Trinity Lake - Day One - Morning

"But one by one we must all file on
  Through the narrow aisles of pain."
                                                                      

-from 'Solitude'

 by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ow.
I am paddling through the narrowest part of The Narrows.
The narrowest part, where it is all so beautifully quiet.
I decide to slip gently to the shore for a moment, to the large flat rock who's top, so invitingly, sits high and dry just a few inches above water level. I am doing this to document the moment.
To do a quick sketch...

After all, it's why I'm here.
But in landing, somehow I manage to catch my finger between canoe and rock.
As I drag it back and forth through the lake water, I recall the words
'the narrow aisles of pain'.

Not a very positive name for these beautiful narrows.

In spite of the pain, I do love this bit.

Narrow waterway, and the view through to gap ahead - blue lake, rocky shore.
Like the song says, I will return once more.
And I have.
Day One of my solo canoe trip.

I sit atop the flat rock and scribble in my journal. It doesn't take more than twenty minutes, and I am back in the bow seat facing the stern, solo paddling position, pushing off from the rock with the butt of my paddle.
It is all so glorious. Still and warm.
I am here.

I paddle slowly, knowing the way, having time.
I am fifty-nine year old artist, writer and teacher, Diana Becquet, 
on Trinity Lake in central Ontario, Canadian shield country, for nine days of solitude.


                                                       *


I have come on this canoe trip alone.
(My idea, not Bud's.)
I am flying solo, here to draw, paint and write.

This is a first for me.

At least the first time since being a teenager that I have paddled the waters of Trinity Lake without Bud somewhere in the vicinity.

We have tripped on, through and around Trinity Lake dozens of times over the past forty years. We've camped at every site, (and then some), on each of its large three bays. But, in the way of our relationship, we have not always stayed at the same site at the same time.

It does seem odd, when I say it out loud.

Bud does things differently.

He is a nonconformist.

If you are inclined to do something because it has always been done that way, Bud will find a way to do it differently. If it feels comfortable, Bud will throw in a few sharp edges.
He likes this type of challenge.
As for me, if I have my doubts about something, some risk, he encourages me to push too.

So here I am, on my own.

Pushing.

I'm definitely pushing my comfort zone.

But it is my idea.
                 

I want to find my rhythm, my voice, my  spiritual connection.

This time, I will spend the days, these nine days, my way.

Solo.

One campsite, my own routine, space.

Space allowing the past to be seen again,

for the memories that have been pushed away

for far too long, to come to the surface. 

                                     *


When I first met Bud, he asked about my surname.
Becquet, pronounced 'Beck-Kay'.  A 'Jersey' name,

Jersey being one of the Channel Islands, the tiny islands clustered between England and France.

Bud wasn't interested in the history. He was trying to get it right.

My name, that is.
He wanted to call me 'Beck', 

and it stuck.

I get that now. 
It's the way his family works with names, the family of Alexander Rudyard Ryder Junior.
From Windsor Ontario, mother, father, and a sister five years older. When he was born, he was to be called Rudyard, to distinguish this baby boy from his father Alex.
But his 5-year-old sister thought Rudyard was too hard to say. And started calling him Bud.
And so, he was Bud.

Bud.

Few words. To the point.

On one canoe trip:

Bud: "You solo back. I'll hike the shoreline for a few miles. I'll meet you in a couple of hours at the landing."

Me:  

"It looks like it's going to storm.

If it storms, I'm heading into the woods. 

I may not be back at the landing when you get there. Then what."

Bud: 

"It won't storm. 

I'll be there in two hours. 

I'll wait."

Another, maybe thirty, thirty-five years ago:

Each of us on different parts of the lake as darkness falls - me at our site, Bud, having spent the afternoon exploring the dense bush at the end of the bay.

And he doesn't show up.

I pace the shore all evening, too worried to eat. I finally go to bed, and make a plan. 

As the moon comes up in the wee hours and over my half-asleep self, I hear a paddle.

Dip, dip, and swing.
And there he was, far out on the lake, 'in the pale moonlight', (like the old camp song says),  approaching slowly. 

In a dark and tangled part of the wilderness, he had gotten a fire going, and waited.

As the moon rose, all became clear.

He made his way to the canoe, drank thirstily, stripped, swam, dressed, paddled back.
As if nothing had happened.

"Supper's ready." Me from the shore.
"I'm starving." Bud, smiling.
For Bud, it's as good as it gets.

 

Trinity Lake - Introduction

Fifty-nine year old artist 

Diana Becquet 

sets out on a pilgrimage of sorts,

a solo canoe trip to Trinity Lake

for nine days of art, solitude and

reflection,

exploring her artistic muse

and unravelling her past.

* * *

'Trinity Lake' is a work of fiction. 

Not quite a novel, perhaps more of an 'epic poem', 'Trinity Lake' appears on this Blog

one entry at a time

from

'Day 1 Morning' to 'Epilogue'

Many thanks for reading!

Bottom left arrow, (newer post), to continue...

Anne Renouf

 

Remembering R. Murray Schafer

I can easily think of my life in these terms: the time before I knew Murray, 

and after.

I think that there are many who feel this way; who remember 

the precise moment that they first met him. 

He was that sort of person. 

For me, it was the late 1980's and I was visiting friends near Peterborough.

Murray dropped by.

He fixed me with his piercing eye and told me that he had 

AN IDEA.

Murray had a way of making you feel that his idea, an idea of great musical genius, 

was somehow about you.

Or perhaps, you, and the small part that he wanted you to play.

In my case, it was my years spent wilderness camping, cooking over an open fire, 

and being able to handle a canoe that sparked his interest. 

That, and the convenience of my being in the right place at the right time. 

A third person was needed to stern a canoe and help cook for fifteen,

for a three day musical performance planning session in the wilds of Haliburton County.

It was the very beginning of what was to become known as 'The Wolf Project'.

My role in all of this was so minor.

But even so, I felt a deep sense of belonging.

Murray believed that everyone played a part, and so even the 'kitchen staff' and 'sternswomen' 

were part of the brainstorming, the composition, the music, 

and most importantly the ritual of it all, 

from the very beginning.

For five summers, I spent a week as a member of the Wolf Project,

helped create masks, costumes, performances,

and most especially 'Firebird', constructed of tree limbs and twigs,

then floated out over the water at dusk and set on fire,

accompanied by echoing, haunting music in the most beautiful place on earth.

Life's demands led me, by necessity, in other directions.

But that involvement would touch every aspect of my life, influencing my work as a

visual artist, teacher and writer.

I am forever a follower of the creative vision of R. Murray Schafer.

I am forever a Wolf.

As fate would have it, my partner and I have lived for twenty-plus years

three kms south of Murray and his wife Eleanor James.

We became close friends, sharing meals, countless bottles of wine, 

ideas, music, art.

Happily, we were able to spend hours listening to the consummate storyteller 

relate our favourites from his past, 

again and again and again.

In recent years, as his stories slipped away, the bond of friendship turned to caring,

and a deep abiding love. 

We have listened to a great deal of the music of  R. Murray Schafer in the last week or so,

music filled with Murray, the sounds of his world, and as fresh and clear as the first light of dawn 

on that little lake in Haliburton Ontario where, for me, it all began.

It is his voice for the world to hear.

Photo collage: Anne Renouf                   Murray, Oct 2019

 RMS    July 18 1933 - August 14 2021

Walking The Walk

 

 

'Act fairly,
show kindness,
walk humbly with God.'

(A translation of Micah 6:8, in answer to the question, “What is required of you?”, connecting faith with action, caring for those in need.)

I thought of this verse recently, while reading a post on social media,

a post written by someone against the idea of

‘setting aside a month for Pride’, specifically, and LGBTQ2+ issues in general. 

I was taken aback by the tone of the post, by its lack of understanding.

The person writing it I knew to be a religious type, writing from what he thought to be a ‘Christian’ point of view.  

But clearly, a homophobic point of view.

.

I responded, by attaching an article by Michael Coren entitled,

“What would Jesus do during Pride? Simple - he’d wave a rainbow flag and march in the parade”.

I believe this, by the way.

Jesus would be walking the walk.

Having spent several years in an ‘Affirm’ study group in our small, rural but progressive congregation, (within the United Church of Canada), I was part of a team that took our time learning to 'walk the walk'.

We studied, met with people, heard achingly poignant and heartbreaking stories 

of struggles with issues of sexual orientation and gender identity. 

Over the months, years, we received pastoral advice, had intense group discussions,

spent a lot of time in prayer, and read and read and read.

The result? Our little church is now an Affirming Ministry.

Walking the walk.

Perhaps you can imagine what I had set myself up for, by attaching Michael Coren's pro-Pride article to a conservative Christian's post.

I wasn’t really surprised by the reaction. 

Well maybe a little surprised by his words ‘lies’, ‘disturbed’, and ‘unnatural’. 

I countered all of that with an offer to loan him Michael Coren’s excellent and grace-filled book,

'Epiphany

A Christian's Change

Of Heart And Mind Over

Same-sex Marriage'

and added some thoughts of my own:

“Our communities need safe places for all who are marginalized -

the least, the lost, the last, the littlest, the lonely.

Isn’t that what our faith work is about?

Isn’t that what Jesus did?”

I knew this wasn’t going to magically change his attitude. But the conversation was being followed by at least some of his many social media friends.

His comments (predictably) were getting many many ‘likes’ and ‘hearts’ and 'shares'.

My comments - zero.

My attachments, my book recommendations, my thoughts were not 'liked'.

Not liked at all. 

Luckily, I have a pretty thick skin. But didn't my words reach anyone?

He went on to suggest that I should have a ‘hard read' of the gospels, 

the unspoken message being that I wasn’t getting it right, that I was clearly missing something, misinterpreting ‘love’. 

A ‘love’, (the message seemed to be), that would mean pointing out to people the error of their ways, even if the perceived wrong is something innate, as in determined at birth, 

like facial features or handedness or curly hair or skin colour.

In the days that followed, all of this stayed with me.

All of this began to play on my mind. 

I couldn’t quite dismiss it in ‘agree to disagree’ terms,

(that unhelpful phrase that really means ‘I'm sick of arguing - you are too thick to get this.’)

I kept thinking...

here are dozens of folks, (his friends), who are following this post.

I had posted these words, for all to see:

“...the least, the lost, the last, the littlest, the lonely.

Isn’t that what our faith work is about?”

Not one of them, not a single person, liked, loved or commented on this.

I wonder... 

Is that what Jesus would do?

"...the gay issue has become the prism through which myriad conservative Christians judge not only their but other people’s faith, morality and conviction. It’s tragic, reductive and destructive on so many levels." 

          - Michael Coren - 'Epiphany'

So, I'm left to wonder, in all of that silence.

For an LGBTQ2+ person, how exactly does all of that disapproval, rejection, disregard,

that 'us versus them' attitude,

how exactly does that show love?

Surely, in love, there is belonging.

Caring and helping. Communication and validation.

Inclusion.

 

I decide to do some research, searching for something...

Searching for, well, something affirming.

And I find this:

“The hardest spiritual work in the world is to love the neighbor as the self -to encounter another human being not as someone you can use, change, fix, help, save, enroll, convince or control but simply as someone who can spring you from the prison of yourself, if you will allow it." - Barbara Brown Taylor

 And this:

“With all the changing ways of understanding gender and sexuality, most of us truly need contemplative eyes and the guidance of the Holy Spirit to ‘rupture simplistic binaries’ and be compassionate and respectful of difference and diversity. It clearly seems that God is quite comfortable with immense diversity."   - Richard Rohr 

And this: 

 “There’s a part in each one of us that would prefer the certainty of an unchanging rulebook to the radical open-endedness of God's ongoing self-revelation in love. But as a Christian, when confronted by a tension between a religious certainty which leads me to violate the law of love and a deep unknowing that still moves in the direction of ‘loving my neighbor as myself,’ (Matthew 22:39) I am bound to choose the latter course.”

-Cynthia Bourgeault

 

 If I were to offer a piece of advice to my new, somewhat pharisaic, penpal, it would be to have a 'hard read' of Cynthia Bourgeault, or Richard Rohr, or Barbara Brown Taylor.

Or Michael Coren - that would be a good place to start.

Because if nothing else, you would hope to gain a better understanding of 'the other', to be more inclined to welcome the stranger.

To offer unconditional love.

To reach out with compassion and respect.

Michael Coren, on preaching at Metropolitan United Church in Toronto:

 "I saw collectives of warmth and support, groups of people from various ethnicities, backgrounds, sexualities, and experiences united in acceptance. ...I told them that as a straight man who had reversed his position on gay rights and equal marriage, I had recently experienced a glimpse of a shadow of a whiff of what it must be like to be a gay Christian.... I said that remaining Christian in the face of hostility and even vitriol was an indication of an enormous depth of faith and was a living, fleshy example of a glorious mystery. I spoke of unconditional love, of what scripture actually said about sexuality rather than the popular and misguided caricature of Biblical truth that we are so often offered. I said that the only absolutes were grace and love." - Michael Coren, 'Epiphany'

Walking the walk.

“Never stop looking at the world as a place of love and never stop embracing and accepting that love. If two men or two women commit to one another in a devoted, sacrificial, committed, faithful marriage, the Christ-centred world of love is made deeper, wider, and better.” - Michael Coren - 'Epiphany'

 

 

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone

Sixty Years Ago in NZ...

Anne Renouf - middle row - second from left

Auckland NZ, 1960

(from the Renouf archives)

A good snapshot stops a moment from running away.

- Eudora Welty

My memory has been nudged.

It's funny, isn't it?

There I was, doing a bit of research into the place where I began my schooling. 

(It was only later on that I realized that it was exactly sixty years ago.) 

What I turned up was quite astonishing.  

But I need to back up a bit...

When I was four and a half, my family moved from Toronto to Auckland NZ. We sailed from Vancouver in January 1960. Six months later I started school - June 30 1960,

 the day I turned five.

I mentioned my early schooling in a previous blog post, and while writing it, wanted to be clear about the order of nuns who taught at the school - St. Joseph's Orakei.

(The Brigidine Order, as it turns out.)

To my delight, the school still exists and has quite an excellent website, with a section entitled 

'Our History'.

I clicked on 'Our History', only to see a photo of the three nuns who ran the school in the early days - 

Mother Damian, Mother Veronica and Mother Tarsisius. 

A few more clicks to a couple of historic school photos, and up pops one of a First Communion class, with my clearly recognizable seven-year-old sister, Kit,

 in the very front.

(See below.) 

Was I imagining things? 

I peered at the image for some time, as it really seemed too extraordinary. 

I enlarged the photo, examining it carefully. 

Yes, that is Kit, front right. 

And then, scanning the very back of the photo, I see myself, in a crinolined party dress, (that perhaps I insisted on wearing), restrained by my mother's arms (also easily recognizable), and looking totally in awe of the ceremonial breakfast. 

Is it extraordinary?

In the (more than) sixty year history of this tiny school on the other side of the world, there are three photos of students in the early years.

Hundreds of children must have gone through this school.

Three Renouf siblings - Simon, Kit, Anne, 

(our eldest brother Andy went to a different school, our youngest brother Pat wasn't born yet), attended for less than a year and a half. 

I mean, what are the chances?

More photos, (these from the Renouf archives), below:

St. Joseph's Orakei students, 1960

The Brigidine nuns,

Mother Veronica, Mother Tarsisius, Mother Damian

Simon, Kit, Anne, 1960

109 West Tamaki Road, Auckland

Postscript:

 I remember the photo of the entire student body being taken. 

I liked the girl to my left - I think her name was Christine.

I was in Primer One (pronounced 'primmer'), and Mother Damian was my teacher.

Things I loved: 

Hot meat pies, guavas, swapsies, Ladies Bay, One Tree Hill, Smog (our cat),

 'White Coral Bells'

My mother kept in touch with Mother Veronica, (Kit's teacher), a dear wonderful lady,

for the rest of her life.

White Coral Bells

(Traditional Children's Song)

White Coral Bells

Upon a slender stalk

Lilies of the valley grace my garden walk

Oh don't you wish that you could hear them ring?

That will only happen when the fairies sing.

I Left You A Feather...

"Hope" is a thing with feathers -

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops - at all -

-Emily Dickinson

...a feather on the breath of God.

-Hildegard von Bingen

I left you a

Feather !

love, Alexis

While out briefly one afternoon, two of our little-uns dropped by with their mother, in order to leave the grand-dog with us for a sleepover. We were sorry to miss them, (the humans that is... we got to see the dog), but the upside was finding this,

the perfect note. 

(See above.)

We love feathers around here, (it has become a bit of a game), and of course the creatures to which they were once attached... our regular birdfeeder visitors:

blue jays, sparrows, doves, blackbirds. 

And the not quite as regular:

cardinals, grosbeaks, warblers, robins,

and sometimes even Canada geese...

The bully blue jays, or as we call them, blockheads (a 'Gumby' reference), are like a gang in the Spring and early Summer, swooping down on others and causing minor disturbances in the bird world in order to pig out on the seed all for themselves, often shedding a feather or two in the process. 

These beautiful (detached) feathers are great for art-making, such as

 dream-catchers, mobiles, wall hangings, and any mixed media art.

Farther afield, (in our quieter, lonelier, more spacious top field), it is not uncommon to come across a wild turkey feather, a feather especially coveted for its 'Harry Potter' uses.

(See below.)

                                    

But more than being useful, there is just something about finding a feather.

I remember singing about feathers as a small child - feathers and angels -

a song from my earliest childhood. 

In my first year of school, (begun on my fifth birthday), I was taught by one of the Brigidine sisters at St. Joseph's, Orakei in Auckland NZ. 

I faintly remember songs and prayers, and 'swapsies', (my collection of religious stickers),

 and something to do with

feathers and angels.

I can almost hear it, in my far away not-quite-forgotten past:

When feathers appear, angels are near.

Hildegard von Bingen, 12th century German abbess, writer, composer, philosopher and visionary knew a bit about feathers too.

The feather flew, not because of anything in itself but because the air bore it along. 

Thus am I "A feather on the breath of God.."

 I have no trouble buying into it, the spiritual aspect of feathers.

 I so want a feather to be a sign. 

Maybe a sign of strength or wisdom, or that someone in the heavens is thinking of us.

Perhaps it is true that a feather connects us with our ancestors.

As it flutters gently to the ground, perhaps it is carrying a message.

A message of hope, (a thing with feathers), as Emily Dickinson muses...

perching in my soul.

Or perhaps it carries a message of love,

a message which may be a special delivery from a great, great grandmother.

 A gift of love, 

(just like the gift of love written on a scrap of paper by an eight-year-old in July 2020

with feather attached), 

 Perhaps the message is saying,

I left you a feather.

Love.

Tiny Gallery

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