*NOTE - This blog was posted by Linda Bobowski “You would have thought by now I would have at least lost a pound….” I am sure the volunteers who answer our telephones have heard me say on more than one occasion as I am walking up the stairs. For anyone who is not familiar with our offices we are located, for about another 10 days, behind the rectory and beside the church. The type of structure use to be called a bi-level but I think the correct term is a split. This means that when entering the offices you can either take 7 stairs up to the main offices or 7 steps down to the lower ones. Then of course if I have to see Fr. David it is fourteen steps to the main office and 7 down to the landing which connects the offices to the rectory and then again 7 down then 7 up and another 7 up. So if you are keeping track on a good day that is quite the cardio workout.
Last week as we were gathered around our ‘water cooler’ one of the new staff members asked me “what are you going to miss about this place?” meaning of course the office. My reply without thinking or hesitation was ‘the stairs’.
This morning I awoke in the wee hours of the morning and that thought crossed my mind. Now I am a self professed night owl, with a dislike of getting up in the morning and especially at this time of year. But I also speak first and then reflect on it at some later date.
Some fourteen plus years ago when I first started to work at Holy Family my desk was located on the main floor, nestled between two windows which allowed me to watch the goings on of the neighborhood. The staff was smaller, a pastor, secretary, caretaker and part time youth minister and pastoral worker. I always knew when it was recess. The shouts and the laughter coming from the playground of the now Bishop Felevich School, around 4 o’clock traffic would start to pick up in the back parking lot as the university students started returning home from classes and some of us were hurrying home from our day at work.
Then a few years went by and the parish was growing and it became obvious that we soon would out grow our space. The talk went from building a new church to a new cathedral. As my duties evolved I was asked to take on more of the book keeping duties it became quite clear that in order to do so effectively I needed an office with a closed door. I moved downstairs.
Now getting back to those stairs; when I first started to work here a former pastoral worker asked me one day “how do you stay so slim?” again without thought or hesitation…. ‘It must be from running up and down those stairs.’ Now throughout these past few years I have had quite a relationship with these stairs.
About three years ago I awoke one April morning and I couldn’t walk or even stand. I was in excruciating pain. The cause to this day is still unexplained. The specialist insisted that my recovery would consist of yoga and walking. Now I was use to walking as I started at a relatively early age according to my mother and I was practicing yoga for approximately five years when this occurred. But my first day back to work I faced the dreaded seven steps. Walking was slow and laborious and I had to cling to the banister and wall to keep myself upright. But I made it down those stairs, and up and again down, you get the picture.
Needless to say age and metabolism have crept up on me. I have now reached the age of that former pastoral worker and I am asking myself ‘how can I get slim?’ I have no problem walking up and down these stairs and depending on the day, sometimes a little faster. Now Deacon Bob asked me the other day ‘If you are going to miss these stairs you can always run up the steps to the Pastoral Centre in the new cathedral.” I just smiled and thought to myself and yes some days I can even take the elevator.
