sillygoosegirl (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sillygoosegirl) wrote2005-08-20 10:58 pm
sillygoosegirl) wrote2005-08-20 10:58 pm
Entry tags:
Serenity
I was thinking about this at work the other day (perhaps because I'd been thinking about Firefly) and wanted to post it.
Back when my brother was going through a lot of troubles, by parents sent me to Al-Anon (or maybe it was Alateen?)... that experience was mostly a real flop for me because everyone else there had a loved one with a drinking problem, which felt very different to me than the drug problem my brother had. But there was one aspect of those meetings which was very moving and I have carried with me since then, the serenity prayer.
I remember, a couple meetings in, telling my mother about it and how much I liked it. I'd only heard it a few times and did not have it completely committed to memory yet, so I kind of struggled though repeating it to her, and asked her if she'd ever heard it before. She told me she had, and then pointed to the white lacy handkerchief framed in a green frame and hanging on the wall in the kitchen. I'd never looked at it closely before and discovered that it was had text embroidered onto it. There in our so very agnostic household, in the kitchen, which was the primary meeting room for family and for guests, framed and on display for all to see:
God, grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.
It's always been sort of an oddity, that prayer, or poem if you prefer, hanging in my mother's kitchen. But only sort of an oddity. Poem or prayer, it is important to remember, and important to strive for.
Back when my brother was going through a lot of troubles, by parents sent me to Al-Anon (or maybe it was Alateen?)... that experience was mostly a real flop for me because everyone else there had a loved one with a drinking problem, which felt very different to me than the drug problem my brother had. But there was one aspect of those meetings which was very moving and I have carried with me since then, the serenity prayer.
I remember, a couple meetings in, telling my mother about it and how much I liked it. I'd only heard it a few times and did not have it completely committed to memory yet, so I kind of struggled though repeating it to her, and asked her if she'd ever heard it before. She told me she had, and then pointed to the white lacy handkerchief framed in a green frame and hanging on the wall in the kitchen. I'd never looked at it closely before and discovered that it was had text embroidered onto it. There in our so very agnostic household, in the kitchen, which was the primary meeting room for family and for guests, framed and on display for all to see:
to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.
It's always been sort of an oddity, that prayer, or poem if you prefer, hanging in my mother's kitchen. But only sort of an oddity. Poem or prayer, it is important to remember, and important to strive for.
no subject
no subject