I have been trialling infirmity, dear reader, to see if I’m well suited to a life of indolence, occasionally flirting with despair. The trial has been forced upon me, somewhat. It’s my first dalliance with a hospital bed, ward food, beeping machines and deeply suffering housemates. I must admit, I don’t think I’ll stay, despite some its occasional charms.
People are altogether rather interesting. We’re all such open books, really, in so many ways. For some reason the delicate balance of sterility and banality creates a stark white backdrop against which our eccentricities are laid bare, clarified and amplified for all to see. Our persnicketiness and peculiarity is framed by a 3x3m window to amplify the effect, in an ‘overflow’ ward of about ten beds. I note the characters around me. The difficult customer. The silent sufferer. The weeper. The curmudgeon. The empath. The larrikin. The everyman. All to be loved in their own ways.
I see so much suffering in here, and find myself falling into a silent prayer again and again. You don’t know who has faith in here. Who has some. Who has none. We all toil against the vagaries of our broken bodies and fallen natures, battling the bleeding, the infection, the disease, the rot and the ruin, and the first question you want to ask, is of course banished from polite public discourse. Are you a believer? Which is of course to ask - do you have a framework of faith and reason against which you can map this pain, this loss, or this confusion?
Perhaps you can feel it. The ennui, or outright despair that supplants faith. The references to the solaces, consolations and distractions that lack the elegance and beauty of a different kind of life; a different kind of relationship to our Lord and His creation. Diet Coke. White bread. Cigarettes. A charged phone. Validation. Honour. Pain. A decent meal. Good coffee. TikTok. You can guess which are mine and which are other peoples. I’m as fallen and distracted as anyone. But your heart extends, reaches, in an anonymous yearning, a prayer of intercession, a quiet, loving bemusement, for the the charming, motley rabble that surrounds you.
And God help them, what must they think of me? How do I appear to them? That self absorbed, hobbling isolate that spends too much time with his laptop, utterly crawling through The Two Towers, or taking calls from his thousand children. Unmoored from home, I am lovesick. I miss my beloved, long suffering wife. I miss our kids. I miss the our charming goats, the irate sheep and the chickens and the alpacas. I miss the paddocks. I miss the round of hay I have to visit twice a day. I miss our impetuous dogs. I miss the noise, the mess, the beauty of the hills, like some incredible watercolour wrapped around our humble little acreage.
I miss our parish, the brothers and sisters in Christ with whom we worship and Commune. I miss the Mass, with a liturgy more beautiful and edifying than we could ever deserve. I miss my real breviary, and our little altar. I miss my music room, my guitars and my pedalboard. I miss the broken couches in the lounge room. I miss the tired rug in our library. I miss the bookshelf. I miss the verandah, with our outrageously long table to fit the beautiful rabble I call my family.
They are the “blood of my heart,” to quote my beloved Dai Bando from John Ford’s masterpiece. And this, dear reader, is who I am, and all I have to offer. Substack hosts an awe-inspiring array of theologians, philosophers, authors, artists, poets, academics, literary prodigies. All I have for you are my prayers, my reading, my quiet life in a quiet little town. I have Carmel, and my vocation. I have a wife I adore, and our eleven children. I have music and song, and a dear love of writing, and the creative endeavour, with a contemplative longing at the heart of it all.
For now, I am this. This is what I have and what I share, and if you’ve made it this far, perhaps we’ll cross paths again. Praised be Jesus Christ - Now and forever.