Pope Benedict XVI is 'warm and sweet'

His books lie on my desk, a tangible reminder of the astounding news this week.

Pope Benedict XVI will resign from papal office on Feb. 28, breaking a 600-year-old tradition.

As a religion writer, I have read every Vatican story that crossed my desk in the city Newsroom during the past eight years, trying to get to know Joseph Ratzinger, the man who became pope.

But it was my freelance work for the Tiverton-Little Compton Patch that gave me a window into the world of the Vatican.

In October 2011, I drove to The Commons Lunch in Little Compton for an interview with Dr. Joseph “Joe” H. Hagan, a local who visited the restaurant every morning after daily Mass at St. Catherine of Siena Parish.

While serving as president of Assumption College in Worcester, Mass., Hagan became a trustee of John Cabot University in Rome and was appointed as a Gentleman-in-Waiting at the Vatican, a position he has held for the past 22 years.

It is the duty of a Gentleman-in-Waiting to escort dignitaries and heads of state to an audience with the pope.

Consequently, Hagan served Pope John Paul II, now Blessed John Paul II, from his appointment in 1991 until the pontiff’s death in 2005; and Pope Benedict XVI from the time of his election that same year to the present.

Hagan described Pope Benedict as very traditional, warm and sweet.

“He has a beautiful personality,” Hagan said. “You can see it in his face.”

Today, I received an email from Father Giorgio Rizzieri, the Catholic chaplain of Rome Fiumicino International Airport in Italy.

A few years ago, he commented on one of my stories, and since then we have been correspondents.

When I heard the news of Pope Benedict’s resignation, I emailed Father Giorgio to hear his reaction.

“I have touching memories of my encounters with him each time he had to board a flight for an apostolic journey,” Father Giorgio said.

He added that he will always remember the pope’s calm demeanor, gentle smile and fatherly concern, especially his words of thanks and encouragement for his ministry.

“I will bring this with me for the rest of my life,” he said.

Father Giorgio wrote that the pope’s legacy will be the genuine experience of faith focused on reason.

“Every Wednesday I looked forward to listening to his catechesis at the General Audience – true delicious nourishings of mind and spirit,” he said. “He taught all Catholics to be strictly united in the Church and to be bold enough to swim against the tide of the politically correct. His ultimate effort for this target was his recent proclamation of a hopefully fruitful Year of Faith.”

There's no place like home in a blizzard

The generator hums rhythmically in the background as I write on my battery-powered Nook.
The simple things in life are best -- heat, light and well water -- and we have survived yet another massive storm, this time a blizzard named Nemo with hurricane-force winds that dumped about two feet in our backyard.
A driving ban is in effect for Massachusetts and Rhode Island so there is no place to go.
Yet as difficult yesterday was and these next few days will be, they cannot compare to the blizzard of 1978.
A stay-at-home mom with an 11-month-old daughter, I kissed my husband goodbye that morning, and little did I know that I would not see him for five days.
It snowed and snowed and snowed ... and it didn't stop for days.
While the power flickered, it never went off; and I never lost telephone service, even though the line hung low across the street and was swatted by passing snow plows.
My husband worked for a large corporation, and because he was in charge of maintenance and security, he was the last one to leave that day -- only by then the roads were impassable.
Back at home I fared pretty well. The cupboards were well-stocked. I cared for my daughter, and while she slept I read. But I worried about my husband.
Meanwhile, he was living off the vending machines in the lunchroom. When he ran out of money, he pilfered change from the secretaries' desks, leaving I.O.U. notes behind. He slept in the rafters, warmed by a small generator-powered boiler that kept the chemicals just the right temperature.
Five days passed and still dressed in the same clothes, he made a break for it, driving away from the plant despite a driving ban. He made it through a city and two towns before he was stopped at a roadblock.
Abandoning the vehicle, he walked the rest of the way home, another ten miles.
I cried when I saw him walking down our street.
Today, in the aftermath of this latest blizzard, we are doing the best we can, accepting the fickleness of Mother Nature in stride.
We toss another log in the woodstove, admire the beauty outside our window, and thank God we are together.

Winter woes and wonders

A couple of nights ago the howling wind woke me, and I prayed the hundred-foot pines surrounding our Massachusetts house would bend and not break.

In the morning, I learned that my daughter had lost power at her house, and she had dressed her toddler and baby in winter coats to keep them warm.

My son awoke to a call with the news that the roof of the steel building that houses his workplace had peeled off like the top of a sardine can.

This wild weather worries me.

Similarly, my mother had a sleepless night, thinking about the summer house. So my parents drove to Rhode Island to check for damage.

Stopping near the water’s edge, my mother watched the wind-whipped waves pound the shore with a vengeance; but she found the house sleeping peacefully in the sunshine.

Winterized and unable to generate heat or light, the house hibernated waiting patiently for our return, she assured me.

"Come when the rains / Have glazed the snow and clothed the trees with ice, / While the slant sun of February pours / Into the bowers a flood of light," wrote nineteenth-century romantic poet William Cullen Bryant, a New England native.

Today we head to Sapowet Management Area, a wildlife preserve on the east bank of the Sakonnet River, a short distance from our summer home near Fogland State Beach.

Jumping out of the truck with my camera, I brave the cold, creeping quietly along the frozen terrain and trying to catch a colony of seagulls unaware.

Those offended by my trespass flap their wings in annoyance, but most plainly ignore me.

Despite the frigid temperatures at this estuarine intertidal wetland, the Ring-Billed Gulls congregate on the icy bank, with their white heads and underparts blending into the white world around them.

Their wingtips are black with white spots, their bills yellow with a black ring near the tips.

From December through February, their habitat is our New England coastlines, and today they are right at home in this Arctic paradise.

I shoot photos until my fingers are numb with cold, then run back to the truck.

As I climb in, I hear the good news.

According to groundhog “Punxsutawney Phil,” an early spring is on the way.

When the groundhog emerged from his burrow this morning, he didn’t see his shadow.

What a relief!

Despite the prediction, I leave my hood and gloves on for a few miles, until the heater finally kicks in.

'Why the beach makes us happy'

 

During the coldest week of winter thus far, the ocean unperturbed rolls in and out in liquid form, while the seashore is tundra, frozen and static.

Driving onto the beach, the sand crackles as the Dodge Ram climbs over the hard sediment encrusted with ice crystals.

My husband shuts off the engine, but the stiff Arctic wind keeps us inside. In minutes, the bright January sunshine warms the truck cabin, even though the temperature gauge registers 24 degrees without factoring wind chill.

Getting comfortable, I click off the seat belt, unbutton my wool coat and take out the February issue of “Coastal Living” magazine. The cover is mostly turquoise, the color of tropical waters and skies, highlighting the feature story about a house without walls on Scrub Island in the British Virgin Islands.

I sigh as I imagine summer at Fogland Beach, just five months away. Ugh!

The truck shifts as the icy wind batters the vehicle, and the antenna rattles in defiance.

But then another story catches my eye on the Contents page: “Why the Beach Makes Us Happy.”

The tease reads: “It’s almost universal. Just being by the sea puts us in a more blissful state of mind – and it turns out, there’s science behind it.”

Rifling through the pages, I find page 70 and satisfy my curiosity.

The first paragraph states the obvious: Beachgoers are attracted by the beauty and the freedom of a day at the beach. But then comes the science that writer Barry Yeoman cites as the reason why we experience such deep contentment by the water’s edge.

He points to the color blue which produces feelings of security and relaxation, as well as the acoustics.

“It turns out that the most pleasurable sounds have predictable wave patterns, middling to low pitches, soft volumes and harmonic frequencies at regular intervals – all characteristics of the ocean’s rhythms,” he writes.

My husband has cabin fever. He opens the door, and the cold wind rushes in. I lose my place and my patience, as I yell, “Hurry, shut the door!”

I button my coat and wrap my arms about me. Now, where was I?

According to Yeoman, “the root of our contentment might even be molecular… Ocean waves generate negative ions, charged air particles that have been linked to mental energy and emotional well-being.”

I wonder if icy winter particles have the opposite effect, but I keep on reading.

He winds up his theses with a side effect of a day at the beach, the memories that are made. Every time we remember a particular beach or see a photo, “we have those good experiences again,” he writes.

Shaking, my husband jumps back in the truck, starts the engine and cranks up the heat. I put down the magazine and strap on my seatbelt.

We happily drive away.

 

 

 

 

 

Favorable winds

The windsurfer's sail is upright for a minute or two.

A frigid sunny morning with northwest gale-force winds, my husband and I head to the beach, anticipating high surf and angry waves.

Our Dodge Ram bounces over the rough terrain as we drive as close to the Sakonnet as we dare, the wind pelting sand and spray at the vehicle.

I attempt to open the door against the wind, and it flings the heavy door back at me. I open the window instead.

Watching a lone windsurfer struggle to raise the sail in choppy seas, I shudder; and memories of an ill-fated sojourner flood my mind.

Twenty summers or so ago, my daughter was walking on Shore Road when she saw what appeared to be a black trash bag, flotsam being hurled back and forth in the tide.

Walking down the steep bank to the seashore to investigate, she saw a man in a wet suit floating in the foam.

Terrified, she called for help, alerting neighbors who pulled the battered body onto the beach.

Minutes later, the first responders arrived, paramedics running from their van with equipment in hand. Shortly after, they slowly walked back to the truck and drove away.

Then came the press, interviewing witnesses and videotaping the lifeless body lying on the deserted beach.

After they left, a solitary officer remained, standing vigil over the nameless windsurfer who was not taken from his resting place until dusk.

Back in the present, I feel the Dodge rock back and forth with each gust, and I cannot take my eyes off the windsurfer.

Over and over, he strains to raise the sail, only to be thrust headlong into the waves.

Finally he gives up, dragging the board and sail in the pounding surf along the water’s edge. Even that requires tremendous strength as wind and water conspire to toss him and his gear onto the rocky beach.

We drive to the summer house, once he is safely ashore.

Rounding the bend on Shore Road, we stop and I roll down the window. The whitecaps careen into the bay violently breaking against the rocks, sending forth a fountain of droplets.

And once again, I am reminded of the unknown windsurfer who sailed these waters long ago.

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable,” wrote Roman philosopher Seneca (4 BC-AD 65), a contemporary of Jesus Christ.

I have faith in a loving God, and I believe the windsurfer is in a better place. The Sakonnet was just his port of entry.  

Skating on thin ice

This pond on Neck Road in Tiverton reminds me of the one I skated on as a teen.

This morning I drove along a road in my childhood neighborhood, and I wondered if it was still there, hidden behind all those trees.

When I was a teen, I spent a lot of time in those woods.

If you knew where to look, you came to a clearing where there was a shallow pond; and in January, it became a sheet of ice.

I still remember the excitement of slinging my skates over my shoulder and hiking with my friends to the natural ice rink.

Sitting on a very cold rock, I would lace them up quickly, take those first few strides and glide.

“Even now I can’t describe why I love skating so much,” said New England native Nancy Kerrigan, the 1994 Olympic Silver Medalist.

There is nothing quite like the feeling of being airborne, the sharpened blades skimming the ice, the frosty wind at your back – propelled down the runway and almost taking flight.

Created by runoff from a nearby water tower, the pond was about a foot deep in most places so we never had to worry about falling through the cracks, although I suppose getting wet was a worse fate.  

Yet sometimes, the ice was downright dangerous. Rocks, vegetation and tree limbs froze near the surface; and we all took some nasty falls. Later we would limp our way home.

“In skating over thin ice, our safety is in our speed,” wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson.

As a youngster, I had some professional training. I was a member of a Junior Girl Scout troop, and we took roller skating lessons at a rink in Warren, R.I.

I cannot remember much about the instruction, but I do recall one incident.

I was outside the rink practicing skating backwards when I collided with an object – a basket. Unfortunately, my ten-year-old self fell into it, where I was stuck with my wheels spinning overhead. Hearing the laughter around me, I longed to stay put.

Despite my clumsiness, I did learn to skate backwards on ice and on hardwood; and I clocked miles in my parka and in the short, blue-and-white plaid skating skirt my mother made me.

Indoors, I felt that same excitement lacing up my skates and taking that first rotation around the rink – the feeling of being free.

Then one day when I was 16, I went roller skating to Lincoln Amusement Park in Dartmouth, Mass., and a boy asked me to skate with him. I held him up as he stumbled and fell.

I like to think it was my mad skating skills that attracted my husband, but it was probably the skirt.   

A season of snowdrifts, silence and seclusion

January is a month of quiet.

Walking in our yard, I hear the crunch of snow beneath my booted feet – and little else.

I listen to the silence.

The frigid temperatures on this first weekend of the New Year keep our neighbors tucked warm inside. The only sign of habitation on our street is the fragrance of wood smoke in the air.

Our neck of the woods is blanketed in white, snow clinging to trees and dusting rooftops. The driveway and front stairs are coated with ice, despite plowing and shoveling right after the storm.

Tiny black-capped chickadees take turns darting in and out of the pine trees to the birdfeeder and back, and they take no notice of my passing.

New Englander Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about these friendly little birds:

“Piped a tiny voice hard by, / Gay and polite, a cheerful cry– / Chic-chicadeedee! Saucy note / Out of sound heart and merry throat, / As if it said, ‘Good-day, good sir! / Fine afternoon old passenger! / Happy to meet you in these places / Where January brings few faces.’”

Although it is tempting to hibernate today, we brave the cold, jump into the Dodge Ram and head to the beach.

It is early morning, and there are few cars on these country roads.

After checking the summer house, which is snug and sleeping soundlessly in a long winter nap, we drive down to the beach. The sand is as hard as ice, and we hear a crackling sound as we navigate over the sediment and crystals.

There are gale-force winds today, and the Sakonnet is deep gray reflecting wintry skies above.

I spot one brave soul walking along the beach with two passive dogs at his side. They amble slowly against the unforgiving wind, perhaps regretting this day’s frosty romp by the sea.

Wrapping my arms about me, I scan the horizon. There are winter fields of white across the bay and meringue-coated houses clinging to the hillsides.

I crank down the window and strain to listen to the slough and sigh of the waves, while the wind tunnels into the cabin. A minute later, I shut the window, sorry for the impulse.

In the quiet, cool confines of the truck, I think about this new season and its restrictions. I know that there will be time enough to venture out into the world and explore. But for now, January urges us to sit a spell.

Emerson wrote: “Over the winter glaciers / I see summer glow / And through the wild-piled snowdrifts / The warm rose-buds below.”