Lughnasa Waning Honey Extraction Moon
The herd tramped out to Roseville, to Warren’s second house, a gift to be that never found its receiver. A broad curve of land on a first ring suburban street holds this late 40’s, early 50’s rambler with dark wood, scrolled book cases, formica kitchen counters and an outdoor fireplace built into a concrete patio. It was someone’s dream, back in the long ago, the second millennium, after the second Great War when we all wanted to huddle down, have kids, read the newspaper and go to church.
This evening it housed this a congregation of graying, even whitening men, who met to discuss at Warren’s call, gratitude. Who did we feel grateful for in our lives? Who reached out to us and saw something special in us, something we may not have seen in ourselves? Who touched us? Three wrote letters to dead men: a seminary father figure, a partner in a business, a great-grandfather of many gifts. One wrote to or about his father, another to his brother. Two letters were written to former bosses.
We had charred meat, cooked on propane outside, as men’s dinners must be on quiet summer evenings when the weather still has warmth. We ate together, swapped stories of Maine, Saudi Arabia, grandkids and grandfatherliness.
After a moment they came up to the counter and said, ‘We go around the country walking into places and visualizing people naked.” How ’bout that?
He also recalled a George Carlin sketch in which Carlin noted that he was not an atheist, nor an agnostic. Instead, he said, I think I’m an acrostic. We all agreed to put that down as our religious preference next time we were asked.
This was the fourth Woolly session that Mark has attended, perhaps the last one for a good while. He seemed glad to be there and I was glad he had a chance to see this group of adult men who love each other. Our congregation.