Simply Must

the artist may attract one fan
or all the family of man
or universally all pan
the work and throw it in the can
it stays inside a deep dark hole
a fledging part or finished whole
recessed within the artist's soul
discovered earlier or latter
or not at all
it doesn't matter
art will out at any rate
the artist simply must create

Sorting

sorting through the stuff of life
good times and bad, the joy and strife
to figure out all that went wrong
to find or fix that which I long
to know or feel or sing a song
of settling down of all the pieces
of the puzzle when it ceases
to disrupt the things I think and say
lay waste and ruin to the day

Zero Sum

thinking back on what I've tasted
perfect days and others wasted
too oft' believed the common lie
that there's a bottomless supply

today's a day that I will live
twenty four hours I will give
two thirds awake and one third slumber
subtract one from the finite number

on crummy days, average, or stunning
all the time the meter running
one less day to work or play
to read a book or stop to say
I love you to a one so dear
to pray or laugh or shed a tear
to share a dream
or calm a fear

would that I could always say
in dark of night at end of day
I did all within my power
to make the most of every hour

How, Why?

how can I
why would I
walk down a road
where I don't know the way?

how could you
why would you
take on a load
when you have no say?

we can never know tommorow
or even just ten minutes from right now
little choice of joy or sorrow
never stops no matter why or how

how can they
why would they
even think to
do it that way?

I hope to know
just a little part
but I'll never see
inside their heart

More Hurry Up and Wait

You may figure out judging by the next few posts that the last couple of days I worked a job that involved a lot of sitting around and waiting. It seems my poetic juices somehow start to flow in such situations. I can't talk about the job until Monday. Stay tuned!...

Honored Unhealthiness

I've been thinking about achievers and achievement in general. Of course, this was in relation to my own life and achievements which are impressive or not completely in relation to one's perspective. Some time ago I quoted Yngwie Malmsteen as saying “The simple truth is that in order to be good, you have to be obsessed.” I'm postulating that any achievement requires obsession with the goal to some extent and that obsession comes with the price of sacrifice of some kind. That sacrifice can be on the part of the achiever but often is on the part of someone around him or her. The achiever may be keenly aware of the sacrifice or may be completely oblivious. These things have certainly been true in my own life.

In the comments to the recent “Below the Line” post, I mentioned the cult of leadership. My friend who left another comment there has written a lot on that subject. I'm thinking of some Christian leaders of renown I have been around enough to observe their spouses or children and witnessed this relationship of high achievement held in high honor by the constituency and price paid by family. Most of the time it was unclear if the sacrifices were made willingly or grudgingly, but the the result was quite clear.

I'm coming to the conclusion that the cult of leadership not only is off base in that it encourages everybody to be a leader, but also because leadership is not even something those gifted in that direction should aspire to. It is a place God will place a person at the right time and under the appropriate circumstances. The opportunity will be presented and the potential leader should then step up to the plate and accept it. But I am coming to believe that to strive for it is wrong and it is sin. It is contrary to the many many times in scripture we are instructed to practice humility (ex: James 4:10, 1 Peter 5:6) . As I've said before, one of the first things a student of the Bible is taught is that when something is repeated in scripture, it has special significance. I can't think of anything more often repeated in the Bible than the concept of humility and the flip side that the thing most despised by God is pride. (ex: The fall of Lucifer) The Christian leaders I have observed that have gained my utmost respect got into their place of visibility by the specific placement of God. Others that seemed to get there by their own initiative generally maintained an appearance of humility, but not far under the surface one could see they were quite full of themselves. I have been one of those.

So, I think what I'm hearing from God on this is to relax and live a humble life. If and when he has some high task for you to do he will give you the vision, present the opportunity and supply the resources. It will be a situation where you absolutely know it is a “God thing” and not of your own invention and you will know that to say “no” is to deny God. I have experienced that as well and the only lasting results of any value came from such a situation. Being a true leader is entered into with fear and trembling and a great sense of the danger and price to be paid by anyone in range. One should never commit to such without the best understanding possible of one's family and friends and without their commitment of support to the cause. Otherwise I have great doubt that the achievement can be worth the price it will cost and humility will be impossible to maintain through the process. You will be humble sooner or later. It may be in a healthy way all the way along, or it may be an unhealthy sickening experience coming down at the end looking back on devastation. As the crowd erects a monument to honor your greatness.

addendum: By being humble I don't mean being lazy and doing nothing. My mentor in film production in college used to say, “There is a prepared place for a prepared person.” When our time comes, we need to be ready.

Sunday at the Park

I spent a big chunk of the afternoon today at the Lake Eola park. Its the jewel of downtown Orlando. If you've ever seen a travel photo of Orlando that didn't involve a theme park, it was probably a picture of this lake with a big fountain in the middle of it and tall buildings in the background.

A more perfect day for human enjoyment has surely never occurred on this planet. I got myself a tasty bar-b-q sandwich from the little cafe and ate my lunch under a tree along the shore. A white great egret waded past me about ten feet away and got himself lunch right there on the spot. He shot his stiletto head into the water like a spear gun and came up with a tiny fish he gobbled up and then wadded off in search of seconds. The lake is a popular spot for many species of birds. An old haggard looking black swan was sitting on a nest of eggs. She looked kinda old for raising kids. I wondered if any birds are ever born with down syndrome. I suppose they wouldn't be able to fly but they'd just love all the other birds to death. Then I started wondering how all these critters found enough to eat every day and why they don't seem to get all the nasty diseases that we people get. And they have no health care! A momma mallard swam by with 14 ducklings swimming along behind her. I counted them twice. And she never even got prenatal vitamins! Poppa mallard was swimming along nearby looking pretty proud.

I've always enjoyed watching seagulls fly. They are such nimble aerobats and have such wonderfully shaped high aspect ratio wings (long and slender for you non-pilots). They remind me of little miniature white German high performance sailplanes, only way higher tech with the variable geometry wing and tail surfaces and all. They seem to always be hungry, always looking for a bite of something, but sometimes it seems they just soar and swoop and fly just for the fun of it. If I was one, that's what I'd be doing a lot of. Lake Eola has hundreds of them. Kids feed them bread and when that is going on there are great clouds of gulls maneuvering for a crumb.

Today I noticed something I really hadn't paid attention to before. These birds can fly pretty fast and often do so in a huge flock in extremely close proximity to each other. But even though they might all be flying different directions in a chaotic traffic pattern that would give an air traffic controller a coronary, they never seem run into each other. They seem to know what the fellow next to them is going to do and not only do they not collide and tumble out of the sky, they move around each other and along in formation with the grace of ballet dancers. I wonder why people can't move around each other without banging into each other and getting all annoyed. This morning as I drove out of the subdivision, another guy entering the roadway from the opposite side nearly clobbered me. It seems he required both lanes at the same time. I had to drive halfway off the road to avoid getting the entire right side of my car crunched. We don't seem to be very graceful around each other an awful lot of the time. When we see a group of humans moving among each other with grace, we call it art. When seagulls do it, they all it lunch.

Some people think seagulls are just a small step above pigeons, but I think they are just fabulous. But if you prefer, there are some beautiful iridescent feathered pigeons at Lake Eola, as well as white and black swans, several species of ducks, grebes, egrets, ibis, anhingas, the common backyard birds, as well as the occasional sandhill crane, stork, or great blue heron. Florida is a great place for bird lovers.

Happy Birthday Blog

Today my little blog is two years old. This date should be easy to remember because tomorrow my sister is... well, she's young for her age. Anyway, it's hard to believe. When I first heard about blogging I didn't get it at all. It seemed like a ridiculous idea to me. Three years ago when my friend started in I started to get it as I participated in the interchange it engendered. Then I took the plunge and it has become very much a part of my life. It is almost a daily thing - writing in mine and reading several others. It's now rather hard to imagine life without it. Kinda like a cell phone. What did we used to do before? It has certainly gotten me to writing, which is something I felt I needed to do more of for many years. And it makes a certain kind of communication possible that never was before. One can really get one's thoughts hammered out and put them out there for the few friends and family that are interested enough to keep up with it and for the cyber-wanderers that happen along. There have been some interesting exchanges in the comments with folks I would never have otherwise talked to, even if I'd been standing next to them in some public place. The wisdom of soul baring in public is still a matter of debate, but I normally hide behind at least a thin metaphor to maintain plausible deniability. And I never put my name in it anywhere so at least you can't google to it that way. But, yes, there is vulnerability. However it does start some conversations. And without vulnerability, what is there to talk about really? Nothing much that is any good happens without somebody getting vulnerable. So, here's to two years of doing something I never thought I'd do but I'm glad I did. Well, at least so far I am.

Blither

I don't know why I'm even going to write this post. It's going to be, like, totally just like, ya know, a typical blog. My boring day, etc., etc. I really haven't talked to anybody for a couple of days. Well maybe three. Or four. And I suppose fingers working a keyboard kinda sorta feels like talking to somebody. So, on with the blither.

When my daughter and her spring break posse blew threw last week on their way back north, my house-mate got them into a fine cultural event: the b-rate pro wrestling show he runs a jib on over at Universal. And once in there, one can just mosey on over into the park since you're already inside. I tagged along and we all went on the “Back to the Future” ride. It opened when we lived here before and was the primo showpiece of the park for some time. Well, I just read that it's last day is next Friday, the 30th. So when we experienced the future last week, we were actually experiencing history in the making. I did notice that it was getting a little long of tooth. Some of the kids on it had probably never heard of the movie(s).

That reminds me. When daughter and crew stopped off on their way south for a bit of fun, I rendezvoused with them at the beach. We made the obligatory pilgrimage to the Ron Jon surf shop. Since one of my all time favorite t-shirts happens to be a Ron Jon item and it was getting pretty ratty with some holes in it, I thought it a fine opportunity to seek a replacement. I spent an embarrassingly long time searching for just the right one. But, hey, they have hundreds of different ones now. Well, at least one hundred, I'm pretty sure. I went back and forth, traditional? Modern retro? Bright colors or muted? Car theme? Board theme? Parrot theme? I really wanted one with cool tree frogs on it but they didn't have the right color in my size. In the end I got a pretty traditional one. So I get home and low and behold, it's exactly the same shirt as my old one, only in green. I probably would have gotten it in tan if they'd had that color and then they'd really be the same. Except that the new one looks like it was done with a silkscreen that had the screen partially clogged up so the logo and all looks like it's kinda old and worn. Believe me, it's cool. So the new one actually looks older than the old one, except that it doesn't have any holes, which is nice. The moral of the story? I am so totally predictable. But I don't know it. I wish I did. Life would be so much easier, I think.

Walking out of the gym after swimming my laps and making a modest effort at pumping a little iron, I looked at a few people. It's an interesting thing to do at that gym. It's a truly international experience there. I'm one of the very few anglos that ever seems to walk through the door. The primary language is Spanish, but I've heard a smattering of other languages, some of which I couldn't place. That's a pretty rare thing for me after all my traveling. I can usually at least get the region. Anyway, I made an observation:

People with soft bodies and soft faces are often pleasant.
People with hard bodies and soft faces are often pleasant and interesting.
People with hard bodies and hard faces are often neither.
People with soft bodies and hard faces are often (I'm sorry) just ugly.

I saw something today I've never seen before: a Disney bus broken down by the side of the road. That's something that I'm pretty sure is a violation of the perfection clause in the Disney operations manual.

I saw the bus while driving around doing some errands. I made the necessary periodic supply run to Wal Mart. I put it off as long as possible. Like everyone else I like the prices, don't mind the store so much, but hate the horror of the checkout lines made worse by standing there looking at 20 of them sitting unmanned except for the week before Christmas. I have a hard time understanding how the most successful retailer in the history of the planet got that way when they make it so terribly difficult and maddening to give them money! Okay, I got that out of my system and I don't ever have to write about Wal Mart again. Please forgive me pulling all those nasty images up into your mind's eye.

So, body well exercised and feeling good, errands run, I drove past the cheap theater and noticed a movie I've been wanting to see was playing. I took advantage of one of the few benefits of my lonely new lifestyle and went to the movies on a moment's notice. Now I'm not going to tell you what the movie was 'cause I don't want to ruin anything for you. My family and friends often get very annoyed with me while watching movies together because, unlike in my own life, I always seem to know what is about to happen. I try to hold it in but sometimes I just can't help myself and it blurts out. It's just so hard when you finally have a rare chance to be the person in the know for a change. I've been told that there are only about 70 or so possible plots and I guess I just have most of them filed away in the back of my brain somewhere. I do so enjoy when something truly novel comes along that I can't figure out in advance. Believe me, I'm not so smart, this is just a quirk. Anyway, I walk into this movie and see in the opening credits that a well known and well loved actor is in it. He's done some really endearing roles and you can't help but love the guy on the screen. But I thought, “I bet he's going to be a bad guy this time,” and doggone it he was! Freaked me right out!

Okay, that's all I got. And you?

Idol

“Thou shalt have no other gods before me” -Exodus 20:3

This is something God is very serious about. It's one of the Ten Commandments. Most of the Commandments are one-liners, but the idea of this one is actually spread across the first two of the ten and has some additional verses of explanation:

“Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God...”

I wrote some time ago about an idol in my life. It was huge. God did some business with me over a period of time to help me deal with it and put it in it's place. I think it could now be allowed back into my life without being an idol, but it seems God has not seen fit to let that happen.

Lately I have been impressed that there is another idol in my life that has been there even longer than the other one. And I believe God has been dealing with me for a long time to address it. The dealing has become more and more severe and I think I am waking up to what has been going on.

My idol has been woman. Or more specifically, the love of a woman. For as long as I can remember, it has been the one thing I really wanted. I was smitten by females in the earliest grade-school years when my buddies were all saying how icky girls were. No matter what other interests entered my life as I grew up, and there were many, the underlying deepest desire was always to have someone to love and be loved by.

I grew up in a loving home and knew the love of father and mother and sister and grandparents. Other relatives and friends have expressed love to me at various times and that is a wonderful thing, but of course all of that is different than the love of a woman. I never cared about money nearly enough to get rich. I've been passionate about various noble and selfish endeavors, but way down deep under everything else, if you asked me at any point in my life, I would have said that the one thing I really wanted the most in life was the love of a woman. To be known to the bottom of my soul and loved as a man. That's it. My dating experiences involved a lot of hope and not much fulfillment. I longed to have a girlfriend all my single years. It did happen a couple of times for short periods. But there never was calm assurance. There was always trepidation. When I was young and single, I thought the ache would be dealt with and gone when I could get married. To an extent, that was the case. But as all of us who have lived long enough know, it's so very much more complicated than that.

I have tasted what I'm talking about. Twenty six years of marriage ran a huge gamut of feelings. There were years when it was wonderful. And others when it was not. The reality matched the feelings at times I am quite sure, and I know that at other times the two were far out of sync. For long stretches I thought everything was fine when it in fact was not. And for other dangerous stretches my fear level was so high and my trust level so low that my imagination ran my feelings amok. In any case, my desire and expectations of a lifetime were so high as to be unrealistic and unattainable. I had set myself up for disappointment. No human being could fulfill what it was I wanted and felt I needed. And even if that were possible, I was never worthy of such. It seems that I have always been a terribly difficult person to love. And so there was trouble.

Romance. The whole package. I am one of those hopeless romantics. And I'm a guy. There are more of us than popular culture might have one think. But even for a romantic, I have to admit when I'm brutally honest with myself, as much as I want a woman to be the object of my love and affection, even more I want a woman because I want to be loved. The desire to be loved is the most primal human condition. We all share it. But I do believe that some of us guys have a stronger need than others to have the love of a woman. For me this desire has always been the preeminent thing. I have thought all my life that it was completely normal. It has been so deep and basic and foundational that I think I have not understood until now that it has and always has had higher importance in my life than even God. It has been an idol and I didn't know it.

I now find myself in a situation where all has been stripped away. I am further away from the love of a woman than ever. It is possible that I am still loved in that way, but the presence is gone and far away. There is no way for me to know it or feel it. And it may in reality not be there at all. My life is now so tangled and tied in knots that I will probably be isolated for a very long time. Reconciliation, moving on, or other possible scenarios all seem so difficult or impossible to achieve that I just see a vast stretch of time ahead of me with no solution. It's possible that I may never be able to know the love of a woman again. That would be more than I could bear but for the thing I am in the midst of learning something about now.

There is an even greater Romance. I have read some books in the last year that have opened my eyes and heart to things I really hadn't been able to connect to before. It is a truth that is the reason for the first two Commandments that at first glance seem so harsh. God cannot bear for us to love someone or something more than himself because he is so passionately in love with us. He is so completely, overwhelmingly in love with me and wants me to know and experience that. He wants that love relationship to be unhindered and for nothing to get in the way of it. The first couple of Commandments are the plea of a lover to forget about things that are meaningless and pale in comparison to the love he has for me. The Law was just an inefficient guide, like the white cane of a blind man, compared to the open arms and tight embrace of a lover expressed by God through the passion play of all that he has done through his son, Jesus Christ. My understanding of the history and workings of the gospel, that I have been taught my whole life from a young age, has somehow until recently failed to impact me with the reality that God loves me with the intensity of a lover. Of course I have heard my whole life that God is love, that he loves me, love, love, love... But somehow, God's love was always in my mind like the love of my parents. It was deep, profound, tremendously important and valuable, but it wasn't the love I had been looking for in a woman. It wasn't love that could meet my deepest need and desire. I now know that some people have actually figured this out. Some have tried to help me see it. And some have written books about it. It's taken me most of a lifetime, but I think I'm starting to see it too.

This jealous God we have, whether we give him recognition or not, is not a tyrant demanding blind loyalty and subservience as acquiescence to his power. He is jealous because he is a lover. He is The Lover. He is jealous because he knows how wonderful the relationship between us can be if I will know and accept and feel his love for me. This is the very most important thing to him. It is far more important than the failures and darkness and sin in my soul. Those are things he has already dealt with by the cross of Christ. It is so important that out of love he will strip away anything and everything that stands in the way of my “getting it.” As important and sacred as the Bible tells us is the human marriage bond, even that he will sweep aside in order for me to meet him at the point of his love for me. This sounds crazy, but I believe that is exactly what is happening in my life. In a very practical way that is in my face every day, God has wiped away most of what formerly occupied my life. He has gotten me alone, injected many hours and days of solitude, and has all but grabbed me by the shoulders, looked me in the eye and said, “I love you and you are going to know it no matter what it takes.”

Okay, that brings me up to date to the present. Where will it go from here? Will I go beyond just having some sort of vision of what this is about to actually embracing it completely and feeling the depth of the emotion of it? Will this Great Romance fill my soul and satisfy my deepest longings? I'm told it will. I do believe it can. Will I be able to process and access it? Will I be able to experience it? I don't know. I do very much hope so. I hope I can learn the lesson and pass this class. I hope I can move on to a deeper relationship with God and on to deeper things. I hope that my life will go on to mean something valuable to God. Much more than has been possible with my hands clinging to idols. And how will this play out as far as my ever being able to be married again and feel the sweet love of a human helpmate, which does permeate my soul as the new vision does not yet do? I don't know. I have spent many, many hundreds of hours of intense thought about that in the last year or so, but maybe it really doesn't matter.

Remote Control

I have discovered that my digital recorder has a powerful, supernatural remote control capability. I can leave it sit for days or weeks. Then, the first time I punch the red record button, a lawn mower or weed whacker will start runnning somewhere in the neighborhood. It happens every time! It's uncanny. At this moment a neighbor, completely unknowing that he has been prompted by the control of my index finger, is out edging his lawn with his whining weed whacker. It's 2:30 PM on a Wednesday afternoon. What is he doing home anyway?! It's supposed to be quiet on the block now. There is another mind control power of my recorder. This situation also gives me a powerful urge to start cursing.

A Blank Day

I'm here. There just doesn't seem to be anything to say today. I met a visiting shirtail relative at a resort tonight. He bought me one of the most expensive meals I've ever eaten in my life. It was really good. Other than that, this is one of several days lately that just seems blank. I've been loosing some days. Their only value seems to be that they are done and I'm one day closer to something different than this.

Below the Line

In feature film production, the budget is generally broken into two sections referred to as “above the line” and “below the line.” Above the line are costs that are generally negotiated such as the contracts for lead actors, director, and the director of photography. To get serious consideration in the market a film generally needs a recognized name in the way of a director or one or more of the actors or the script writer, etc. These “names” command higher than standard “scale” rates based on previous successes. When a director or a star becomes so popular that having them on board all but guarantees people will pay to see the film, that name is considered “bankable” and that person can command the exorbitant amounts we associate with mega rich movie stars. Below the line are production, post-production, and distribution costs that are basically set and predictable. These consist of hundreds of line items such as the day rates of camera operators, sound technicians, gaffers (lighting), grips (sets and props), art department, editors, and things like film or tape stock, crew meals, and on and on.

My point is that on any production, there are going to be certain things that are necessary and fairly easy to budget because the market sets a price for what each crew member or piece of equipment or expendable item costs. But they are required every time one sets out to make a film. You always have to have a camera or you won't have a film no matter what else you bring to the table. And the cost per day and per minute of stock exposed is basically the same from project to project. But the above the line items are all negotiable. One has to cover the necessary below the line costs first. Then one can figure out how much money is available to go after above the line talent. If there is not much left, then one may have to go with unknown actors or an unknown director who will work for less and may be a small percentage of the overall expense. Or, it may be that a huge star will be hired who will assure a much bigger box-office but that actor will make a huge percentage of the overall cost of making the film. It all varies and it's all a big gamble. Sometimes the big star walks off with his or her huge check and the film is a flop in spite of their name recognition. And sometimes a sleeper with all unknowns is so good and/or hits the right buttons at just the right time that it becomes a hit that makes money all out of proportion to what it cost to make. You just never know.

So, on to my point. I got to thinking how our lives in general have below the line and above the line elements. There are basic things we all need to live: food, water, shelter, clothing. Then there are other things that we may or may not actually need but most of us generally think we do like electricity, a car, health care, telephones, and education. And we have needs that are a bit harder to quantify in the way of mental and emotional health: family, friends, support groups, clubs, church, time alone, hobbies, etc. So these are more or less the necessities of life. And most of us have family who also need these things so we have the burden of providing for them. I am calling all of these things below the line items. They must be provided or life just can't go on. The babies must be fed.

Then there is life above the line. These are things we aspire to. These are our dreams, our passions, our ambitions and goals. To build something. To influence people. To create something of beauty or meaning. To make a contribution. To leave something behind. These are considered our “accomplishments” in a way anything to do with survival is not. And they are focused outward beyond our immediate circle. Countless books and motivational speakers and pretty pictures hanging in offices with poignant quotes at the bottom encourage us to dream dreams and reach for the stars and make it happen, etc., etc. These things are the negotiables. They are not absolutely necessary for survival. Indeed, most of the world never has the option to include any of it in their lives. And what one can do in that realm is governed by what is left over after the below the line items are dealt with. For a small percentage, below the line is a mere trifle, really, and their attention and time and energy is mostly applied to above the line pursuits. And most of the encouragement for us to do the same comes from these kinds of folks. But for most of us, we are mostly consumed by dealing with what is below the line. We seldom if ever get our heads above the surface, which could equate to “the line,” to be able to live there much.

That is just life. The vicissitudes of birth, ability, nationality, opportunity, ambition, education, health and on and on work together either for or against a person being able to rise above the basic needs of a living human being. Most of the world ends up living way down below the line. A small percentage, which nonetheless constitutes a very large number of people, live way above it. It would likely seldom occur to members of either of these groups to be much concerned with what goes on on the far side of the line. Unless you are a politician. Then you pretend to be.

But then there are those, also a large group, at least in my country, who hover around the line. At some periods of life the necessities consume all. And sometimes we are plowed under by them. Other times we seem to have enough of a surplus of money, time, and energy to take on something bigger than basic survival; something noble, something righteous.

And now I am funneling the thought closer to what has been bothering me. We hear messages encouraging us to be about the big things, the big ideas, the motivation to get up, get out there, and do whatever it takes to make something of our lives. In other words, to get up above that line and make our mark on the world. I have been one who has listened and heeded and strived and stretched to do that. What I'm faced with now is that being one of the line straddling, middle class folks who has accepted the challenge of getting over that line, I have done so by borrowing against below the line budget items. I have paid for my risky above the line ventures into the noble yet not entirely necessary with below the line resources. I have thus short-changed some of the more necessary things of life. I and my family have always had shelter and clothing and food. But some of the other things have suffered. The cars have always been old with fears of breakdown always hovering. Health care provision has been spotty with more fear along with that. Time that should have been spent on primary relationships was given to blessing strangers leaving emotional hunger where I should have been providing abundance. And neglect of other basics of life I didn't consider important enough or just didn't think about has left vital infrastructure crumbling or completely broken from poor maintenance.

I am now well into the last half of my life having thrown myself at what I believed to be a calling, having taken risk after risk sacrificing security and what I considered self-interest for the sake of what I thought was "the right thing to do.” I look back and see some good that came of the pursuits that were the result of my personal philosophy. But I also look now and see how the financial and emotional debt I incurred in those decades has come due and I'm left wanting. I have terrible doubt about whether it was the right path. When I rose to the challenges and said “Yes! Here am I! Send me! I'll do it!” I thought that somehow it would result in the below the line part of my life falling into place. Well, it didn't. It was wishful thinking. Probably the worst kind of thinking there is. I was afraid of being one of the many who look back on their life and wish they had tried to do more with it. I'm looking back wishing I had tried to do less. Wishing I had cared less about the world around me and minded my world at home more thoroughly. To have invested my time and emotional energy and what little money I ever had my hands on more on me and mine and given less away. To have lived much more simply. More like a survivor. I now have no choice in the matter.

I never dreamed I would ever feel this way. It may sound like I'm getting into a bitter state here. I'm really not. But I am confused and very sad about the turn my life has taken. I have been reduced to much less of what I thought I was about. The Bible talks about wheat being beaten and pounded and threshed down to just a handful of grain. That's where I've been living; on the threshing floor. It's a place very very far below the line.

Saturday Outing

I've been neglecting my feathered roommates, I'm afraid. They spend an awful lot of time with nobody around to relieve the boredom of cage life. Today I got in some serious time reading and got them out finally. They did a bit of flying about the room. Spent some time in the window sightseeing. But most of the time they kept flying to me and walking all over me while I was reading. I didn't have a shirt on and they eventually started to get annoying by finding hairs I didn't know I had and yanking on them. And the green one actually tried to climb up my face. Well, like little kids let outside after a long season of being cooped up, they finally wore me out and I had to get them back to the cage. I gave them a spray of millet, their favorite snack, which they gorged on as usual. Now they are worn out and napping. They can be noisy at annoying times and I get tired of cleaning up their mess. But I do like having them around.

This is the most inane thing I've written in a while. But, I guess I'm just in the habit of writing and want to keep at it. Sometimes the brain goes when the fingers can't and sometimes it's the other way around.

Grounded

The first time I was in Israel on one of the innumerable stops at stores full of every imaginable thing carved out of olive wood, I picked up a little angel playing a guitar. Well, okay it's really a lute. But basically the lute is an early guitar. (Side note: At some point in my life my guitar playing was disparaged by the notion that I should have applied myself to a serious instrument that makes “real” music - like the piano. But wouldn't you know it, the guitar predates any keyboard instrument by like a thousand years or something. So it would seem it was real before “real” instruments were. At all!) Anyway, my little angel has managed to keep up with me. No small feat there. But in the chaos he has lost his wings. Will they ever be found again? Who knows? But I doubt it. But he's still playing his guitar! My ears can't hear him, but that seems to be a problem that is going around. I wonder if my living angel friends ever get to play the guitar. Harps maybe? I hope they still have their wings. I know I'm a real pain for them to keep up with.

Marbles in Hand

I love days when I don't have to work. I love the time to sit and read and think and pray. Today it's blowing like crazy. Looks like some more weather is moving in. I have always loved that magical time before a storm hits.

So I found myself in John 14 again. It seems this passage just keeps honing in on my life, always coming back around. I noticed this time that the last thing in chapter 13 immediately before it is the disconcerting words to Peter that he was about to deny the Lord three times. The first thing in 14 is Jesus saying, “Let not your heart be troubled.” One of the few semi-famous people I have known, one who went on to record numerous albums, wrote a song with that as it's title. It was his first and had a big impact on my life when I was in high school. I saw personally for the first time how a guy with a guitar could speak powerfully into the hearts of people.

This morning I thought about what some theologians consider to be the one “unpardonable sin”: denying Christ. It's logical that it would indeed be the one unpardonable sin in that by rejecting the giver, you reject his gift: reconciliation with a holy God and thus separation from him. But that is ultimate rejection. Every one of us denys Christ in some way at some time. We hurt him when we do that. But if that is not what we really want, if we do it out of weakness and lament it and ask forgiveness for it and for grace and strength and wisdom to handle such situations better in the future, then that is not unpardonable. I believe this because of the context of the end 13 and the start of 14. Jesus announces the most famous denial of himself in recorded history, followed by the comforting words to “let not your heart be troubled” and then later declares Peter the foundation rock of the church. God knows we are but dust as that's what he used to make us. And he is able to pressure that soil into stone capable of supporting great weight.

Yesterday a friend who plays gigs all the time asked me to come to a place where he hosts a regular open mic kinda thing on Thursday nights. I had been there before and it was a bit less than a satisfying experience. But I decided to give it another shot and try out a couple of my new songs. The place is a wine and cigar bar and is trying for a trendy, sophisticated vibe. But it's in St Cloud, just south of Orlando and the demographic there really doesn't support such an ambiance. They are nice folks but they really don't get it. To them it's just another bar. But after my buddy's pick-up band got through a raucous set, he announced it was going to settle down to some acoustic music. The bass player grabbed his 12-string and moaned through some Neil Young and a few other tunes. Then it was my turn.

Now, my friend is an accomplished player and a true lover of the guitar. He enjoys a wide range of styles, but his bread and butter is electric rock and roll and blues. But he gets what I do and encourages me. So I'm up. As happened before at that venue, I had some technical difficulty which distracted me terribly. I got into one of my new songs and of course nobody really paid any attention, which is normal in such a place. But then this white bearded old drunk biker-type guy staggered up to me with a big smile and some advice. He said something like, “Hey, these people are here to have a good time, play us some upbeat stuff.” I'm thinking (and I really didn't mean it as ugly): pearls before swine. Or perhaps more realistically, marbles before puppies. So I shrugged off my hopes that maybe someone there would hear what I had to say and launched into the rowdiest thing I had come prepared to do. I had some mix minus tracks prepared with the lead vocal and most of the rhythm guitar cut out, so on that one there was drums and bass and all seemed to enjoy that one. Then most of the band came back and I sat in on a couple of tunes that consisted mostly of endless jamming. And then I bowed out, my buddy got back in the saddle and wailed away at Santana and Stones and Stevie Ray Vaughn at enormous volume all mushed into the terrible acoustics of that room and all got back down to the business of drinking and dancing.

I was not terribly disappointed. I pretty much expected that this was as it would go. But I left deciding that a couple of tries was enough for that particular place. My tunes just don't play to folks who are focused on enjoying an evening of alcohol and carousing. I was sorry about one thing. I had prepared one, just one, tune that overtly focused on Christ. I had this infinitesimal bit of hope that I might be able to be real enough and compelling enough with a magical enough sound to get an audience eating out of my hand to the point I could lay this on them and they would have ears to hear it. That is my musical fantasy. But of course, it didn't happen. Maybe another time in another place.

Spurgeon left these thoughts behind for me to find today:

“...all must be brought into action, and talents which have been thought too mean (average) must now be employed.”

“Each moment of time, in season or out of season; each fragment of ability, educated or untutored; each opportunity, favourable or unfavourable, must be used ...”

“Idlers may indulge a fond conceit of their abilities, because they are untried; but the earnest worker soon learns his own weakness.”

“If you seek humility, try hard work; if you would know your nothingness, attempt some great thing for Jesus. If you would feel how utterly powerless you are apart from the living God, attempt especially the great work of proclaiming the unsearchable riches of Christ, and you will know, as you never knew before, what a weak unworthy thing you are.”

That is indeed a bit how I felt last night. But I knew those poor folks just didn't have ears to hear me. I hope someone else will at some point be able to speak in a way they will hear.

So I attempted in a stumblingly feeble way to shine a ray of light on those unsearchable riches. I failed. But it is the Spirit's work. I tried to be a willing tool, but the tool doesn't bear all the sorrow if the work isn't accomplished. A tool is just a tool. The artisan is in charge of the work.

As I was thinking these thoughts, a pretty little grey dove landed on the patio about ten feet away from me. I thought, “Peace I give to you, my peace I give to you.” She poked around among the bricks searching for a little breakfast and seemed quite unconcerned with my presence, pecking to within six feet of me. The stiff wind would seem to make the presence of such a fragile little flier unlikely today. Indeed it would get under her feathers and splay them all into disarray. But then during the lulls her feathers smoothed right back into a perfectly blended silky surface. What a sublime little creature. Lowly, perhaps, in the avian kingdom, but marvelous just the same. She hung around for a while and then just as suddenly as she appeared, she launched into the air and disappeared around the neighbor's house.

The weather is still moving in. I'll probably have to seek cover soon. But it's okay. Today is a good day.