Sabbatical a long way off; thee says truly

I have a list of publishers now who might be possibilities for my Seventh-day Quaker book. I realized after hearing the talk by Wade Rouse that the draft might be considered a memoir, which helped shape the publishers I've noted. But after negotiating with another librarian in my unit who is also applying for sabbatical, I realized that if it is granted, it is still a year and 3 months away. What will carry me through: the discipline of hope, small tasks like creating the bibliography in the citation manager, refining the publisher list, and perhaps an intensive class at Earlham School of Religion.

By the way, I continue to be fascinated with the Spanish Sociolinguistics class I'm sitting in on this semester! The question of English-speakers using the singular came up Wednesday--and I wonder if there are any Friends who still use either thou or thee? I do have a non-Quaker friend who uses "thee" as an intimate and affectionate term for her spouse, as do I. But are there folks who use it as a regular practice, at home or in Meeting, school, in blogs, etc., or has it truly died out? I see that jeanne_d_arc has urged us to observe "October (Tenth Month) 24 ... as International Talk Like a Quaker Day." I also see this article citation from Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts, which says that a 1990 survey of 28 Quakers showed that the 2nd person singular is still in use:
Birch, Barbara M. "Quaker Plain Speech: A Policy of Linguistic Divergence." International Journal of the Sociology of Language. 1995. v. 116, pp. 39-59.
If anyone would like to weigh in, speak thy mind, Friend!

A list of blessings

In this week of so many things going wrong, what have been the blessings?

• My wife, the best blessing of all.
• No one was hurt when the garage door broke on Sunday morning, and on Tuesday the repairman fixed the cable and the one on the other side of the door as well.
• On Monday I saw a bunch of really cool inukshuk outside Lake Ontario Hall.
• A & I heard an excellent talk by memoirist Wade Rouse on Wednesday.
• My talk with the dean and director about my sabbatical proposal went well today and they gave several solid suggestions.
• The dining room is now a beautiful greeny-robin’s-egg color.
• I’ve been playing the viola quite a lot lately. I had a good walk in the park this afternoon, then when we got home, A put together a great dinner while I played the viola. We decided where to have the outdoor motion detector lights, where to plant the mums, and I put together a few inukshuk.
• Tomorrow the electrician is coming, along with the garage door salesman, and Ffriend Walt for a chat—and I am only working a half day.
• Sunday our best friends are coming over for dinner.

That's it, just a list. Sometimes all I need is to count them.