The Place Returning to Where it all Began

The Place

Returning to Where it all Began

A number of years ago I drove to Northern Idaho to spend time with my brother Dwayne before the onset of winter, thus avoiding the snows that would soon make Snoqualmie Pass on I-90, perilous. This visit turned out to be one of the best I'd had with my brother, and the highlight was the day we drove to a remote portion of Priest Lake, where our grandfather had built a lake cabin. It was the first time I'd been there since my senior year in high school.

The place was just as I'd remembered it, with the cabin still the same color my grandfather had chosen, and Priest Lake, with the snow capped mountains off in the distance, and the little island just off shore,  just as tranquil as the first time I had walked on that beach, soon after my grandparents had purchased the property from the Idaho Department of Forestry. I remember camping in a tent, while my grandfather began clearing trees, and selecting the site where he'd build his lake home.

The photo of me standing next to the dock is especially meaningful for me, for it was this dock that served as my special place of solitude as a sixteen year old. I would spend hours sitting in a deck chair, alone, praying, and reading the Bible and theological works. It was on this dock that I first experienced the contemplative life, and sensed God calling me to be a monk.

This beach overwhelmed me with memories of my youth, for it was here where I first felt the desire to wear a black robe, and live a life that would be focused on communing with God. It was this place where God first instilled in me a desire to spend my future in solitude, prayer, and community, as a monk. No longer a sixteen year old with dreams, but a seventy-seven year old monk, wearing that black robe, and gazing out at the beauty that first instilled in me a desire to live a life in communion with God.

With love in Christ,

Abbot Tryphon