Mary Breckinridge and The Frontier Nursing Service

       I am so happily reading the autobiography of Mary Carson Breckinridge, "Wide Neighborhoods."

       Born in 1881, Mary's father moved the family to Saint Petersberg in Russia. He was the United States Ambassador and Mary remembers meeting Czar Nicholas and Empress Alexandra. She later attended boarding school in Switzerland. It is fascinating to relate her life experiences to others I have read about by Tolstoy and Queen Victoria, and by watching "Downton Abbey" and "Call the Midwife."

       Mary's family bought two islands on the Muskoka Lakes in Ontario, not far from where I worked and vacationed on Ahmic Lake. Having moved all over the world, and though they still owned family lands in the South, this was where the family considered "home." They had a large house built when the lake froze over and supplies could be hauled across the ice. Her mother spent most summers there for the rest of her life. Mary loved her mother, father, two brothers and sister devotedly.

       In adulthood Mary lost a young husband, and dealt with grief through service. She trained as a nurse in New York. She married again, but was later divorced from her second husband following the tragic deaths of her baby girl Polly and four-year-old son Breckie.

       Once again, Mary plunged herself into service. After Breckie's death she helped with the war relief in France for several years. She fell in love with the poor, the mountains, and needy children. She was exposed to the nurse-midwives of Great Britain who volunteered in France alongside her. Midwives in the United States were not formally trained nurses at that time, and she was inspired.

       She returned to her family lands in and near Kentucky and rode on horseback, covering thousands of square miles through the Appalachian Mountains, and decided that she would serve those mountain folk. Mary knew the value in great preparation. She traveled to England to become a nurse-midwife, then spent a summer traversing the Hebrides on foot, horse and boat to learn all about a successful rural public health program there.

       Finally ready, she secured the support of friends, judges, officials, nurses, doctors and locals and created the "Frontier Nursing Service" in 1925. The nurse-midwives delivered babies, and provided families with healthcare in the Appalachian Mountains of Kentucky, traveling by horseback. Daily, they might have to ford rivers and travel scores of miles. They were always treated with respect, great hospitality and even "chivalry" by the mountain men, women and children.

       Mary Breckinridge died in 1965 in her eighties; she directly affected the lives of tens of thousands of people, and many, many more indirectly. She is an example of faith and redemptive suffering. Mary would have been happy being a devoted Mom to her two children, had they lived. She wrote in her prolific journals about the dreams she had for them. But their deaths inspired in her great service, and changed the lives of those many thousands for the better.

       I'll close with a quote from"Wide Neighborhoods," as Mary relates a story about a little Kentucky girl, thrilled with a rag doll:

"The doll...was a piece of old blanket, tied around the middle with a string, with a stone fastened at one end for a face. But she loved it, with that creative instinct older than recorded time, which springs up anew in every girl baby. Why must she needs mother something, with the first outreaching of her tiny hands? Why plead so early for a life whose sword shall one day pierce her own? 

When Christmas comes we understand a little less dimly. The Light of the World could only come to His own through a woman's body. Only a woman held the mysteries of His advent, and pondered them in her heart."

       As Christmas is not over until Epiphany--I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!


Suzy
The Abbey Farm

A Single-Subject Spiral, and a Sharpened Pencil

       I mentioned my screenplay. Screenplay writing is formulaic. Even so, talent is a must and I claim none. When I was a little girl, my friend Bev and I wrote novellas. We'd exchange them and giggle. They were almost always love stories. A single-subject spiral notebook and sharpened pencil are still two of my favorite things. Other writers understand the hypnotic attraction.

       I still see my story as a movie. Novel writing is much harder. My daughter Marie has written a few and I urge her to publish. She's gifted.

       I decided to try and write my story. I'll start here. It is inspired by one of my favorite people and her gift of giving. The character in the novel is not the same, however, in that events are purely fictitious. A name here and there, a line, a setting--but the rest is from my imagination.

       It is the story of the people influenced by a woman named Renata. Renata means rebirth. Some say that for all women, their genius--their greatest gift--is life-giving. Whether we have children or not, we have the ability to inspire, to support, to love in a very unique and special way.

 

Saint Francis Was Not Only About Animals

  

     I've written a post before on organization. I've thought many times that if only I could be as organized as I would like (as I "should" be) then I would not suffer from discouragement.

     Appearances are not always what they seem. We know that. Certainly the lives of famous people and their problems are evidence enough. Yet I think many of us don't let the lesson sink in completely.

     In the last few years a couple of my friends--whom I confess I almost worship because of their beautifully behaved children and their spotless homes and knack of doing all so perfectly--have suffered with discouragement, too. I think to myself...they shouldn't! They are doing everything as I would wish to. They have lived an ideal, still married to their sweetheart from a young age, consistently parenting their children from day one, responsibly living...the list goes on.

     I have read that discouragement stems from pride. Perhaps. I get that. I feel as though I've had a lot of humble pie thrown at me in the last ten years. Truly, I know I'm lacking in a lot of ways. Bruce loves to joke with us, "I am the humblest man you will ever know!" as he raises his eyebrows and looks up at the sky. I'm certainly not implying that.

     I post beautiful things because I want to share them. I do not, however, want to give the impression that all goes smoothly each day. It doesn't. I have more positive friends who seem to rejoice in their challenges! And some who don't seem to have many challenges. I sometimes wonder why there is so much challenge!

     On the other hand, I have friends who have hit rock bottom. Unbelievable events have transpired for them. I have friends who have lived through far more difficulties and tragedies than I have. And I've read about people like Immaculee Ilibagiza in "Left To Tell" whose stories are horrifying and inspiring at the same time. I reprimand myself for my discouragement, then.

     Our lives are unique to us. Our families are unique. Our situations differ. The truth is, though, everyone at some point feels discouraged. Some momentarily, some frequently and some chronically.

     Pride aside, isn't it also from a desire to want to be a better person?  Christians believe they will never deserve the salvation they believe in which is through Christ. He loves us and paid the sacrifice for our failings even knowing us at our worst. We are worth something very special, then. Not "worms on a dung heap" as some Puritan writers may have proclaimed.  Knowing this, we want to please Him as a child wants to please his parents. We want to love creation as He loves it.

     Saint Francis was born in the Middle Ages into a prosperous family. His father was a respected merchant. Francis had a life of priviledge and excess. He ate well, he partied well, he "loved" well. He went on one of the Crusades to save the Holy Land. He returned disillusioned and sad. He saw the atrocities of war and the evil that man was capable of. We would have called it PTSD today. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. He did not speak for a long, long time. During that time he prayed to and listened to God.

     He had to come to terms with his humanity, what he was guilty of, what his fellow man was guilty of. Most of us know the rest of the story. He left his home, his money, his priviledge and rebuilt the church named San Damiano. Other men followed him, his life became simple and pure and self-sacrificing. He took care of the sick and the poor. He shared God's love with them. Later, he visited the Pope for permission to continue and the Franciscan Order was started. His childhood friend Saint Clare was inspired to start a second Franciscan Order, The Poor Clares living a similar "code," or rule.

San Damiano

     I think we all need to come to terms with our failings. When offered back humbly to God as imperfect gifts, God can bless us, and many others. It seems counter-intuitive.

     We'll all struggle at times. I pray that you will not withdraw from others. Try not to avoid those who can help. It is a tendency we have and sadly, divided we are more easily conquered. Talk to a friend, a priest, a pastor, a counselor. There is more ahead. There is more to give.

Saint Clare and Saint Francis

     Our society seems to be teaching us that we are at the center of our world, that we deserve fill in the blank: wealth, happiness, anything we want. But the truth is, true joy is in giving, not getting. In acceptance and obedience. Our culture despises the latter term. But obedience to an authority we trust, that is good, is something we have taught our children through the ages.

     Saint Francis gave it all up. He lived a poor beggar's life. And he gave amazing things to the people of his time, to the suffering, to the lepers. And to us all.

     When discouraged  remind yourself that you are "a work in progress." Pray and seek help and put one foot in front of the other to keep trying. God doesn't give up on us. We are precious to Him.

Saint Francis Prayer

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

Where there is hatred, let me sow love.

Where there is injury, pardon.

Where there is doubt, faith.

Where there is despair, hope.

Where there is darkness, light.

Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive.

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.

 "I have been all things unholy, if God can work through me He can work through anyone."

Saint Francis of Assisi