dual personalities

Tag: Lessons and Carols

December 10, 2012

Weekend update

by chuckofish

Oh, weekends in December! So busy and filled with seasonal activities such as buying Christmas trees ‘n such.

On Saturday the husband and I hopped in the Subaru and headed over to our local Optimists lot where the fellas are very friendly and helpful. We picked out two trees (one big and one small) and as my husband disappeared into the trailer to pay, I moseyed over to talk to….yes! Santa!

image-6

I asked if I could take his picture and then one of the guys directed me to sit on Santa’s knee. I demurred. He insisted. Santa admitted to having a titanium knee. Hilarity ensued.

santa

Then one of the guys said, “Oh that’s a terrible background. Let’s move some trees over there…”

tree 1

More picture-taking, even less flattering than the first batch, so I will cease and desist at this point to share any more. You get the picture.

I am telling you, we are well on our way to December 25th! I put up the little tree.

xmastree

It is beautiful, isn’t it? We’ll put up the big tree next weekend when daughter #2 gets home.

On Sunday the boy and his bride came over and we went to the Service of Lessons and Carols at Grace. It was very nice, but I was distracted by the woman in front of me who went to my high school where every year the choir put on a Festival of Lessons and Carol of its own, the old school English version. This woman was a few years ahead of me (7) and was a cool-girl-hockey-player, and I couldn’t stop thinking about how she’s 63 years old now! Could it have been that long ago that we sang Ralph Vaughan Williams in the school chapel? Yes, it has. Turns out, she saw our sign out in front announcing our Lessons and Carols service and she decided to come. I told her it was great to see her and I hoped she’d come back.

‘Cause you sure as hell can’t go home again. Onward and upward.

Anyway, we are well into Advent. Blessings be upon you and yours. Here’s “Gabriel’s Message” sung by the King’s College (Cambridge) Choir to start off your week right:

8 Comments
December 5, 2011

Stand ye still, and ye shall see the salvation of the Lord

by chuckofish

Tonight I went to our service of Advent Lessons and Carols at Grace Episcopal Church. We sang all the great Advent hymns, including (56) O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, (66) Come Thou Long Expected Jesus, and (265) our all-time favorite, Gabriel’s Message, the one about “thou lowly maiden Mary, most highly favored lady.”

There were eight lessons, scripture readings from the old and new testaments, and a variety of carols sung by the Choir of Men and Women, the St. Nicholas Boys Choir, the St. Cecelia Girls Choir, and the (adorable) St. Patrick Training Choir. This AND a homily from the visiting Rt. Revd. Stephen Dokolo, Bishop of the Diocese of Lui, Southern Sudan, who looked like a Masai warrior without a spear. Very impressive indeed.

The highpoint for me was when fourth grader Brigid strode across the choir, bowing before the altar, and proceeded up to the lectern to read the second lesson. Clearly enjoying herself, radiantly self-confident, she smiled and read Isaiah 40:1-8: “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God” better than most adults are able. She never stumbled over such stumbling blocks as “recompense” or “constancy”. She read with conviction, “‘Cry out!’ And I said, ‘What shall I cry?'” She brought to mind Linus in A Charlie Brown Christmas.

I am particularly fond of Brigid and her siblings because daughter #2 has been babysitting them for many years and so I have a tangential, proprietary attachment to them. They give me faith in the next generation.

So onward through Advent: Look toward the east, O Jerusalem, and see the joy that is coming to you from God.

5 Comments