Acting out

The subject of the week this week in TS501 is.. epistemology: the study of knowing. How do we know what we know? And what, if anything, can we know?

"The traditional model of knowledge that we have inherited from the Greeks, that extends through millenia down to us, typically divorces knowing from doing. It is possible to think about something in abstraction from acting on it. While there are times in our experience when it is useful to make this distinction, the distinction has the adverse effect of leading us to think of action as mindless and mind as actionless. Knowledge, we are led to say, is to be had even if it does not shape our behavior."

"On the other hand, ... someone can show you that he or she cares about you by sending you flowers, inviting you into his or her home, silently stroking your shoulder as you cry."

"Knowing is, at its heart, an act. To act is to live, [to] embody, knowledge. The act of knowing is a profoundly human one. And it is a struggle toward coherence."

----- Esther Meek, Longing to Know



The subject of the week in church yesterday was the "love test" in 1 John 2:7-11. The gist of it is.. how do we know love? By what it says and does. And it's not just John, the apostle of love - Jesus taught the same thing (as did James in his letter.) Our words and actions reveal what's in our hearts. It seemed to tie in with the "knowing" idea for TS501 somehow.. to know something is to experience it: act it, embody it, live it, as Meek says.

We can say that we *know* someone loves us. But if they don't act on that love, don't express it to us in ways we can perceive with our senses, doesn't thinking about unexpressed love in our heads also call for that love to *show* itself, to demonstrate its existence in reality? Don't we long to *feel* it from them, as well as *know* it exists? As humans, we are not a walking dichotomy of feeling and reason, as if the right and left sides of our brains had an impenetrable wall between them - we are an integrated whole.

If I love someone, and don't tell them so with my words, show them so by my actions.. am I not divorcing feeling from reason, thought from action, denying my basic humanness, and essentially dis-integrating the wholeness of the love I have for them? What good is the knowledge of love without the experience of it? If I am human, I also *experience* that which I know, or.. I may not really *know* it at all, according to Meek.

Does God love us this way? Not just thinking about it, but acting on it? It seems that He's told us He loves us with His words.. and shown it by His actions. It's what's embodied in the liturgy: hearing His Word, remembering His Action.

And so.. how do we love God? "...with all your heart and soul and mind and strength." Like that? With the whole of ourselves, not just with an unlived concept in our heads? Is what He wants of us?

"...and your neighbor as yourself..." Is that also to be done with our heart and soul and mind and strength? Not just thinking about it, but acting on it?

I guess these are rhetorical questions; I hope the answers are obvious.
(to me as well as to everyone else.. I know I need reminding of this.)



And so if I ask you: "do you really love me?", you may say "yes!", but how will I *know* that your 'yes' is true?

(pause here for obvious answer..)



Somehow I can hear Jesus asking this of Peter, while taking steps to reconcile with him after all that happened: Peter's trust-breaking lies, the crucifixion, the resurrection:

"Simon, do you love me?"
... Lord, you know I do.
"Feed my sheep."

(repeat as needed, until Peter gets it.. and sees the painful irony)



I think God is saying: intellectual assent is not enough. If you think it, then act on it. Put legs and arms and hands and lips on your beliefs. Show what you believe, what you think is true, with your words and your actions, even if it costs you. Costs you in your checkbook, your calendar, your freedom.. and your heart. It's what Jesus taught, and how he lived.

That combination of thought and action represents whole, healthy humanness, *and* it's the way God made us: to think.. and act out what we think. He set the pattern, showed us how.



(note to self: you would do well to take this to heart more often.)

50 is the new 30?

Oh, I don't know...

That is what they're saying now (along with brown is the new black.) Maybe they say it because the people who are in charge of advertising agencies are 50ish and they want to feel better about themselves. ;)

But this morning, I actually believe it. Sort of.

Slept in until I woke naturally this morning, showered, shaved, had my coffee.. felt good all over, and the morning had dawned crisp and clear and cool after a week of rain.. so I thought "Go on! Try it! Maybe today!"

After the first half mile, no twinges in my knee. So far so good. After the second half mile, legs feel light, feet aren't like lead. So far so good. At 1.50 I found myself at the top of a little rise and actually forgot I had just gone up an incline. No sweat trickled into the eyebrow until 1.8, and I rounded for home knowing I had crossed what for me is a magic barrier, and still felt like I should keep going. :)

But I stopped at 2.08 miles and checked my time.. the same pace as I run for one mile. Wow. Never, ever have I done this.

At 30 I couldn't have run two miles straight if my life depended on it, much less do it at a "good" pace (according to Dr. Cooper's book.) Yeah, Fat Boy weighed less then, but had very little muscle tone and was so out of shape.. I feel so much better now.

Maybe there's something to this advertising slogan. When you're 30, you are supposed to have sort of an existential crisis at leaving your "youth" behind. Gee, that sounds freshly familiar, too.

Except that I'm not concerned about becoming part of the mistrusted "establishment" now, like you supposedly do at 30.. I'm actually working the first year of a 4 year plan to leave the establishment. :)

From whence love stems

While online today, I saw this quote, and thought it to be true.



"Love which stems from created things is like a small lamp whose light is sustained by being fed with olive-oil. Again, it is like a river fed by rainfall; once the supply that feeds it fails, the surge of its flow abates. But love whose cause is God is like a spring welling up from the depths. Its flow never abates, for God alone is that spring of love whose supply never fails."


----- St. Isaac the Syrian (Isaac of Nineveh), 7th century



I think for we who are creatures, we must tend and feed the love we have for others, or it will fade to something less than it was. But if the love we have for others is grounded in, undergirded by, the love of God.. then He supplies what's needed to sustain it.

Nice thought to take into the weekend. :)

Stinking insurance companies..

I know, I know, I've worked for them all my adult life.

But there are times when they really deserve the lousy reputation they've got. And in part, it's why I want out. At least I want out of the ones who are in it only for making a solid return on equity (ROE), which is.. all of them now, I guess. :(

When I started the process of seeing a counselor, I checked with the insurance plan to see who was eligible. Dr. Shrink-wrap was on the list. So I go to him, spill my guts, start down a path of identifying and working on key issues, and.. what do you know? There's no coverage!

Apparently the insurer told my clinic some completely wrong information about Dr. S-w's eligibility as a provider. The clinic and I were both going forward in good faith, thinking it was all set. Nope. Ooops, gee we're sorry.

So now I either have to start completely over with another provider in a different clinic - yuk - or change insurance plans to one that this guy's qualified through, but is more expenseive and more restrictive in the number of visits, or... go uninsured at a discounted rate of half the normal one per session, but still 4x what my co-pay is.

Grumble, grumble, grumble.. so no appointments on the calendar now for a while until I sort this out.

But he did say that I was thinking about things properly, and heading in a good direction. He also said, though, that, as I change my patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving, and at the same time contine to deal with losses of all sorts, both fresh and long-standing, it will feel like I'm "white-knuckling" it for a while. I should expect it will feel like "going through withdrawals" until my patterns really change for good, and I get some distance from the old ones. :(

Gee, I feel better already.



Shifting gears a bit..

At RCIA classes last night, we began three weeks on the sacraments. Hoo boy, there is a lot going on in these. Sooooo many questions! So this may be a bit of a sticky wicket here. Oh, that darned John Calvin! His theological framework was just too appealing, too neat and tidy and consistent and.. parsimonious! ;) (Read parsimonious as: "All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the right one.")

It's not easy to lay aside all I've understood as right for so many years. But as my "author of the week" in TS501 says (Esther Meek, "Longing to Know"): "..the circumstances of our lives at times force us into the cellar, so to speak, to examine the foundations of our beliefs."

Hmmm... it's kinda dark down here in the cellar of my foundational beliefs.. where's my flashlight? This feels kinda scary... gee, maybe I should've tied a rope around one ankle before I came down the stairs, just in case I...

woah, what was that?!?!?

Felt like a liberal thought brushing my cheek. Must be a spider web..

Postmodern Protestants

"Postmodernity is Modernity with a broken heart."

Fun class last night. :) It started pretty slow, but then the prof had just come back from his honeymoon, and honestly he looked a bit worn out. I made that remark under my breath to my seatmates, and the girls on either side of me giggled & said in a knowing voice "yeah, but I'll bet it's a good kind of tired." Mmhmm.

Interesting dynamic in the class - most of the students are married (those two included.) I wonder if this is normal for grad school in general or just Seminary in particular?

Anyway, it was good to listen to some lecture and discussion rather than read. After 135 pages this week of the most tedious writing and arcane language I can recall in a while, it was time to just hear someone talk about the topic. I mean.. this is a sample paragraph from the text:

"Here we reach the particula veri of the notion of verbal inspiration. Because verbal inspiration was routinely misconstrued (sometimes by its defenders and nearly always by its detractors) as entailing divine dictation, the notion of inspiration has been 'personalized' or 'deverbalised' and redefined as authorial illumination. This distancing of inspiration from the verbal character of the text is considered to ease the difficulties of offering an account of inspiration by thinking of the words of the text as a purely human arena of activity, whether of authors, redactors, or tradents. But the result is, again, docetic."

Arghh. Makes me want to have this guy over for dinner and discuss the subject over some meatloaf and mixed vegetables, to see if he really talks like this in person. I can't imagine this being anything but a persona laid on to relate to other academics. Ick.

So, we talked about the doctrine of Scripture last night: inspiration, inerrancy, infallibility, authority, etc., and the interaction between divine agency and human agency in the writing of, and attesting to, Scripture. Fascinating. To me anyway.

And eventually, we got around to talking about interpretation (hermeneutics) and how the twin Reformation emphases on sola scriptura and "the priesthood of all believers" in northern Europe, served to cooperate with the Enlightenment in southern Europe, to essentially sever all ties with the past and repudiate the traditions of the Church.

I asked: "Well, okay. The Church guided our interpretation of Scripture for centuries, and then the Reformation knocked the legs out from under that. Since then, it's been 'every man for himself' when it comes to interpretation, and the Protestant church has fractured into uncounted pieces as a result. Like this is better?"

"So is there any recognition of this among Evangelicals, and is there any attempt underway to sort of 'herd the sheep back into the pen' and come to some agreement on interpretation that can put at least some of this missing guidance of the Church back in place?"

He said, yup, there is. In the last few years, Protestant theologians have realized what they are missing by being disconnected from the centuries of believers that have gone before us, and the great insights that formed the creeds and liturgy and ministry of the Catholic Church. The Reformers focused so much on the excesses of the 16th century Church that they threw out all the good things that a consistent faith tradition brings to the individual Christian.

Then he went in a fascinating direction. He said that it's much like what is being realized in our culture today. Post-modernism is starting to long for a connection to the past, an appreciation of traditions. He put it like this: "Postmodernity is the ultimate result of modernity's despair at its rootlessness, with angst laid on top." The angst comes from the perceived relativity of truth ever since Einstein upset Newtonian physics - no anchor, no roots, no stake in the ground.

And even the advances in science since the 1500s, which seemed to portend an upward trajectory for mankind (evolving to something better and better, if you will) and reinforce the idea of mankind's essential goodness... even all this positivity has been shown to be false hope as progress resulted in the design and use of more and more horrific means of destruction and death.

Man is not getting better. The Enlightenment has crashed and burned. And what it has reaped in postmodernity is.. despair. Modernity with a broken heart. And no "family", no home to go back to, since the Enlightenment and the Reformation burned those bridges - the chafing teenagers yelled at Mom and Dad and all their "rules", and stormed out of the house never to return. :( Now they realize, like the Prodigal, that maybe it's time to go home.

And I think, if they do, that to the Protestants the Catholic Church will be like the Dad in the story.. they'll welcome the Prodigal home. And for the Humanist children of the Enlightenment, the community of faith will welcome them home, too.

Live your way into the answers

Got the nicest letter from J1 last week, encouraging me in the new job despite its lack of altruistic appeal. :) She's always been a natural encourager. And, she has the ability to know, somehow, where my heart is, even though we haven't sat down and talked.

In it, she quotes from Rainer Maria Rilke, author of "Letters to a Young Poet", to wit:

"I beg you... to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the question now. Perhaps then, some day far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

While I never heard this before today, at some subconscious level I think I first began to understand this idea of embracing the unresolved, about three years ago.

And you know what? Now for the first time, I actually feel like I've given myself permission to do this: have patience with the unresolved in my heart.. love the questions.. and live my way into the answers.

Anglicans & Catholics

Are not so far apart, I think.

Sunday we skipped the 60th anniversary festivities at Calvary (hard to relate to when you've been there a month) and went to Messiah Episcopal down in the Highland Park neighborhood. Smaller place, a bit newer than most Episcopal buildings I'm familiar with, but the same wooden stave ceiling that looks like the bottom of a ship.

Somebody told me once why they are all built that way, but I forget. Something about the church being like Noah's Ark?? Hm. Looks kinda funny when everything else around it is blond brick and glass, but... it's symbolic of something. I just can't remember what.

The service was constructed very much like the Mass - first the service of the Word and then the Holy Eucharist (and yes, they call it that.) Many of the prayers and the responses were the same. And because of the lectionary, the readings were the same as at Mass Saturday.

And they still do the Apostolic Succession thing with their college of Bishops, etc., and still hold to transubstantiation of the elements. Confession, Nicene creed, kneeling, sign of the cross, passing the peace.. it seemed pretty close.

The wine was a nasty sweet German white, though.. not good symbolism there, folks. I mean.. think Passover, people! Red wine, cut with water, served warm. And.. no dinner rolls for bread, please! The yeast!!

Must I go into the details of how Christ fulfills the feasts of Israel along with the prophecies? Liturgical servers: read St. Paul on Christ the Paschal Lamb, the Unleavened Bread of sincerity and truth..

But oh, the music during communion! D cried, so did I. This song by Michael Perry contains it all, in just a few well-chosen words:

Heal me, hands of Jesus, and search out all my pain;
Restore my hope, remove my fear, and bring me peace again.

Cleanse me, blood of Jesus, take all bitterness away;
Let me forgive as one forgiven, and bring me peace today.

Know me, mind of Jesus, and show me all my sin;
Dispel the memories of guilt, and bring me peace within.

Fill me, joy of Jesus, anxiety shall cease,
and heaven's serenity be mine, for Jesus brings me peace.

Prayers for the Seasons - Creation

This is the last of the prefaces. Thanks, Fr. Joe Dolan, for writing..

Preface of Creation

Loving God,
You have given us the abundant earth to be our home,
and from your hand has come
the fields that yield the harvest,
the gardens and waters that feed and delight us,
the vineyards and the mountains,
the valleys, plains and meadows.

All that lives is your gift of life,
all that grows is part of your creation,
and all that delights us in the rainbow and the rose
is part of your eternal beauty.

For the miracle of life,
and for sending us Jesus to teach us how to live,
we give you thanks,
and join the angels and saints
in their unending song of praise...

Prayers for the Seasons - Everyday

Preface for Everyday

We give you thanks, Lord,
that you have sent Jesus among us
and he became the reason for our hope.

You have called us to be children of the light,
no longer to walk in darkness,
not even to fear the night of death.

You call us to live by your commandment of love,
to recognize our neighbor as part of ourselves,
to see all things and all people
as part of your creation
and the earth itself as the home of your children.

For this we give thanks and pledge our faithful love
as we join the angels and saints
in their unending song of praise...

Prayers for the Seasons - Summer

Preface for Summer

We give you thanks, O Lord, for summer days,
for waterfalls and waves
that beat on lazy shores,
for the fruit of spring's blossom
and gardens of delight.

We give you thanks for murmuring sound
and brilliant wing,
for all your carnival of living things,
birds, butterflies, and honeybees,
that cannot keep the secret of your art
but wear it in trees
and dandelions and green carpets on the valleys.

We thank you now for laughter and for rest,
for animals and fish and time to play,
for friends and love's embrace.
And for the hope that endless summer
is a hint of our eternal joys.

Lord of our happiness and sorrow's end,
we give you laughter and our praise,
as we join the angels and saints to sing...

Prayers for the Seasons - Spring

Preface for Spring

We give you thanks, O Lord, for times and seasons,
for wheat that grows through winter snow
and now for spring and the promise
that life has many colors
and stirs within the womb.

We give you thanks for greening fields
and warming sun
for winds that move the rainful clouds,
for all the flowering land
the budding tree
and seeds that break the tomb.

The brook runs free, the clod is broken,
and hope is sudden, like the swallow's flight.
Our sleep is deep, O Lord, as vast as death,
and waits the quickening of your word.

We give you thanks for Him
whose newest birth we celebrate in spring
so all may know that beauty is not counterfeit
and earth has yielded up her dead.

Lord of color, Lord of all living things,
we are your glory, and we give you praise
with all your angels and saints as we sing...

Prayers for the Seasons - Winter

Part 2 of the series.

Preface for Winter

We give you thanks, O Lord, for times and seasons
and now for wintry nights
when stars shine coldly bright
and dust is turned to diamond underfoot.

For wintry days
when trees are stronger than the icy death
and hold in blackened limbs
the promise of the resurrection.

For opposites be praised: for heat and cold,
for stillness and the snow
that sculptures every house and tree, and falls
like some great absolution
to heal the wounded earth.

We give you thanks for Him
whose birth we celebrate in winter
so all may know, may wildly know,
that love is stronger than the coldest flesh
and mercy blankets all the land
more surely than the snow.

We give you thanks for him
who makes more than children joyful
and does not cheat our laughter in the end.

Joyous Lord,
beyond imagining but not beyond desire,
we give you glory and our song of praise...

I like the line about the trees holding within themselves the promise of the resurrection. :) What powerful imagery - blackened limbs stronger than icy death; as I move toward winter in my own life.. something to remember.

And yet.. not just yet. Yesterday night I'm at Caribou, reading a textbook from TS501, the place full of 20-somethings with laptops and backpacks studying this or that, and as I get my refill-to-go, the talk at the counter among young customers and staff turns to the groundbreaking "free" (w/ optional donation) online album download from Radiohead.

They wondered out loud what the name of the album was.. I filled them in. They asked what I paid.. I told them. Approving nods. :) Said I hoped it was better than OK Computer, and that Radiodread, the reggae tribute version to it, was actually an improvement over the original. With mouths (complete with lip rings) hanging open, they stood speechless and watched the old guy walk out..

And 6 tracks into it this morning, so far it is better. A lot better. :) Guess it's not quite wintertime for me yet. ;)

They did get 2" in Bemidji yesterday (!) but that's Bemidji for you. As for me, I won't have to really face what winter has in store for me for oh.. about another 3 weeks or so. :( And in the meantime, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to finish listening to Radiohead's latest.

Prayers for the Seasons - Fall

Here is the first of these beautiful Preface Prayers, written by Fr. Joe Dolan, that I mentioned two posts ago. Makes me want to meet the guy. :) I also can't help but relate them to the seasons of life that we as people go through as we grow and age. He makes the autumn of my years sound lovely. :) I need to see them as more like this, rich and full, and less as a harbinger of winter and old age..

Preface for Fall

For autumn and the leaves of death
we give you thanks, O Lord, and seek to praise
that northern lands can be a glory,
and men and women can find rest from empty fields
and spilling barns.

We thank you for abundant days,
For all the richer life your Son has promised,
more than eye, taste, and even autumn can provide.

And present things: books, faces, friends' return,
the fire's dance, the shouts of play,
the scarlet maple and the distant hills.

Your gift is like a wine,
pressed down and running over,
good measure for Autumn days!

We give you thanks for banquets and for bread,
but more, that You are the One that saves
the very leaf that falls
and seeks communion with the earth.

And we are never dead,
although we sleep and winter will return.

Gather us, O Lord of the Harvest.
We are the children of your love.
We are your glory, and we give you praise
with all your angels and saints as we sing...

And at this point the musical liturgy kicks in again with the priest singing the Sanctus: "Holy, holy, holy Lord ... " or however it goes. I don't have it memorized yet. :)

Hello, India?

So at 6:50AM this morning I'm sitting in my underwear at my desk (try not to picture this!), swilling my second cup of coffee, pulling on my headset, adjusting the microphone arm, logging in to the company network, pulling up the internal IM program to ask the meeting moderator what the dial-in number is today... and...

presto! Some guy in New Delhi or wherever is on the line and sharing his screen. Weird. Kind of gave me the creeps.

I mean this is soooooo technologically advanced from when I saw my first computer printout on paper with green and white bars chunked out from a tractor-fed dot matrix printer running on a Univac mainframe (all before the internet and wireless were invented), that I thought for a minute I was inside a Philip K. Dick short-story-turned-movie. Blue pill or red pill, Bob?

I haven't mastered the accents yet, either. The India dude was pretty faint in the headphones, but if I muted myself I could hear. Hmmm.. maybe it was because I had a fan running in the background, since it's still about 100 degrees in this darn house! Luckily the furnace people come today and I can get the A/C back on this afternoon, and cool it off & dry it out in here.

So whatever it was he said, I caught about half of it. Maybe I can work with him by email instead. I'm sure there's no accent in his typing. ;) And how peculiar the time zone difference. It was 7AM here, and 5:30PM there. Five *thirty*! What's up with that? Half a time zone? How does that happen?

Ooh! Ooh! He just answered my email. And yay! No accent! ;) Plus, he works noon to 8PM their time, so thats.. um.. gosh this is awkward.. um.. 10:30PM to 6:30AM my time. No, wait.. uhh.. it's.. 1:30AM to 9:30AM my time. Yeah. That's it. Oh, that's better. :) I don't have to have 7AM calls with him. Whew.

So week four begins with a lurching cough and a sputter. Two of the first three weeks were not spent at home. But no travel plans on the horizon now, except for a little vacation. :) Not that I've worked hard enough to need it, yet, but.. I get 5 days for the rest of this year, and.. I'm taking it! :)

Money and Seasonality

Money, money, money.

At church this morning a guy from the elder board came into adult SS class with architectural drawings for the next in what seems to be an unending string of building projects. I mean, they are still reporting in the bulletin the progress against the notes they sold on the last one!

I have sat through more presentations on building projects than I care to remember, and am so glad that I can go to Mass on Saturdays where this subject doesn't seem to come up - ever. Not to mention that they seem to toss around so blithely numbers like $500,000 to $2,000,000 for this or that addition to a facility.. ugh. How far could that money go in Ethiopia? Sudan? South Central LA? The Bronx? Or a little closer to home - Frogtown?

And to top it off, the sermon this morning was on 1 John 3, talking about how, if we claim to follow Christ, we must walk as Jesus walked. I seem to recall Him saying "foxes have holes, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay His head." And in the bulletin, apparently the shelves in the community food pantry are still running low and need our contributions..

Building projects. Yuk.

I know, I know, there is seasonality to life - cycles of acquisition, consolidation, elimination. I've been through all of those personally several times. I just so rarely see the church in a cycle of elimination. We just add and add and add, never subtract. And it seems to be a problem particularly in the Evangelical church, which (implicitly or explicitly) follows the model of business which says "grow or die."

In business, growth is equated with success. The Evangelical community is obsessed with growth as a measure of success, and to accomodate and effectuate that growth, we must have larger and more ministry-effective campuses. Bigger barns to store all the souls we save (as if they were ours to house.)

Just once I'd like to see a church adopt a model of the boutique winery. Small batches, but exquisite results. Why not?

Speaking of seasonality.. the priest at St. Rose's prays something remarkably beautiful after consecrating the host. It's a lengthy prayer that focuses on the season of the year we're in. I heard him pray this Summer-y thing every week and thought it was part of the liturgy, until the Autumnal Equinox when he switched it to a Fall version.

So finally I asked him about it yesterday. Turns out they are something called Prefaces, whatever that means. Some guy, a Father Dolan or something (Hmm... Timothy?) wrote them. The priest said "email me, I have them in a Word file, I'll send them to you." So I did. When I get them, I'll post them here.

That's the kind of seasonality I can celebrate. You'll see. :)

20 degrees above normal

Just before I left for KC, the furnace fan went out, and no air can circulate in the house, hot or cold. The home warranty policy covers it, though, and the repair people are were set to come on Monday while I was gone.

Yep, that's the problem, all right, fan blew, but we have to order the part. A couple days. Sure.. no problem, D says. I mean.. it's early Fall. Temps are neither too hot or too cold, right? And besides.. ha! I'm gone and in an airconditioned office and hotel. Riiiiiight.

The hotel room never gets below 70 no matter what I do, so I get maintenance to bring up a fan and have it going all night. The office is worse. 74 at least and no air movement. I run to Target and buy a cool (as in hip) little fan that plugs into my laptop's USB port - works great, but.. makes a lot of noise. :( I feel bad for the people in neighboring cubicles, so rarely use it. Drip, drip, drip.

Now I get home and .. no furnace fan. Monday after 1. Fine, fine. Except that this weekend happens to be a record breaking heat wave. Arghhh! :(

Still, last night it didn't matter. I crashed anyway.

Nice to be home, heat and all.

39 Hours..

..and I'll be home.

I can do this. The week is winding down. Only two more days in cubicle-ville and this rat can exit the maze.

My cheese is waiting.. up north.

Drinking the Company Kool-aid

So yesterday 35 of my closest new corporate friends and I spent all day in a meeting room listening to talking heads (of businesses, that is - some in person and some by video) explain their vision and strategies, and listening to their underlings drone on and on about their accomplishments by reading from mind-numbing powerpoint slides. And ooh, just think – more today!

All day long we heard about initiatives, initiatives, initiatives, ad nauseum (and oh yes.. why don’t initiatives ever become conclusives?) Then we saw the latest in corporate direction reduced to logos and diagrams rich with embedded meaning.

I felt like I should open up the “random corporate buzzword generator” spreadsheet that I invented a few business cycles ago. Just open it up and hit ‘enter’ to get the buzzwords of the day, like “quantifying effective strategies”, or “initiating meaningful incentives”, or my favorite.. “right-sizing inspirational reorganizations.”

Well, for once in my life I didn’t drink all the Corporate Kool-Aid they served. I sipped one serving all day long, in between many many cups of strong coffee, and was able to even have a bit left in my glass at the end of the day.

They are not going to get my heart this time, no matter how winsome they are. This time I'm going to remember - they will never love me!

So I felt refreshingly detached from the rah-rah mumbo-jumbo (which I have so earnestly delivered myself more times than I care to admit), and was able to focus more on connecting with the people around me. That was a nice change.

And.. about a third of them were teleworkers! Even met a Sales Director from South St. Paul. Wow.. I didn’t feel so out of place.

Of course, there was a little “getting to know you” exercise. We submitted pictures of things in our office environment. Mine were 1) my full-sized shofar & miniature ark of the covenant, 2) the red alstromerias I had in a bud vase on my desk, and 3) the small bronze of Rodin’s “The Kiss” that’s on my bookshelf. We were supposed to guess whose office it was by the pictures. They were more than a bit surprised that the owner of these things was the new actuary, who also happened to wear a bright blue & green shirt with an electric green tie today. Nothing like making a statement as the new guy! :)

And speaking of making statements…

After the group had dinner and drinks last night (good martinis!), there was a “team-building exercise.” O joy! O rapture! They broke us into teams of 6, and told us to put on a skit, complete with designated topic, creative costume materials, singing requirements, advertising jingles, and man-on-the-street interviews.

I was at my wit’s end… not! ;)

They did give us some props. Without going into details, let’s just say that our skit revolved around a glamorous celebrity, a fashion infomercial, real tattoos, tinfoil, balloons, pipe cleaners, a Manfred Mann song, serious gender confusion, hair removal products, and an extremely thick Swiss accent. By some twist of fate I got the lead role, and it would be safe to say that I made an entirely different impression on the group than earlier in the day. And really.. it’s probably better not to ask. :)

Fun as that was, playing for laughs again, I still really, really , REALLY don’t like being here in the “corporate environment.” Especially when they are soooo gung-ho about return on equity targets. Ugh. I wanna go home!!

There’s a lot to be said for going to work in a t-shirt and gym shorts… and not having to model a sports bra coated with reflective safety material..

Oh, that's me, all right

A couple of quotes from Sunday morning that struck home.

First:

There's a hole in my sidewalk, by Portia Nelson

******

I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I was lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It takes forever to find a way out.

I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don't see it. I fall in. I can't believe I'm in the same place, but it's not my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.

I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in. It's a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

I walk down a different street.

******

I know which stage(s) I've been in, and when, and which I'm in right now. Which are you in, dear reader?



The second quote is from Julie Gorman, in her book "A Community that is Christian":

******

Persons today hunger for intimacy. They long for someone to know and accept them as they are. They fear being known and judged. They want to be in a relationship where they can trust, where others will be committed to them when they are the least desirable. They long to be esteemed as individuals.

******

Yes. They do.

I do.

Uff-da!

Oh, yah, da polka mass, you betcha. :)

It was... like nothing else. Ever.

A 3 piece combo: clarinet/sax, concertina, and drums. Hawaiian shirts, 55+ all. And until you've sung the Agnus Dei to an oom-pa beat, and the Responsorial Psalm in Polish.. you haven't lived. "Gdzie wschodzi slonce, I kedy zapada, niechaj swiat Boska, chwale opowiada." it says.

Oh yeah? Same to you, buddy.

But what it really reminded me of, with that clarinet and the 1-2-3-hop, 1-2-3-hop rhythm, was.. Klezmer! Really. It was almost Yiddish. Especially when they were marching the Gospels around the altar to the sound of a wailing clarinet. Oy! Such pagentry you never saw!

Apparently, according to the handout, the first polka mass was held in 1973 in the Iron Range of Minnesota, for the Croatian and Slovenian workers there, and it spread to other "polka centers" (you know who you are) around the country.

Yeah well, I don't know how far it spread, but all I can say is the place was packed, and the priest's first comment after his welcoming greeting was.. "My goodness, is it Christmas already?

I don't know.. it was a little.. cheesy. :) Cute, yes.. but I'm not sure you want the Mass to be.. cute. I'll be glad when the cantor is back next week.

And after another week on the road in KC... I'll be glad to be back home. Bon Voyage!

Riding in the dark

My buddy from Nashotah, the Lutheran/Baptist/Catholic/Episcopal soldier/politician/pastor/professor, came up last night for a seminar downtown this weekend. I grilled a nice filet of salmon (in tinfoil with olive oil, dill, lemon & capers - mmmm..), broke open a Wollersheim Prairie Fume', and talked a little theology. Fun!

We also talked about the American Anglican church (read: Episcopal) as a potential spot for me to continue exploring.. sacramental, but reformation-based. Maybe. We'll see. :)

Then D & I went out for coffee, a long talk, and bike shopping. Happy birthday(s)! :) Found a pair of matching his/her Schwinns at Target for $99 each. Cute! Just right for putting around the neighborhood.

The tires were low, and rather than stuff both of them in the back of the Jeep and risk scratching them all up so soon, we went to the gas station a block away, filled up the tires, and I rode mine home the 3 miles or so, at 9:00 at night. Flying downhill in the dark, with only the occasional street light or car headlights to help me see was kind of a thrill. :) Yeah, I know.. simple pleasures for simple people..

I had forgotten that when you ride bike, you don't realize you're getting hot, because of the breeze in your face. But when you stop... whoo... I was working! Anyway, it felt good to ride in the dark. Even if the seat *was* about a foot too low.

When you don't want to get up..

.. how do you motivate yourself to?

First real struggle this morning with telecommuting. :(

Somehow when you have an office and co-workers to go to, you learn to put a mask on your personal issues and just move forward. You know.. cover up what's bothering you.. keep up public appearances.

But what about when you're alone in the house and can't think about work because of what else is on your mind?

How do you put the mask on.. with yourself?

The working chef

So today I discovered that I can cook while working. Well, sort of. At least I could lay out the ingredients, make a dash to the store for an extra red onion while on my lunch hour, thaw some vegetable stock, and think about when I'd have to start chopping veggies. I worked, and sort of took 5 minute breaks every hour to puddle around in the kitchen, thinking about dinner, getting a plan in my head.

Then at 4:30.. I start chopping onion. Should I cry more with red onions than with yellow? Hmm.. not as bad as with shallots though! Bake the red onion in olive oil at 425 while I chop the yellow ones and the carrots, celery, cloves of garlic, etc.. then cook all that with the cumin and fennel and olive oil in the stockpot..

But back down to the office to answer a few last minute emails, save a couple of spreadsheets, log off the in-house IM application (that is nice, by the way..) and knock off for the day (5:10 or so) and back to cooking in earnest. :)

Time to add the vegetable stock and the lentils.. and then some off-recipe stuff. Shhhh... it's a secret. ;) Mmmmm.. simmer away.. make dessert.. grill some sausage.. ready by 6! Good planning. And yowza! What soup! :) I'm glad I didn't have to completely give up cooking when I started back to work.

And tonight, study for TS501 begins - I'll stop for a new episode of Mad Men on AMC, of course. Then another hour of John Calvin, his various opponents, and that last sip of wine. Sweet.

RCIA

Well.

Also pretty interesting.

My first class for the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults was tonight (although as Sister Penny said, maybe it should be *Catholic* Initiation, since most everyone going through this is already a Christian of one stripe or another. Of the four of us "candidates", three were there because they married a Catholic. Not me! And all of those were Lutherans. Not me! Not anymore, anyway.)

It was quite unlike my first class of TS501 yesterday. The only similarity was the time spent in introductions and sharing. And yet, I can see already that this will be stimulating and disturbing also, just.. not at an intellectual level, so much as at an emotional one.

Something as simple as Sr. Penny going over the schedule of classes, the various rites (of Welcome, Sending, Election), a list of topics, and the many events of Holy Week.. wow. I realized that either I am going to take this seriously and engage honestly the material and the rituals, such as the Sacrament of Reconciliation (aka Confession), confronting it (and letting it confront me), or I have no business being in the classes.

I found myself a little nervous about what I might experience emotionally as I go through this. Even a brief description of the preparations for Initiation made me think about what that Easter Vigil service may be like for me. It could well be as powerful as my Evangelical conversion experience was at 16, but more of a slow buildup to the climactic moment of anointing, rather than the sudden, jolting thunderclap that was my teenage conversion.

Anyway, the whole notion of it gave me pause. Do I want to start down this path? I guess I already have started, but I mean.. once I begin, will I be able (or even want) to resist the conclusion?

I have two weeks to think about it, since I'm in KC again all next week. And when I come back to class, the topic will be.. conversion. How appropriate.

TS501

Well.

That was pretty interesting..

My first class in Systematic Theology I. Oof. This will be both stimulating and worrisome, I can see it already. There's a whole world of ideas that I haven't heard of, many more which I have heard of but don't understand well, and a bunch that I do grasp but don't necessarily trust in the way I used to.

Good teacher. I like him. He is open to the ideas of others, but will gently guide their thinking when it's incomplete. And the man knows his subject well enough to extemporize and shift gears to accomodate discussion, with appropriate examples to clarify.

Ha - he even provided an answer for us to tell people when they ask "well, what did you learn?" I can confidently say with the rest of the class, that tonight I apprehended the differences and the interplay between the neumena and phenomena of Immanuel Kant, epistemologically speaking. :)

Oh yeah, that. What you just said there. Yup. I'm all about that.

The creepy part was that the thing I have been angry at God about for a few years now is pretty much exactly the dilemma Kant articulated, the disconnect between the way things really are in their essence, and our limited knowledge of them via experience (or lack of same.) Example: who God really is, and how we understand Him (or rather, fail to) through our mind and senses.

I have found myself focusing on knowing other things (and people) that I *can* experience, hoping they will substitute for the God Whom I cannot experience. Not the best idea - it gets confusing. And if God is essentially unknowable in His essence... what good are my 5 senses for anything but, as Solomon says, the enjoyment of life, a.k.a. seeking pleasure?

Kierkegaard apparently had the definitive response to Kant, which is: faith! Well.. okay so far.. but then he said that faith has no ground other than in itself otherwise it wouldn't be faith, which I think is just so much horse hockey. But what do I know?

So anyway, here I thought I had an original idea. So much for that notion. Solomon's right again: "there's nothing new under the sun." Hm. Least of all my puny ideas. :)

I'm up!

The cable guy finally left at 5:15 after two hours of poking around, drilling holes, calling the help desk, resetting modems, and the like. But .. it's working, and he fixed what he screwed up. I'm linked to the company's VPN! Now, tomorrow... real work. :)

Well, I *was* on a conference call today, so some real work was done, but mostly the day was spent setting up the office, making sure all items are working and connected, taking inventory of what wasn't, and getting the right people on the task of fixing it.

Took a whole 15 minutes for lunch, and a bit of a break to read a winemaking magazine while the cable guy was in my office. But I will be a good boy tonight and read a little for class tomorrow - the first couple of chapters of Calvin's "Institutes of the Christian Religion" on the subject of how it is we come to learn about God in the first place.

His initial argument is that we can only begin to know God by coming to some knowledge of ourselves, particularly our moral and emotional poverty, and our utter dependence on our surroundings and other persons to survive. So far I buy what he says, that the greater our awareness of our limitations, the more we are receptive to knowledge of God. Ha - based on that logic, I should be the most receptive guy on the planet when it comes to God.. ;)

And then another episode of Ken Burns' new PBS special.. the rest of the bottle of red Zinfandel.. and off to bed. A good day. :)

Here we go..

..the first week of telework.

Hm.

I don't know why I'm so nervous about this, but.. I am.

Will I meet expectations? Will I learn fast enough? Will I work hard enough? Will I work too much? Will I manage to handle studying, too? Will relationships suffer?

It was nice to have J2 up, have fun with college kids over for dinner, meet my Bethel professors at orientation, hear a good band, go to Mass and church, run this morning (in cooler weather), then work with D both outside and inside today to get things in order in yard and office, and finally chill to pizza and beer and Ken Burns' new PBS special. It was a good weekend of non-work activities in between last week's orientation and this week's practical application of it.

Should I worry about my performance? No, of course not. :) Worry accomplishes nothing. I just wish I was more confident that I can do this well. It's rare that I've had a job where I feel this tentative about my success at it. I know I have the knowledge..

But.. I'm very unsure of myself nonetheless. :( I still feel like my world is unstable, and there's another shock around the corner, another loss, just waiting to catch me feeling a little better, and then.. knock the legs out from under me again.

How do I keep from anticipating failure and loss, when it's been so routine for me in recent years, months, weeks? Maybe I'll ask Dr. Shrink-wrap this week, and see what he says. He was right last time..

Gambling in the Elevator

Home. :)

How good it feels. And how strange to find that this house, this town, this area.. is beginning to feel like home, after such a short time.

For the longest time, I had no idea where home was. But, for some reason.. this one is growing on me. Now if I can just figure out where *work* is, in this place that is becoming home.

Should be a nice weekend. J2 is up, with roomie in tow. My new student orientation at grad school is on Saturday, plus college kids we know are coming over for dinner in the evening, too. And Mass.. and church.. Busy! But that's good - a different kind of busy than the rest of this week. Whew..

Ran last night, in the oppressive heat, and made it through the mile loop! Not a bad time, either.. But as I was heading in afterwards, I noticed through the glass walls of the elevator this man and woman walking down my hallway talking. They seemed to know each other.

But then, as I got off the elevator, there was an exaggerated distance between them, and all of a sudden he pretended not to know her. "After you, Miss." he said as they got on. Hmm.. fishy..

Then, as I walked down the hallway, I turned back to look, and sure enough.. he had his hands all over her! She's facing away from me, but he looks up, sees me watching, and winks, as if to say: "Hey, buddy, you know the score, right?"

Yeah, I know the score. But I'm not sure you do.

You may think so, pal, but do you realize what a high-stakes game it is you're playing? Maybe you have nothing to lose, but if you're being furtive.. I'll bet you do. You really should think about not playing this particular game at all. Because in this one.. you're playing against the House, mister, and the odds.. they are *not* in your favor.

Sure, people do have streaks of luck, bad or good (after all, 3000 years ago, the author of Ecclesiastes talked about the wicked appearing to prosper and the righteous being hurt) - so a person may take risks and, with some good luck, for a while may have more than they came in with - but it's a rare person who *stops* risking before he blows everything he's gained and more besides, winding up empty-handed in the end. Nobody beats the House forever, friend. Nobody.

Anyway, home. :) It's nice. It's been a long week.

And brrrrrr.. is it cold up here! Ahhhh.. ;) Lovely.

Wearing me down already..

not in a bad way, though. Just tired.

A variety of meetings today, starting promptly at 8, some with people I've actually talked to more than once! The boss left me to my own devices in a couple of them, and is handing one to me on Monday to be there in his place (by phone, of course). This is progress.

As is getting approval to access certain servers where all the files I need happen to live! It seemed like my email asking for access went into a black hole. :( But it's always good to follow up if there's silence from someone for several days. Maybe it's *not* because they don't care about you.. there's often some other reason. It just seems like they don't care - especially if you're feeling like you're a nuisance and not all that wanted.

I know, I know, that's the insecure teenager talking, coupled with the middle-aged guy who's unceremoniously lost his job a few times.. but still.. silence feels cold sometimes, even if it's not meant to be. And the more you need their response, the worse it feels.

Okay. Enough of that.

I really need a night off. :) These 8AM command performances where all I do is take in more information are wearing on me. Think I'll go to the mall near the hotel, poke around in Borders or something, see what's new. If it weren't so darned hot, I'd run. I'm so sedentary here, I feel restless. A run would help. And maybe, hot or not, I still will. Working up a good sweat might help my mood, too.

Gossip and grouper

It was a very different day today from yesterday. I'm wrung out.

With every new job there's a state of information overload, and I've reached the point of mental exhaustion with it, but I still have 2 days to go in this orientation week. The expression "like drinking from a fire hose" sure applies.

But today the focus was not just on data and systems and jargon, but more on who's who and what pitfalls to avoid with which people. I still haven't seen an org chart yet, so it's a mystery how this place is organized, but I think I'm homing in on it.

Met another teleworker (as they call us) today who was in the office for some meetings. I'll be working with him routinely, it turns out. He's a great guy, and lives in a little burg NW of Milwaukee. We agreed to have coffee sometime when I am visiting the area - whenever that might be. He's a long-time Wisconsinite, knows my hometown well, and he gave me a few "off-the-record" tips that may come in handy, as to how to make this telecommuting thing work better when I get home. Shhhh! You didn't hear it from me.. ;)

Dinner with the boss (still no nickname yet.. have to work on that) was lovely. More office gossip (or rather, inside info on people) over a bottle of Fume' Blanc, some lobster bisque, goat cheese & kalamata olive tapenade on foccacia bread, and finally an entree' of potato-wrapped Blue Nose Grouper with creamed leeks and a wine reduction sauce. Whew. It's a wonder I could still type, back at the hotel.

The boss has a predeliction, however, for 8AM meetings. And given that my hotel is a half-hour from the office.. I am not a happy boy in the mornings. :( 8AM meetings won't be so bad if I'm still in my underwear down in the den. ;) Try not to picture that. And no, they don't provide web cams, thank God.

I belong. :)

Today was one of those days where you see signs of being official:

I got the meet and greet tour, got my ID badge, parked in the employee lot instead of the visitor lot, sat in two meetings (and was told by my boss's boss "Wow.. you're contributing already!"), found the cafeteria and mail room all by myself, ordered business cards and the corporate credit and phone cards, got on email distribution lists, and began a project list. :)

Gee.

This is good, right?

And, even better.. too busy to think. The therapist was right. It helps a little to have more to do and think about this week.. less time to focus on pain and loss.

Oh, and.. they have free coffee and tea on every floor, all day. Hm. Not a bad idea to provide your employees legal stimulants at the workplace. I do notice that the bathrooms are crowded. ;)

Whew!

One down.

First day jitters were not too bad. :)

HR stuff in the morning, lunch with boss and co-worker (hmm.. need to think up blog-y nicknames..), afternoon with IT (laptop & systems seem to work fine.) Email goes out and comes back.. so far so good.

Tomorrow, my first meeting about a work issue, so first new faces to meet (and names to forget..) plus an orientation with the telecommuting support unit leader (by phone - she also works from home), plus dinner with the boss.

Not a bad day. Looks interesting tomorrow, too. No real snags so far. Even ran this morning! Yuk. :( Too hot down here. Love that pedometer, though.. no measured running loop needed! :)

Wearing a tie today, and with a coordinated brown/brown ensemble.. I clearly overdressed. ;)

Oh,man.. so much to learn..

but so far everyone's nice. :)



And for those of you who were on prayer support yesterday and today (whether you were drafted, or volunteered without my knowledge)... thanks! Good work.

A Better Resurrection

A BETTER RESURRECTION

by: Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)

I have no wit, no words, no tears;
My heart within me like a stone
Is numb'd too much for hopes or fears;
Look right, look left, I dwell alone;
I lift mine eyes, but dimm'd with grief
No everlasting hills I see;
My life is in the falling leaf:
O Jesus, quicken me.

My life is like a faded leaf,
My harvest dwindled to a husk:
Truly my life is void and brief
And tedious in the barren dusk;
My life is like a frozen thing,
No bud nor greenness can I see:
Yet rise it shall--the sap of Spring;
O Jesus, rise in me.

My life is like a broken bowl,
A broken bowl that cannot hold
One drop of water for my soul
Or cordial in the searching cold;
Cast in the fire the perish'd thing;
Melt and remould it, till it be
A royal cup for Him, my King:
O Jesus, drink of me.

Onward

Okay.

Breathe deep..

Wipe eyes..

Square shoulders..

Lift chin..

Look forward..

Ready?



One foot in front of the other, man..

Let's go.

Therapy, schmerapy

What did I think he was going to say, anyway? Snap his fingers and just solve things? Have me recite some magic mantra that will make pain go away?

What he *did* say that I think is right to the point is that it's a good thing I will be in orientation all next week in a real office. It will make it easier to keep my mind off what's eating at me, if I am trying to assimilate a bunch of new information, and having to deal with a bunch of strange new people. Less time to think and mope. Not as easy to be in a blue funk as if I were sitting at home. A big distraction is good sometimes. Not forever, we still need to deal with it, but.. during the worst part, it can help.

Yeah, I get that. He's right. Then maybe when I'm back and starting to work, I'll feel enough of a sense of urgency to get started on my assignments and show some progress (since I'll be down there again the first week in October, the boss tells me), that there'll be little time to think.

People tell me that it works - keep yourself busy so you don't think as much. I'll try it. I haven't been busy for quite a while. And like they say about idle hands (and, I suppose, an idle mind)...

yeah.

So, this afternoon for instance, I think I'll try to busy myself with some stuff, whether I'm in the mood for it or not. Like beef tenderloin with mustard & capers sauce for dinner. Like unpacking my winemaking stuff in the basement, organizing it. Like putting up the decorative window film in the lounge (it arrived today. Cool!)

Keep busy, buddy.

And don't even think about that 7 hour drive alone on Sunday..

Anger must help you run..

or else I'm getting in better shape.

My fastest 1.5 miles yet, and no warm glistening behind my ears until the 1.2 mile mark, no annoying trickle down my collar until the last 1/4 mile. And a kick at the end, yet.

Maybe my pace was quickened by the anger. Damn this therapy for releasing it.

I'm angry at my brother for dying when he did and so much unresolved with me, for not waiting until Dad passed first as it should have been, for not taking better care of himself and living the life he did.

I'm angry at the heavens for being brass right now. Nothing is getting through, in either direction. I know, Dt. 28:33 says it will be this way, but why now? Yes, it's only been a few days since last weekend, but why now? Couldn't it have lasted a few months instead of a few days?

I'm angry at the ether for being silent & cold. Am I full of such malice that I should be shut out like this by the elements that hang the world together and link us with each other?

I'm angry at myself for all that I do and don't do, the comission and the omission, the failure and the faithlessness, the rebellion and the reaching, the discontent and the drifting.

And so I run faster, further.



I wonder if John Donne was a runner:

A HYMN TO GOD THE FATHER.
by John Donne

I.
WILT Thou forgive that sin where I begun,
Which was my sin, though it were done before?
Wilt Thou forgive that sin, through which I run,
And do run still, though still I do deplore?
When Thou hast done, Thou hast not done,
For I have more.

II.
Wilt Thou forgive that sin which I have won
Others to sin, and made my sin their door?
Wilt Thou forgive that sin which I did shun
A year or two, but wallowed in a score?
When Thou hast done, Thou hast not done,
For I have more.

III.
I have a sin of fear, that when I have spun
My last thread, I shall perish on the shore ;
But swear by Thyself, that at my death Thy Son
Shall shine as he shines now, and heretofore ;
And having done that, Thou hast done ;
I fear no more.




If you can hear me through the brass... forgive, take away my fear? Let me hear what I long to hear? That there is mercy in you, that you will use it, and restoration between us is possible?

Speak. My heart waits..

Why am I not excited?

about starting work?

I don't know, everything feels flat. Life feels flat. No texture, no contours, no thickness or lightness or smoothness or silkiness or roughness, no.. nothing.

Talked to the therapist again today. Still didn't use the tissue box. Close, but.. nope.

He asked how my week was. "Oh, up and down" I said. The up part was easy to talk about. My trip on Thursday/Friday was the up part. The down part was not so easy. So he made a space for me in his schedule on Friday and we'll see if I can talk about it then. I believe the tissue box will get used. :(

Most of the session today was about work/career - how I view it, what effect on my self-worth it has, rightly or wrongly, and ... well, many other things that are best left on the therapist's couch. And no, I still didn't lie down. I was on the couch but.. sitting up.

He did have a couple of helpful little suggestions. I think I'll like working with him. But I'll know better after Friday..

The rest of the time was spent on filling in family history, childhood, adolescence, and, as is normal for me, tears come when I don't expect them to. And when I talked about my brother.. I kind of lost it. Guess I hadn't realized how much his death last year still clung to me, and how upset I still was at him for what he made of his life, and for falling off that big white charger I always had him riding on as my boyhood idol.

It's pretty tough to stay on a white charger for very long. I've fallen from one often enough to know. Maybe that's why I drive a black one..

Getting nervous

... about next week. Or something.

Trying to get stuff finished up this week while I have time: doctor, dentist, vision, haircut, business phone, office stuff, blah, blah..

Edgy, restless, upset.. all day. D noticed, but I couldn't explain to her what it was, exactly..

I can't concentrate, have no appetite. Nothing tastes good.

Something seems off, but..

I don't know how to fix it. :(

Wrapping up and settling in

When I headed out on Thursday for a couple of days, I prayed for clarity (and closure, if needed) in certain unsettled areas of my life, including that last lingering job interview. Hm. It turned out to be more of a vounteer consulting assignment where I simply got my expenses covered, rather than an interview.

Still, it seemed good to help them think about what kind of person they need to hire, and I felt like I was helpful to them. Nice people.. just not ready to make a hiring decision; that may be months and months off. Too long for me to wait! They understood, and were appreciative of the time I spent with them discussing possibilities, even if those possibilities didn't include me. :)

It was a good trip all around, though. And I got the clarity I wanted. Good clarity. The kind that brings resolution and peace of heart.

So, back at the ranch.. wrapping up a few items of unfinished business. Like putting up the record racks in my lounge! :)














And, rearranging some of the decorations..







Plus, place my textbook order for Systematic Theology class, send off for a little decorative window film for the lounge windows, put down a deposit on a few winter-hardy grapevines for Spring planting.. ahhh. Nice to know where I'll be for a while, and can finish getting settled.

Now, only one more week of unemployment! A few more exotic meals to cook, winemaking equipment to unpack and arrange, one last test to correct so I can turn in grades that are due this week, and.. order some new home-office furniture and supplies from the on-line catalog my new company emailed to me.

Getting ready for a long steady stretch coming up, on many fronts, I hope. Long, steady, and.. happy? That'd be nice. :)

Unpack the boxes...

... put up the record racks, order the window treatments, call the lawn guy for the fall feeding, buy my Systematic Theology I textbooks from Amazon, start a batch of wine in the basement. Yeah! We're staying right here. :)

And maybe by the end of the month, I'll get a paycheck. Now I just have to deserve it. ;) I'll be, um.. working on that.

Hey.. I'll be working! Period! And.. out of my own house, no less. Woohoo!

Feeling kind of flat

So I'm driving back tonight from a speed run to the local Landmark Theatre to grab a new sampler CD before they're all gone.. (since I'm leaving in the morning and won't get back until Saturday night.) I pull into the garage, hop out, prize in hand, and I hear a lawn sprinkler running. What the? It's 8:30 at night. Why is D running the sprinkler.. wait.. that's not a sprinkler.. it's like, air hissing or something.

Walking out into the yard the sound goes away. Back in the garage it's loud. Oh oh..

Sure enough, it's my left rear tire. I feel the top of the tire and there's air blowing out. Some kind of metal shard is in the tire, but I can't pull it out. Into the house for a pliers, which works fine, and the hissing stops. What the heck is this thing? Woah.. it's a broken off blade from a carpet cutter. Where in the world did I pick this up?

Well, now what do I do? I gotta leave in the morning and the spare is one of those dinky little spares that isn't highway rated. Poop. Okay, call AAA. Maybe they have roadside service from a place with a service bay who can patch the tire first thing in the morning..

No such luck. Some crazy joint with a name like "Tex's Towing & BBQ" is dispatched, and it will take them an hour and a half to get here! Argh! But, the AAA rep is nice and searches for a service station in the area and finds one that's open until 11 tonight and can handle a flat repair! Woo! Maybe I'll lose a little sleep but still get underway in the morning. That'll still work.

So the tire change service is supposed to be here by 10. Plenty of time to get the flat to the station. Four calls to AAA later, he shows up at 10:55. So much for getting it fixed tonight. Up early to get the flat in when the station opens at 7. Maybe I can still leave close to on time..

Shrink-wrapped and ready to go!

Let's start with the ready to go part.

J1 is heading out, with the dog in tow, tomorrow morning to rendesvous with her furniture in California. (sigh) Wish she wasn't leaving, just when we barely got within driving distance, but.. what are ya gonna do? She's always had a mind of her own, and is a cussedly determined sort when she locks in on something. Now is no exception. She's had this move in her head (one version or another) for years.

J2 drives her to the airport and will hang on to her car until he can shake loose for a weekend and bring it up north for me to try to sell. He can't afford the insurance for another year until he turns 21, and by that time who knows what kind of vehicle he'll want? His preferences change with the seasons. Always have. The difference between those two kids is profound.

As for me, I faxed back the acceptance letters for the telecommuting offer, so they can start the background checks and try to get me on the payroll by the 17th. I redo the drug test tomorrow, at the right lab this time, and then I think I'm all set. :)

Alright, then, on to the shrink. Excuse me .. THERapist. Had my initial consultation today with the guy. Seems nice enough, and so far a good combination of being directive when necessary and yielding ground when appropriate. I think we'll get along. He has a decent couch-side manner (actually I took an arm chair), except for the pained look he puts on his face when I refer to some negative experience. I wonder if he practices that look in front of the mirror, or asks his wife if he looks sincere..

No tissues needed today, but I can imagine there might be a need for some as he peels the onion a bit. I have a feeling that he is going to be able to open me up like a paper grocery bag. ;) But I draw the line at guided imagery or hypno-therapy! Don't even..

On a culinary note.. oh, that eggplant lasagna was tasty! Leftovers last night, and mmmm.. so good. Tomorrow: tomato-fennel soup! Bought my first fennel bulb today. First time I ever saw one, in fact. What a funky looking critter that is! Sort of alien. Smells kind of anise-y. Also bought my first shallots today. Never saw those before, either. Kind of nondescript little things, in a little mesh baglet. Hm.. this ought to be interesting. Maybe it will go well with meatloaf..

And finally, my last class as an adjunct professor for a while is tonight. Maybe I'll teach again in winter after I have one Systematic Theology course behind me and have worked in the new job for 3 months and know what's expected from both. Oh my poor students.. a 60 minute timed test.. they're terrified. :) heeheeheehee..

Labor Day, Under The Sun

dawned clear and warm. Should be a lovely hot and sunshine-y day (for those of you who like such things, I say from my cool and dark basement lair from which I'll not venture far today.)

Why don't we celebrate "rest from labor" day?

Ahh.. but we're supposed to. That's what the Sabbath is for. "Six days shall you labor and do all your work. But remember the sabbath day to keep it holy." Instead most of us work 5 days, and then work hard at recreation the other two, packing our weekends with stuff and not really getting rest.

Others, like me, have too much rest and wouldn't mind working at *least* 5 days, even 6. So I take up shopping and cooking and cleaning bathrooms to pass the time until I can work again. Soon, though! Offer accepted, release forms signed & faxed back, so the background checks can begin. Still hoping for a 9/17 start in the KC office for a week of orientation. That's if the background checks get done on time, they say. God, please expedite those.. I'm tired of sitting here. Wish school would start.

The textbook list got posted on the school website yesterday, and Amazon had them all. :) Only about $120 this time for half a dozen texts. No syllabus up yet, but .. it'll come. I'll wait to place the order until after I've had that last interview, just to be sure, but.. I'm as sure as I can be that I'll be starting class on the 24th.

Systematic Theology I. Mmmm... I can hardly wait. :) Hope it doesn't screw up my faith even more! ;) Maybe it will help clarify things in my head - give me a system to argue against or something. I think I come to believe something by mentally demolishing the opposite position. What a contrarian! I'll make a good "old codger" when I get to be of a certain age.

Stop that. I know what you're thinking.

So back to Labor Day. I was thinking of all the ways that the word "labor" is used in the Scriptures (which I won't detail for you here, don't worry), from the work a woman goes through in delivering a baby, to work used as punishment when under oppression, to work producing rewards (firstfruits), to companions in work (Paul's "fellow laborers"), to the rest promised to those who have been burdened with work. So many different senses of the word..

And then there's the paradoxical references in Ecclesiastes about the futility of work and the blessing of it. How strange:

"For what has man for all his labor, and for the striving of his heart with which he has toiled under the sun? For all his days are sorrowful, and his work burdensome; even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity. Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God." ----- Eccl. 2:22-24

Huh? So, which is it then? Meaningless? Or a gift from God? Or... a meaningless gift from God? Hm.. that doesn't seem right, either. Maybe.. meaningless in and of itself, but.. a good thing when God gives you joy in it?

I don't know. It's confusing.

I've had work that I've found joy in, but seldom. Mostly it's been sorrowful, burdensome, meaningless, vanity, a chasing after the wind. The enjoyment has come when the work fit me well, like a custom-tailored shirt with no pinching or chafing, and when those around me were happy with what I was doing for them and with them. How rare that's been. But, I've seen it - I know it's possible.

So.. this time? Next time? Never again? In retirement? Who knows?

We spend so much time working, that I think Solomon's right: there's nothing better than if your soul can enjoy good in your labor. And I look forward to the next time that happens. It really will seem like a gift from God.

Are you saved???

Uhh.. from what?

by what?

for what?

That was the theme this morning. The answer to all three questions, of course, was God. Saved from His wrath, by His grace, for His use. Yup. Can't disagree. Plus it makes for a good 3-point sermon.

But when the pastor said "The question 'Are you saved?' is the most critical question that can ever be asked of someone.", I had to disagree. Even he, in the same message, acknowleged that salvation is used in the Bible in the past tense, in the present tense, (both *are* saved, and are *being* saved), and in the future tense. He agreed with the Biblical writers that salvation is a process, which is more like the Catholic view of things (weekly Eucharist, regular reconciliation and penance) than the Evangelical date-in-time transactional view.

I think the better question is: "are you seeking to know God?"

For one, it relates to the post-modern culture better. "Being saved" doesn't. The pastor even said that people today don't believe they are accountable to God for their actions, and that there's no imminent threat of danger. They think (in a moral sense) "sure, I smoke in bed, leave candles burning all night, don't own a fire extinguisher, so what? My house hasn't burned down yet; and I just don't think it's going to. If it happens, it happens, I'll deal with it then. Why call the fire department when my house isn't burning?"

So then.. why ask them the moral question that way, as if you were talking about fire hazards and danger? But you can ask (morally): "do you like what's in your house, and what happens there? Is it ideal as is, or could it be better? Does it reflect who you are as a person?"

Two, it is less of a transactional view of spirituality, and more of a relational view, which is the original idea from back in the Garden anyway. It's not a test to which you must have the right answers.. instead it's spending time walking and talking with the teacher, learning what he knows & knowing who he is.

Three, the Scriptures teach that anyone who seeks God will find Him, and that He has marked His own for salvation before the foundation of the world, and that no one seeks God unless God draws him to look, so.. if you are seeking to know God, the salvation part will take care of itself. It's a given.

Finally, the Bible uses salvation in different ways, but mostly it's in the sense of being rescued from something bad, be it the threats of an enemy, the consequences of our wrong actions, or the potential loss of what is dear to us. It's not unlike the way we might say a beaten-up boxer was "saved by the bell" ringing at the end of a brutal round, or that a junkie/prostitute was "saved from the streets" by a rescue mission worker and/or rehab, or that a suicidal person was "saved from himself" by being talked back from the brink and gotten into therapy, or that an alcoholic was "saved from the gutter" by AA, etc. Unless you're facing calamity or consequences or threats... who needs to be saved?

But.. anyone can understand the question "are you seeking to know God?" Especially in our current culture where "being a spiritual person" is considered a good thing.

So, are you seeing to know God?

If so.. press on. He'll make sure you find Him. Because.. even *wanting* to seek is evidence that the relationship is already underway. He'll do His part: reveal. You do yours: seek.

If not.. why not? Are you afraid that if you do seek Him, that He'll intrude into your life and make you change what you're doing and what you value? Or is it because you have no need to be better than you are right now, you're just fine the way you are and need nothing from anyone, God included? Or is it because, even if there is a God.. you simply don't care?

Those are the scary answers. Not because morally your "house is on fire". But because they reveal what's inside your house (or speaking metaphorically.. inside your heart.) Do you like what you see there? House (and heart) without God living in it?

To me, that's the critical question.

Ahh, September..

the gateway to Fall. I love this transition month as heat yields to cold.

And, I love the September of my years, too, as Sinatra would say. Yes, it does come with advantages. ;)

I discovered a new advantage this morning, right after my what-seems-to-be-developing-into-a-daily-at-least-as-long-as-it's-dry-and-cool-in-the-morning run. And lest you think I've defected to the ranks of the athletic, I still hate running. Hate it! I only do it because it's good for me, and it keeps the sagging body from sagging any faster than it really needs to.

And while we're on the subject, have you ever watched runners run? Oh, I don't mean the competitive track and field people; I mean the regular people who do this a lot, either as a hobby or a discipline. I've never *once* seen one who smiles while they run. They all look like they're either in pain or resigned to the suffering that running brings. Nobody runs exultantly!

So what if running adds years to your life? Who wants to spend those extra years in the misery of running? I don't get it.

What's my excuse, then?

Oh.. just.. stop asking so many nosy questions!

Where was I now? Running doesn't help the brain work any better, apparently..

Oh! Yeah.. advantages to aging. And no, I don't mean getting the senior discount, smart-aleck. That's a loooong way off yet. :P

What I do get is the advantage of using (drum roll..) the age-adjusted fitness charts! Hey! This is a good thing.

Back in college (um.. that's the *first* time), there was a hot fitness book out called "The New Aerobics" by Dr. Kenneth Cooper. He studied a bunch of military (NASA) personnel, identified the fittest people through a variety of means, correlated that with their abilities to do certain exercise activities, and developed a simple way of assessing their overall fitness. It was this: how far can you run in 12 minutes?

He said that to be considered in "good" condition (one level below excellent, three levels above "call 911"..), a male under 30 needed to cover 1.5 miles in 12 minutes. Ha! That's nothin', you say. Yeah, right. Just go out there and try. It ain't nothin'.

(a woman under 30 would have to cover 1.35 miles in 12 minutes, by the way, to be considered in good physical condition, for those of you with an interest in such things.)

So during my college years, I worked and worked at that goal (yes, miserable the whole time).. lost a lot of weight in the process.. and got to that distance in 12 minutes for a brief period at age 19, and never since.

But for a guy who was the fattest kid in his high school, it was a milestone. I still remember freshman gym class where everybody, "Everybody!", coach said, had to run a quarter mile in under 2:00 or the whole class would get an F. I hated that man with all I had in me. The first day of the track unit, I was still 2/3 of the way around the track when the 2:00 whistle blew - the only boy who hadn't made it.

If it hadn't been for Roger Karl forgetting his jockstrap that day, and the vivid image of him running around the track with his.. (oh, man, it's still hilarious after all this time).. I think I would have been lynched that day. But they were too busy laughing at "big Rog", and giving him all sorts of novel nicknames. Well, after two weeks of being ridiculed, I finally made it in 1:59, and collapsed in a redfaced, gasping, sweaty blob on the track. The other guys shrugged and said "Finally!", and we all could move on to baseball. Creeps.

So where was I going with this? The mind is a slippery entity..

Oh! Yeah.. the charts. So, after that brief moral victory at 19, I've deteriorated since then, and thought I would never, never get back to the "good" category. But ha! Shows you what modern medicine can do .. better living through chemisty. :) Now I'm in the 50+ bracket and, woo! I only have to cover 1.25 miles in 12 minutes (or run 1.5 miles in under 15 minutes, either way), and I did both this week! Ha!

All of a sudden I kind of like running now. Or maybe, I don't hate it quite so much. :)

Drug test a drug.. bust?

So when you get a job offer, they give you 72 hours to get a drug test done. This is normal procedure.

What's not normal is that they send you to the wrong clinic.

The cover letter says "call this 800 number to find the testing lab nearest you." Okay. I call, and sure.. there's one about 4 miles away, no appointment necessary. So I just drop in. Problem is.. the chain of custody form they sent me with the offer is for a competing lab to the one the 800 number gave me. They can't use their competitor's form. They don't even have an account with the hiring company! Huh?

So I call the person whose name is on the cover letter. She's out. I leave a message. Then I call the person whose name is on the bad form. She's out. I leave a message. I begin to see a disturbing pattern emerge. So I call the person in HR who is in charge of the whole recruitment process. She's in meetings until 2, leaving the office at 3:30. I leave a message. 3:45, 4:00.. no call back.

So I call my recruiter to tell her that I will most assuredly miss the window for taking my drug test, since it's Friday, and the 72 hours is up Sunday night, not to mention that it's Labor Day weekend. No doubt I will be fired before I even start. Does she have any bright ideas? Alas, my recruiter is out, along with the rest of the free world. I leave a message. The message goes something like this:

AAAAAAAAH!

Later, the recruiter calls and says, don't worry about it. I'll call the HR lady Tuesday AM - it's their fault, they'll fix it. Relax, have a nice weekend. Okay, okay..

I felt better after I made Shrimp de Jonghe for dinner. Wowzers. Tasty! I'll make that again. :) Maybe with a bit less butter.

Oh yeah, and before I forget.. J2 & friends helped J1 load her stuff on the moving truck today, and it left for California. :( She and devil-dog follow it on Wednesday.

Bye-bye, Kitten.. I'll miss you. And you be a good boy for her, buddy. :(

Fair is fair

Finally! The written offer letter arrived this morning - I have until 9/6 to accept. I um... doubt it will take me that long. :)

They offer a complete teleworker office setup - desk, chair, cabinets, shelves, the whole bit, that I can order from a catalog. They pay for a dedicated phone line and for the high-speed internet hookup, too. I really have very little out of pocket to get started. And the terms are as expected, fair all the way around. Pay is reasonable, benefits seem good, I have to travel as needed for "face time", be available during certain working hours, etc. Seems fair. They even raised my vacation to 4 weeks without being asked, prorated for the rest of this year. *Very* fair.

Whew. I can breathe. :)

Now I just have to learn how to manage my time well without putting on a shirt and tie and driving to an office.


On another subject, the State Fair was.. more than fair. It was nice! Quite a bit bigger, cleaner and nicer than my former home state.

Some representative pictoral highlights follow.

LIFO, FIFO..

..schmifo.

Taught methods of inventory tonight. Ugh. This syllabus is all screwed up. They skip the chapters on Balance Sheet and Income Statement and then try to teach methods of determining your cost of goods sold. Why? Without the first two topics you don't even know to *care* about cost of goods sold..

Plus, this is a math class! It's not economics, it's not accounting.. it's math! Grr... if I teach this course again, I'll change a few things.

Next week we *finally* get to talk about cool stuff: measures of central tendency and measures of dispersion. Something exciting, you know? I mean, who doesn't like to discuss mean, median, mode, standard deviation, and the normal distribution? Ahh.. real math. :) Thrills my nerdy heart.

There's a beauty and a romance to math, you know.. Really!

Hey, as a little test, let's see if I can't throw together a quick bit of poetry just on the spur of the moment here about the beauty of math.. I pledge not to take more than 2 minutes, including editing.

Let's go with a haiku, since it uses a scheme of prime numbers for its syllables :) (5 + 7 + 5 = 17... all primes)


come and count with me
show to me your symmetry
let me take your sum


mmm... romantic, isn't it? Math can stir your blood if you let it..



Okaaaay. I'm sure I've lost some of you. ;)

So back to the practical. I heard from the recruiter today that the written offer letter I've been fretting over is hung up in New York awaiting one last signature. (sigh) It *will* come out, she says. Okay. At least it's a plausible explanation. And depending on how long it takes, I may be able to squeeze in my last interview at the little company in Southern WI before I have to say yes or no. I suppose that would be good.

Tomorrow, off to the state fair! Yay! Elephant ears! Cheese curds! Taffy apples! Farm animals! Spam burgers! (Really. Not to mention Ole and Lena's Hot Dish On A Stick.)

I'm sure I'll be ill on Thursday, but.. so what? I don't have to work! :) hahahahahahahahaha...

Like that's funny.

Sorbet or Small Group?

Which do I want to focus on today, food or church...

Oh, neither, I suppose. But they're both worth a quick mention.

Overnight guests on Thursday brought cantaloupe, and it didn't all get eaten, so ... what do you do with leftover cut-up melon? Just Google it and see! And sure enough, out came a splendid little recipe for cantaloupe sorbet - just fruit, sugar (maybe just a bit too much.. the melon was plenty sweet), a little orange juice, some salt, puree, pour into bowls and freeze. Yummy! :) Warm, it sort of had the texture of a smoothie, without the yogurt, but when frozen was verrrry sorbet-like. Easy, too.

Morrocan carrot soup coming up this week. With cardamom, ginger and ground pistachios.. mmmm. And maybe eggplant lasagna!

Mass Saturday was back at St. Rose's, and better than last week. They keep playing music there that brings back "good" Evangelical memories. It's odd, but nice. This time "You Are My Hiding Place" was the offertory, which I used to sing as part of a "round" years ago. Lovely. The priest at St. Rose's just loves to sing - loudly, and he's got a good voice. He leaves his mic on all the time, and I heard him throwing in spontaneous harmony lines on the Acclamation songs. Yay! If he can do it.. then so can I!

Church once again at Calvary, better than last week. Again asked some questions - continues to look like a good place to join, will probably do something with the younger couple we know from Milwaukee over next weekend. Perhaps they will invite us to join their small group Bible study? That'd be nice.

Still no written offer letter from the KC company as of Saturday's mail. :( Maybe Monday...

Teresa's Crisis of Faith

This is stunning.

"I call, I cling, I want - and there is no one to answer - no one on whom I can cling - no, no one. - Alone ... where is my faith?"

"How can you assume the lover's ardor when he no longer grants you his voice, his touch, his very presence?"

"The more I want him - the less I am wanted"

Who would believe this of her? And yet..

to be able to live in complete doubt, but complete trust, at the same time, and

to have hidden it, kept so many from knowing her doubts, for so long, and

to still, even in the midst of the greatest dryness, retain the intense desire to believe..

hm.

This is really familiar.



I'm glad I haven't waited until after my death to begin to talk about my crisis of faith.

But I also wish I hadn't waited nearly 50 years to begin.