i+alia a to z :: s - a sabbath in assisi

i'm getting creative now. doubling up letters and going out of order. after all, this is a blog about queer living and perhaps dying, so disordering is definitely part of the fun. i recently read some rules for good writing on a friend's facebook page, which warned against alliteration, rhetorical questions, and cliches. all of which i (a bit cheekily noted to myself) violate. i appreciate good writing, don't get me wrong. but i also appreciate knowing the rules to break them. so funny how those who preach diversion are often SUPER pretentious about discursive particulars. jeez.

speaking of breaking the rules, my family and i spent our last sabbath in assisi and not in one of the 5-6-7? sanctuaries in the city. we spent it hiking up mount subasio to francis' hermitage. dad struggled some. about a third of the way up, he started questioning wether we were going the right way. this lasted until about 2/3 of the way up. then mom and he got quiet, realizing together the allegorical quality of this journey, the struggles that they've endured, the uncertainties. it wasn't long after this quieting down that we reached the final stretch.

some say (no footnotes here, sorry) that the journey is more important than the destination. i think its both. you see, my dad has worked very hard all his life. this trip is the celebration of that difficulty and marks a transition into rest. and repose frees us to believe and contemplate in ways that the realities of struggle make impossible (just as repose without struggle also hinders this practice). he spent years in labors that have diminished him physically and in company that required him to sacrifice ambiguities.

we reached the tree cover of the hermitage and felt a shared connection that had long alluded us and our shifting spiritual temperaments - whether everyday mystic, the re-christened in justice, strictly naturalist, not anything really, and the wayfarer. recently, we've come to an agreement about the presence of something special outside, whatever 'out' might mean. walking francis' way and spending some solitary moments, together and apart, in his found sanctuaries was a way to share enjoyment in the splendor of the universe without the rules and proprieties contrived inside. we resolved then to spend our sabbaths (the ones we spend together that is) in this first cathedral.