Ladydale Diary
Saint Bernard, 2021

Most of the past week has been spent with my son, Leo, a very special boy with special needs. I say “boy” because he’s very much like a sweet little child, even though he’s now nineteen-years-old. Hard to believe!

Here is how we spent each typical day for the past week, during which we were home alone together while Susannah and Evangeline were visiting family in California:

Sometime between 5:30-6:30, I am awakened by Leo’s emergence from his room. Staggering into my dressing gown, I usher him into the bathroom and brush his teeth. I then tell him to go and get himself a drink in the kitchen, after which I put on a DVD for him to watch, or not. I then make his first breakfast. Yes, he’s a hobbit who has two breakfasts every day. The first breakfast consists of five fried eggs, sunny side up. We then head outside; he to the swing set, me to let out the chickens and the ducks.

After we’ve showered, I try to get a little work done while Leo alternates between watching a DVD, scooting around the house on his scooter, or generally just lounging.

Second breakfast consists of two tins of sardines, after which we might go out in the car, or play “Hop, Hop, Hooray” (a variation on marbles), or play ball, or go out once again to the swing-set. This same sequence of activities punctuates the day, though not always in the particular sequential order given above. Squeezed in between the cracks, I got a little more work done.

Interwoven into this fabric of routine are lunch and dinner, and finally evening prayer time and bedtime, the latter of which is around 10pm. I usually lull Leo to sleep to the repetitive refrain of the Aves in the praying of the rosary. As soon as he’s asleep, I go to bed myself, perchance to sleep, knowing that the whole routine will recommence a few hours later.

The nearest we had to a particularly adventurous moment, was my letting Leo out the door to go to the swing-set, just as a large black snake was serpentining its way across the porch. I wasn’t paying attention at the crucial moment, but Leo must have either trodden on it or stepped over it.

Susannah and Evangeline were meant to return home on Tuesday but severe weather prevented them leaving California. They rescheduled for Wednesday but could not get home until after my weekly evening online class for Memoria College. Not wishing to cancel the class, I moved my standing desk downstairs and set myself up in the dining room, strategically placed so that I could keep an eye on Leo while I taught. Knowing that Leo could not be kept quiet, I explained the situation to my students, warning them of the background accompaniment that would be a part of the two hours we had together. Everyone was very understanding!

Susannah and Evangeline eventually got home at around 1am yesterday (Thursday) and they are both still jetlagged.

Needless to say, I’ve been playing catch-up over the past two days, with very limited success.

Yesterday evening, I was blessed to see a doe and her fawn grazing right below my office window. Anxious that Susannah and Evangeline shouldn’t miss it, I alerted them to the great view of God’s grandeur made present in the beauty of his creatures. On Wednesday evening, shortly before my class began, I saw two does and three fawns, the latter of which were gamboling with carefree abandon. A sight for sore eyes which had my heart gamboling in unison!

This morning, I taught my regular online class to students in Santiago in Chile. We’re currently doing a course on Jacobean Shakespeare and this morning’s lecture was on Macbeth.

This brings us pretty much up to date. The podcasts I’ve just recorded for your exclusive delectation in the Inner Sanctum include a discussion and recital of the poetry of Sir Thomas Wyatt, an enemy of the Church during the time of Henry VIII who was imprisoned for allegedly having an adulterous relationship with Anne Boleyn. I’ve also recorded the fourth in the ongoing series examining Tolkien’s philosophy of myth, in which Tolkien connects art with the elves and technology with the magicians. Finally, we’re continuing our journey through the shire of Merrie England, arriving at the beautiful village city of Ely, home of the infamous Oliver Cromwell but also site of one of Christendom’s most magnificent cathedrals. Check them out and tell your friends to join the Inner Sanctum so that they can do the same.

Thanks, as always, for your support.