It has been a busy week at the Vicarage. I guess the pace really picked up last Frida.y As Brenda had her first full day at the apple orchard I performed a funeral and then mowed the lawn at our local art gallery. Meanwhile Amanda did her on-line children’s church lesson and prepped for Sunday.

Saturday was church clean up day. About twenty of us raked leaves, pulled weeds, dug up saplings and cut down a few bigger trees.

By the time Amanda and I got home from this we both needed Motrin and a nap.

Sunday of course was a church. After service one of our congregants had a medical emergency. Thankfully a family from church was able to get her to urgent care. Afterwards while the family got the lady settled back into her home Amanda, Brenda and I took a trip to the pharmacy to pick up…

The dogs and I got up at 4 A.M. this morning to begin the day. It is just before 6 now and they have had their morning outing and are now eating second breakfast. Well, Mercedes is pushing the breakfast bowl around inside the eating crate trying to bury second breakfast so she can eat it later for elevenses.

It has been a busy few days here at the Vicarage. Brenda has been working some long hours at the apple orchard in Harvard MA and Amanda has been working some long hours at the church.

I have been running between the Vicarage and visitations and what not. Yesterday I had a funeral over in Athol MA and then I had to mow the lawn up at the art gallery up the street after supper.

The art gallery gig is something I picked up early in the summer…

I often write with music playing softly in the background. Somehow the rhythm and the sound help me to focus on what it is I need to say. It is like the sound draws the words out of me.

Maybe that has something to do with my years as a worship pastor. I remember one of my mentors teaching me that in order to lead worship effectively, I needed to be able to move beyond the place where I played music into the place where the music played me.

Yesterday I wrote to an Epic Celtic Album on Youtube. Tonight I am playing the Easters. Somehow their music fills me with hope and just a touch of melancholy. Those things might not seem to go together. Maybe they don’t. Maybe they are polar opposites like the yellow and purple on a color wheel.

Maybe that tension is what I am…