The Unexpected

Contrary to popular belief, life in a monastery is never boring! Although there is a regular rhythm and pattern to our days, the unexpected always pops up. Last Sunday one of the sisters unexpectedly stumbled (not literally!) across an unusual animal in our enclosed yard. After much discussion, debate, photos and videos it was determined to be an incredibly mangy red fox. Although it is missing the beautiful bushiness of a normal fox tail, it still has a white tuft at the end! We've had foxes out back before, and we've recently had many reports of a fox in the front of our property, but this creature did not look familiar at first because of its pitiful state. Every year there are reports of rabid foxes in the area, so we kept our distance and locked Sabina inside.

The next day another unexpected event occurred, though of an entirely different type. In the middle of the afternoon a flood of water suddenly deluged our walk-in fridge in the basement. Consequently the water was unexpectedly shut off. It turns out there was a bit of a construction blunder by the electricians who have been installing wiring through our basement for the new wing. The blunder caused a very old water pipe above the fridge to be knocked apart, causing the flood. After supper Sr. Mary Magdalene, our 'handy-nun', pointed out the problem pipe to our prioress, Sr. Mary Martin, as they balanced on ladders. Thankfully they were able to partially fix it within a few hours and the water was turned back on later that night. It reminded us how blessed we are to have clean safe running water, something that 2.1 billion people around the world do not have access to.