from the ‘bardo holyland’ dept:
this morning, sonny and i followed ali out to the marine post, for a short am workout. these marines must be suffering — they can’t get out for a decent run due to security concerns, and their treadmill is for the birds. they’ve got a nice set of free weights tho!
we came back to the heavenly smell of fresh-baked muffins. thanks, mum and cris! tasty, too. a relaxing, slow morning, getting ready to go back to the holy sepulchre for owen and jacob’s blessing. father luke, the sardonic franciscan placed in the holy sepuchre (he’s hilarious, and a good, good man; he has some interesting takes on the other churches sharing the space), did the blessing. troy and kath, godparents for jake, and pat and mindi, godparents for owen, stood for the ceremony. there were fantastic readings from the bible, and from william blake, and children’s stories.
after the blessing we went over to the monastery for a bit of shopping, then grabbed some of the (2nd?) best shawarma in jerusalem. mmm. i could eat this stuff forever. from there we met father luke again, and walked the stations of the cross in reverse. we got a lot of history on each station, and there were readings from the guidebooks where appropriate. when we finished up we said goodbye to father luke; some of us went over to notre dame (!) to prepare for the dinner party, and some of us went back to the house for mum and the boys (and jackets, and party favors, etc etc). cris and kath and i went back to the house, and stopped for a bit of shopping — cris and i were stunned as kathleen haggled with the shopowner for a pair of leather sandals. she’s a natural!
the party was for jake’s 1st bday ever, and for st. patty’s day. we all got lei’d, and battled the kids with the noisemakers, and had some wine, and had some great food … an amazing time. happy birthday jake!
quote of the day, from kath: “cris, the only name you haven’t said is mindi. are you sure she’s in the other car?”
i got a great compliment from cris — “matt has embraced his inner israeli.” i did a bunch of driving today, and i think i’m good at it … being a new yawka, jersualem has held few surprises for me as a driver. fun stuff.
