A quiet corner

I apologize for being so remiss about blogging lately.

I have several excuses:

• other projects real (sewing curtains for our place in Colorado) and virtual (a new web project that's not quite ready for prime time yet—perhaps a preview will be coming soon);
• bad cold that's hung on with a cough and sapped energy; and, perhaps most telling,
• a case of the blogging blahs

But, on the way to speak in a science class, I happened to see a quiet corner of the campus from a new angle, and my near-dormant blogging juices felt a stir.

I pass the Marianist cemetery going to and from the bus stop every day, but hadn't seen it from this slightly elevated viewpoint before. And since I've always found cemeteries to be uniquely peaceful and welcoming places, I thought it might make an interesting blogging subject.

Especially when we were fortunate to have a foggy morning earlier this week. Fog enhances any landscape, but perhaps especially one like this!

The cemetery is a final resting place for over 100 lay and professed Marianists who have taught or otherwise been associated with the University. It's next to the residence where many of them live. The building on the far side of the graveyard in the picture at the top of the post is their chapel—great acoustics! the college choir I sing with has performed there.

Also next to the chapel is the largest set of windchimes I've ever seen...it takes a bit to get them going, but when they swing they sound amazing!

Here are a couple more atmospheric foggy shots of this peaceful place:

I've been at St. Mary's a long time, but of course the earliest gravestones in the cemetery memorialize educators unfamiliar to me. 

But the more recent names are another story. For example, Brother Paul, the gentleman whose stone is on the left was director of the Library where I work when that building was constructed in the late 1960's. Word has it that he had a lot to do with its design, and I must say he did a great job. It's been a very pleasant work environment for me all this time. He'd already retired when I came to work here, but he continued to be active in library-related work, spending many years as the Marianist archivist.

We are making some big changes in the Library, though, this year. I'll tell you about that in a future post.