iPad bliss

I have to start this post with a confession. For months I've been lusting after an iPad, and I've been having serious discussions with myself and God about how that's not what I should be lusting after, spending money on, even thinking hard about. I was doing pretty well with that, or so I thought, disguising all those side glances at friends' iPads, only checking out the Apple website once in a great while.

And then, to my great astonishment and greater delight, some dear friends gave me an iPad, thus short-circuiting the me-and-God-and-I-shouldn't-want-this conversation. Here's a photo of me in iPad bliss, fresh from the Mac store. I am, I have to tell you, having a wonderful time discovering its charms, linking up to this and that, playing Scrabble, checking the web, and hoping that God is OK with all this fun.

Four generations

Last November my great-niece Amy gave birth to Addyson Kayanne Skalisky, the first of her generation in my family, and on Saturday we had a family gathering to meet this 4-month-old charmer and take a photo of four generations: in the group photo, Grandma Joanne, Great-great-aunt Kathy (my sister), Amy, Addy, and Great-great-aunt Susan. Shocking though it is to become a great-great-aunt, it sure was fun to meet the newest and to think about all that lies ahead in her life! May she have many joys and many adventures.

We also got to visit with Addy's Aunt Cara (above with Addy) and Uncle Jacob, with Great-Aunt Sally and Great-Uncle Gary and first cousins once removed Corina and Katie... And we had the fun of revisiting family baby songs and games, of catching up with each others' doings, of applauding Corina in her gorgeous prom dress and seeing Katie's drawings, of being family. I'm grateful, always, to belong to a family that loves and enjoys each other. What a blessing, and what a blessing for Miss Addyson.

Excess

The first day after coming home to Bellevue, I needed to make a trip to Bellevue Square, our local mall, to get a new battery compartment for my Macbook laptop. Now Bell Square is not just any mall - it's full of high-end luxury stores, and I've heard that it makes more money per square foot than any other mall in America. So you can imagine.

The first thing I saw as I walked in was a store called "Free People." "Free People" - I'm not even going to look up the URL - features fluffy dresses for teenage girls. The next thing I saw was a giant poster at a store called Oakley: "Join the Rebellion!" said the poster. "Join the Rebellion" was surrounded by photos of a guy in swim trunks and sunglasses (sunglasses being what they sell: Join the Rebellion, wear expensive sunglasses).

What would Libyans and Tunisians and Egyptians think of those notions of freedom and rebellion?

After I got my new battery, I walked over to the nearby QFC supermarket and marvelled at the sheer excess of offerings in any category. In El Salvador, I can find three kinds of flour in the supermarkets: white wheat flour, corn flour, rice flour. Period. In QFC, there must be 65 different kinds of flour - rye, barley, amaranth, quinoa, teff, red winter wheat, and so on and on. There was a display case with 23 different varieties of gourmet chocolate bars. Mind you, it's grand fun to shop there: you can find anything and everything. But for someone who's been living in Central America, it's beyond excessive.

I know I could find grocery stores in the Seattle area that would look a lot more like my Salvadoran supermarkets, and I'd feel more at home there. The flashy wealthiness of Bellevue, apparently untouched by three years of economic collapse, imagines a world full of people who think they should have anything they could possibly want. I hope and believe that is not the truth of my Bellevue neighbors - but it is the truth of the merchandizing that surrounds us.

Barack Obama in El Salvador

I'm sad not to be in El Salvador today while President Barack Obama visits - not that I'd have been asked to the state dinner, but the television channels will have been full of images of every moment. The moment that will mean the most to many Salvadorans is captured here: Obama paying his respects at the tomb of Monseñor Oscar Romero in the crypt of the Cathedral in San Salvador. La Prensa Grafica, source for this photo, noted that a few days ago Obama had said that Romero is a point of social reference not just for El Salvador, but for all the world.

I'm sad not to be there today, but I'm proud and happy to be a U.S. citizen who lives and works in El Salvador on this day.

Feast of St. Joseph

Our western community of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace had a very special Feast of St. Joseph today - we were all invited by Father Paul Magnano, pastor of the new downtown Catholic Church, Christ our Hope, to celebrate the Solemnity of St. Joseph. Father Paul invited the CSJPs because our history is so entwined with this new church, and with its home, the Josephinum, an elegant former hotel on 2nd and Stewart in downtown Seattle.

Back in the 1970s-1980s (before I entered the community, so I don't have the precise dates), the Catholic Church bought the hotel, which Elvis Presley once slept in, and turned it into senior housing, administered by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. We called it the Josephinum, in honor of our patron saint, and put a chapel in the former ballroom. The Josephinum has since become low-income housing, serving many formerly homeless people in downtown Seattle, and about six months ago, the chapel - beautifully remodeled - was transformed into the Christ our Hope Parish. A statue of St. Joseph which used to stand in the chapel now is placed in the Josephinum lobby.

We were invited to join in the Mass and to bless and rededicate the statue of St. Joseph - we all got to take turns sprinkling Joseph with holy water (that's Sister Noreen Linane at work in the photo). And we were honored by Fr. Paul's homily, which concluded:

The example of Joseph is precious to each of us. His Sisters of Peace who ministered in this building for 23 years are also precious to each of us. These sisters continue in their ministries today the commitment of Joseph to right relationships, justice and peace. This Solemnity of St. Joseph triggers our own response to care for each Jesus and each Mary in our lives, given us to cherish, to protect, to help grow. We pray for joy in discouraging days, for confidence in hopeless situations, for joy in our heartbreaking service to all God’s holy people

Novel without End

About a year and a half ago, I bought a copy en español of Ken Follett's World without End, or in this case Un Mundo Sin Fin. All 1178 pages of it.....and I don't read very fast in Spanish. I dithered along with it for a year and more, got to about page 300, and didn't have much energy to continue. Then Sister Kristin Funari came on a Christmas visit, and she spent every possible moment reading the English version of World without End. I decided that if she was having that much fun with it, I owed it to myself to persevere through the remaining 878 pages.

And now, three months later, I have actually read page 1178, the novel without end has ended, and I feel very pleased to have arrived there. I am also reminding myself that the next book I pick up in Spanish could well be something a little, er, shorter....say 250 pages, max? But Ken Follett is always fun, and I now have a vocabulary that includes some unusual architectural terms - who knows when I can ever use it?

Tomorrow I fly back to Seattle for three weeks of combined meetings, vacation, family time and friend time - at least I won't need to carry a three-pound book along!

Parsing a Lenten Fast

My Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace have suggested a Lenten Carbon Fast for 2011 and sent out a calendar (created by the Intercommunity Peace and Justice Center - you can find it here) with 40 carbon-fast options - one, you'll notice, for each day of Lent. I could happily incorporate most of the suggested actions or changes, but reading the calendar in the context of Suchitoto, El Salvador, Central America I saw that some changes had to be made.

So here are my Central American alternatives to some Carbon Fast ideas:

Turn down your thermostat. We don't have a thermostat or a heating system. Alternative: be sure to turn off the fan when leaving the room.

Check for drafts and seal leaks. Houses in El Salvador are built full of openings so the hot air can escape. Alternative: take a morning walk in the cool of the day.

Beware of hot water use today. Like most Salvadorans, we don't have a water heater. Water comes out of the tap at room temperature - which is sometimes quite toasty! Alternative: water plants by hand, not by hose, and use a jacal (tub) to do dishes.

Try travel without flying. Not a possibility for my trip back to Seattle in a couple of days - I can't even get from here to Seattle non-stop. Alternative: donate to a carbon bank organization to offset the heat I'll be adding to the planet.

Hang clothes to dry on a rack or clothesline. This one's no problem: that's the only way we have of drying clothes here (and they generally dry in 2 hours). Alternative: mark it done, and move on.

Turn down your hot water heater. See above: no hot water heater. Alternative: pay more attention to turning off the lights when I leave a room.

As you can see, there's only a few of the 40 that needed to be rephrased for Central America. Most of the Carbon Fast ideas will work anywhere - check tire pressure, pick up litter, unplug appliances, recycle, learn about climate change. My greatest challenge is to cut back on driving - especially now that gas has reached $4/gallon here. There's a certain amount of necessary driving that goes with my mission, but my goal this Lenten season and hereafter is to combine trips and get in that car much less often.

And climate change has certainly reached us here in Central America. The weather patterns over the two years I've been here have been more violent and less predictable than the norm. This year, we've had several big rainstorms already, though the seasonal rains aren't supposed to start until May. I can't do enough to hold back the changes, but I will do what I can.