Saturday, March 16, 2024

Donna’s Birthday, Dinner near the Bunker Hill Monument, Charlestown Massachusetts

We were looking for a restaurant and the cab dispatch told us there was in fact one closer to our apartment than the one that had recently closed. For her birthday, she had a computer class, in which she was given a new computer, she lost twenty pounds and we celebrated by going to dinner when, after dinner, I looked up and noticed we were right near the Bunker Hill Monument, our having come from a different direction. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DONNA and I look forward to our thirteenth anniversary this summer.
Living on the thirteenth floor, I can see the monument, the entire monument, clearly from our living room, The Boston skyline has almost changed dramaticlly while we've been together. Evacuation Day in New York City is on November 25, 1783, and also marks the British departure. (Donna's father went to NYU) Happy St. Patrick's Day. ps. I ordered fish chowder for myself but she was hungary and couldn't wait for dinner, so I gave her mine untill my seafood came later, which was half the fun of an enjoyable evening- I was glad she liked dinner after our skipping lunch during a busy weekend.

Sunday, February 4, 2024

Donna is at her library desk as the church organ plays upstairs- this is a poster of the church from 1971

From a poster made during 1971, this may in fact be The Old North Church, the tallest building in America before 1809 when the Park Street Church was built, it then becoming the tallest. I belive both have clocks. I asked a member from M.I.T and he thought it was Park Street Church and it afforded me the chance to tell him that the Internet Archive hists all Dewey Decinal categories of out of print books by using keyword search, not just "Christianity", but also "Thermodynamics". She refers to it as her "antique desk". These are my photos from this morning when Donna was behind her desk.
photos: Scott Lord, I apologize for the lack of a telephoto lens.

Postscript: Embrace: Dr. Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King Statue added to Boston Freedom Trail

I usually don't update this blog and usually do update my other blog on film, but this morning the guide that welcomes people to either the Freedom Trail or to the Park Street Church began a conversation about our lack of books on William Lloyd Garrison. There was one that we had. The photo above is our library card catalog that has internet- as an assistant church librarian I could pull up the sermons that William Lloyd Garrison delivered in this room twenty years after the church was erected (in the same way that if you were at Harvard College you would have poems that Oliver Wendall Holmes had delivered there.) Our welcomer referred to the stautue from the previous entry, and you can notice that there was not yet any snow, as "The Image" and judging from her age I really think she meant "the blessed image of the late Dr. and Mrs King". She couldn't just say statue even though there is a statue of J.F.K (the blessed, but more than that the still legally elected) at the Boston State House, but that is something polite, and nice. There was a class today- Tammy (Harvard Divinity) gave me permission to "jump in" in the middle of it or be added to it next week. It is titled Lenten Discipleship Initiative. -----:-----::-----:::-----::-----:

Below is my original blog entry on "The Image" and I myself quake in many ways:

Although the Boston Freedom Trail is meant to be a tour of the Revolutionary War and the grave of Crispus Attucks, a stevadore killed in the Boston Massacre, is directly outside the Church window where I am right now, the new statue of Martin Luther King holding his wife, Coretta Scott King has been unveiled on Boston Common. Another piece of history, ourchurch ran a film on this week marking the one hundreath year of radio broadcasting of the church service, there having been a shop that sold radios across the street on Tremont Street. The service is in progreess upstairs and on WEZE while I am in my wife's library. Donna, please accept these photos as symbolic of our spending our Sundays together.
photos: Scott Lord
photo: Scott Lord Postscript:The Girl on the Flying Trapeze I spend every Sunday on the Freedom Trail, which our church is on, and I listen to the ministers conduct tours in case I'm needed when in the library or if I think I should point out the Granary Burial Ground. This morning we had a new addition, a sculpture where the usually have a Christmas Star. The other Christmas lights are still in Boston Common. As it is Freedom Trail art, I thought I would add it here, but it takes a couple of photos to conquer the height distance and perspective. It is an installation- a sculture of a girl on a swing put into an envirornment where art meets reality.
Girl on a Swing photos: Scott Lord

Friday, December 8, 2023

A Hanukkah Card for Donna that has been coming all year; I try to read it every day and please feel invited to subscrbe



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: My Jewish Learning <community@myjewishlearning.com>
Date: Friday, December 8, 2023
Subject: This Hanukkah Prayer Is About Courage and Miracles
To: scottlordnovelist@gmail.com


Al Hanisim reminds us of the role we play in our own modern miracles.
If you are having trouble viewing this email, click here.

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Friday, December 8, 2023

My Jewish Learning

Today: A deep dive into Al Hanisim. • Can you blow out Hanukkah candles? • A cheesy vegetable latke recipe for Hanukkah.

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HANUKKAH

Al Hanisim is a prayer recited on Hanukkah that expresses gratitude for the miracles performed for our ancestors. It can also serve us spiritually as a reminder of our role in creating space for miracles in our own day.

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THIS WEEK'S TORAH PORTION

In this Torah portion, Jacob favors Joseph, and this angers Joseph's brothers. Joseph has dreams in which he predicts reigning over his brothers, provoking them further. They decide to sell Joseph into slavery in Egypt. Tamar disguises herself as a prostitute and sleeps with her father-in-law, Judah. In Egypt, the wife of Joseph's owner tries to seduce Joseph, and when he rejects her, she accuses him of trying to rape her and has him sent to prison. In prison, Pharaoh's baker and butler have dreams, and Joseph interprets them correctly.

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Sunday, December 3, 2023

From Donna's Library, The Articles of Faith from the founding of the Church

I took the time in the church library while Donna was reshelving books to look for the Articles of Faith from when the church was established. Between services, I said "hello" to Mark,the present minister, who was busy and remarked that we still use the Articles of Faith today, "I know that well." The first minister of the Park Street Church,Boston was Edward Griffin, also the first Phi Beta Kappa student at Yale, and apparently Donna was Phi Beta before I met her. His particular theme was preaching against something referred to as the New Divinity. I was surfing today and found that we are listed by the National Historical Park Service along with our adjacent Granary Burial Ground. The president at the time was James Madison. Below is a historical perspective.

Scott Lord