Sinsinawa
Spectrum
A Congregation News Magazine
An Advanced, Backward Glance
by Jill Poehlman
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Jill Poehlman |
The Associate Office, when not trying to imitate an art farm, most resembles a schoolroom, and the staff and volunteers are groups of somewhat over-age students. We’re always learning, often by experimentation. Whenever we try something new, we learn a lot. We often hear statements such as, “That’s not the way we have always done it,” or “I don’t know why it has to be changed.” But after one year, you remain my teachers.
When it was decided to dedicate this article to the best of my first and past year of serving as Promoter of Associates for the Dominican Sisters of Sinsinawa, I learned that just asking the question, “What was the best?” is a bit like opening Pandora’s celebrated box. A lot of unexpected things fly out, including more pesky questions about how to define and select “the best.”
Calling something “the best” is an exceptionally reliable way to start an argument. It doesn’t much matter what the something is: the best Bogart movie, the best beach, the best Beethoven sonata, the best city park, the best French impressionist painter, the best short love poem, the best Clapton album. If I named all eight, I would have an absolute minimum of eight arguments on my hands, and that is assuming only one person reads this note.
That’s because “best” is, of course, a subjective term. Anything that can’t be measured statistically―and that is most of the things that count in life―can’t be ranked, whether the ranking is “best” or “top ten” or “worst.” I can say, without much fear of contradiction, that Everest is the tallest mountain, but I can only call it the best mountain as a statement of my opinion. And as soon as I do that, some fan of McKinley or Blanc or Olympus will tell me, in certain and quite possibly passionate terms, that I am dead wrong. (Fine, you win. I am afraid of heights, anyway.)
And so it is with the family of Associates. I can tell you, with some certainty, how many there are in each group, where they live, when and where they meet, and a bit about their mission; but if I try and tell you what makes the best group of Associates, I will probably start a feud. However, I assure you that when I have had the honor to visit and get to know some of you, as a group you all convince me as you smile with a sparkle in your eyes and a tease in your attitude, that, “We are the best.”
I love that each group feels certain that they hold the title and of course, I have no right, responsibility, or rationale to try to figure out which group is the best. I am still newish at this job, newer to the Associates (2003), and new at visiting all of you. Yes, you are right, I am chicken! Nor can there ever be a statistically certain “best!” However, I can tell you that the Associates are vibrant, thriving, committed, devoted, exciting role models, peacemakers, educators, students, community members, contemplatives, and, as Erica Jordan, OP, repeats, “all are in the hot pursuit of truth” and filled with the “best of love for God, each other, and the world.”
So here I sit trying to say thank you for one of the most sacred and grace-filled years in my life, and with a smile on my face, and yes, a few tears from the awesome blessing, loving all of you, even if we have not met, and certain that you make me, certainly not the best, but better! I offer my eternal gratitude with an open heart and hope that you smile.
Oh, I almost forgot: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre; Tobacco Bay, Bermuda; Opus 101 in A Major; St. James, London; Renoir; Shakespeare’s Sonnet XXIX; Slowhand. Those are the absolute facts―in my opinion, of course.