sell that brand of essential oils. They both responded right away.

Kathy Kay said she wished she had some, but she didn't. Jana said the same, but added she would check with a friend. At that point I got online to see what Spikenard even smelled like, so that maybe I could find a close substitute. I came up with something that was not Spikenard, but perhaps similar. I really wanted the power of aroma in the experience I offered in my upcoming class. I mixed a combination of oils I had on hand. Two of my sisters and I tore small pieces off a cotton ball, pressed them into the tiny glass vials I had purchased, and prepared to drop a tiny bit of the oil into them. 80 of them. As we worked my friend Jana called.

"Are you home?"

"Yes."

"OK, I'm headed over to you. I have some Spikenard, and I am giving it to you."

I objected, knowing that the cost of Spikenard, at least the quality that Doterra produces, is roughly $50 an ounce.

Within minutes the doorbell rang, and there stood Jana. I embraced her and welcomed her in. 

You'd have to know what's going on in Jana's life right now to see why Jana's presence deeply moved me. 

Jana Fowers is a most remarkable woman. Brilliant, powerful, beautiful and faithful. She is mother to nine children. When her son Jordan died unexpectedly just after his LDS mission, my first Christmas concert in Salt Lake City was a benefit concert for a scholarship fund in his memory. Their family has filled rows at my concerts for years, and I love them. Jana is a designer extraordinaire, astute in political and community matters, and a friend to all. Four years ago her beloved husband Sam also died quite unexpectedly. He left a lot of broken hearts. But Jana is guided by a strong inner compass and she sallied forth. A couple years ago she cautiously fell in love again, and is now Jana  Fowers Bybee. She and her husband Howard served a mission in the eastern US during the pandemic. Two weeks ago Jana's remarkable mother passed away just shy of her 100th birthday. She died on Sam's birthday. This month Jana is selling off her beautiful decor and leaving her lovely home and hometown to move to Howard's hometown. She is brave, and standing straight shouldered, as Jana does, but when I put my arms around her she curled in a little more than she usually does, and I felt a heaviness in her heart at leaving her kids and grandkids and a place filled with people who know and love her and have done so for decades. Whose heart would not hurt with all of this?

As I added drops of spikenard to our tiny vials after Jana left, I thought of her. Well into the wee dark hours of the night I thought of her, of her quiet resolve, of her nobility, but also of her tenderness. Jana was packing up her house for the move when I had messaged her about the Spikenard oil. I had not been aware of this at the time. Something in her caused her to pause from this immensely focused labor, and from her own shaken vantage point. I imagine her, like Mary, stopping to find the Nard oil. I imagine her telling herself to ignore the cost, to ignore the other labors pulling at her, to put herself and her offering of oil into motion and deliver it for holy use.

Jana would not know how deeply her offering touches me. The emotion of what she brought to me, knowing I would pass it on to so many other women, grew as the night progressed. As I dipped my small dropper into the ancient oil, I offered prayers for Jana, in her new home, in her new love as it sits beside her old love, in her new community. I offered prayers that she would know the love of her village here will remain wherever she is.

I inhale this spikenard oil, brought to me with complete purity of heart from a faithful woman. It is a powerful witness to me that our Lord uses women for his most divine purposes. He knows how pure a well-pressed heart can be. Pressed, like the oil that came from the Spikenard plant. Patiently and painfully earned.

ANOINTING

John 12:1-13 / Mathew 26:1-16 / Mark 14: 1-11. Three different accounts of Christ being anointed by a woman. John says it occurred the day before the Triumphal entry. Mark and Mathew say it was the day before the Last Supper. All accounts indicate a woman did the anointing, that she used costly oil, and that there was discussion about the monetary value of the oil. Judas, in John, complains that the oil was worth 300 denari, or 300 days wages. Ironically, Judas would sell off Jesus for one tenth of that, 30 pieces of silver.

Mary’s head was uncovered, against Hebrew law. Unless in a home with family.

Judas reprimands Mary for wasting oil.

The contrast could not be more pronounced: Mary is generous; Judas is greedy. Mary is humble; Judas is arrogant. Mary is selfless; Judas is self-centered. Judas stands aloof; Mary kneels in humble adoration. Together, they serve as vivid contrasting illustrations of Jesus’ own teaching: “where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Matt. 6:21).

One day pure knowledge will come to me, not through the blue light of my computer, but from the true light in my Master's eyes.