Journeys of a Pregnant Virgin

As ambivalent as I profess to be about this process, several enthusiastic emails from friends have drawn me back to the blog page. What a clumsy name - perhaps I'll refer to this as my update from Zurich instead.

Steve tells me Vancouver is still bathed in clear golden sunlight and here there are grey skies and showers. I'm ready for some more sunshine - we've really just had a day or two so far. It hasn't stopped me from wandering and exploring but that's surely much more fun without an umbrella impeding my view of the Alps. I compared annual rainfall in Vancouver and Zurich this morning (in a rare burst of energy for what the Internet provides) and discovered that while Vancouver's is just short of 44 inches a year, Zurich gets 42.5. I hope the next few months are dry ones here! It was hard enough to leave Vancouver during my favourite time of year but for a sun-bunny like me, this feels like I'm being cheated!

Today was a quiet introspective day. No lectures or seminars but I met with the Director of Studies, a warm and charming Swiss woman, fluent in five languages, who welcomed me with sincerity and expressed great interest in the work I've done with Marion Woodman over the past four or five years. I asked all my questions and left feeling the new training program is wide open with possibility and potential. Of course the semester is young and everything remains to be seen and experienced but I do feel good about it thus far.

Yesterday, Virginia from Calgary, Ingrid from Oslo, and I went to a tiny cinema, "Arthouse Commercio," to see "Touch the Sound," a fascinating film about Evelyn Glennie, the deaf Scottish percussionist. I loved her clear and radiant presence and her joyful celebration of what I would call synesthesia, although she would probably just say that her entire body hears the music, rather than "just" her ears. What really struck me was her reference to the human body as resonator - an integral part of the BodySoul Rhythms work with Marion. I can hear how much more resonance there is in my own singing voice (not that I use it much) and I feel my body much more finely tuned than before I began that work. Afterward Virginia and I jumped on the train to Einsiedeln and, at long last, I saw the famous and much-loved Black Madonna. She is exquisite, to be sure, but I want to go back when there are fewer people. We arrived just in time for the Vespers service. The monks' music was beautiful but what moved me most was their procession to the back of the church and obvious reverence for Black Mary, as they took their places and sang to her. I was even able to join in when the congregation sang two of my favourite hymns (in German, of course).

The remainder of this week will be busy with lectures and seminars, right through the weekend. The schedule is erratic and some weeks are very light while others are packed full. I know the days and weeks will fly by and in less than a month, Steve will be here, then Ursula, as we prepare for the BodySoul Writing course in France.

To finish up tonight, here is a quote from "Divine Beauty" - almost every page in the book is quotable - in keeping with his theme (with thanks to Yvonne, whose blog is chock full of wonderful quotes and poems).

"We have often heard that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This is usually taken to mean that the sense of beauty is utterly subjective; there is no accounting for taste because each person's taste is different. The statement has another, more subtle meaning: if our style of looking becomes beautiful, then beauty wil become visible and shine forth for us. We will be surprised to discover beauty in unexpected places where the ungraceful eye would never linger. The graced eye can glimpse beauty anywhere, for beauty does not reserve itself for special elite moments or instances; it does not wait for perfection but is present already secretly in everything. When we beautify our gaze, the grace of hidden beauty becomes our joy and sanctuary." (p. 29)

I do love books that embody what they celebrate. This is a tender and graceful book.