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Blow by Blow or rather Box by Box

Blow by Blow or rather Box by Box

Last updated on: January 24, 2009 at 9:30 pm by Matt Kennedy

Blow by Blow or rather Box by Box 2009-01-24T21:30:00-04:00 Matt Kennedy

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I’m in that impossible place of having lived so much in such a short amount of time that I have nothing to say. It seems years and years have passed in the course of one day and so now I am very old and my back hurts.

I’ve been trying to think in categories of things, but its not going anywhere, so I’ll try days.

Thursday 8 January
Noon Eucharist. Found the Tabernacle Candle out. Thought it odd. Went to lunch with a friend (really fine Indian food) and arrived home at 2 o’clock to find that we’d lost our court battle. Had an immediate adrenalin rush. Felt like panicking. Sat down with Matt and four whirling children to pray for a few minutes. Then headed straight over to church to pack up our offices and get out the stuff that belonged to us. Fell sad, exhausted and geared up, into bed.

Friday 9 January
Tachee (I’ve decided to go ahead and use her ‘name’ because you’ll never be able to find her this way) came over early to stay with the children so I could go back to church with Matt and finish packing up, as well as doing up a final bulletin for the service. Worked all day.

Saturday 10 January
Women’s Bible Study and Choir Practice. Went home to “pack” only to sit down on the couch and fall asleep with my mouth open so that I woke up drooling.

Sunday 11 January
To church early. No proper Sunday school because of parish meeting. Children all made little things out of Femo/Sculpy. Parish Completely United, save one. Everyone eager to know where we would be the next Sunday. 10:30 Service with Communion and Incense at the last minute because of the Baptism of Jesus and because it seemed like the thing to do. Excellent Music and Sermon. Everyone crying. Stripped the altar at the end. Someone accidentally spilled over the therbal making a large smear of ash across the nave floor. Walked out in silence.

Monday 12 January
Friends arrived early to start packing. Made extensive and complicated lists and pinned them to the stairway wall. Tachee took the children to make their lives happier. Felt really sad. Packed all day. Amazing Friends. Someone began taking laundry away to do and bring back clean. Pizza for lunch and supper.

Tuesday 13 January
Friends early again to pack. Packed all day. Ate more pizza. Realized that it had Iced the previous Wednesday preventing us from going to CC, meaning that here I was, on a Tuesday Night, Completely Prepared Already for class next morning. Wondered at the mercy of God who knows all things and from whom nothing can be hid. Verse for the day, ‘If the Lord had not been my salvation, I would have soon gone to the land of the dead’ or, If the Lord had not been my salvation, and you had not come to help me pack, I would have soon gone to the land of the dead.

Wednesday 14 January
Took the day off packing. Went to CC. Realized there was no breakfast and stopped at Starbucks for muffins in the frigid cold. Windows frozen shut and had to get out, even at the drive through, to buy said muffins (and coffee). Very calm CC morning. Thanked God for the break from Chaos. Dropped all the children at Tachee’s. Realized there was a free hour with no children. Went and had all my hair cut off. Young child like boy hair cutter took nearly Two Hours to cut it. Repented of my rashness and began praying for it all to miraculously grow back. Met Matt at St. Andrew’s Rectory to receive the key from Msgr Meagher who has been So Gracious, I cannot even begin to describe to you how gracious. More people in the evening to pack. Lovely friend showed up with supper—beef stew, fresh spinach and strawberry salad, plus more pizza. ‘Scriptural Refrain of the Day’: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning, great is thy faithfulness O Lord.

Thursday 15 January
Up early. Packed all day. Amazing friend took two oldest children to do CC Review for the afternoon. Amazing Tachee took babies to her house. Amazing guys from church and from the Shepherd’s Bowl showed up on the Coldest Day in a long while to begin moving stuff to St. A’s. Stayed on my toes trying to keep track of where boxes were going. More supper from wonderful friends—baked ziti. Slept the first night at St. A’s Rectory.

Friday 16 January
Men’s Bible Study at Denny’s. Guys over early to begin moving again. Totally spooked our black kitty who promptly ran away. Began worrying and praying about kitty. Back and forth from old to new houses trying to pack and unpack at the same time.

Saturday 17 January
Woke up late. Widely made semblance of order before 10am so that Women’s Bible Study could sit and be warm and cozy. Forced to unpack beautiful restful Bombay china in order to serve tea. Derived great comfort therein. Dumped out several other boxes looking for Bible and fabulous Isaiah Commentary. Found it in the evening, when I wasn’t looking for it any more. More help in the afternoon unpacking. Back to the old house three times to look for kitty.

Sunday 18 January
Worshiped at Conklin Avenue Baptist Church in their gym. Couldn’t find anything to wear, for anyone. Two hours of sheer panic while we dumped boxes out looking for anything, tripping over each other, crying and finally getting to church an hour and a half later than usual. Fell in a snow bank with the baby. More crying. Coffee hour continued at the St. Andrew’s Rectory and more people unpacked and tried to sort through all the junk. Micah hosted Sr. High Youth Group in the Basement. Back to the old house three times to look for kitty. More praying.

Monday 19 January
Went straight away to check for the cat. Tried vaguely to clear up before more visitors. Friends brought lunch and helped unpack all the school supplies.
For Supper made a pork chops for Matt. Discovered that all through the weekend God had rolled the same tape over in our hearts, “You meant it for evil, but the Lord meant it for good.” Micah hosted Middle School Youth Group in the basement.

Tuesday 20 January
Morning Prayer in the Basement.
Remembered, unhappily, that it was Inauguration Day and we had no way to watch the proceedings. Managed to pack E and A off with Tachee to watch it. Swapped her big kids for babies when it was over. Sat on the couch and drew pictures of our system of government. Amused to find that E lost all her principles in rapture over Obama’s beautiful daughters. She spent the rest of the afternoon trying to draw a perfect picture of them. Started four or five times because it wasn’t coming out right. Spent the evening preparing for CC and packing an elaborate and unnecessarily beautiful lunch (curried egg salad sandwich, a little jar of gray sea salt, boiled eggs, carrot sticks, apples, bananas, Oreos, little plates and napkins all packed in a fancy pail because I couldn’t find any of our regular lunch containers).

Wednesday 21 January
Up at 5 to gather wits. Long time ‘mussing’ hair with weird gel trying to look hip. Reviewed all the songs and hand motions for class. Left promptly at 8 for a restful morning of CC. Turned out not to be restful as all 4 little boys appeared to have eaten straight sugar for breakfast. Home to find Matt is serious horrible pain from barbaric teeth removal. Immediately went to fill his prescription. Took it home, went back out to look for the cat. Came home and cooked a long and complicated supper for Micah (who has been owed supper for a long time) involving Sweet Potato Fries, Curried Chicken and Rice, Peas, and Chicken Soup for Matt from scratch (a satisfying little pot of chicken, carrot, celery, onion, garlic, thyme and peppercorns, added cream to thicken it up). Forgot to make dessert causing children to gnash teeth and whine. Disappointed all parties by falling asleep after story time leaving Micah and Matt to fend for themselves. Deeply impressed to wake up and find Micah doing the supper dishes.

Thursday 22 January
Did Morning Prayer for Matt in the Basement.
Started on our bedroom. Got distracted by hanging up curtains and looking for pictures to put on the walls. Didn’t actually put any clothes away.
Celebrated Thursday Noon Eucharist in the basement using a wineglass, a bread plate, some oldish wafers, and the end of a bottle of something. Excellent discussion about God’s providence and love. Several trips to look for the cat. Surprised to have a Realtor come by to show someone the house and church. Grateful that we hadn’t had time to pick up, prayed fervently they would hate it and be put off by all the strangely dressed children. Took Emma to ballet. Put all the children to bed. Finished off the end of ridiculous and lesser known L. M. Montgomery novel, The Blue Castle which turns out not to be nearly as romantic as I thought it was as a child, still very pretty descriptions of the weather.

Friday 23 January
Woke up to the sound of the Men’s Bible Study going on loudly. Poured bowls of cereal and wished I could wake up sooner than the children so as to be able to pray. Sat vapidly in front of the computer catching up on other people’s blogs. Went to look for the cat. Read more blogs. Made a pot of tea but forgot about it and went to the post office and to look for the cat. Came home and drank a cup of cold tea. Nagged Matt about being on time to go to the notary. Were late to the notary to sign the New Corportation’s Papers. Went to Circuit City for a wireless router. Went to look for the cat. Still no cat. Cried bitterly and put the last load of stuff in the car.

And that brings us to today, Saturday 24 January. And so to bed, because tomorrow there is church, and more trips to look for the cat, for whom, tonight, I hope you will pray and pray and pray.

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