Personal retreat

I'm home from church this morning. I decided last night not to expend my energy getting ready and not to set my alarm for this morning. I just felt tired. I needed to catch up on sleep and my brain needs a little toning up. Of course, good Calvinist that I am, I also felt guilty about this decision. I don't like to miss church. I like church. I approve of it. I won't get another chance to go to church for at least a week.

But I decided, since my motive is not rejection of the church and its teachings, but a need for down time, for alone time, to label my morning not as "skipping church," but rather as "taking a personal retreat." The goal of this retreat is solitude and the length of the retreat is from the time I get up until around lunch time, when I will go visit my sister-in-law.

Retreat activities include: sleeping until I wake up naturally, walking the dog, having a bite of breakfast, having an extra cup of coffee, taking a shower, looking out the window and reflecting on the strangely sweet melancholy of autumn. I hope also to include in the agenda: taking out the garbage and doing a load of laundry. I'll wait until my folks upstairs go to their church service to do those, so I can traipse through their house with my garbage and laundry without engaging in any conversation.

Some of these activities are my normal Saturday morning routine, but I couldn't follow that routine yesterday because of the ALS Walk. I need them.