Day Eighteen — Blessed Touch
“Don’t tell me we have to redo all of these! This is the seventh time!” sister Mary-Francis cried out over the sea of lavender gauze that refused to drape itself as planned.
“The pleats should fold in the other direction and the folds are two small, try to imagine this in the actual setting,” Lily pointed out the objectionable items on the punch list.
“You said six inches wide, they are six inches wide!” the sister protested.
“I know, sister, I’m sorry, I was wrong! Why don’t you ask Sys to fix these real quick, you don’t have to do them by hand,” Lily compromised.
“A piece of information I could have used during the last three changes,” Mary-Francis pointed out the obvious.
“If you have a minute, sister, could we go over all of these changes here, I really think we could make some small improvements,” Lily sat down at the table without waiting for confirmation.
Sister Mary-Francis sat down.
“It’s for the after party, you know? The wisps have no opinion regarding the feast, since they are not accustomed to get-togethers that don’t involve covalent bonds, so they left it to us to decide all the details.”
Sister Mary-Francis looked at her, incredulously.
“I have a rough draft of the party planning, but I would like everybody’s input, I want it to be memorable and enjoyable and approval process free,” Lily bubbled over like a little brook in spring.
“What can I do to help?” sister Mary-Francis offered.
“We need ideas for decor, catering, you know?” Lily continued.
“Dear, I’m a nun. I’ve been a nun for a very long time, fun party activities are not my forté,” Mary-Francis laughed kindly. “Although I do have preferences for the kitchen staff, if that’s OK.”
“Of course, sister, that’s a given. What about the setting? We were thinking to set up some of the tables on the beach at the bottom of the stairs, just in case the healing garden can’t accommodate all the guests. Of course the Prayer Hall has enough large assembly rooms if we need to move the party indoors, and we’re going to use the kitchen there for all the food, of course,” Lily enumerated.
“I think that’s a splendid idea,” sister Mary-Francis concurred.
“We’re going to have a problem with the dragons around food, so I was thinking that if we can distract them with a healthy aloe patch, they’ll stay away from the food tables. I’ll have to run this by Sarah, to make sure she’s OK with it. We can replant the aloe afterwards.”
“And then I was thinking we could connect Purple to the translator, their conversation would make a wonderful music improv piece, and since most of us speak Purple, it would serve dual purpose. They are very melodious,” Lily explained.
“That they are,” said sister Mary-Francis.
“Of course we’ll have to move some of the potted gardenias, maybe a couple of the stone benches, to make more room for the lighting. There should be sufficient lighting, but not too much, you know? We don’t want to compete with the night sky, the green moon and the studded chocolate firmament are too beautiful not to emphasize,” Lily continued.
“Aah, the beautiful Terra Two skies, a poet’s dream!”
“Oh, yes, poets! I completely forgot about Humon, he needs to organize the speeches, there are going to be lots of speeches. Do you want to give one? Just a few words, a little toast?” Lily jotted down sister Mary-Francis’s name.
“Oh, no, dear, please keep me out of this, I dread public speaking!’ the sister tried to defend herself.
“Please, sister! Just a few words! For Lelia?” Lily pressed.
“But…” the sister wanted to protest.
“Great, it’s settled then. I’ll ask Humon to pencil you in between Seth and sister Benedict. Those were the best orators of the Order. The sister let out a wretched sigh.
“Now, the decor! I think we should carry the lavender theme, so the colors don’t clash with our attire, we’re going to wear the same outfits, of course, there is not enough time to change.” For a brief but terrifying moment, sister Mary-Francis worried that she was going to have to wear a lavender gown, but then she remembered the outfits had already been sent to Vlor and approved, and the Order was going to don ceremonial robes.
“That’s a great idea,” she answered, relieved.
“There is, of course, the issue of the table settings, I can never get a unanimous decision from the wisps, each one of them wants to sit next to everybody, and even though it makes sense in covalent wisp world, I have a very hard time making them understand that in solid form it is practically impossible. Like they didn’t have enough reasons to point out we exist in an inferior state of matter.”
“I’m sure you’ll think of something, darling,” sister Mary-Francis encouraged her.
“Maybe we should stand, instead, and have wait staff carry trays of hors d’oeuvres around, so they can mingle freely,” Lily thought out loud.
“That could provide a solution,” sister Mary-Francis said.
“No, on second thought that would be too complicated, and we couldn’t accommodate a main course, besides it would be exhausting to stand for eight hours straight,” Lily changed her mind.
“I’ve done worse,” sister Mary-Francis replied.
“Speaking of sitting, do you have any preferences for your table companions?” Lily asked.
“Whatever works best for everybody, I don’t want to be a bother,” sister Mary-Francis said.
“I’ll figure it out, then. Thank you so much for your help, sister! Your input was invaluable. I have almost all the details drawn out, a rough draft, of course, but a wonderful start. I knew I could count on you!” Lily said.
“You are welcome,” sister Mary-Francis said, puzzled, because she couldn’t figure out exactly what her contribution was, other than saying ‘yes’ to everything.
“Well, I have to go, a million things to do, still!” Lily got up to leave.
“But…” sister Mary-Francis tried to stop her.
Lily turned around, her hand on the door handle.
“Yes, sister.”
“So, what should we do about the gauze?” sister Mary-Francis asked.
“Oh, don’t worry about those, we’ll ask Sys to fix them later. Can you help sister Joseph make the dragons presentable? She refused to let me tie lavender bows to their tails. Their blue scales are not fitting in the color scheme at all, would you talk to sister Joseph?” Lily said and left.
Sister Mary-Francis stood staring at the door for a second, door which Lily, in her rush, had left open, and breathed a sigh of relief that their ceremonial robes were in a neutral color and shuddered at the thought of what they would have had to do if their garb clashed with the decor.
Landing Bay, Terra Two, July 20th, 3245
My dear child,
You might have heard about the little stone convent in Perpignan that cradled the beginnings of our life here. I was a novice at a neighboring abbey, I didn’t get my calling until well into mid-life, so most of the nuns there were at least a decade younger than I was. Though fervently devoted, my nature always got me in trouble, and I found it difficult to adjust to doing obedience and spending countless hours in meditation and prayer (you might have noticed that I still get chided, now and then, for idle chatter, mostly). Mother superior, a sainted woman, kept constant vigil to beseech my better angels to guide me on the path of enlightenment, deference towards elders and observance of the sacred rules.
She prayed and counseled, and she brought examples from the lives of the saints, examples of self-denial, hard work and hope in the providence that allows us to experience miracles large and small.
I knew I was called to the monastic life, so I worked really hard at becoming what she expected me to be, I ended my novitiate and took the veil (I know you rarely see us in our religious garb, it tends to get a little cumbersome when one works in the fields all day in this climate).
Mother superior was an insightful person: she sanctified my transition to the new life but she wasn’t happy, because with the shedding of my stubborn, non-conforming traits went out the fire that lit up my heart towards the spiritual vocation in the first place. She didn’t say anything, but from that day forward she never stopped looking, and asking around, and putting the word out in the community in the hope of finding a place for me that would help me multiply the gifts of the Spirit.
I’m sure you heard that the Spirit works in mysterious ways, and in my case, quite disappointing ones, I must say. There was this old abandoned farm house, a distance from the village and the abbey, the locals didn’t even know how old, but it hadn’t been inhabited in decades. It had a good stone structure and a solid foundation, no doubt a testament to the pride in craftsmanship that was a trademark of the builders back in the day, but that was where the positives ended: it had a disheveled roof, no doors or windows, broken floors and unusable building systems.
The abbey had received the deed for of the land some time ago from a pious old woman who died without close relatives, and the nuns didn’t even consider renovating the structure, which looked beyond human help. The locals whispered stories around the camp fire, about ghosts and eerie blue lights hovering like cold fire over the adjacent bog.
During spring cleaning, mother superior found the deed at the bottom of a drawer, and realizing she’d completely forgotten about the property she assembled a small group of nuns, myself included, and sent us to take a quick look around the building and see if we could reuse the stone for a retaining wall we were trying to build. We left before dawn and it took us a good two hours to reach the place; we arrived with the first rays of sun.
As we approached the doorless entry a frightened owl took heart and flew out clumsily, almost touching our heads, putting a chill through our bones and making the sisters cross themselves. The shyer ones were really reluctant to enter, and if it weren’t for the holy apprehension mother superior inspired, they would have immediately turned on their heels and run back all the way to the abbey.
I wasn’t too keen on it myself, to tell you the truth, the inside was darker than the bowels of the earth, its uneasy silence punctured by the strange sounds of the wildlife that sought refuge between its walls. I stood in the doorway for a moment, then retrieved that stubborn, defiant streak that was the bane of a saintly existence and stepped in.
Some people believe in signs from the Providence, some prefer to relay all unusual occurrences to coincidence, I tend to be more of the former, if you please. The second I stepped in, the sun rose over the horizon and its fiery glow filled the eastern enfilade of rooms with what I could only describe as heavenly light.
The light drew me in and I tried to get closer to its source, while the rest of the nuns followed halfheartedly, ready to turn back at a moment’s notice. Projected on an entrancing tapestry of magnificent light, a little head peeked from behind a small mound of debris, startling a scream from one of the sisters, who mentally reviewed the haunting stories and started assessing their truthfulness.
Turns out it was indeed not a ghost (you wouldn’t believe the scolding our ears received upon conveying this assumption to mother superior!), but one of the local kids, a little girl, who valiantly stood her ground and insisted that the building was her play house. Some of the nuns were troubled by the child’s unsupervised stroll through such blood curdling scenery, especially at that time of day, but the little girl was completely unfazed by the grown-ups’ concerns. She took my hand, eager to show off her domain, and walked me around the structure, pointing to every room, nook and crevice and explaining in detail what they used to be, what functions she had assigned to them and what she had in mind for the future.
I didn’t have the heart to tell her the purpose of our visit, and my spirit was troubled by the morning light’s warning that we were disturbing hallowed ground. Upon return I begged and pleaded with mother superior not to tear down the building (whose stone walls were too fused together to be disassembled, I argued), but to let us take the time and effort to restore it and put it to good use. She reluctantly agreed, swayed by my passionate arguments, under the condition that I find a group of nuns willing to move there, help with construction and stay after it was finished to take care of the building.
Suddenly you couldn’t find a busier convent in all the land, why, with all the sisters being inextricably involved in various activities, one more important and urgent than the other. I finally managed to convince a couple of them, sister Joseph and sister Abigail, and survived the months of hard labor and continuous grumpiness.
As I said, God’s blessings often come disguised as opportunities to challenge one’s weaknesses; throughout construction the little village girl showed up bright and early every morning, managing to always be in the way and supervising construction with the self-assurance of a local overlord, questioning decisions and having strong opinions about how things were to be accomplished.
We figured it was easier to give in to her requests than to listen to the endless whining and arguing; between her exacting wishes, being constantly exposed to the elements, sister Joseph’s charming disposition and sister Abigail’s cooking the Lord forged the mettle of my patience.
When we were done with the building, the girl insisted on restoring the garden, whose main contours and general organization were still discernible under the overgrown wild flora. She walked quickly from one planting to the next and excitedly pointed out where to place the tomato patch and the herb wheel, stepping over freshly planted vegetable beds and getting her hair tangled in the cucumber nets.
When the work was finished, she insisted that we should make room for her, and already used as we were with her fixation with completely illogical demands (after all she lived right down the street) we obliged.
Soon after she left for boarding school and her family moved to a nearby town to be close to her. She didn’t write or visit and at our bequest mother superior tried to contact her family, but they had moved again and she was unable to find their forwarding address.
May the Lord be with you,
Sister Mary-Francis
