Tag Archives: Ramblings

Ready for too much information?

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At the encouragement of Brintus Maximus… here’s a little pic from the downstairs TPLF WC… & a little story to go with it. I was takin’ care of business after a hard days meetings – the cardboard roll at left in the pic tells the story of the drama I faced. No mas.

No worries. There was a handy little package of baby-wipes for just such an occasion – as you can see, the package is wholly in German, but the package resembles the one we use, literally, at our house. It even had a cute little puppy dog on the package.

My first swipe w/the mystery wipes was effective, yet accompanied by a vigorous tingling, & not the good kind, in just the wrong place. My second swipe did the job, yet the tingling grew more intense… into pain.

Checked w/Johannes on the contents of the mystery package. Turns out they’re BLEACH wipes.

Duly noted.

Saturday

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Made it to 5 today. Woohoo. More musings then. And, may I warn you now, it is deteriorating, though my mental acuity increasing with each passing moment.

-Every long plane ride, I take my Tolkien – its like travelling with an old friend that you haven’t seen for a while. Didn’t finish Lord of the Rings (book) this time. I usually make it through on the plane trip home, but this time, Casino Royale was calling my name, thereby sabotaging my reading…

-glad we missed the snow last week.

-they’re everywhere. On our flight home from SFO to RNO, 2 German ladies sat across from Joni, coming to visit a relative in the Reno area.

-2 Daylight Savings Time jumps forward in one 3 week period is lame. 4 March in the US, 18 March in the EU. Progressive.

-Pondering & repondering Luke 9:23-25… still. The whole “deny your selfish ambition” makes me have to introspect – What are my selfish ambitions? If I’m going to deny them, I better know what they are or least what they look like… How deep does this rabbit hole go?

On that note, 1John 2:15-17 comes to mind…
“Do not love the world, or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world; for all that is in the world- the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches – comes not from the Father but from the world. And the world & its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God live forever.”

Identifying selfish ambition: the 3 things mentioned in these verses are about me & fulfilling me. Like Indulgence. Accumulation. Self-exaltation. Gaining the whole world, while losing the soul. –> Denying selfish ambition. Its got to be more than mere asceticism, which can be done in the name of God, albeit with a selfish motivation.

Maybe the “denying of selfish ambitions” can’t be separated from the “taking up the cross daily” – simple obedience. Makes me ponder some more –

Has God really called me to do “great things” for Him? The divinely-ordered task of doing “great things” seems to hide in it lots of room for selfish ambition. I can see a trap here. My introspection continues… I can’t recall a time in my life that I have ever had God call me to do something “great”. Usually, for me, God’s call is a point of obedience that no one else finds out about. And it often seems to involve pain. And being misunderstood. And suffering. Standing firm somewhere.

Something that comes to mind is God’s call to the Apostle Paul on the Damascus Road HERE– esp. verse 16 – where God says, “I myself will show him (Paul) how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” Interesting.

Selfish ambition points to me, ultimately, no matter what flowery language or high purpose I declare that I am really pursuing – the taking up of the cross, daily, is a call to obey, but also a call to die. Jesus must have chosen the words carefully, loaded with imagery as they are, esp. in the context of the 1st Century Roman Empire. Lay aside selfishness & obey. It will hurt. We will suffer for obeying. But, we’ll be following in His footsteps.

-time for another cup of joe.

Cheers.

glasses

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When I was a kid, my dad would take me & my brother fishing – I wasn’t very good at it, didn’t catch much, & really struggled with the touching of the bait & the fish… seemed like it took forever to get the smell of salmon eggs off of my fingers. Something I could never understand is how my dad would know where to stop & fish – sometimes he’s even say, “There’s a few fish right over there.” I thought he was just trying to get me to wet my line…until the time that he took off his sunglasses & let me wear them.

They had this cool polarized effect, which eliminated the glare & allowed the wearer to see under the surface of the water. Now I knew why my dad said that there were fish over there – I could see them too. But I couldn’t see them until I had the glasses & was able to get past the powerful glare on the water.

Sometimes I feel like I’m still wearing the glasses, & that I can see things that are flowing under the surface of life as plainly as if they were exposed & in the open. I wonder why others don’t see it too. And when I try to describe what I’m seeing, all I get is a blank stare. Or worse, conflict. Sigh.

PS. cg- I changed the sunglasses pic because I couldn’t stand the starburst “white” outline around the glasses on the jpg.

Reading

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Sex God on Amazon.com

I’m tackling the stack of books behind my desk – & have finished Rob Bell’s latest – here’s an excerpt that really nailed it for me:

When it’s written that Adam & Eve were one flesh, their “echad flesh” is acutally a celebration of a million other things. Things that ough to be celebrated: God. Life. Creativity. Potential. Shared partnership in caring for the world. Strength for weakness, weakness for strength. A new family. The ongoing creation of the world.

And finally after all of this leaving & cleaving & bones, & flesh, the passage ends with the line “the man & this wife were both naked, & they felt no shame…”

No shame or embarrassment. No apologizing for who they are. No covering up or pretending. No masks or secrets. Total acceptance of each other. That’s what we want, isn’t it? We want someone to see us exactly as we are & still love us.

It’s terrifying to let people see who we really are. To see the darkness in our hearts, our bad habits, all of the things we’ve done in the past that we regret. Our biases, our shortcomings, the things we aren’t good at.

Being naked is terrifying.

What would it be like to be with someone who loves you exactly as you are? If you see me for who I really am, the me that no one else has ever seen, the me that I wouldn’t dare to show anybody else on the planet, the parts of me I’m not sure I want anybody ever to see. If I give you that kind of glimpse into the seat of my being, into my soul, will you still love me like you do now?

It’s our question for each other & it’s our question for God. Unconditional, absolute acceptance. From a lover, from God – it’s what we crave.

A Quirk

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One of my favorite smells in the whole world is bleach. No particular brand, though is there any brand but Clorox? (CG- I know there is, but I needed to ask the question so you would post a URL to a pic of another brand of bleach…)

I associate it with clean. With fresh. With contentment. The other day, I got some coffee (espresso actually) on the sleeve of my white Gonzaga U. sweatshirt – the one I bought when my brother got accepted to Gonzaga’s law school, the one I bought to feel closer to him, though he was moving 13 hours away by auto.. the XXL sized shirt, the one that I put on when I get home, the one that makes me feel comfortable, in an oversized hoodie type of a way. The brown spot on the cuff of the sleeve of my right arm of the sweatshirt bothered me… maybe because I could see it everytime I looked down. Reminded me that I can see my hands all the time. How do you get a brown espresso stain out of a white hoodie? With a Clorox (R) bleach pen – just write on the affected part, wash, & presto! It’s all good & clean.

It took 42 minutes for my washer to wash the hoodie. Thought that was funny, because the timer at the beginning said 40 minutes. It’s off by 2 minutes. Should that get looked at by a guy? Should that bother me? The dryer took about 18 minutes to dry the hoodie – it might have taken less time if I hadn’t kept opening the door of the dryer to check on the dryness of my favorite sweatshirt.

When it was dry, (really dry, not just mostly dry) I took it out & examined the cuff of the sleeve to see if the espresso stain had come out. It had. Boy howdy. In its place was a white, really white spot – I deduced that the bleach pen had taken the brown stain of the espresso drip & had removed it – in the process, whitening the spot where the pen touched. To Super White. Uber white.

I had thought my Gonzaga U. hoodie was white – now I see that it is truly “off-white” in color – & that the only really white spot is on the cuff of the right sleeve in the shape of a starburst

I see it all the time. And I like the white. Now, to get the rest of the hoodie white.

Don’t know why, but when you add it all up, it comes out as me.

Reunions…

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I chose the picture of Adam Sandler from The Wedding Singer because I believe that it epitomizes the decade of the 80s, stereotypically, better than any one image i could post. Perhaps you could find another one to rival it? If so, post the URL in a comment & we’ll break-dance fight to see whose picture wins.

A few weeks ago, I received a notice that the 20th High School Reunion for the McQueen High School class of 1987 was officially on… for the weekend of August 10-12. Which just happened to fall on the weekend after when the Bean & I are flying to Frankfurt with a team to visit our sister church there. Bummer.

Some may wonder, “Why would you want to go to a reunion?” My oldest son is in that boat, esp. because 20 years is SUCH A LONG TIME.

Part of the reason I really didn’t want to miss this one is that I was in Romania 10 years ago for the 1st reunion – I missed an opportunity to reconnect with some people that I wish I hadn’t lost contact with. The 20 year provides just such an opportunity…

(Disclaimer: I have no Bryan Adams, “Summer of ’69” “those were the best days of my life” delusions. High School was painful in some ways, but good in other ways – people ways. Friend ways. And I believe that God had me in that spot for a purpose & that 20 years later, part of the purpose may be discovered. Or, I may just get a chance to hang out with some old friends, & bring my wife into a part of my life that she has so far never been a part of. Moving to Carson City in 1987/88 meant losing touch with anyone who was still around in Reno – so by the time I was dating Joni, the people that had been in my life as friends were no longer there… remember, this was before wide-spread email, Al Gore’s inventing the internet, & ‘everybodies got cell-phones’, which made it easy or easier to keep in touch & have a plethora of means to do so.

I have literally attempted to find, just short of stalking, friends by calling their old home phone #, the only # that I had for them, but to no avail… Bean never got to meet any of my friends or the people I hung out with – maybe 2 of them, but not to actually see & talk to them. But I digress…)

So, I wasn’t going to be able to go to the reunion, though the Bean & I considered taking a later flight to Frankfurt so that I could go to the reunion. I prayed that God would work it out – believing that the desire in my heart to go to this reunion, for some reason, was a big one, & may have come from Him. If so, God, would you please make a way for it to happen?

Today, I got a note from the reunion coordinator – due to HAN (Hot August Nights!) the reunion had to be moved to the weekend of 8/3-5… dates that work just fine for me, thank you very much.

Thank you.

God’s Gonna Cut You Down…

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Feeling a bit introspective – saw this & it got me thinking… what’s it mean “God’s gonna cut you down?” This thought was magnified as I watched the video (embedded, courtesy of YouTube) & saw many, many famous (& famously irreverent &/or non-religious) types mouthing the lyrics…

You can run on for a long time
Run on for a long time, run on for a long time
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down

Go tell that long tongue liar
Go and tell that midnight rider
Tell the rambler, the gambler, the back biter
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut ’em down
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut ’em down

Well my goodness gracious let me tell you the news
My head’s been wet with the midnight dew
I’ve been down on bended knee talkin’ to the man from Galilee
He spoke to me in the voice so sweet
I thought I heard the shuffle of the angel’s feet
He called my name and my heart stood still
When he said, “John go do My will!”

Go tell that long tongue liar
Go and tell that midnight rider
Tell the rambler, the gambler, the back biter
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut ’em down
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut ’em down

You can run on for a long time
Run on for a long time, run on for a long time
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down

Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand
Workin’ in the dark against your fellow man
But as sure as God made black and white
What’s done in the dark will be brought to the light

You can run on for a long time
Run on for a long time, run on for a long time
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down

Go tell that long tongue liar
Go and tell that midnight rider
Tell the rambler, the gambler, the back biter
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut you down
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut you down
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut you down

Why Girls are different than Boys #1

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Taking a page from Shontell’s “Why I Like Mike” blog series, I’ll be posting from time to time on the joys of having a daughter. For me, growing up as 1 of 4 boys, there was little to no experience or understanding of the world of the Girl. Being married has provided a little insight, but hey, grown up girls are different than little ones. Mostly.

I understand boys – so when we had 2, I didn’t have any issues knowing how to deal with & parent them… part of me has taken great joy in mystifying & amazing the Bean with how I can predict how the boys (esp. Joey) will act – I’m not a mind reader, its just that boys aren’t too complex, if you get my drift.

Girls are different. They look in the mirror all the time. They watch their expressions, when they cry, laugh, talk, you name it. I continually find myself amazed at the attitude, observational skills, personality, interests, & sheer emotional spectrum that my Weezer regularly functions in.

Which leads me to “Why Girls are Different than Boys #1” – the Weez is looking in the full-length mirror WHILE doing her homework. All of the sudden, she jumps off her chair & hikes her pants up. Way up. To the skies. She looked like Jimmy Cagney’s character in “Angels with Dirty Faces” when he wore his pants up to the middle of his chest. (All the cool guys did this, I’m told, even Cary Grant, which is the topic of another blog.)

I have to ask: “What are you doing?”

Her reply: “I’m trying to look like Mrs. Smith.”

(Mrs. Smith is a teacher at the Weez’s school.)