Heartwork

Sue to Mark 5, part 3

       Thank you for your concern about my Dad. My parents live on the edge of the hill country southwest of San Antonio. Dad was a colonel in the Air Force and they are close to the military establishment there. His surgery will occur at an air Force hospital in San Antonio. I have a brother and sister who live in the area and they will be there for Dad's surgery. I will go home, of course, if the surgery doesn't go well. But at the moment, we're expecting all to go well. They are planning a trip to Dallas the third week in May. Dad is quite the Texas history buff and I'm doing a unit on Indians of Texas at school. He will come speak to my classes and then we will celebrate their 45^th wedding anniversary at the Dallas Symphony that Saturday night.

      There are so many other items in your last installment I want to respond to i.e. C. S . Lewis: (I did a book review of A Grief Observed for Baptist women in our church 6 months before Roger died. I have known of A Severe Mercy for many years - but have not read it. I will definitely put it on my list for the summer.) Trips, house, the story of Roger's death, your work, my work, our families, our children . . . so many topics, so little time. (Your last note came at nearly 2:00 a.m. - how deeply and ruefully I can identify!) I must take the TASP test tomorrow morning at 8:00. Unfortunately, although I have a master's degree and 11 years of teaching experience, I do not have a teaching certificate, and I have to take the TASP test to continue course work on my teaching certificate (I'm taking 3 hours of independent study this summer on critical thinking which should be fun). A public school would never hire me, but private schools have a little more latitude. All to say, I must conclude. I'll leave you with a little Emily Dickinson (whose work I love so much I named a child after her . . .)

                                                 After great pain, a formal feeling

                                                                             Comes---

                                                             The Nerves sit ceremonious, like

                                                                             Tombs-

                                               The stiff Heart questions was it He that

                                                                             Bore--

                                                            And Yesterday, or Centuries before?

                                              The feet, mechanical, go round-

                                                           Of Ground, or Air, or Ought

                                                                          A wooden way

                                                                         Regardless grown

                                             A quartz contentment, like a stone-

                                                          This is the Hour of Lead-

                                                          Remembered, if outlived,

                                                          As freezing persons, recollect the

                                                                           Snow

                                                          First-Chill, then Stupor-then the

                                                                            Letting go-

 

 

                                                 Your Friend,  

                                                                                                   Sue

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