Elisabeth Dearborn
Elisabeth Dearborn first came to Pendle Hill as a resident student in 1981-2. She has returned many times since, as a sojourner, workshop participant and program leader. She met her husband, Richard Brady, at Pendle Hill. Below she shares her most recent experience as a Pendle Hill Resident Program student in winter 2006. She describes a typical day, her courses, and what she finds most meaningful at Pendle Hill.
"I have felt returned to a deep unity with Nature here. My windows open to the East where each morning the sun greets me. Outside is a bird feeding platform which I've kept regularly supplied with black sunflower seed in gratitude for the amazing experience of sharing breakfasting with bird friends.
I take breakfast in my room in order to enjoy thoroughly preparing for Meeting for Worship - some yoga, some journaling, quietly watching the birds who come to eat at the feeder outside the window. I love the gathering into worship of the whole community. I have a job in the kitchen after lunch cleaning pots. I love the four of us on the 'post-pots' team. When we finish up - sometimes greasy! - we do a little dance of joy together. On most days I get in a walk to the Swarthmore woods and Crum Creek. Whatever else I do, these daily rhythms are the anchor. In the evening at 9 p.m., I slip downstairs for Epilogue to quietly close the day.
The two courses I am taking this term seem to offer me regular nuggets of insight connected to my own spiritual seeking at this time in my life. I heard other students, taking other classes, say the same thing. Is the mystery of classroom learning at Pendle Hill the work of the Spirit? I think so.
I combined a term at Pendle Hill with a course in watercolor painting at the Community Arts Center next door. The class was taught by a teacher from the Philadelphia School of Fine Arts who helped me as a beginning painter to explore this new medium. It was terrific.
The experience of living in community with people from all over the world, sharing in common the spiritual search, has been profoundly nourishing. Living so simply, choosing not to be on email, and having my phone on for only half an hour each day has helped me listen to ‘the still small voice within.
With so many opportunities for learning available here, I've enjoyed steering a course among them that has nourished me deeply. Deep solitude has been the most powerful of all, embedded as it is here in the context of a present and loving community."
