It's really hot. And humid. I rode 57 miles today.

Did I mention that it's windy? Wind turns a bicyclist into a blubbering idiot. (I said that, one time, to Al and Diane Bean, and Al, ever the inquisitive one, asked, "How will we be able to tell when that happens?") Today the wind was in our faces until we got to the turn-around point, at the Charles City County courthouse. If there has to be wind, it's lots better when the tailwind helps out on the second half of a ride!

Did I mention that it's really hot? And humid? While I sat, collapsed, on the screened porch, drinking a cold mixture of water and Gatorade, I enjoyed looking at the sundrops. They're in full bloom!

(Here is where I would have inserted a picture of the sundrops, had my computer cooperated. They are in full bloom! Bright yellow! Beautiful! Trust me.)

From her collection, Thirst, a poem by Mary Oliver, entitled "Praying"

It doesn't have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don't try
to make them elaborate, this isn't
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.

(Thanks, Brenda. You're in my prayers.)

Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful! What a wonderful wedding weekend.

Today has been a rest and recovery day, a day to savor the celebration, the time spent with friends from past eras of our lives as well as Emily and Sheldon's friends who came down from NYC (three jam packed carloads!), the time spent with family from out of town. It was a four-day celebration, including an open house yesterday morning for breakfast, before folks got back on the road to go home. In fact, yesterday was my mother's birthday. I gathered everyone together and said, "Sheldon and Emily's wedding isn't really the big deal here. We've thrown this whole party because my mother is 80 years old today!"

Many, many people have talked about the wedding service itself: the prelude music by Michael Monaco and by three of Emily's opera singer friends who sang "I Want To Praise The Lord All My Life" from Telemann and "Lift Thine Eyes" from Mendelssohn, the way Emily and Sheldon's pastor, Elise Brown, led the service, her homily. And the hymn singing! I can't tell you how many weddings I've officiated, when a bride and groom has chosen a hymn, and I've found myself singing a solo while most others in the congregation have murmured -- because so many of the guests have not been church people. At this wedding, though, the pews were full of regular worshipers -- including six pastors and two former pastors and many who are choir members at their congregations, along with those three opera singers. Whenever there are a lot of pastors, there is great singing. Have you ever worshiped at a Synod Assembly, or at a seminary worship service?

That's what was special: this wedding was a true worship service, giving thanks for God's blessings.

The wedding weekend is upon us, and what grace abounds! Of course, for months and months we've given thanks for Emily's choice of Sheldon. He is a sensational addition to the family, as is Nathan's wife, Renee. We're so blessed in those two!

This is what's called these days a "destination wedding." Nearly everybody who's attending the wedding is coming in from out of town. There are Patty's and my family coming in from South Carolina and Northern Virginia and Baltimore and Massachussetts. There are Emily and Sheldon's friends coming in from NYC, and Sheldon's family from Colorado and Pennsylvania. For a pastor, it's a real hard thing to decide who to invite from congregations we've served. Funds are limited, and we simply cannot afford to invite everyone who is important to us! So, we took our guidance from Emily. We have invited the small number of folks who she knows from St. Stephen in Williamsburg (because when we moved here, she was on her way out the door, beginning college). And, from the three congregations I served before moving here, Emily chose those who have been a continuing presence in her life over the years.

That made for a magical evening at our house last night. About 20 family members and friends arrived yesterday and last night, and we cooked out hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill. Over the evening, the house filled with people from the various eras of our lives, many of whom had never met each other! Folks joined the gathering as they got into town, driving rental cars from various airports -- the last one got here at 9:30 PM. What multiple celebrations -- folks introducing themselves to each other, and, for Patty and me and the bride and the groom, hugs and joyous greetings of each one. (I was pleased to see that those who were just meeting each other fell into easy conversation together. There wasn't any awkwardness that I could see. As I said to one friend, "Well would you expect anything different? They're our friends and relatives, so of course they're all quality people!!)

This morning I'll lead the groomsmen down to the Men's Warehouse in Newport News, and we'll get our tuxes, and then I'll meet the plane of Emily and Sheldon's pastor, Elise Brown, coming in from NYC to officiate. I've told her, "We're simply going to include you as a member of the family over these next few days."

Grace upon grace. We are so richly blessed.

Ok, so I admit that I had never heard of Justine Henin until I saw the article about her retirement. I don't follow tennis. It turns out that Henin retired while ranked as the #1 tennis player in the world. She's won 41 singles titles, and has won 386 more matches than she's lost. She's earned $19,461,375.

She's 25 years old.

The Times article carried quotes from her competitors, expressing their shock. What I feel is admiration for her. It looks to me that she has retired because what she's been doing has prevented her from being the person she is. She's ready to leave behind the obsessive sacrifices necessary to be an elite athlete. Instead, she wants to be more healthy in her personal life than she has been. She wants to give attention to a new tennis academy she has established in her native Belgium, to teach the game to kids. She said, "I think I will take a long vacation. I'm going to appreciate going for a run with nothing at stake, just doing it for pleasure. I've never put my feet in skis, and next year I think I'll be doing it the whole winter. I want to rediscover the small pleasures, not look at my watch all the time because I have to get to training the next day." How refreshing for an elite athlete to have such perspective, to recognize what's important in life.

It also makes me think of the most recent graduate of The University to leave pro football: former quarterback Aaron Brooks. Brooks has also made millions playing his sport. He's no longer a starter, but he's only 32, and could be a back-up (making millions more) for several more years. But he decided to retire this summer, for two reasons. He's made enough money. And he's begun working with Newport News city officials to invest millions of his own money into redeveloping the dangerous and poverty-stricken neighborhod he grew up in. That community activism is his life, and he's anxious to get on with it!

What wonderful role models Henin and Brooks are. It's a shame that they are so unusual among their peers: having the confidence that their most significant accomplishments in life will be beyond the playing arena.

One of the smartest things I've done in a long time was to spend $14.95 for the rights to listen to any major league game played this year, on any computer, at MLB.com.

There's nothing more relaxing than listening to baseball on the radio. Hearing the game described is much more satisfying to me than watching distracting graphics and fan shots and dugout shots and manufactured dramas among players. Over the radio, the whole thing distilled down to the game itself. It's just the baseball.

Last night I was listening to the Phillies-Nationals game while paying bills, and I heard the Phillies announcers say that John Lester had a no-hitter going through seven innings for the Red Sox, against the Royals. So I quick switched over the Boston game and heard the home town announcers call the last two innings of the no hitter! What fun!

Then I switched back to the Phillies game -- just in time to hear the final out of the Phillies' third loss in a row. Sigh ...

I'm keeping track of the checks I'll need to write this Sunday night, to pay for the wedding reception and the photographer and the DJ, etc., etc.

What an expensive thing!

But -- it's also a reminder to me that a key to happiness is living below your means, which is what Patty and I do. That includes how much you spend for housing, and the car you drive, and the TV you buy, and the level of cable TV and cell phone contracts you take on, ...

When you live below your means, there's always enough money!

I am such a morning person. I'm so much more alert and open early in the morning than I am at any other time of the day. This morning I finished reading Nora Gallagher's moving memoir of a year spent living in her Episcopal congregational community, Things Seen and Unseen. Last night I had been reading it, just before sleep. I had been thinking, "Well, this is ok. Nothing special." But this morning! I would be grabbed by a sentence or phrase that seemed so significant I would have to stop reading and think for a while! Was it a difference in the writing? Of course not. It was the difference in my attentiveness.

I have long known that I am a morning person, certainly. That is why I devote a chunk of time nearly every morning to reading and prayer at home, before coming into the office. I find I can't be contemplative once I'm in the office. It's not because of the space. I've put a lot of thought into providing a very nice set-up there. It's very comfortable. I've arranged inviting chairs. Houseplants provide greenery. I keep the ceiling florescent lights off because I think the light is too harsh, and I use desk and floor lamps instead. Visitors who come in for all types of conversations find it to be safe and welcoming space. Some have even come to know it as a special place of grace for them. But, for me, it's work space. And so I need to be elsewhere to pray and read and think with depth beyond the demands of the everyday schedule.

That will be one of the richest blessings of this three-month sabbatical that is beginning today: To be able to take as much time as I need for morning reading, contemplation, prayer, without feeling the pressure of the schedule, of having to get into the office. I'm looking forward to noticing how the Spirit will move during that morning time.

For my sabbatical reading, I have a shelf of books that would take three years to read properly, when I only have three months! My hope is to resist the compulsion of productivity: of worrying about how many volumes I'm finishing; how fast I'm reading. I want to read as the Spirit moves me, to be drawn by whatever book seems to call me, putting one down and taking another up as it seems right. I want to be attentive to what the Spirit is doing.

Meanwhile, of course, this is Wedding Week for us! Emily and Sheldon get to town on Thursday. Out of town friends and family will begin arriving the next day. I'll pick up their pastor, who's flying in for the City to officiate, on Saturday morning. (I like her very much, and am looking forward to the chance to spend time with her.) We're descending into the throes of the details that can only be dealt with during what will become increasingly-frantic last minutes. This morning, Patty was wondering which plates she should use for the Monday morning breakfast we'll host for the out of town guests before they get back on the road home. Patty was holding some very nice clear plastic plates, elegant, really. But she wondered whether they'd be too small. "Maybe I should get some larger, Chinette plates. But these are so nice. I used them for the reception we had here for our Williamsburg friends after Nathan and Renee were married. They worked well then. I just don't know." I said (in stereotypically male, problem-solving frustration), "Good Lord. Are we going to agonize about every detail all week long??" She said, "Probably."

Ah -- spring in Virginia! It's May 12, and it's ... 47 degrees! The high is forecast (by yahoo weather, at least) to be 57 degrees.

What's going on?

Last year's Theologian in Residence at St. Stephen, Larry Rasmussen, was among us to talk about Christians' responsibility to care for the earth. He explained during his first session that he was careful not to use the phrase "global warming," because that has become such a political football. Instead, he spoke repeatedly of "climate change" -- because of so many weather occurences that haven't happened in human memory: tornados in England, for instance, or snow in Libya. Compared to those two examples, I guess 52 degrees in Williamsburg, Virginia on May 12 is not so dramatic. But still, it feels like something's going on with our climate.

Anyway, Patty and I had her parents over for a Mother's Day dinner last night. The house was chilly. I refused to turn on the furnace on May 11! So I built the traditional Mother's Day fire in the fireplace.

The weather was chilly and threatening two days ago, on Saturday, for the annual Capital to Capital 100 mile bicycle ride, from Jamestown to Richmond and back. The wind was not our friend. On the way to Richmond we rode into a slight head wind, and I kept thinking how wonderful it would be for it to be a tail wind when we turned around to head back home. Of course, by the time we got to Richmond, the wind had shifted and intensified -- so we got to ride into the wind for most of the 100 miles! At least it never really rained.

Robert Floyd, a 15 year old from our congregation, rode with me. (Actually, it was more a case of him having patience with my pace. The last seven miles or so, when Robert was familiar with the course, it was all I could do to keep him in sight! After 93 miles, 15 year old legs have a lot more spring left in them than 54 year old legs!)

Here's a picture of us after conquering the course:

The Phillies are in first place!!! Last year the Phillies weren't in first place until the 160th game of the season. Last year, the Phils won the Eastern Division after a horrific start. Each of the two previous years, they came within one game of the playoffs after horrible Aprils. This year they've made a strong beginning! The starting pitching has been good. The bullpen has jelled. The closer, Brad Lidge, has been sensational. They're winning even without Jimmy Rollins, last year's MVP, who's on the DL. Shane Victorino, their starting center fielder has just come back from the DL. Ryan Howard is just now getting warmed up. Can this be THE year?

My wife, Patty, is not much of a baseball fan. That means that she is much more objective than I am about all of this. This morning, when I opened the sports page and poked my finger at the baseball standings and said, "Look at who's in first place!!!!"; she simply looked up with a raised eyebrow and said, "That's unusual!"

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Did you know that it is exactly 55.21 miles from the current Virginia state capitol building in Richmond to the reconstructed Colonial Capitol building in Williamsburg? Yesterday, I rode that distance on my bicycle, following the reading in Richmond of the governor's proclamation that May is Bike Month in our Commonwealth. There were riders from several cities' bike clubs there to hear the reading, who were then given little reproduction proclamations to take back home. (I've taped mine to my office door!)

The morning began at 7:00 AM, when we representatives of the Williamsburg Area Bicyclists gathered at the Rec Center to put our bikes into a truck and then to pile into a van to go to Richmond. Everyone else on the ride returned directly to the Rec Center upon return to Williamsburg, to get their cars. But I thought it would be most appropriate to ride from one capitol building to the other with my little reproduction proclamation. Of course, that meant I had to ride another five miles to get back to the Rec Center to retrieve my car, so my odometer was turning over to 60 as I pedaled into the parking lot!