A Vision

I want to write this down before I forget it completely. Already the words are getting confused in my memory.

Holy Tikhon of Zdonsk

Last night was standing in the nave of St Nicholas Orthodox Church in Saratoga. My mind was wondering and I was praying for my children instead of praying the communal prayers being sung by the choir. Suddenly it was like I was having a dream and St. Tikhon of Zdonsk was standing in front of me. And he said something like "Remind the Holy Synod of Metroplitan Leonty" or "Tell the Holy Synod to remember Metropolitan Leonty". Then the vision was gone but I was shaking a little and crying.

Metropolitan Leonty at Holy Trinity Cathedral in San Francisco, 1955.

As soon as the service was over I found Fr. Basil in the church hall and told him what had happened and asked him what I should do. I didn't know anything about St. Tikhon of Zdonsk excpt that I saw his icon and have heard is name mentioned during Saturday night vigils. And, other than having seen a photograph of Metropolitan Leonty and having read his name somewhere I knew nothing about him. I didn't even know he had been the primate of the OCA. I told this to Mitered Archpriest Basil, and as I was a telling him I started crying and shaking again. He told me then that the Holy Synod is trying to decide whether or not Metropolitan Leonty should be recognized as a saint in the Orthodox Church. And he crossed himself and said "I believe this" and said he would relay the message to the Holy Synod.

Needless to say, when I got home from church last night I read everyting about these men I could find online.

Honeymoon and Covid

We went on a cruise to Alaska. We flew from San Jose to Seattle, where we got on the ship, the M.S. Westerdam. Our first stop was in Juneau where we visted St Nicholas Orthodox Church (They currenty do not have a rector and are surviving on reader services and occasional clergy visits), and then Glacier Bay, then Sitka where we visted St Michal Orthodox Church and were blessed to venerate a relic of St Herman. The ships next stop was Ketchican, where we went fishing.

We caught amazing number of fish, and Kathleen caught the largest one, a 34" Silver Coho.

We had 180 pounds of various species of salmon flash frozen and shipped to us, even one chum salmon which we will feed to the dog.

The next stop was Victoria, BC but we did not get off the ship. That was the night Kathleen started coughing. The next morning we got off the ship in Seattle and Kathleen had a fever. Our hotel, the Mayflower Park Hotel was very comfortable and the staff was very helpful. As soon as I told them my wife was sick they had a room ready for us, letting us check in 7 hours early.

Kathleen spent a miserable night. I walked to a nearby drug sstore to get her medicine but it did not do much. The next morning I was coughing too. By the time Basil Wenceslas picked us up at the airport in San Jose on the 31st of June we both had fevers. When we got home we went strait to bed. The next morning we both tested positive for covid. Then the next day Basil tested positive. All three of us got perscriptions for paxlovid that day. As of Sunday (today is Tuesday the 8th of August.) we are both testing negative and Kathleen says she is 80% recovered. She began teaching her fall semester yesterday. Today was the first day I was able to get out of bed. I can't taste anything except for salt and citrus, or smell anything except for what I think is a hallucination (burning wood), and my sense of balance is off, and I am partially deaf. Hopefully, that all corrects soon. I go back to work tomorrow so today I spent writing my course syllabi. Basil is doing worse than Kathleen and I. This is his third time to have covid.