tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-66434107188828967192024-03-19T05:37:29.979-07:00Memutar dan Berteriak (Twist and Shout)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger124125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-32233245570355435732022-01-31T09:29:00.002-08:002022-02-06T08:26:58.385-08:00Norman Ediston, 21st Century Essene Monk<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhxAQvujZBiNND5FMIVVOJCEOmG2bnbEesAmjFd8JyauTo-E_Eg4d5cb4uBLwpf7ODQKJUJfB9yjwBXeG0VyGvRbkcsaGhWaCeV3SLGvjmmDnuArTUQOsOUxX1jS4bgj98LUM97rBBfjN3ZEy2zpTDS3bC0KEgRc3QR6lZB46qjx1nsbRSlbNX4Gw=s1508" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1508" data-original-width="1235" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhxAQvujZBiNND5FMIVVOJCEOmG2bnbEesAmjFd8JyauTo-E_Eg4d5cb4uBLwpf7ODQKJUJfB9yjwBXeG0VyGvRbkcsaGhWaCeV3SLGvjmmDnuArTUQOsOUxX1jS4bgj98LUM97rBBfjN3ZEy2zpTDS3bC0KEgRc3QR6lZB46qjx1nsbRSlbNX4Gw=s320" width="262" /></a></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="5kbl6-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="5kbl6-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This</span><span data-offset-key="5kbl6-1-0" style="font-family: inherit;"> is my friend: Norman. Norm died a couple of weeks ago. He was what America calls 'homeless'. Which is a terrible misnomer for the people who (as the English put it) 'live rough' on our streets. </span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="1ch4e-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="1ch4e-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="1ch4e-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="25ua6-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="25ua6-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="25ua6-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">In my experience there are three kinds of people living rough: </span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="1pl00-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="1pl00-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="1pl00-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="1ahn4-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="1ahn4-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="1ahn4-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">Those who find themselves there through failure or circumstance and who are trying desperately to escape.</span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="9omt1-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="9omt1-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="9omt1-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="fsd5s-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="fsd5s-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="fsd5s-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">Those possessed by the twin demons of mental illness and mind bending drugs - often both and often hard to tell apart - except that those possessed by drugs die faster. </span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="1pank-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="1pank-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="1pank-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="fg0ik-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="fg0ik-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="fg0ik-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">And then there are the outliers like Norm. </span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="ebobg-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="ebobg-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="ebobg-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="49v7t-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="49v7t-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="49v7t-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">I don't know Norm's back story but by the time I met him Norm didn't really fit into either category. He wasn't anguished and struggling nor did he appear to be possessed by 'demons'. The Norm I knew seemed to be at peace: with his situation, with others and with his God. Norm lived underneath the freeway in a small tent, not far from the church. He worked at church every week, directing traffic and parking cars. He also was a regular attender at the monthly 'Homeless' Barbecue that I help at. That was where this photo was taken.</span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="9tjos-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="9tjos-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="9tjos-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="929ak-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="929ak-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="929ak-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">Norm and I spoke often. Usually about the weather - whether it was hardest to live rough in a Houston summer or a St. Louis winter - we agreed to disagree about that. Or about the parking traffic and how otherwise intelligent church goers couldn't follow simple directions. Sometimes we talked about the church and faith and while I never pried, I know he was a believer. I always looked forward to seeing Norm with his wry, enigmatic smile. It's how I imagine Abraham or Moses must have looked after crossing the Sinai.</span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="450ri-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="450ri-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="450ri-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="6nk1n-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="6nk1n-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="6nk1n-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">And so far as I could tell, Norm was at peace: with himself, with others, with his life. It's what made him such a unique figure at church. I believe that to know Norm was to get a glimpse of what the Essene monks of biblical Israel must have been like. As I understand it, the Essenes took vows of poverty, living in the wilderness copying scriptures (it's where the Dead Sea Scrolls come from), praying and communing with their God. Some scholars believe Jesus was an Essene. John the Baptist probably was.</span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="50uc4-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="50uc4-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="50uc4-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="93pj3-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="93pj3-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="93pj3-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;">Whether or not Norm was really like an Essene, Norm's existence had a singular quality: He was in some fundamental way beyond the cares of this world. Most of us spend our days struggling, grasping, getting, justifying - always chasing something or someone. But Norm didn't. He was past all that. As if he was standing on the boundary between this world and the next, looking with bemusement back on the roaring bedlam he had crossed.</span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="a50s0-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="a50s0-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;"><span data-offset-key="a50s0-0-0" style="font-family: inherit;"><br data-text="true" /></span></div></div><div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="11rtq" data-offset-key="6lpk2-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-9104297861836417332020-01-31T15:31:00.001-08:002020-02-02T12:27:17.272-08:00I Know These ThingsI have learned that love is perfect and infinite.<br />
For it comes from a God who is both.<br />
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But we don't treat love that way.<br />
We hoard, saving it for our 'special 'loved' ones'.<br />
Or we hide it, lest our black hearts corrupt.<br />
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Some of us see more clearly.<br />
Whether due to greater suffering or truer vision,<br />
they have acquired the ability to love without restraint.<br />
Never hoarding but extravagantly giving and receiving.<br />
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I know these things because I know Cindy.<br />
And she showed me how.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-40430941140590712612019-12-05T20:53:00.001-08:002020-01-22T13:12:13.485-08:00Mildred and Sam<div bis_size="{"x":15,"y":7,"w":652,"h":23,"abs_x":282,"abs_y":141}">
Last night in my small group my friend Jerry asked us to think back to our 'best' Christmas memory. I had an immediate answer that had to do with being in Jakarta, Indonesia and having my dad - dressed at Santa - terrify dozens of small local children: "manusia iblis merah! manusia iblis merah! (red demon man! red demon man!"). But as I listened to the others talk about their best Christmas experiences I decided I was wrong. My best Christmas memory happened the year my son Sam was born. He was born a month before Christmas so had nothing else happened it probably still would have been my best Christmas. A brand new baby is an incredible gift any time of year.</div>
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But I don't believe that was why Sam made that Christmas so special. For some time we had been helping Mildred, an elderly woman who lived in a small apartment near our home. Among other things we always brought her to church with us. And we didn't particularly like her. She was a rather miserable, bitter and terribly lonely 75 year old woman who apparently had never fit in anywhere. She was often critical and rude but it wasn't much of a sacrifice to drive a few blocks and pick her up so we tolerated the occasional outbursts.</div>
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From what we could tell she had been alone for most of her adult life. She had never married or had children. She'd worked as a department store salesperson and had been fortunate enough to retire with a small pension that paid for an apartment in a nice part of town. But it was barren, empty of art, pictures of family members or any of the markers of a life lived with others. She was alone and apparently she had almost always been that way. </div>
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On Christmas eve - as was common in the first few months after Sam was born - it took us longer than anticipated to get going so I drove over to pick up Mildred while Sam's mom finished all of the complex procedures necessary to bring an newborn infant out on a snowy winter's night. When we got back, mother and child still weren't ready so I brought Mildred inside to wait. And Sam's mother, being far more intuitive than me, brought him in and plunked him into Mildred's lap so she could finish getting ready.</div>
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It was then that a small miracle unfolded. Mildred leaned over him and with tears in her eyes whispered and sang him a tuneless song, the melted snowflakes on her coat glistening in the Christmas lights. She was a woman transformed. For those few minutes she wasn't bitter or miserable, she was filled with the true joy of Christmas: celebrating the birth of a baby who would love the world but also could be loved.</div>
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It's been twenty six years since that night but I think I've finally realized what God and Mildred and Sam had to teach me: that the key to surviving as a Christian in this world isn't in being loved, it's in loving. Because we Christians can survive even if no one loves us. After all Christ died for us and sent his Holy Spirit to minister to us. It's not ideal and not easy but God promises us that He is always with us and always will love us and that is enough. No we don't need other people to love us but we do need others <i><b>to love</b></i>. We must love others the way he does, for there is no other way to truly be like Christ...to be Christian.</div>
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And so on that snowy St. Louis night we - but mostly baby Sam - gave Mildred the most precious gift she had ever received: someone that she - even in her limited, bitter state - could love. And I think that's the best gift we've ever given anyone.</div>
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I 'work' with the homeless at church. Mostly I hang out and do what my brilliant friends Andrea, Sarah and Carolyn tell me to do. I've gotten to know a whole host of what I call 'lost boys' - mostly men who have fallen between this world's cracks, people like LaKeith and Chris. And I've always thought that what I was doing was showing 'love' for them. But I realize now that as Christians they don't need my love so much as they need to have real people in their lives that they can love. The task of 'lifting' them out of their struggles isn't my job, it's their's and God's and the first thing they need to master is the vocation that we all are called to: to love one another.</div>
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Which can be very hard for me. Requiring me to admit my weakness and limitation. Because it's only when my pride dies, that I can become someone who can truly help the lost and the lonely progress on they journey to Christ. So this Christmas, I'm trying to focus less on 'proving' my love to others and more on making my self vulnerable and approachable enough so that other people can do God's will through me. Which will be strange for a rather hyperactive and self righteous man like me. </div>
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In my mind's eye I can still see Mildred holding Sam and singing her tuneless song. And it is still beautiful. </div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-15194580033840459502019-08-30T08:00:00.001-07:002019-12-09T14:21:11.743-08:00My encounter with T. Boone Pickens<div bis_size="{'x':16,'y':8,'w':653,'h':23,'abs_x':207,'abs_y':145}">
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T. Boone Pickens is dead. <a bis_size="{'x':227,'y':8,'w':236,'h':22,'abs_x':418,'abs_y':145}" href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2019/09/11/remembering-when-t-boone-pickens-got-a-brain-scan/?fbclid=IwAR2WC5OiqggqbGfbaBC51vWheQh5jIOKpsBkwK5EKW3LyfhnCLbsnVN6m2M">Here's a Forbes piece on him.</a></div>
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I have a personal recollection of T Boone: I was attending the University of Chicago when he came to give a speech. I was able to weasel my way into the handful of students who were invited to have lunch with him beforehand. I did this because at the time he was making a play for Phillips Petroleum which was my father's company whose then headquarters were in the town I graduated high school from: Bartlesville, OK. The news even featured a prayer service at the Church I attended (I suppose beseeching God to hex Boone or something). Each of us got to introduce ourselves to the great man and so I pointed out my connection. After lunch as we walked to the speech site Boone sidled up to me and worked me the entire time, emphasizing his concern for Phillips and the people of Bartlesville and so on. The ironic thing was being a Good Chicago economist, I was rather agnostic on the whole affair. But Boone was clearly more than just a cold corporate raider: he wanted to be seen as the hero. But I'll let History be the judge of that.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-21385104757582552352019-07-14T09:37:00.001-07:002019-07-14T09:37:29.336-07:00The savior of the world<p dir="ltr">In an uncharacteristic failure of judgement, a friend asked me to give the invocation (church talk for kickoff or warmup prayer) at church. This is what I said.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Dear lord thank you for this day, <br>
for the sunshine <br>
and the <u>truth</u> of your gospel.<br>
Lord Jesus give us eyes to see,<br>
ears to hear and the faith to know that <i><b>you</b></i> are the savior of the world.</p>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-32539220161506279362018-11-04T07:31:00.001-08:002018-11-05T14:51:48.423-08:00Thoughts on the occasion of a child's baptism.<p dir="ltr">Thoughts on the occasion of a child's baptism.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Friends asked me to be Godfather to their first born. This is what I wrote to them:</p>
<p dir="ltr">When I went outside this morning I saw a rainbow. It was complete, both ends touching the ground, with every color from violet to deepest red. I have never seen one as beautiful.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In biblical times this would have been interpreted as a sign of God's blessing. But your son bears a much greater sign of God's favor than sunlight bent by rain: he has you.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Never forget that you are his first and most important blessing.</p>
<p dir="ltr">And never forget that it is his life. Help him by giving him the space to play and experiment and grow. Know that he is God's child and that he and his Lord will choose his path. Welcome this because it lifts an unbearable burden from you. You are not responsible for W's future - only his present. Love him, guide him, protect him.... less than you would like, but probably more than he needs. So he will grow up a strong and faithful man.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Thank you for honoring me with the opportunity to participate in his life<br>
</p>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-80230138872019474272018-08-25T05:37:00.000-07:002020-01-31T16:27:52.977-08:00Shovel Boy Go BoomThe first time I got blown up I didn't think anything of it. The second time, I began to perceive a trend.<br />
<br />
When I graduated from High School my father got me a summer job working on one of the seismic exploration crews that reported to him in his role as Chief Geophysicist of a giant global oil company. A seismic crew explores for oil and gas deposits using wave physics. Onshore this involved spreading thousands of specialized microphones called geophones over a large area and then placing high explosives in sequences of holes drilled in the ground and blowing them up - in our case usually five charges at a time. The broad spectrum shock waves generated by the explosions then propagate through the ground. Each layer of rock, oil, gas or water has its own resonance so only a specific wave form will reflect off of it. These reflections are then gathered by the geophones and shipped to a (usually Houston) supercomputing facility where they do fiendishly complex processing to reverse engineer all of the bouncing and pinging the waves did so that they can create a layer cake map of the underlying rock strata and find the oil and gas. Pretty standard stuff, really.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a class="hoverZoomLink" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioiOS6qxtmBMS3pe6JaWneWXU8eje9rmlFymMEC0VvUDI4Stzm57zdbzJbslSbHJdtbtsk44olGR2GvP9j1DLJv8m0By0MaY276_wfsAQ7ehRFKy_0bUO6YCZxMyCP4ewta72p4ns4Tg/s1600/11988186_10207228518653200_6195711610552308920_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" class="hoverZoomLink" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="720" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioiOS6qxtmBMS3pe6JaWneWXU8eje9rmlFymMEC0VvUDI4Stzm57zdbzJbslSbHJdtbtsk44olGR2GvP9j1DLJv8m0By0MaY276_wfsAQ7ehRFKy_0bUO6YCZxMyCP4ewta72p4ns4Tg/s400/11988186_10207228518653200_6195711610552308920_n.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Shovel Boy rock climbing six short weeks after the<br />
events related here. Still 100% boy.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
As the youngest and lowest 'man' (for I was only notionally one, having none of the traditional secondary sexual characteristics associated with manhood) on the crew I was given a shovel and told to follow the 'Shooting' crew around as they set off the explosives. This was because from time to time some of the charges would 'blow out', meaning they would look like the explosions you see in war movies. I used the shovel to fill in the resulting craters, hence the name 'Shovel Boy' - although they rarely called me that, preferring 'hey you' or 'kid' - they loved hazing the 'boss's son.<br />
<br />
My secondary job was to help hook up the charges. Typically they were spread over one- or two hundred meters and needed to be hooked up by wire to the Shooter's detonation device. The procedure was to hook up all of the charges then the Shooter would notify the Observer who was at a remote location inside the back of a truck filled with computing gear. The Observer would issue-and the Shooter would relay the warning "Get it Hot" and we would step away from the charges. The Observer then detonated the charges remotely. Sometimes one or more of the connections from the detonator to the charges would be faulty and the shooter would call out to us to go reset the connection. This was how I got blown up.<br />
<br />
The first time I was blown up we were in a dense forest and I couldn't see or hear the Shooter well, I was having a hard time fixing the connection so when the Shooter yelled "hurry up kid" I yelled "I am" which he interpreted as 'I'm done', so rather than being clear of the blast zone, I was just standing up when the charge went off under my feet. It turns out that in those types of situations things really do seem to happen much slower for I recall having the time to think 'so this is what it's like to be blown up' before my back crashed into a nearby pine tree upon which all I could think was "ow". But I came out of that with nothing more than a deep and quite colorful bruise so it was all good.<br />
<br />
The second time I was blown up was in a swamp/forest with waist deep water. So when the call went out to check the charge and the charge blew out while I was still nearby, I wasn't blown up. Instead a geyser of swamp mud and water shot in the air and with time once again moving slowly, I mused 'gee, that's going to land right on top of me' and then it did. I wasn't injured by the swamp stuff, it just splattered all over me but it came with a terrible side effect. It turns out that swamp mud that's been blown up has the consistency and smell of...well you know. And I was more or less covered in it. I spent the afternoon dry retching while vainly trying to wash smelly swamp mud off with smelly swamp water. When it came time to go back to the motel the guys made me ride in the back of the truck. We stopped at a 'magic wand' car wash where I stripped and was 'car washed'. Fun times.<br />
<br />
So the more thoughtful of you may be wondering "gee Bill, why did you keep getting blown up?". Well it was really very simple. The Shooter and his Assistant had the civilized tradition of 'smoking a bowl' of home grown marijuana before shooting and during the lunch break. The usual scenario for us was to backpack all of our gear in country and then wait for the Observer and the rest of the crew to reset all of the geophones that had become dislodged or chewed on by wildlife the night before. This gave us an hour in the morning and half an hour at lunch to.....partake. You may also be musing "gee that was really stupid" and you'd be right. But fortunately for me I couldn't join my comrades because among my other wimpisms I had asthma and try as I might I always slipped into anaphylactic shock before I could get high. So ixNay on the opeDay. Which probably saved my life.<br />
<br />
Right after this second 'incident' the crew took two weeks off - our normal pattern was to work seven days a week for five weeks straight and then go home for two. So I went home to my parents and told my father absolutely nothing about the dynamite dope fiends or being blown up. Why? For the same reason the military recruits 18 year old boys to charge machine gun nests. I very much wanted to be accepted as a peer by the men I was working with and to 'squeal' on them would have made my situation unbearable. Besides, I'd already been blown up twice and nothing particularly bad had happened - I could handle this.<br />
<br />
Then the crew shifted from damp and swampy Vicksburg, MS to dry and gravelly Elk City, OK and the stakes became life and death. Two factors combined to make my job in western Oklahoma much more dangerous. The first was that the size of the individual charges was increased from about 5 to 20 pounds per hole (for comparison's sake the standard NATO 155mm (6 inch) artillery round contains 15.8 pounds of high explosive). Supposedly the holes were drilled much deeper to account for this difference but in the rocky high plains the drillers sometimes had difficulty doing so. The result was a lot of shallow charges and far more blowouts. And the second was when a hole blew, the result wasn't a nice WW2 movie crater or muddy shower, it was more akin to a shotgun or perhaps a Napoleonic cannon firing grapeshot. The geysers of small gravel and sand shot high into the air. And any part of your body that was over the blast zone would be shredded.<br />
<br />
Being reasonably intelligent, it only took one blowout for me to realize that I wasn't in Kansas anymore (actually Kansas was just as bad but it's the conventional phrasing for this type of situational transition). I immediately began taking much more rigorous precautions. When the (stoned) Shooter told me to check a connection I would make him step several steps away from the detonator (he had to be holding the detonate button down for the Observer's detonation command to work) before I would go near the charge circuit. I really, really didn't want to be shredded. Needless to say this upset the two regular Shooters. They teased me, called me names and blamed me for delays but self preservation is a powerful motivator and I stuck to my guns. But still being an 18 year old boy, I didn't say anything to anyone else about why I was behaving this way.<br />
<br />
The result was that the Crew Chief yanked me from the shooting crew, making me his miserable (but much safer) personal dog's body. My replacement as Shovel Boy was much older man, perhaps 24 who had just been hired. I met him at the weekly Sunday night barbecue that the Crew Chief catered. I remember telling myself when I shook his hand "I need to take him aside and warn him". But everyone was drinking (me included) and before long the hazing resumed. Now with a sharper edge: I was a coward who was afraid of things that go 'boom'. It's hard to describe just how painful this mockery was to me. I almost broke into tears. I had tried so hard to 'be a man' and now what was I? Nothing. And then I saw my replacement laughing at me with everyone else and thought "Well fuck you too".<br />
<br />
The next day I still pretended that I was going to warn him but I really had no plans to do so. And after a few days I figured 'well he's obviously figured this out by now'. Then on that Thursday we got the call: "Man Down". The Crew Chief and I were the emergency response team and we got there in a couple minutes. It seems the new guy misunderstood a "Get it Hot" signal as a command to check the connection and the hole blew out while he was kneeling over it.<br />
<br />
It blew his face off.<br />
<br />
Well, not completely, there was still flesh clinging to his skull but it looked like gravelly hamburger. His eyes were like popped grapes. He was concussed and disoriented. We got him into the back of the truck and the crew chief - who had been in combat in Vietnam - told me "DO NOT let him screw with his face" while shoving a reluctant me in the back with him. This was when I reached my low point. Since then I have spent quite a bit of time reading combat memoirs, trying to understand how men respond to crisis situations and through that reading and this experience I have perceived what I suspect is a stock 'untruth'. Combat memoirs almost always share a story about the 'no hoper' wounded. The typical narrative is that the guy is in agony and can't be saved or begs to be killed because he has no legs and the murderous enemy are coming. I realize now that many of these are likely rather sanitized tales. I suspect what really happens is that frightened men, when confronted with a severely wounded comrade who they can't get to shut up, often choose to overdose him with morphine or barring that kill him outright due to fear and panic.<br />
<br />
Why do I think this? Because my wounded replacement wouldn't shut up. He was in agony and he couldn't see so he kept moaning and trying to touch his face. Fortunately he was shock-ey and weak so even I was able keep his hands from scrabbling at his bloody mess. During the drive to the hospital it hit me just how badly I had betrayed him. The resulting shame made me even less compassionate. I wanted him to shut up in the worst way. I began by reasoning with him, then begging but ended up telling him in a low voice to "shut up, please shut up" until his moaning became whimpers.<br />
<br />
There was an inquiry and my father flew in with the investigation team in a corporate jet. He immediately took me aside and asked me what had happened. I lied through my teeth. I 'didn't know', I 'wasn't there', I 'didn't have any problems when I was on that crew'. And it paid off. From that point on I was no longer a coward, no longer 'Daddy's little boy'. I was one of them, on their side. All I had to do was betray my own father and the horribly mutilated kid who replaced me.<br />
<br />
And then came the most shameful part of the tragedy for me: I forgot it. I shoved my memory of it so far down, so deep into my subconscious that despite spending the last 18 months of my father's life caring for him every day, I didn't even remember the incident until he was dead (it was there but I had to want to remember it for it to surface and back then I didn't). I never confessed it to him. I never asked for his forgiveness. And the faceless stranger? I never knew his name. Never tried to look him up, much less confess and apologize to him.<br />
<br />
Since last year when I allowed this memory to resurface, I have thought long and hard about the events of that hot summer. I have concluded that there are several kinds of coward and I'm one of them. I'm not a physical coward, in fact I'm kind of the opposite. Nor am I a social coward - if I'm in the mood I'll go up to anyone. What I am is a moral coward. When the chips are down and the right thing to do is obvious I will do it unless it costs me something socially or economically. Then my natural instinct is to side with my own self interest.<br />
<br />
But there's a silver lining to my cowardice. In analyzing my sins, I realized that despite not even remembering what I'd done, God had used this experience in my life to change the way that I behaved. You see the key to living honorably if you're a moral coward is to take the moral stand up front. To announce your loyalty to the truth or honor or honest practice loudly before the chips are down and you are tempted to cheat. By doing so you trap yourself with the truth and make moral cowardice more costly to you than doing the right thing. It's really a form of jujitsu that I practice on myself - making the consequences of moral cowardice more painful than those of the truth.<br />
<br />
And I didn't think of it at all, God somehow built it into my nature. Since then I've always been a bit of a 'turd in the punchbowl' - the critic who points out the flaw or the weakness or the questionable practice - never when the chips are down, mind you, but always when it was early and relatively cheap. When I was with the big and greedy consulting firm I would challenge powerful senior leaders on issues and my partners would come to me and ask me why. I always said something eloquent but the real answer was "I don't know", "I just had to". And to be honest it never really cost me much, in fact in most cases I ended up either ignored or even vindicated. Yet it wasn't some great moral undertaking or sacrifice, it's just what I was compelled to do.<br />
<br />
So the bad news is that I'm still the moral coward who betrayed my own father. And always will be. But the good news is that God has built into me an imperfect but often effective habit of taking stands early, before they become costly and by doing so allowing me to better live up to the standard that I profess as a Christian. And crucially, he did it by taking one of the worst things I've ever done and using it without me even realizing what he was doing.<br />
<br />
Jesus Christ said to us:<br />
<br />
<i>I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
John 15:5 English Standard Version (ESV)<br />
<br />
I am living proof of the truth of that statement. And of the fact that no matter how cowardly we are, no matter how broken, it is <i>God</i> who reaches down and changes <i>us</i>.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-75288123337817710102018-08-19T14:18:00.000-07:002018-08-19T23:33:16.913-07:00Life is PainAbout seven years ago a friend of mine was going through a particularly difficult time. Upon entering puberty both of his children had developed serious psychological problems, problems that were quite disabling and difficult to manage. One day I asked him how it was going and looking at me in anguish he replied, "Bill, life is pain".<br />
<br />
I did not like his answer. Like me, he was a Christian and by all outward signs, a much better one than me. How could he, being redeemed by Christ, say such a thing? Particularly to me because at the time I was going through great, if largely self inflicted tribulations and yet he was telling me that life was nothing but. It made everything seem so cruel, so pointless.<br />
<br />
I never bothered to ask him what he meant but from time to time I would take out what he had said and examine it anew. Yet I never could quite grasp his point....I'd get close but it always eluded me. Until today. As I was driving home from church it finally hit me. My friend wasn't telling me that everything was hopeless, he was pointing me to the source of all hope.<br />
<br />
You see without faith, without Christ's redeeming Grace, life is indeed nothing but pain. It's simply a constant string of tribulations that we try to flee and obscure with transitory pleasure. Unless we have the faith that only Christ can supply. Let me give you an analogy: Without faith we are like fish on a dry lake bed, gasping for breath. When tragedy strikes it lands on us full force, crushing us beneath its weight. The other fish can't help because they're stuck in the mud too. But God's Grace is like that lake full of water. All of a sudden we can breathe and when the same tragedy strikes we feel its arrival but its crushing weight is absorbed by the deep, life giving density of the water - directly by Him and via His people. Yet this Grace is so ubiquitous, so powerful that we can hardly even tell it's there.<br />
<br />
So I <i>think</i> my friend's point was that whatever sorrow or tragedy I face, I should look to the only one that can heal my deepest wounds, to the source of all hope, to the Love of our Lord Jesus Christ. And it is my prayer that you're quicker on the uptake than I was. That it won't take you seven long, harrowing years and the collapse of everything you've built to learn what Paul taught us in Romans:<br />
<br />
<i>For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. </i><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Romans 8:38-39 (ESV)<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-43894159494472092712018-02-18T14:20:00.002-08:002018-02-18T14:51:11.830-08:00This is Christ's body....I was minding my own business, drinking coffee before church when my friend Will came up and asked me if I could do communion for someone who didn't show. Despite going to church my whole life, I had never served communion before. At first I was too young and then later I never felt worthy of the honor. But trapped by the need, I consented. This in spite of what I knew would inevitably happen.<br />
<br />
When it came time, I turned to my partner, Andree and said: "you take the wine"...because I'm a spiller - I spill. I had this terrible vision of dumping a melange of wine and grape juice down someone's spring frock. As it was I was going to have problems with the crackers - I mean wafers. Because what I feared came true as soon as the first customer walked up. As I looked them in the eye and spoke the words the tears began to pool. Each time I said them the pool got bigger. I dared not reach up and wipe them away, that would have just resulted in me serving the crackers - dang! I mean wafers - off the floor.<br />
<br />
I prayed "Lord please don't let me blubber" and He didn't but by the end my eyes were so full of tears that I couldn't see much of anything. But sometimes tears help us see more clearly, indeed sometimes we can only see the truth through tears. And my truth came through loud and clear. For while I was saying one thing, another was imprinting on my soul:<br />
<br />
<i>This is Christs's body, broken for you</i><br />
<i>This is Christ's body, broken for you,</i><br />
<i>This is Christ's body, broken for you,</i><br />
<i>This is Christs's body, broken for....me.</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-44940214741272062452018-01-11T07:03:00.000-08:002018-01-11T07:03:04.386-08:00Damn Cats<br /><br />In remembrance of Yanti Ardie 's deceased cat Smoky. A po-em: <br /><br />Cats, cats, cats<br />Damn all cats<br />They make me sneeze<br />And scratch the door<br />They bring dead things<br />Lay them on the floor<br /><br />But they're warm in bed<br />And they purr purr purr<br />With scratchy tongues <br />And fuzzy fur<br />So I love damn cats.<br />I miss mine so.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-51330708898315729062017-12-30T08:46:00.003-08:002022-12-13T07:42:09.960-08:00Somebody else's problemI was strolling down Lindell on a crisp, bright winter's day, enjoying the sunshine gleaming off of the new fallen snow. A huge round young black man yelled out from across the busy street: "hey mister, hey wait!" he jay-ran across, heedless of the traffic and pulled up puffing in front of me, his St. Louis street vendor certificate blowing around his neck - "it's a mooch", I thought.<br>
<br>
"Hey mister, I represent (he mumbled some alphabet soup agency) and would you like to buy...." I put my hand up - I was prepared for such simple come-ons: "I'm sorry, I never purchase from or give to organizations that come up to me on the street, it's just my policy, I'm sorry." I turned away and walked off, congratulating myself for handling the situation in a philosophically consistent way. He muttered "I was just tryin' to make a living".<br>
<br>
But I didn't really hear what he had to say because he had already ceased to exist. With my statement I had defined him outside of the circle of people and things that I had to worry about - I had made him "somebody else's problem".<br>
<br>
In his brilliant (well at least to me) Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy Douglas Adams described the theory of a "Somebody Else's Problem" field - an "SEP" for short. In Adam's cracked cosmology SEPs were used to make things invisible - by defining something as "somebody else's problem" one could get people to walk by spaceships, buildings, even massive mountains without noticing they were there. And that's what I had done to my rotund interloper. After all, I had learned as a boy on the streets of Kebayoran Baru that one couldn't possibly help all of the people who needed it. There were too many of them and their needs were too great - to survive emotionally you needed to harden yourself and look past the pain and suffering around you. Indonesia had taught me to build my walls high and tight. And it worked - I now am a master at making things somebody else's problem.<br>
<br>
Yet Jesus came to make everyone <i>His</i> problem. I sometimes wonder what it must have been like to be Him: fully human and yet knowing, indeed, feeling the seemingly infinite roar of sin and pain and needfulness around him. I can hardly handle my own troubles, yet He confronted an entire world's. No wonder He sometimes fled the crowds - there were too many, it was too much.<br>
<br>
What the young man was really saying to me - what we all say every time we come into each other's presence - was: "I am here, I am real, and I matter". For if Jesus came and died for each of these then how can they not matter to us? How can they simply be "somebody else's problem". All of these thoughts and a few more besides flashed through my mind as I fled down the street. They rose to a crescendo and stopped me in my tracks. "Aw crap!" I said and began to backtrack<i> - of course</i> I could help him - I had a few minutes and I knew exactly what he was doing wrong - didn't the clowns at the agency teach him anything? "First of all you don't go running up to people yelling in inner city Saint Louis - do you want to get your ass shot? Let me tell you how to engage people respectfully in a conversation, solicit their help, get them on your side so they want to buy your...what is it you're peddling again?" I double timed back up Lindell, rehearsing Sales 101 in my head - where was he? Gone. How in the hell could a guy that big disappear so quickly? Gone.<br>
<br>
"Lord forgive me. Please help him, show him the answers to his questions, show him that he is loved, heal him from any harm that my indifference did him" - it didn't seem like much. After all, I was going to <i>fix</i> him. But I sensed a feeling of completion - it was enough - it was OK.<br>
<br>
I turned around and headed for the office. For a while after that I stopped averting my gaze from the people on the street, I looked in their eyes, I said 'hi'. In some small way I widened my circle a bit and let a few others in.<br>
<br>
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." Whoever. And none of them are somebody else's problemUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-82050709437083362872017-11-12T17:45:00.000-08:002017-12-04T15:28:32.973-08:00Free Too<div dir="ltr">
<div dir="ltr">
<div dir="ltr">
I hear what you're saying<br />
I see what you mean<br />
I know what you're doing<br />
But I want to be free</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
I stood there when she said it<br />
She came straight up to me<br />
So filled with His spirit<br />
So gentle and free</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
I hear what you're saying<br />
I see what you mean<br />
I know what you're doing<br />
But I need to be free</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
I was there when she said it<br />
She came straight up to me<br />
So filled with His love<br />
So beautiful and free</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
I hear what you're saying<br />
I see what you mean<br />
I know what you're doing<br />
But I must be free</div>
</div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-62117790036337686582017-10-30T10:22:00.002-07:002017-12-04T15:26:25.913-08:00I want to be free<div dir="ltr">
I hear what you're saying<br />
I see what you mean<br />
I know what you're doing<br />
But I want to be free.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Love's not an excuse<br />
It isn't a lie<br />
It doesn't come in youth<br />
But only when we die. </div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
When we die to self, <br />
Die so we can live,<br />
Die to receive<br />
Receive life as a gift.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Love's not an excuse<br />
It isn't a lie<br />
It doesn't come in youth<br />
But only when we die.</div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr">
I hear what you're saying<br />
I see what you mean<br />
I know what you're <u>doing</u><br />
But I want to be free.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-67651997893450299682017-10-26T14:21:00.002-07:002017-10-26T14:21:38.253-07:00Addendum to On FreedomAnd my Kids. Praise God for them. They had lost all the trappings of wealth that they were born into: the private school, big house, beach cottage, winter skiing. But they never complained or blamed me. The only thing they said when then came back from their first week of public school was "the kids here are nicer". My daughter would frequently ask me to help her with school projects and for a couple of hours I would lose myself with her. One day I offered to drive her home - it was cold and snowy - but I ran out of gas right in the underpass of a rush hour freeway. I shouted with frustration and and cursed myself and she broke into tears. But my son was there to help us within minutes. He was always there when I needed him. Their steadfast love and refusal to judge or complain was the greatest gift anyone has ever given me.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-60343383001195170252017-10-16T17:57:00.002-07:002019-04-19T13:46:16.617-07:00On FreedomFour years ago I moved into a minivan. I handed my house keys to my Son and told him to sell everything and give the proceeds to his mother. With my business bankrupt, my marriage gone, my self respect and confidence in tatters, I moved into the van to die. I was in despair, everything that I had built my life on was in ruins.<br />
<br />
I spent nine months there. I overnighted in strange places - one was an auto body shop amongst the wrecks. I went days without speaking to anyone. I experienced 100 degree heat all the way down to minus 15f - not windchill - temperature. My toes still tell the tale. I kept clean by bathing in men's rooms and occasionally strolling brazenly into the local College's faculty locker room as if I were a Professor of Indigence, the Hobo Sage.<br />
<br />
No one from my Church came looking for me. A couple times old colleagues came by and gave me money - claiming that they had forgotten to pay me for work I'd done.<br />
<br />
I was angry at myself and at God. I acknowledged that I had wrecked my life but insisted I didn't do it alone. I was an active Christian: tither, promise keeper, BSFer, sunday school teacher, Deacon: the full Yaweh. From where I stood it seemed that God had let me run off the rails. I told Him "you let me do this to myself". His answer was: "Yes, I did. Now pay attention."<br />
<br />
Spoiler alert: I didn't die. Which was a problem: what exactly was I supposed to do? I couldn't sit still so I started walking which led to thinking then to ideas and ultimately writing. Early on I wrote angry polemics against God. I would send them to my pastor friends. They were hot stuff, I'm sure I could get a gig writing for the Atheists if I still believed any of it. The irony was that I had announced that I was 'done' with God yet He had never dominated my thoughts so much as in that van.<br />
<br />
And then slowly, at first almost imperceptibly I began to see people differently. I started really looking at them, looking into their eyes. I began going up to complete strangers, trying to understand them. It made them really, nervous. I became friends with the disabled woman who worked at McDonalds. I had always avoided her because her small twisted body made her slow. But I had become slow too and it allowed me to see what I had missed. It was a revelation: up until that point I had looked upon most people as "tools" to be used or obstacles to be gotten around. But there, at the bottom I began to see people for what they truly are: God breathed miracles, on their journeys to eternity.<br />
<br />
Then Mom called: Dad had cancer and needed my help. So I became my father's primary caregiver for the last 18 months of his life. The truth is I never really knew my father until then. And then as if by plan, the week Dad died an old friend called asking me to join his new west coast software venture.<br />
<br />
It was shortly after that I strolled into this building on a Sunday morning and someone said 'Hi'.<br />
<br />
God brought me full circle. From failure and despair to renewal and purpose. So how did I change? First of all I am so much more holy than I used to be (snort guffaw)...No, that's a lie. I am the same knucklehead I've always been.<br />
<br />
What God did with that time was teach me what it meant to be free.<br />
<br />
Free to fail. And being free to fail, free in Christ to truly try.<br />
Free to see myself and to see others for what we truly are.<br />
Free to be honest, to confess sin openly, and ask forgiveness.<br />
And Free to really love, to love God and to love you.<br />
<br />
<span class="text John-8-32" id="en-ESV-26402" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;"><span class="woj" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;">John 8:32 "and you will <span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "verdana" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">know the truth, and the truth <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-26402C" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-26402C" title="See cross-reference C">C</a>)" style="font-size: 0.625em; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; vertical-align: top;"></span>will set you free.”</span></span></span><br />
<br />
Most of you are young, talented and industrious and you will go far. But I'll let you in on a secret: Someday you're going to fail. And I pray that when you do, you'll find the freedom that comes from knowing that you can't possibly live up to God's Standard - the only one that matters. That's the edge we street veterans have. We know that there's nothing we can do by ourselves.<br />
<br />
So during this time of feasting and plenty remember that crucial truth that street people know better than anyone else. And take a moment to stop, listen and learn from them, it will bless you. I say this not because "There but for the Grace of God go I" no, I say it because "There with the Grace of God went I".<br />
<br />
One more point: One of the reasons people on the street look so defeated is that they are often so very alone. There is really nothing quite like 'street alone', people everywhere ignoring you. There's a song that expresses that loneliness well. It's not particularly pretty but it is True. The Song is The Wrestler by Bruce Springsteen.<br />
<br />
<i>Have you ever seen a one trick pony in the Field so Fancy and Free?</i><br />
<i>If you've ever seen a one-trick pony then you've seen me.</i><br />
<i>Have you ever seen a three legged dog making his way across the street?</i><br />
<i>If you've ever seen a three legged dog then you've seen me.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Then you've seen me, I come and stand at every door.</i><br />
<i>Then you've seen me, I always leave with less than I have before.</i><br />
<i>Then you've seen me, when my blood it hits the floor.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Tell me friend can you ask for anything more?</i><br />
<i>Tell me can you ask for anything more?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Have you ever seen a scarecrow filled with nothing but dust and weeds?</i><br />
<i>If you've ever seen a scarecrow then you've seen me.</i><br />
<i>Have you ever seen a one armed man punching at nothing but the breeze?</i><br />
<i>If you've ever seen a one armed man, then you've seen me.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Then you've seen me, I come and stand at every door.</i><br />
<i>Then you've seen me, I always leave with less than I have before.</i><br />
<i>Then you've seen me, when my blood it hits the floor.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Tell me friend can you ask for anything more?</i><br />
<i>Tell me can you ask for anything more?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>These things that comfort me I drive away.</i><br />
<i>This place that is my home I cannot stay.</i><br />
<i>The only faith I have is in the bruises I display.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Tell me friend can you ask for anything more?</i><br />
<i>Tell me can you ask for anything more?</i><br />
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>Have you ever seen a one legged man trying to dance his way free?</i></div>
<div>
<i>If you've ever seen a one legged man, then you've seen........me.</i></div>
<br />
Thank you.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-86649982231777424952017-10-08T21:38:00.002-07:002017-10-08T21:41:44.394-07:00All that's left is love<div dir="ltr">
I heard about another slaughter<br />
And that people don't have homes <br />
But in the end none of that matters<br />
Rich or poor, black or white<br />
We're all losers in this game of Life<br />
Not one of us gets out alive<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Love brought us here<br />
Love will take us home.<br />
A<u>ll</u> we get to keep is love.<br />
For love never dies.<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
So many people are shouting<br />
Hating on each other every day<br />
But no one will win the argument<br />
Right or left, my country or yours<br />
We're all lifers here,<br />
There are no eleventh hour reprieves<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Yes Love brought us here<br />
Love will take us home.<br />
A<u>ll</u> we get to keep is love.<br />
For love never dies.<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
We can't eat it or sell it,<br />
We can't wear it or steal it<br />
Love can't be bought, <br />
It's not for sale.<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
But we can accept it <br />
Accept it from it's only source<br />
And we can share it<br />
For love never runs out<br />
Love multiplies again and again<br />
Until it covers every sorrow, every sin.<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Because don't you know that:<br />
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Love brought us here<br />
Love will take us home.<br />
A<u>ll</u> we get to keep is love.<br />
For love never dies.<br />
<br />
Look at all the souls<br />
on their journey to eternity<br />
All beautiful, all loved<br />
I love you.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-8412381447246546552017-10-08T12:38:00.000-07:002017-10-08T12:38:05.234-07:00Words of encouragement to a friendWe are all constantly in a process of becoming. Once in a while we suddenly discover what we've become. It's never quite what we set out for. But if we're fortunate and true to ourselves it will be where we are meant to be. Here's to you becoming an ever wiser, more joyful and creative version of yourself.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-87293838044250068702017-09-21T19:08:00.001-07:002019-03-25T19:51:44.997-07:00A striking bloom<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA7QE8_2AdxTdbpvVIJm8WC2bZ1Zu_XT3B5pPeeetbT75mdk21BBK8vREza-a4iH0U17TCKzPIvSnCCN7aeqd_23I7Ez4wVbmBARM_YF6VN_Ow7aJMZD487Uo_XJGoqTbzvwTYbp9v5es/s1600/FB_IMG_1478181651442.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="790" data-original-width="720" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA7QE8_2AdxTdbpvVIJm8WC2bZ1Zu_XT3B5pPeeetbT75mdk21BBK8vREza-a4iH0U17TCKzPIvSnCCN7aeqd_23I7Ez4wVbmBARM_YF6VN_Ow7aJMZD487Uo_XJGoqTbzvwTYbp9v5es/s400/FB_IMG_1478181651442.jpg" width="362" /></a><br />
<br />
For E.<br />
<br />
I spied a flower, a striking bloom<br />
It shocked my soul and pierced my gloom.<br />
<br />
But I can't have it, nor make it mine.<br />
Only love its grace, its beauty, its life.<br />
<br />
<br />
Photo by author: Texas Hill Country WildflowersUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-45229311903761960982017-09-07T15:34:00.000-07:002017-11-10T05:27:44.564-08:00Hitting things...HardSo Hurricane Harvey landed on Houston with a terrible squelch, temporarily returning neighborhood after neighborhood to the swamp from whence they came. While this was going on I was home spending what seemed like an eternity with my paranoid 'refugee' friend barricaded in his room convinced that I was conspiring with persons unknown to...well, do unknown things to him. By the time he finally escaped my evil clutches (also known as 'when I drove him back to his homeless shelter when it became safe to do so') I was ready to hit something. Hard. Over and over again.<br />
<br />
And Harvey obliged, wrecking something like 100,000 homes to one degree or another. Technically I only hit three of them, taking a crowbar to soggy walls and wrecked floors. It was quite cathartic. I did my hitting with friends from church. Like most everyone in Houston who wasn't a victim, we were doing what we could to help or if we couldn't really help, at least demonstrate that we gave a damn. The therapy I got from all the hitting was just an extra, probably not shared by very many others.<br />
<br />
It was at my third house-hitting that I had a bit of an epiphany. There were two women there that I was friends with from church (or if not friends at least they never visibly blanched when I came their way). I could tell that this wasn't their usual line of work from their soft shoes that screamed 'nail wounds' and from the fact that during that entire day they didn't smash a single thing (they did the essential but IMHO less fun work of clearing up our smashing). But there they were, covered in dust and sweat, dodging flying boards and falling cabinets, the detritus of disaster. And inexplicably, there was joy - in doing hard work for people we would likely never see again for nothing but a thank you.<br />
<br />
I noticed that their attitude was radically different than my paranoid friend's. Paranoia is a bit like cancer: it spreads in a person's mind until it consumes everything: every person is suspect, every event a portent, the whole world a threat. I realized that this is what terminal narcissism looks like....the total focus on self, so extreme that its victims can't even function. There is no joy there - nothing but terror and chaos. And I recognize that in my life: the times when I was most focused on myself were often miserable while when I chose (or was forced) to focus on things greater than myself and on others I was happier.<br />
<br />
At this point you're probably thinking "that's what Jesus told us 2000 years ago, knucklehead", "Love your God with all your heart and soul and mind (aka: 'the Greater') and Love your neighbor as yourself' (aka 'the others')" and you would be right.<br />
<br />
I think this overfocus on ourselves, this 'cultural narcissism' is what has been happening to all of us. We've become more and more focused on our private entertainments, on our own petty concerns and on our status as victims. And it is making us miserable. Perhaps Harvey was sent to remind us of this central truth:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>"Whoever seeks to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will keep it."</i></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-30124676768048106012017-05-20T07:43:00.001-07:002017-05-21T19:24:16.880-07:00Moments<div dir="ltr">
<u>Moments</u> come and then they go.<br />
We think they're true and full of hope.<br />
Then we find they aren't meant to be.<br />
And never were.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Faces come with hopeful gaze.<br />
We place our hopes and dream of days.<br />
But we don't really know them.<br />
And never will.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
We tell ourselves that it's fine.<br />
There's always more wine.<br />
But we know the bottle's near empty.<br />
And there are no more.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
So we search and hope and pray.<br />
With voices that <u>fade</u> more each day.<br />
And we learn our fate face by face.<br />
Until there are no more.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-73737618240575325352017-05-13T20:49:00.000-07:002017-05-14T03:32:17.107-07:00Your mother Your mother:<br />
Suffered pain, sweat, blood, tears<br />
Endured hopes, terrors, fears.<br />
Wears scars inside and out.<br />
Overcame bouts of longing and doubt.<br />
<br />
She gave you your first gift.<br />
The one from which all others flow.<br />
She was your beginning.<br />
The rock to which you clung.<br />
<br />
You can't pay her back for all she's endured.<br />
Only be grateful that she did endure.<br />
And love her for that.<br />
And much more besides.<br />
<br />
I know these things for<br />
I saw them with my own eyes<br />
and heard them with my own ears.<br />
And I am grateful too.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-89793578065061245552017-05-12T17:56:00.001-07:002022-12-14T06:20:23.209-08:00Birthday Elegy<div dir="ltr">
We spend sixty years chasing, grasping, clawing.<br>
Then we spend thirty - if we're lucky - forty if we're not,<br>
Releasing those <u>things</u> for which we fought so hard.<br>
If wise, we know to lay them down <u>gracefully</u>.<br>
If not, we fight and rage but lay them down all the same.<br>
For it's God's world and it's God's way.<br>
We're all just <u>players</u> in his play.<br>
<br></div>
<div dir="ltr">
So how have you found my <u>playing</u> thus far?<br>
Have I said my lines and toed my marks well?<br>
Will you stay and watch my show to the very end?<br>
Or will you lose interest, shuffling out for brighter fare?<br>
I will play the play so long as I have breath.<br>
And the last thing I will lay down dear friend,<br>
<br>
Is you.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-18177384291265563952017-04-29T16:43:00.001-07:002017-05-09T20:04:44.618-07:00Too sad to laugh<div dir="ltr">
Sitting at a party, too sad to laugh<br />
and too drunk to go home. </div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Parties bring out the best in you, <br />
they bring out your worst.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
At a party i'm everyone's friend <br />
And i'm no one's.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Everyone looks to see what you'll do<br />
but you're waitin' for them too.</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
We're all looking for something,<br />
it could be good or bad .</div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
Don't matter to me, <br />
so long as I can feel. Cause I'm.... </div>
<div dir="ltr">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr">
...sitting at a party, too sad to laugh<br />
and too drunk to go home. </div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-54178987627863828982017-04-26T16:09:00.005-07:002022-12-13T07:41:15.197-08:00Real Men Hunt Real Beasts<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2N4iEJYCFUb944-2ZUKDFyg8Q13LT3e5c-OXuINeZZgbNxBqtsxvwedun3V0uhbya2oMoflG7UtVO5Q46Hd0N9oHctqBWq18yNJZYSMLOChkWa4n7RCMOcf7SXKIlM0ZmWLpf9iwHiw/s1600/squirrelhead1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="325" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2N4iEJYCFUb944-2ZUKDFyg8Q13LT3e5c-OXuINeZZgbNxBqtsxvwedun3V0uhbya2oMoflG7UtVO5Q46Hd0N9oHctqBWq18yNJZYSMLOChkWa4n7RCMOcf7SXKIlM0ZmWLpf9iwHiw/s400/squirrelhead1.jpg" width="400"></a></div>
I would like to point out that shooting a Deer or an Elephant or a Blue Whale is pathetically easy. After all they're ginormous. A real hunting challenge is plugging a common Field Mouse at 100 paces. Particularly if it's a duel and the little nipper is firing back. I've set out to hunt, kill and mount every single type of vermin that vex my property today. Mice, voles, crows, cockroaches, fire ants, you name it, I'm going to take them down and mount their heads on my wall.<br>
<br>
That'll teach 'em to screw with me.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6643410718882896719.post-61683697970028091662017-04-26T14:51:00.005-07:002017-04-27T05:14:41.333-07:00On Monocles<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWCvs5EDBOUw5YfbcNgHlF1JlkQodQKMUhs0SP01i7eVb4KsNEpkGJV2Ir-fF6EIiQrlfimbdtv2wPTkMQjsY07rj_ed9opHhvbu7JYa6NGmQxbV5Yd3UQExo7KPVivnQhFzTs4Jg8Zg/s1600/Monicle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWCvs5EDBOUw5YfbcNgHlF1JlkQodQKMUhs0SP01i7eVb4KsNEpkGJV2Ir-fF6EIiQrlfimbdtv2wPTkMQjsY07rj_ed9opHhvbu7JYa6NGmQxbV5Yd3UQExo7KPVivnQhFzTs4Jg8Zg/s400/Monicle.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
I really think Monocles are going to come back into style.<br />
<br />
You know the Monocle: that one eyed wonder of vision correction beloved by Terrifyingly Taut Teutons in all those old war movies. I think they went out of style because they reminded us of Nazis or some other equally prissy category of bad guys. But it could also have been because the "classic" monocle wasn't particularly versatile, having only "in" and "out" settings. In today's hip, "with it" world the humble monocle becomes a whole range of monocle-based technologies. There is of course the Monocle "Classic" for daily domination but there's also the "reading" monocle and the "sun" monocle with the exciting possibility of having a bi-monocle that goes darker in the sun making you a dreaded monocle triple-threat.<br />
<br />
Then there are different fashion choices: I particularly am fond of the cheap "Wrap-around" Sun-Monocle styling that I'm sure will sweep the nether regions of California and Florida before long.<br />
<br />
Some days when I'm feeling particularly sinister I put in just one of my contact lenses which is just like having a monocle although it's hard to peer down at someone with studied contempt while holding your contact lens over your eye. This is because when trying to get your contact/monocle you end up poking yourself in the eye, causing it to water which makes it look like half of you is crying which isn't a particularly sinister look no matter what your sycophantic henchmen say.<br />
<br />
You heard it here first: the Monocle is back. Bigger, brighter and more intimidating than ever.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0