Letters from Ascension Hermitage and Sanctuary

 It's chilly and overcast here today, but this little squirrel found a pecan that he had buried last autumn - so breakfast was a yummy pecan! I hope you, too, are having something delicious for breakfast - pecan waffles?  or something even more delicious!

Maggie was spayed last Tuesday - when I picked her up at the vet's office on Wednesday, they advised using a collar because Maggie very much wanted to remove her stitches! The collar lasted about five minutes because Maggie wanted to remove it too! So on with the blue post-surgery suit. Maggie actually seems to like it and so far, has made no attempt to take it off. Maggie is a little cat - she is almost a year old, but only weighs 5.6 lbs. Fortunately, she has a long body, so the medium size suit originally purchased for another larger cat is quite comfortable. We'll remove the suit and stitches next Wednesday!  

I was delighted this morning to see that bumble bees also love irises!   And on a different note, I want to share a prayer that I heard last Sunday. . . not in church but on the radio! Listening to  Pipedreams  is a regular part of my Sunday evening schedule - sometimes I pay close attention and sometimes it's just background to whatever else I'm doing. The program last Sunday included Sacred Place  by Alex Berko.  This was the program note: " Sacred Place  is an ecological service that connects the old with the new, the sacred with the secular, and the individual with their community. The outline of the work is a Jewish service. However, rather than Jewish prayers, the text is made up of various writers and thinkers who speak of the environment as a place of safety, comfort, and beauty. Written for SATB choir, piano, violin, and cello, the six-movement piece is at times a meditation and at times an impassioned prayer for the world we inhabit and share." In...

Much rejoicing here on Maryland's Eastern Shore - the hummingbirds have returned! I took this photo from the laundry room window, so the hummingbird blends right in with the nearby leaves. Usually the males get here first, but this little female is the first I've seen to visit our feeders. We hope you too have a wonderful day with many reasons for rejoicing!  

On this gray, rainy day we said goodbye to the smallest Sanctuary House resident, our guinea pig Daisy. I must admit that before Daisy came to live with us in September 2004, I really knew almost nothing about guinea pigs - I certainly didn't imagine that they have amazing, outgoing personalities and definite food preferences. Daisy taught me all of that! Whenever I go out the dogs welcome me home with much barking - Daisy welcomed me with her loud wheeking, the same way she greeted me every morning. Of course, Daisy ate ordinary guinea pig food (actually a premium blend of hay pellets, fruits, and veggies!), but I also discovered that she loved dandelion leaves and flowers, Italian parsley, green beans, bell peppers, and apples. Daisy was already a senior guinea pig when she came to us, in the last weeks of her life she only wanted to eat her favorite foods . . . I definitely agree with that idea! This morning she was silent, curled in a nest of hay, her spirit gone to the Rainbow...

 I was delighted to find the first iris blooming two days ago! This small purple and yellow iris is one that I added two years ago. The larger purple irises that make up most of this bed are from my friend Bill Asplen. Bill died in 2004, and his cousin encouraged me to take the irises from his garden before she sold the house. They bloom every year with very little help from me - my only job is keeping grass and Virginia Creeper out of the bed!  In addition to Bill's irises, I also took his little American Eskimo dog Minnie. Minnie died many years ago, but I always think, when the irises bloom, that Bill and Minnie are still watching over all of us at Sanctuary House. Many more to come:

 One hundred sixty-one years ago today, General Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the Civil War. I have reason to believe - although certainly no proof - that my great-grandfather, William Scott, may have been at that meeting. I must admit that in all my years of school I do not remember ever hearing anything good about General Grant. However, I did read today that not only did he agree to release all of the Confederate soldiers being held prisoner by the Union if they would promise not ever again to take up arms against the United States but also allowed the Confederate troops to keep all of their personal property including their horses. And upon learning that Union troops were celebrating, he said, "The war is over; the Rebels are our countrymen again, and the best sign of rejoicing after the victory will be to abstain from all demonstrations in the field." [Quotation ...

 If you have been participating in Lent Madness  this year you will know that the final candidates for this year's Golden Halo are Sister Constance and her companions: Sister Thecla, Sister Ruth, Sister Frances, the Rev. Charles Carroll Parsons, and the Rev. Louis S. Schyler - and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The information for today included this prayer:   “Dear Child of God, I write these words because we all experience sadness, we all come at times to despair, and we all lose hope that the suffering in our lives and in the world will ever end. I want to share with you my faith and my understanding that this suffering can be transformed and redeemed. There is no such thing as a totally hopeless case. Our God is an expert at dealing with chaos, with brokenness, with all the worst that we can imagine. God created order out of disorder, cosmos out of chaos, and God can do so always, can do so now -- in our personal lives and in our lives as nations, globally. ... Indeed, God ...