It is a warm morning in Malibu as the sun rises in these final weeks of summer.
I am showing you a little more my employer's front lawn this morning than usual. It is the time when this school chooses to make itself a proxy graveyard to remember those who died in the terrorist attacks on 9/11, planting a flag to represent each person who perished that day and leaving the display up from 9/11 to two weeks hence.
There are days when it is frustrating to work for a school or any school I imagine, where managers must do things that at the same time satisfy and also dissatisfy the many, many constituencies that make up the stakeholders of such an institution--the students, the alumni, the faculty, the donors, the regulatory agencies, etc.
But I like days such as this when we can get it right and agree on something that is right and good to do. As we move out past 10 years from that incident, and it becomes history lesson rather than a current event, it's something that when you stand there among the poles and flapping cloth and shadows, gives your gut a tangible sense of the scope of loss in a scale you can relate to.
Of course, it's not all supportiveness in the Malibu community for this display. We have neighbors who complain about the traffic that this installation creates, and that it attracts the wrong kind of people to Malibu who will come out and wander and sit and pray and contemplate. But it takes all kinds to fill a bus eh?
As my parting image for this week I give you this that I found on my recent trip through San Diego and La Jolla. It is art the faces the street on Girardi in La Jolla on the front of Mary, Star of the Sea Church. You can find interior photos online if you look, but I think this will suffice as my visual prayer today for those who have passed on and for those of us who remain and continue to struggle.
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| Artist unattributed, Front elevation, Mary, Star of the Sea Roman Catholic Church, La Jolla, CA (I seem to recall this was mosaic, but not sure) |
Peace and love to you all until next we meet,
Pops
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Be truthful and frank, but be polite. If you use excessive profanity, I'll assume you have some kind of character flaw like Dr. Wong. Tks!