Rhythms

OK, I admit it. I feel bad, even though there is no real reason I should. I have just noticed that it is almost two weeks since I last posted a blog and that is not very good. I have, though, been amazed at the number of different people who have said that they have been reading and I feel bit off that I have allowed the posts to slip.

What is interesting me more, though, is why they have slipped.

When I was abroad I had a rhythm for each day, to be honest because ‘being on sabbatical’ was the only thing I had to do. This meant that I got a lot written on the various projects that I have been considering and each day I wrote a reflection arising from that day. Back in the UK two things have changed. One is that I have been building the poustinia and the other is that I have been spending time with the family.

Building anything is unpredictable. It is possible to write for a two-hour block and the go to chapel, write a blog or go for a walk. It is not possible to stop with a wall half fixed upright or roof-felt half stuck down because, if you do, it is highly likely that you will need to redo everything you have done when you return due to wind and weather. Thus other things get pressed.

Time with the family has been wonderful. I hate being away from them. However what this means at the moment is that no two days are the same. I am spending 5 days a week away from home, and they join me at the weekends (so that we get most of the week together), but that means that one day I will be all alone with one rhythm, the next I have a journey, the next I am at home the next another journey, the next I am excited about them arriving and so on… It is lovely, but hard to settle into anything.

Why this reflection? I suppose it has made me realise again how important it is to find and use the rhythms of life. Sometimes they will be provided for us, sometimes we have to make them, and sometimes we have to muddle through without. They are a blessing to be cherished though.