Paul M. Dubuc

I’ll bet some of you thought this blog was dead. I thought so too, but maybe it won’t be much longer. This summer has seemed like a pivotal time for me. After four years of seminary and one year in the Wellstreams program, I felt saturated and tired. Tired from the effort of all that practice and study while trying to have a normal family life and work a full time job, and saturated with so much good information and experience picked up from five years study of, and practice in, spiritual formation. The crisis that helped bring me in to that phase of my life seems more in the background these days. Not that I’ve conquered it, but I think that I have begun to see ways of accepting it, making sense of it, and using its influence to push me in the direction of greater spiritual growth and a stronger, more well grounded faith.

This spring, Toward the end of Phase 1 of Wellstreams, I started a discernment process that led to my decision to discontinue the program. Phase 2 would have kept me in the saturation process for another two years. There were several reasons, circumstances and events that led to the decision not to continue. It wasn’t just the feeling that I couldn’t go on this way for two more years. But after soaking up so much for so long, it seemed like time to start an outflow, both for the benefit of others and to make room in me for fresh “living water” (John 4:10-14) and turn this sponge into a fountain. I still think training in spiritual direction is in my future, but perhaps in a less intensive venue. For now I need to find more of my own direction to provide a context from which to help others. After so long, I’ve felt spiritually disconnected in a way, rootless. It’s time to put into practice more deeply what I’ve learned in a way that is more driven by God’s intentions for my life than by the specific requirements of a class or training program (I’m reminded of Psalm 1:2-3 here). It’s time to be open to the the possibilities that are hard to notice or consider when one’s life is so full of other things. I enjoyed the Wellstreams classes and will miss my classmates who will go on without me. I think I made some good friends there and I hope our paths will cross again. But rarely has a decision like this seemed so clear to me as to seem like God is really up to something in it. Pray for me and for Mary Beth too, please.

One of the things I’ve enjoyed about having more time off this summer is getting to to more discretionary reading instead of assigned reading (and writing). I’ve been using Shelfari for a while to keep track of my reading, but I’ve recently copied it to Goodreads to try that out. So many good books … so little time to read them all. I hope to be doing more discretionary writing too. Some of it should find its way to this space.

Sandy is a new member of our family, adopted by us about seven weeks ago. I wasn’t sure I was ready for another dog so soon after Sheila but Sandy needed a home and we had a big vacancy. She’s an Australian/Border Terrier mix, a little shy and unfriendly to strangers and other female dogs, but she’s very affectionate and playful when she gets to know you. She’s learned pretty well to get along with Jessica and Lucas’ boxer, Bella, on their visits. She also did well at a big party we had this weekend to celebrate a “milestone” birthday for Mary Beth and my completion of seminary. It was a great backyard party where we enjoyed seeing many family members and friends.

That’s right, four years of part-time study at Ashland Seminary is finished. I enjoyed very much my last course in the theology of C. S. Lewis. It’s good to have all the work over with, but I enjoyed the experience quite a bit, the sense of accomplishment it produced and being immersed in the challenging study of so many interesting subjects. I will miss it. I’ve come away with the feeling like I’ve just gotten a good taste of some very deep subjects and experiences that have whetted my appetite for a life of continued learning and application.

I’ve hardly had time to miss seminary before entering another study program called Wellstreams. I see this as a continuation of my seminary studies in spiritual formation along a more personal, less formal route.

Our son, Bryan, is off to study in Spain for a semester. He’s writing his own blog on the experience.

Today is a very sad day in our household. We lost a special friend and family member. Our 15 year old Australian Terrier, Sheila (that is my son holding her in the picture), took her last trip to the vet today. She had been getting us ready for this for over a year now. She had diabetes for the last five years and her health has steadily deteriorated since then. Last year before Easter she became very sick and I was sure we’d lose her then but she recovered and gave us one more year. Though her eyesight and hearing were almost gone and she didn’t have much energy, she still liked to be held and have her back scratched. She no longer greeted us when we’d come home from work, but she seemed to know we were there. She couldn’t climb stairs but seemed content enough to eat and sleep and wander around the house or back yard bumping into things. She was always able to find her food and water and her bed when she needed them. There was nothing wrong with her nose.

In spite of all her ailments it’s been hard to let her go. We hoped she would go on her own, but when her insulin supply ran out the decision was put into our hands. The drug company stopped making the type of insulin that we were using for her over a year ago and we bought up all that we could find before it became unavailable. Switching her over to another type could have caused her a lot of problems. We didn’t want to put her through that on top of everything else she suffers with so today we took her to the vet and were with her as she passed on calmly and peacefully.

Good bye old friend. We got you as a pup when our kids were young and they grew up with you. You are a part of many happy memories that we have of those years. Now the kids are grown and gone from our home and we are very sad to have to say good bye to you. You added so much fun and unexpected entertainment to the mix of our lives. If I slept in too late you would barge into my room greeting me with happy barking and jump up on the bed to lick my face. You liked to play fetch with the tennis ball, but not outside. That was strictly an indoor game. Outside you would run around and play with the kids, the long fur around your face swept back by the breeze as you ran. You were cute and cuddly but no lap dog, always on the go, full of energy until your later years (but you never stopped being cute and cuddly).

During the most depressing years of my life, when I was going though great difficulties, you were my companion on many late night walks that were full of prayers and tears and I shall never forget those times. Thank you for helping me get through them. Our late walks got to be such a habit that you wouldn’t go to bed until I did no matter how late I stayed up. You were there with me in case I needed a walk. Most nights I did, though sometimes I just felt like I needed to reward your patience. I especially remember the one glorious night just before Christmas when we happened to wander off our usual course for some reason and found one of the streets in our neighborhood lined for a long way with brightly lit luminaries. It was so beautiful, such a blessed experience that so easily could have been missed. As you got older our walks got slower, less frequent, and shorter until a walk to the corner was about all we could manage. Still, my walks won’t be the same without you.

I don’t know if dogs go to heaven, but it sure seems like that is the place from which they are sent to us. They give us so much love and acceptance in return for so little in the way of basic care and feeding. It’s no wonder we become so attached to them that it hurts so much to let them go. There’s a short little prayer that says, “Lord, make me the kind of person that my dog thinks I am.” That says a lot. The things we learn from our dogs could make us much better people.