17-Jan-2000
The city celebration of Martin Luther King day was around the corner from where I work (granted, a long corner). Arlene drove over and we both went. It was in Our Lady's church (not our as in Arlene's and mine, butÝthat's the name anyway), one of the biggest Catholic churches in the Boston area. It's where Mother Theresa and her entourage went to mass when they were in the area a few years ago. The only other time I've been in the church part was for another MLK day observation, plus I've been in the church basement to donate blood a couple of times. The sanctuary has a huge cathedral ceiling, with gothic arches and vaults, painted all over, with stained glass and sculptures all around.
The Newton clergy association arranges to have MLK day observations at different churches around the city every year, and they split up the officiating. Cantor Osborne led the entire assembly in a two-part round in Hebrew (“for those of you who have trouble with the transliteration, the original Hebrew words are printed in the upper right corner”) of Hiney Mah Tov, “how good and pleasant it is for brethern to dwell in unity,” a psalm verse that synagogue youth groups have contests to see how many different tunes they know to sing it to (with a little effort you can sing it to “Deep in the Heart of Texas.”) Our congressman Barney Frank spoke briefly. The main speaker was a retired rabbi from New Jersey who had been active with Dr. King in the civil rights movement in the '60s. Among other stories, he told about being holed up in a house in Albany, Georgia, with Dr. King and several other clergymen one night when the white citizens' council was picketing outside, and about having been about twenty yards from Dr. King when he gave the “I have a dream” speech. He talked about the two times Dr. King had spoken at his synagogue in Springfield, NJ, and Arlene said, “sure enough, that was his synagogue that my mother drove my brother and me out to in the ice and snow when I was in high school to hear Dr. King. ” It sure was worth missing a couple of hours of work for. As for my tiny participation in the civil rights movement, please start here.
Hmm, in the prosaic part of the present, I swam 1 Km in the morning.
And, here's the eraser carving I did yesterday:
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