The kids are away this weekend, and for the first time i don't have to bend over backwards arranging babysitting for a retreat. No screaming dramatic children running behind my car as i leave.
For a moment, i actually felt like one of my clients who said about her marriage " Now that i have all the reason to leave, i really wonder if i want to leave"
But i forced myself to "seize the day" and literally typed in this weekend's dates and the word "retreat " in Google and found a Lenten retreat in right in my backyard, San Rafael, Santa Sabina.
I had just visited here last year for a Hildegarde Von Bingen retreat and was really struck by the quietness of the place. It's in the Dominican Order and i have to say, i really feel a different energy from the Franciscan hospitality that has been my home retreat at San Damiano. They are cooler, more reserved. Very committed to silence -- the whole house is silent and it can come across aloof.
I was laughing because they showed us a picture of St Dominic and he had his hand to his mouth going " shhhhh". Me and Natalie, we are texting each other chomping down my meal silently in the dining hall going " shhhhhh i'm eating".
But i have to say, something about the whole house being committed to silence is relaxing.
Yesterday, the retreat leader talked about "giving each other the gift of silence" and being "connected by silence" and i am so aware of how i struggle with silence. Somewhere between my childhood friends giving me the "silent treatment", the idea of being "sent to my room", my teenage years when my mother and i barely spoke, i still feel so punished by silence. i remembered being so anxious with my last psychotherapist's silence i ended up in fetal position tied up in knots.
I think about how sad i was the first time enoch and i drove long distance and i realized, he was perfectly content to drive all 5 hours in silence. I remember how hurt i was on 20 hour flights when he would put in ear-plugs under the flight headsets so he could drown out the plane engines. Such precious times to communicate, and he would choose to be silent.
On very good days, God teases me that my marriage is one long silent retreat and if i can survive that, i can survive anything.
On better days, He challenges me with the thought that perhaps my husband is my spiritual challenge, my spiritual practice, that i have to face all the anxiety and panic, isolation and rejection when he chooses not to speak to me. Not because he is punitive or punishing ( mostly ) but because he is content with silence.
Someday, i am going to have to reconcile myself with being able to silent with others that i care about, instead of only with strangers.
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