To all of you who have lingered, loitered, listed to port or to starboard, given up or given in or gone mental while waiting even for an update as to anything Orphan Wisdom, or are awaiting the starting gun, or a sign that it even exists anymore:
Good day to you, and blessings on your hearth and heart.
We first of all thank you mightily for hanging in, if indeed you’ve done so.
Many of you may go back to pandemical days, or feel like you do, while the school just mysteried out, as so many things did.
Thank you for considering coming to the school in your life schemes.
You might be able to tell by now that this note isn’t unequivocally good news on the school front or the life front.
A certain reversal of fortune has found me, wrenched my plans for myself out of symmetry.
It’s medical, with a kite’s tail of consequence.
I’d had a feeling for a while, which is why whenever any of you who I met on the Nights of Grief and Mystery asked about the school I tended to equivocate about the thing. I didn’t know if I’d be able to follow through on the commitment. That was a bedrock consideration for me. No false starts if at all avoidable.
But I don’t feel entirely done.
And so I am thinking of a couple of events.
A caveat: the June dates are pretty firm. The potential August session won’t be some version of the school as I’ve known it. It’ll be a chance I’m granting myself to see how good I might be at summing things up. I’m taking a chance here, content-wise and capacity-wise. That means you’ll be taking that same chance along with me.
Stephen Jenkinson
Founder of Orphan Wisdom
June 9th-13th, Ty Sanctiadd/Trefacwn in Wales: A weekend among friends. Theme: The Beginning of Ending. Registration coming soon. Save the date link.
June 14th, t.b.c. Totnes, Devon: An evening with myself and Martin Shaw on Prayer. Registration coming soon. Save the date link.
August 6-10th, in the teaching hall at the farm in eastern Ontario. We are consideringdoing a one-time only crash course in all things Orphan Wisdom, five days over six if Stephen’s fit.
And so we’re asking now how many of you’d be up for such a thing as the August event. To make any kind of a plan that includes Stephen these days needs a clear, good faith ‘yes’ from you to nudge this thing along.
It’s early days, and we’re already deep in the planning, are you in? Could you let us know by replying to this email, contact@orphanwisdom.com by April 15th.
We’ll let you know the fallout of this after that date.
Many thanks for thinking of us.
Khadija Striegel
Orphan Wisdom Manager
khadija@orphanwisdom.com