Jul 29 2015
St. Martha's Day

On What is Just Right

Martha

Summertime is full of the feast days of lesser known saints, and for the 29th of July it’s the Feast of St. Martha, patron saint of cooks. If hearing this calls to mind for you a contemporary patron saint of cooking and entertaining, Martha Stewart, well, then… your mind operates a bit like mine. In the gospel story, Jesus is visiting Martha and her sister Mary at their home in Bethany. Martha is consumed by the tasks of good hospitality: cooking, preparing, making everything just right. Her sister Mary, on the other hand, spends all her time visiting with their guest, leaving all the work to Martha. Martha, as you might imagine, is a bit peeved about this situation, and she asks her guest to intervene. “Lord,” she says, “don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

But Jesus basically tells Martha not to worry about so many things, that she should come and sit with him and Mary. I love this story, because I can be a bit like Martha (both the biblical and contemporary versions) as I strive to make sure everything is just right. But what is just right? Sometimes just right is just being. Martha offers us a valuable lesson. She does this by practicing the opposite, of course. But through this visit and what she learns from her visitor, Martha teaches us to engage life fully and to not worry so much about appearances, and this is a valuable thing to learn.

Image: Saint Martha, in a Flemish illumination from the Isabella Breviary, 1497. [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.

 

Jul 23 2015
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Neptunalia & Salacia

Salt & Water

CloudySkyMediterraneanSea

The Romans celebrated the Feast of Neptunalia and Salacia today, the 23rd of July. And why wouldn’t they? In these hottest days of summer, it is only logical that we would want to escape the heat, no matter to what age we belong. And so the Romans did just what we would do today: they would hit the beach. The sea beckoned then just as it does now, and the masters of that sea were Neptune, the sea god, and his wife Salacia, goddess of the salty sea. For their feast day, the Romans would go to the shore and enjoy the salt air and cool sea breezes. Water and wine were fundamental to the celebration.

If you are not landlocked, you would do well today to visit the sea. Dip your toes in the ocean nearest you. Breathe in the salted air. I can see the Atlantic if I stand on my rooftop, so we have an easy time of it here. If you are in the center of Kansas, far from the ocean, I’d say you can probably just as easily find your Neptunalia and Salacia in a pitcher of water. It is a good day to recognize our reliance on water, to honor its preciousness. Without it, we are nothing.

Salacia, of course, is a name derived from sal, the Latin word for salt, and we’d do well today to also recognize all that salt brings to our lives. We hear the constant warnings of the sodium in processed foods, how there is too much sodium in our diets, the threat it brings of high blood pressure… but if we connect with our food more directly––prepare our own meals from basic ingredients––we recognize immediately the importance of each ingredient, and salt is an excellent example of the need for moderation and balance in our lives: Too much salt will render your meal inedible; too little and your meal is mediocre. But the right amount of seasoning can make things downright sublime.

The Dog Days of Summer, these hottest days of the year, ruled by the dog star Sirius, remain with us until the middle of August. So get you to the beach today if you can and cool off some. The Romans would wish it so. More importantly, though, may your day today be one where the importance of common, ubiquitous things––things like salt and water––are understood and honored for their beautiful mystery.

Image: Cloudy Sky, Mediterranean Sea by Gustave Le Gray. Albumen print, 1857 [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.

 

Jul 02 2015
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Book of Days Calendar

Your July Book of Days

Liberty

My birthday is on the First of July and so that makes me, according to some of my Canadian friends, an honorary Canuck, for my birthday falls on Canada Day. I find this all very interesting, because I was supposed to be born on the Fourth of July, a “real live nephew of my Uncle Sam,” as the song goes, but I was early for something for once in my life, arriving three days early and on the national holiday not of my native country but of Canada. What is odder is when I speak in public, which turns out to be pretty often (and even this is odd as I’m a pretty shy guy, generally), people often ask me afterward where in Canada I’m from. Toronto? Alberta?

I chalk this up to a couple of things: First, as a shy guy, I am a quiet guy. My voice doesn’t carry well and I mumble a bit… so when I speak in public, I try to focus on projection and diction. Second, I listen to a lot of Canadian music. For no particular reason; it just so happens that a lot of my favorite artists are from there. You try listening to Jane Siberry for 28 years and see if her speech and diction patterns don’t infiltrate your head, too. (Not to mention all those prior years of fascination with The Smiths, UB40, and, when I was a kid, ABBA––not an American in the bunch.)

Put these things together (28 years of singing along to a quirky Canadian and attempting to focus on diction) and I am pretty sure this is the source of my apparently not-quite-American speech patterns. Or maybe it’s just that I was born on Canada Day. Nonetheless, I am pretty big on the Fourth of July, and the family will be coming to our house for the traditional cookout and for toasted marshmallows as the day closes, and come sunset, we will head to the lagoon to watch the municipal fireworks. And in pondering what or who should be the cover star of the Convivio Book of Days Calendar for July, it was a no-brainer: I went with something patriotic in honor of our nation’s 239th birthday. Click either of those two links above and you’ll have this month’s calendar, ready to print as a PDF document on standard US Letter size paper.

The image is from an old penny postcard from our collection. As the postcard says, 4th of July Greetings to you, and to yours. I wish you a month of wonderfully summery things.

 

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