Longest Night

Because there is a conversation about it going on at the RevGalBlogPals, I'm going to post the liturgy I created for our first Longest Night service, which will be next Tuesday night. If you'd like to use any of this, or want information about the service, put your email in a comment and I will contact you. (I will delete the comment once I get your email, so put other actual comments in a different comment.) I will post the prayers in a separate post, once they're written! The homily is going to focus on the fact that Christmas is really more about the Incarnation than it is about "Jesus' birthday", which means it's about God taking on the full complexity and ambiguity of human life.

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“The Longest Night”

*Please stand as you are willing and able.

Prelude

Welcome and Introduction

Song of Invitation “Come Darkness, Come Light”
by Mary Chapin Carpenter

Opening Prayer

*Responsive Call to Covenant
Leader: Friends and strangers, captives and nomads, orphans, widows and runaways, we have gathered this night in the presence of the God of Love.
People: We come seeking room at the inn – room for our true and whole selves; room for all that we are, all that we feel, all that we lack; room to air out what has been hidden away.
Leader: This night, let us make this a place of grace for one another. Let us covenant to make space for each soul here, no matter how messy or vast our brokenness.
People: Here in this place, this night, we will not judge; we will not compare; we will not gawk. We will hold the space between us gently and reverently, knowing God is here.
Leader: Here in this place, this night, let us trust that honesty is our true worship, that tears are worthy prayer, that emptiness can be openness to new blessing.
People: May these long hours of darkness hold us close to the heart of God. May the promise of the dawn hold out the hope of healing and wholeness.

*Opening Hymn “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” #119
As we sing, you are invited to omit the words “Rejoice, rejoice”
and experience their absence instead.

Scripture Readings Matthew 5:1-12 (p. 785)
Isaiah 52:13—53:6 (p. 596)

Responsive Reading of Psalm 42 (p. 741)

Scripture Reading Matthew 1:18—2:18 (p. 783)

Homily

*Hymn “Once in Royal David’s City” #165

Time of Prayer (Individual prayers read and then a candle lit from the named Advent Wreath candle)
For those who grieve – Hope
For those with family difficulties – Peace
For those with depression and mental illness – Joy
For those who have been rejected – Love
Silent Prayer for all those who struggle – Grace

Sharing in the Light
("When Aimless Violence Takes Those We Love" with organ, recorder and solo voice)
As the music begins, you are invited to come forward and light a candle, if you would like to. Perhaps for you it is a prayer. Perhaps it is a sign of hope. Perhaps it is a cry to God for healing. Perhaps it is a way of bringing some light to the darkness. The candle-lighting can mean whatever you need it to.
If you would like to light a candle and leave it on the altar, use a tea light. If you would like to take the candle back to your seat and home with you, use one of the small taper candles.

Benediction – From Luke 1:78-79, the Song of Zechariah

Dismissal and InvitationThis concludes the formal portion of the service. You may go in peace or stay for continued prayer.
Chaplains and counselors are available for individual prayer around the room. A list of who is where is on the back of this program.
You may share briefly what your prayer requests are, or, if you prefer, you may pick up one of the slips of paper on the table at the back to clarify your needs.
The slips of paper include such issues as: grief, abuse, depression, mental illness, loneliness, estrangement, pain, lack of forgiveness, rejection, divorce, job loss, health issues.
There are also supplies in the room off the left side of the sanctuary for writing down what is on your heart.

(During the end part, we will play more Mary Chapin Carpenter -- "Longest Night of the Year" and "Once in Royal David's City" and then some classical music.)

Grammar Godmother is Getting Testy

So lately, I've been extra annoyed by people abusing apostrophes. They're using them to make words plural. They're spelling the contraction "y'all" incorrectly. They're adding them in where they simply don't belong. But thus far, I've mostly kept my mouth shut.

But now... I just saw something that made the jaw in my head drop. (That is, my actual jaw didn't drop, but if I were a cartoon, it would have.)

The culprit is a little-discussed challenge of American English. It has to do with the way we pronounce, or rather hardly pronounce, the phrase "would have". I am guessing that if you asked people what they were saying in using this phrase, a large majority would think the correct word choice is "would of".

But apparently it gets worse. Not only do we smoosh the word "have" to the point of non-recognition, evidently we do the same thing to the word "would". Case in point, from an anonymous facebook status update, "wish it had of snowed". (Emphasis mine!)

Seriously, it's no wonder people don't mind that politicans use words to mean their opposites. Apparently some portion of the American population can't be bothered to think about the meaning of the words they're using themselves. "Wish it had of snowed" does not mean what you think it means! In fact, it doesn't really mean anything at all! It is gibberish!

I sometimes wonder if the progress of literacy in this country has started moving backward. By certain measures, there is no doubt that it has. We might assume this is only bad news for publishers of books made of trees. But I think it will have much larger implications. Frequent reading is inextricably connected to the ability to think critically. Once we lose that skill, we're doomed. Dark Ages 2.0, here we come!

Stormy Weather?

So I've been kind of surprised that there haven't been thunder storms over my bed these last few nights. It's cold in my house (since I've apparently become my mother and keep the thermostat punishingly low), so I've been running the space heater in the bedroom while I sleep. (Actually, I've been running it in whatever room I'm in, whenever I've home. The cat wishes I'd just stay home all the time.) But I've also had a cold, with a scratchy throat, so I've been running my cold water vaporizer on the other side of the bed. Just seems like wet cold front meeting warm front ought to create some weather systems in between, namely directly above me. Maybe there isn't enough wind involved...

Stop Me If You've Heard This One...

Is there such a field as historical social psychology? Because if there is, I think someone should do a study of how and why humor has gotten more sophisticated through the years.

Now before you guffaw too loudly, I do realize that there countless examples of current highly unsophisticated humor around. But I just watched "Bringing Up Baby" and I'm convinced that early movies simply weren't as complex and nuanced as many of them are now.

"Bringing Up Baby" stars Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. I think I'd seen it once before (now that I've watched it, it feels vaguely familiar). But I got it from Netflix this time because of how it was talked up on a set of Katharine Hepburn postage stamps I bought recently. They made it sound like her signal achievement. Which is sad. Because it's basically a ridiculous caper movie in which she pretty much acts surreally hysterical most of the time. It's not very funny. At least not to me.

But I wonder. Were things more rigid back then? Were social categories so much stricter that these caper stories seemed the height of hilarity? I just think someone should do a study of how the current state of a culture affects its humor.

Part of humor is surprise. This movie was highly predictable, to me. But would it have been to its original audience in 1938? The medium was relatively new. When a medium is new, are the mechanisms for giving an audience the satisfaction of being in on a surprise more heavy-handed than they have to be now that we're so familiar with film devices?

I have had this experience quite a few times, where I hear such incredible things about some classic film, and then it disappoints. I'm not very good at appreciating films for the impact they had when they first came out. I am not a product of 1938.

Anyway, if anyone knows of any historical studies of humor, please let me know.

Say What?

It's possible that one of the reasons I have a blog is that I try to avoid mocking people too heartlessly on facebook.

This is an actual quote from an AP article I just read about a referendum battle in Bowling Green, Ohio. The referendum was about whether the city would extend anti-discrimination protections to gays and lesbians. (Well, okay, I'm assuming it would include lesbians; the article just said gays.)

"It's about trying to impose on our community a political agenda," said real estate agent Ed Sitter, who was active in the No campaign. "The militant homosexuals want their lifestyle elevated to the same level as the civil rights movement."

I'm not even sure how to begin responding to that, so I'll let you do so in the comment boxes.

(The referendum passed, by the way. How's that for elevation?)

A Difficult Time of Year

My church is going to be holding a service this year for people who have difficulty with the holidays, whether because of grief or depression or family issues or whatever. I'm having difficulty with the current holiday, myself, but for none of those reasons.

Because the current holiday isn't really a holy day, it's a series of fairly unholy days. Facebook and the rest of media and life have been taken over by two things I have absolutely no interest in -- shopping and football.

In fact, if I felt like it, I could make strenuous theological arguments about why both things are bad for the soul, but I won't. Because it would be difficult not to wallow in self-righteousness if I were to attempt such a thing.

The shopping thing isn't really ever going to go away, but it will dissipate a little. The football thing will get less intense once people go back to work. But in the meantime, I'm going to focus on cleaning house, raking leaves and baking cakes, and pretend the rest of it just isn't there. Who's with me?

For Example...

You have heard, I am sure, as I have, that language influences the way we think. That is true, I believe, in ways that are even more complicated and subconscious than we'd like to admit.

I'm thinking about this because I just had a thought reading this highly interesting post from my friend Helen's blog. (You should read it. It has cool pictures from a museum. And if you go to her home page, the post just before this one is about monkey poop and highly interesting.)

Anyway, she has this picture of whales carved out of ivory from walruses. And here's the thing. I realized that because we call ivory "ivory" and not, say, tusk, I think of it as a substance unto itself. Not that we call the stuff that grows off elephants' and walruses' face ivory, but more that they have tusks made of ivory. In my head, ivory is like something you mine and then the elephants and walruses have their tusks made of it.

This is, of course, ludicrous, but it's reflective, I believe, of how we relate to ivory. That is, we don't see it from the elephant's perspective (my big tooth), but rather, in giving it a name, we were already commodifying it and thinking of it as a raw material. I find this disturbing.

If I were industrious, I would research whether cultures indigenous to the habitats of elephants or walruses have names for ivory that better reflect its existence as a body part more than a raw material. I hope they do.

In the meantime, we must keep questioning the perspective that our language dictates to us. It may be enforcing values we don't really believe in.

Moving a Movement

So I went to a vigil today. At least, that's what it called itself. It wasn't really a vigil. It was a rally. No biggie.

It was commemorating the death of a young boy who took his own life a year ago, apparently because of bullying and/or pressure to join a gang. It was a good thing. But it could have been so much better.

I have been to numerous rallies/vigils/events in this particular park, and I usually come away feeling like, with a little attention to certain details, they could have been so much more effective.

So I offer here, some advice to those planning events that are aimed at getting people to coalesce into a movement.

First of all, it is, obviously, important to think about your goals, what you want to say, and who you want to have say it. But it is equally important to consider the perspective of the audience. Just because you succeed in saying what you want to say does not mean the event has been a success. People may have heard you (or they may have half-heard you). But at an event aimed at creating a movement, people need to be moved. They need to experience something, not just hear about something.

One of the challenges of the space in our park where rallies are frequently held is the lay-out. There is a stage, where usually, organizers think to put chairs for the speakers. And then there is a large space in front of the stage, with a short brick wall around the edges. The distance from wall to wall is probably 50 yards. (I'm totally making that up, as I am not good at estimating distances.) The point is that it's pretty far across.

The intention, I believe, of the structure is that people are supposed to bring lawn chairs to come hear a concert or some such. But for something like this, that is not going to happen. There are a few sections of bleachers on the ground beyond the short wall. Some people sat there. More people sat on the short wall. Which meant that the folks attending the rally were all really far apart and far away from the stage.

This is not good. This is detrimental to experiencing the birth of a movement.

Ideally, chairs would have been placed in a few short rows, close to the stage. A section of the bleachers could possibly have been moved down there. At the very least, if I'd been opening the event, I would have cajoled people to congregate on their feet down in front, together.

If people do not feel close together with others, they go home feeling like they were the only one there. There were enough people at this event that, if we'd all stood together in a mass, it would have felt like something. But we didn't. So it felt scattered, ineffective, impotent.

I think sometimes, when people are stepping out to try something new, and they don't have a huge crowd (which is generally true when you're starting something new), they are just so grateful that anyone showed up that they don't want to risk offending their small, precious crowd, so they hesitate to tell them what to do.

I would argue that the converse is what is needed. When people show up for something like this, it's because they're looking for someone to tell them how to get involved. Even if the only directions, initially, are to get closer together and feel your neighbors' presence, they will be open to that. There is, inevitably, a little grousing about having to move, but once they do, they realize there was a good reason.

There were a few older people there, so I might have had everyone move over to where those folks were sitting on the wall and be together there, rather than making everyone stand. But it could have been done, and it would have helped.

Secondly, I, personally, do not think you should use the word "vigil" to describe any event that does not include prayer and candles and singing. If what you have is a line-up of speakers, that is a rally, which is a perfectly respectable thing to have. But a vigil, with candles and prayer (or at least directed meditation and silence) and SINGING, is a much more powerful experience. (I'm fairly certain this was called a vigil because it was commemorating a death. Which is also a reason it should have had prayer and candles and singing.)

Why? Because then the audience is involved. They are participating; they have become part of what is happening. They are moving with the movement. Action breeds commitment. How do you get people to give money to Habitat for Humanity? You give them a day on the work site. They come away committed.

Giving people a candle to hold, a child's candle to keep an eye on, a neighbor's candle to help light, these things get people involved.

Singing. A proverb tells us that "When the people sing, the spirit comes down." There are all sorts of truths about breath and the way we use it and the power it has when used in unison that apply to these situations. People are anxious about singing. They are hesitant and need much encouragement. But if you pick a simple song, with only a few words that you line out very clearly, they will try. If you have a leader who is not afraid to be the one singing, but who makes very clear that the point is to sing along, people will catch on. And the breath will move within them, and they will be moving the movement.

Candles are a little tricky. It was daylight, so in this particular situation, they weren't going to be as powerful as they sometimes can be. Also, breeziness sometimes makes candles more of a distraction than a help. But how the crowd is standing makes a huge difference here. If people stand close enough together, they create a wind break that makes candlelight possible. There is a rich metaphor there. And an important truth.

As I'm writing this, I'm sitting here wondering how it is that I think I have the expertise to tell anyone how to stage a rally or vigil. I think it's just experience. When you've been to enough events, you learn what makes things work and you notice when those things aren't happening.

It was interesting to me to realize how my reflections felt like political or public relations techniques. The main guy who organized this rally spoke last, and he immediately struck me as someone who would eventually be running for office. IF he can get a campaign manager who gets this stuff. I think the thing that makes a campaign or movement effective is taking the step beyond your own perspective -- what you want to say -- to considering how to make sure it's heard and experienced. Once you get tuned into that level, you start thinking about a whole host of details you might not have otherwise.

I'm pretty sure my understanding of these issues doesn't just come from attending rallies and vigils. These are things preachers have to deal with all the time. A huge part of effective preaching is, once you've figured out what you need to say, spending time discovering how best to say it so that it's heard. The perspective of the congregation must be part of the equation or you might as well be talking to yourself. Preachers, or more broadly, worship leaders, also must be tuned into the power of music, the power of space and how people are arranged in it, and the power of silence and ritual.

There is a reason that the church was such a huge part of the success of the Civil Rights Movement. The church knows how to move people. If you're going to build a movement, you have to move people, not just your own mouth.

Strange New Compulsion

The weirdest thing has happened to me recently. I've been feeling compelled repeatedly to say "bless your heart" or "bless her heart", etc., in totally sincere ways (that is, not in the passive agressive way that uses it as a way of supposedly excusing the saying of rude things about someone). I'm saying it because I mean it.

It's not that I'm opposed to this. It's just that it's never felt natural to me before. It's always felt a little affected or forced or in some way uncharacteristic of me and therefore not the thing for me to say.

Except now it doesn't. It's like something shifted internally and I'm somehow a slightly different person. The first couple times I had the inclination to say it, I didn't, because I was so surprised by the impulse and didn't trust it. Then I started trying it out and was shocked at how okay it felt. I'm pretty sure it's a good thing, because it feels like it leans toward sympathy, which I've never been very good at. I have no idea what prompted it or if it will last.

I don't think it's that the South suddenly conquered me. I caught myself thinking about "fixing" to do something over seven years ago. If that happened (which I never thought would and I shuddered when it did), this would have happened a lot sooner, if it were a developing-new-habits-of-speech thing. But it's not.

Is it possible to just wake up one day and be a nicer person? Without even trying? Did my snarkiness subscription expire? Did my fetish-like preference for people being strong and taking care of themselves, thus not requiring my sympathy, suddenly grow weary of itself?

I'm pretty sure this is what we call Grace. I'm a fan.

Faulk Tales -- Inaugural Edition: Italian Wedding Soup

So I'm inaugurating a new feature on my blog today.

[What, you say, why does she need a new feature when she never even writes ordinary posts anymore? Well, let's just see if it helps, okay?]

I'm calling it "Faulk Tales". Perhaps it should be called Fauxlk Tales, but I think that looks wrong. Let me know if you agree or disagree.

Faulk Tales is designed to tap into my mostly hidden talent for creating folklore out of nothing. That is, I'm good at making up back story for odd conventions or names or whatever that has no basis in actual knowledge of anything. At least, I think I am. I'll invent. You decide.

* * *

So last night I had Italian Wedding Soup. Unfortunately, it was not because I went to an Italian wedding. I have, in fact, never been to an Italian wedding, sadly. That's what growing up in the Midwest will get you, I guess. My soup was from a lowly Campbell's can.

But here's what Italian Wedding Soup could mean, as explained to the happy couple...

The broth is your love -- the context of your relationship, the thing that must surround, envelope and hold everything else.

The noodle balls are your daily work -- There are a lot of them and they're not always easy to keep in order. But they sustain you. You should share them equally.

The meatballs are your fortune -- Don't eat them all at once!

And the spinach is sex -- It adds color, health and flavor!

If I Were a Right-Wing Conspiracy Theorist...

So this morning, when the cat woke me up, odd thoughts were going through my head. I was thinking about the epithet "red" that used to refer to communists. My local news paper is frequently accused of being too liberal. Since it's name is the Star, it often gets called "the Red Star" which I find hilarious.

But mostly, you don't hear that word used any more. I suppose some of it can be attributed to the demise of the Soviet Union. I think that's why we hear more about socialists these days, rather that communists. Hard to say.

But I also wonder if it has something to do with the switching of colors on electoral maps. As you know, a common way to refer to places populated with liberals now is to call them "blue states." I do not live in one. I live in a "red state." Which is hilarious, given the history of that color and what it used to mean.

But it used to be the other way around. As recently as the 80s, I believe (someone look that up and report back), blue states were those that went Republican and red states were those that went Democrat.

If I were a right-wing conspiracy theorist, I would wonder if the news organization that started the switch (someone research and report back who that was) did it in order to make it more difficult to call blue states "red". It just doesn't really work to use both colors. Which is part of the reason, I'm guessing, why you never hear the word used that way anymore. I bet there are portions of the population (the young part, that is) that don't even know it ever had that connotation.

Timed Times Test

For some unknown reason, a memory has been rattling around in my head lately. Over the weekend, I was at a retreat, participating in a workshop, and at the beginning of one activity, the leader said, "You're going to be timed."

And the first thing that popped into my head was the horrible memory of my first timed times table test in third grade.

I was a smart kid. Math was not my forte, but I did okay. I even TA'ed a math class my senior year of high school. But I wouldn't say I'm fast at multiplication. And I hate being rushed.

So the memory that has been bugging me ever since the weekend is this: We had to do these multiplication table tests in third grade. There were 100 problems, in three columns on a legal size sheet of paper. I think it was that we had to get as many done as we could in a certain amount of time. 3 minutes? 5 minutes? I don't remember.

What I do remember is that the first time I took one of these tests, I was so freaked out that my multiplying ability was basically paralyzed and my arms started sweating so much that by the time the teacher called out to stop, my paper was soaked. It was insane.

I'm trying to imagine what the pedagogical purpose of such a test might be. I suppose it's a good thing to know your times tables automatically. But does such an exercise really help with that?

There is part of me that would like to try to take one now. I'm not sure I'd be much better at it today than I was then. After that first one, I did fine. But the memory of the fear and pain of the first one never went away. I. Do. Not. Like. Being. Rushed. Especially with math.

Mamma Said There'd Be Days Like This, or Somebody Did Anyway

So the heading up there probably says this is a Friday post, but it's still Thursday for me. And that Moment has come.

The moment that they warn you about in seminary in order to scare you out of your procrastinating habits. (I'm pretty sure that's completely ineffective. If it works on you, you weren't really a procrastinator in the first place, and if you are, it won't work on you.)

The set-up is that you shouldn't be able to turn in term papers late because you can't turn in a sermon late. And then they proceed to ask you what you'll do if you waited to finish things till the last minute and then a pastoral emergency arises absorbs that last minute.

Usually, that scare speech is about sermons. I always figured that if the pastoral emergency actually was over in time for me to be in church, I'd wing my sermon. As a Sunday morning sermon writer, I don't actually find that all that alarming. Heck, I made up the second half of my high school graduation speech because I didn't have it written before the ceremony. (I also smuggled in a pen, in case there was time to work on it while other people were talking. That proved to be useless.)

My problem this evening is that it's not a sermon I've procrastinated on. I'm not even sure I'm giving myself the credit I deserve in calling it procrastination. The thing that isn't quite put together yet is our all church retreat. Such things require organization. It's mostly in my head at this point, but the booklet isn't finished. It won't be relaxing without organization; I know that.

But it's now time to go back and see just what is essential, what can realistically happen at the true last minute (that being tomorrow), and what can be skipped completely.

Emergencies are all about priorities. And I'm thinking the triage is the only other thing happening tonight. Blogging probably shouldn't have made the cut, but my brain needed a way of shifting gears anyway!

Alone vs. Lonely

We had the second week back to our contemplative prayer service tonight. It's a really nice service, with very few people who come. Sigh. Oh well.

Each week, I lead an intercessory prayer that starts with ourselves and gradually moves out to the world. The second stop is "our loved ones and all families." And ever since I started doing this, because of single people who had shared their frequent sense of being invisible in churches, the next stop is something about "those who are lonely".

Which gets complicated. I do want people who aren't part of traditional families, that is, people with families of one, to feel comfortable in our church. But trying to pray for them is a little awkward.

I try to include lots of categories of loneliness. In fact, I usually say "for runaways and those who have been dis-owned or distance by their families, for those who are the last one left and those living out their lives in nursing homes, for those lost in the loneliness of dimensia. For all those living lives of solitude, whether by choice or circumstance..."

So right there, you've got a lot of people in dire situations, and then some whose lives are completely normal, they're just single (or divorced or widowed). And what about people who are married and lonely? You know they're out there.

I've even sometimes throw something in about people who are lonely, even when surrounded by other people. Sometimes I list the circumstances, death, divorce, moving...

Obviously, I can't cover every situation. But sometimes I worry if I'm making it worse by bringing it up. I've occasionally wanted to ask some of the people who come how that part hits them. But I never have. Maybe I should. On the other hand, the ones who come may have been thinking of it as applying to people other than themselves this whole time and may be offended if I suggest it might apply to them. Aaah. So delicate.

I mean, when I pray for families, some of what I mention does illustrate that family life isn't a bowl of cherries either. But somehow, those problems are more socially acceptable, I'm afraid. We're just not that good at talking about loneliness.

Any suggestions? Would you rather have it mentioned or left out? How specific should it be? There is always silence after each section, so you could take it in any direction you wanted, regardless of what I say. And it does help me think of some folks I might not otherwise.

Two on Tuesday

1. I'm beginning to understand the 140-character limit on Twitter. I've noticed that when people's facebook statuses are too long, I don't read them. Scary.

2. On Sunday, I accidentally put the toilet paper on the holder the wrong way. I tried to just be okay with it that way, but in less than 24 hours, I changed it around. Oh well.

I'll Be the Heavy. 'Cause He's Your Brother.

One of the strange things about ministry is when it has to involve meddling. Which it does sometimes. One of the situations that comes to mind is when an elderly person is aging and decisions need to be made. Perhaps there are no family members to address things like when it's time to stop driving or whether you really can stay home alone anymore. Perhaps it's something like one kid doing all the care-giving and another hardly being in touch who someone needs to call.

Sometimes it's about getting in touch with out-of-town kids who need to have the seriousness of a situation impressed upon them because non-relatives really aren't allowed to make decisions like moving into a nursing home.

There are very few people who are comfortable inserting themselves into other family's lives in these ways. And I doubt most ministers are either. But sometimes we have to, and we do, and it's the role that carries us in there, not anything about us personally. Sometimes someone has to step in and be the heavy, and having a collar (even if it's figurative) makes that easier.

I say all this because I'm sensing I may need to be gearing up to do it again soon. Delicacy and weight at the same time is a complicated combination to convey over the phone. It gets easier with practice, thank God! Part of it is that one of the things a minister can do for a family is give them someone else to be mad at so they don't have to stay mad at each other. A crappy role to play, but sometimes a true gift. And since it's not really about you, it's easier to let go of than having a member of your family mad at you.

Life in the Round

In the hammock,
on the porch,
which is on the east side of the house,
it has grown too dark to read.

I must turn on the camping lantern,
left there for precisely this purpose.

But out the south window
(straight ahead
if you've turned your back to the street)
is a terrifically tall tree whose top can still see the sun,
which convinces me that tomorrow will also have a dawn.

The Meaning of Compliments

So I wore a new dress today. Sort of. I also did my hair differently, but this story isn't about my hair, except that it might have magnified the effect of the new dress.

It wasn't a new, new dress. My mother made it. We picked out the pattern and fabric over a year ago. She gave it to me at Christmas, I think. And it's hung in my closet since then.

I knew it was a bit of a departure from my usual style when we picked out the pattern. But I thought I'd try something new. Once it was here, however, I was unconvinced.

The dress fit very nicely, and I love the way the skirt is. But the top is just a little odd, for me. Plus, it had these really long, skinny ties at the top. I'm not really a bow at the neck kind of person.

But today I was in the mood for something different. (That's been a theme lately, I guess. The new hair debuted on Thursday, simply from blow-drying differently.) So I decided to wear the dress, albeit with a black blazer over it, to cover the weirdness of the top, and the stringy ties tucked inside.

But, of course, this is the Heart of Dixie and it's not Labor Day yet, so the blazer was a delusion. It didn't even make it to Sunday School.

And here's the thing: I got a ton of compliments on my dress today. It really is a pretty cute dress. I'm sure I would totally love it on someone else. But the top still seems weird to me. (I tied knots in the strings and cut them shorter when I got home today. Sorry, Mom!)

But people seemed to like it a lot. Or else they just noticed that it's not much like the things I normally wear.

I am convinced that we're not always saying what we mean when we give someone a compliment. Usually compliments about clothing or hair follow a set pattern, which is "I like your ______." I'm not sure all of them did this morning, but that is the most common compliment.

What I think we really mean, a lot of the time, is "You are wearing something unusual, thereby taking a risk, and I admire the courage that demonstrates."

Which is also a perfectly lovely thing to say to people. And makes those "I like your shirt" comments make a lot more sense when they're said to people wearing horridly loud, ugly shirts.

The stock compliment is sometimes even preceeded or followed by an observation that the object in question is different. (When said about hair, this frequently though unintentionally leads the recipient to wonder if the complimenter usually doesn't like their hair.)

I'm not trying to slight the compliments I got today. I was grateful for them. Especially since no one except my husband mentioned my new hair the other day. I'm just saying that, frequently, we aren't saying what we really mean when we compliment people.

It doesn't really matter though, because the result is the same. I'm probably going to wear the dress a lot more often now.

We Need More Categories

A couple weeks ago I was talking with a friend about how "vacation time" is just not complicated enough. There needs to be vacation time and family time and travel time. Because those three things are not all the same, and yet, you have to take vacation to do any of them, and therefore, somehow, people expect you to return refreshed despite the chances being very slim that you actually were only sleeping in and reading novels the whole time.

Today was Saturday, and I spent most of the day at work. But I was doing "Saturday work". And in fact, I was doing two different kinds of Saturday work.

We had an actual Saturday thing going on where we walked around the neighborhood with doorknob flyers to invite everyone to our dedication service next week. So that was "real work" though of the Saturday quality, which means I got to wear jeans and a t-shirt.

But the rest of the day, I spent tidying my office. (HALLELUJAH!!! PRAISE JESUS!!! It was really a mess. There was mail in my inbox from 2009.) This is something that has needed to happen for ages, but it's not something I can effectively get done during the week. Because there are too many interruptions and too many other things that are seemingly more important.

But since it's Saturday, I'm not supposed to be doing those other, more important things. So I had the time to tidy my office.

Now, the thing is__the messier one's office gets, the more vital tidying it becomes. I suppose you could say my office reached a critical point where it became worth it to use "time off" to clean it. But shouldn't it also qualify as work?

So work needs more categories, just like vacation does. Because life is complex. I'm not complaining. I just like to be precise.

Sometimes It Doesn't Go Both Ways (Weekly Devotional Message)

Matthew 7:12 – “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.”

Proverbs 24:29 – Do not say, “I will do to others as they have done to me; I will pay them back for what they have done.” (NRSV)

Most of us learned “The Golden Rule” early on in life. We are supposed to treat people the way we would like to be treated. This is a natural corollary of loving our neighbors as we love ourselves. Despite the technicality that some people may have different preferences than we do, this is a solid guideline for behavior. It offers a clear measure of whether our actions are right or wrong.

And yet, too often, we are tempted to twist it around into justification for bad behavior. “He did it to me first!” “She started it!” These are the cries of children, yet we act them out, even if we don’t say them out loud. We tell ourselves that if someone did such-and-such to us, that must be the way they want to be treated, so we can respond in kind.

The author of this saying from Proverbs knows about our tendency to rationalize this way. And he points it out for the lie it is. The Golden Rule doesn’t go in both directions. It is a standard for our behavior toward others, not a justification for our reactions to others. The truth is that we all fail at it much of the time. But the example of Jesus is one of forgiveness and grace. We are asked to turn the other cheek and walk the extra mile, even if the other person will never in a million years do so.

Just like children, we are so often obsessed with fairness. But our preoccupation with what’s fair comes from our preference to judge other people’s behavior and not stay focused on our own. That is not what Jesus asks of us. When it comes to judgment, the gospel says MYOB – Mind Your Own Business!

Collect for the Week: Gracious and Loving God, who sent your Son to show us how to live your will, grant that our hearts might be filled with grace, mercy and love, that we might offer a gospel witness in the face of injustice and discord. Through Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit, Amen

Pros and Cons

Hmm, does anyone know where that phrase comes from? The words aren't short for anything, right? They're just a Latin way of saying "fors and againsts"? Weird.

Anyway, what I was going to say was that last week my walking buddy and I finally got back to walking. This was a good thing. This week, we finally got back up to 3 miles. (From 2 and then 2.5.)

But then my walking buddy went to the beach. ("BUM!" Oh well.)

So today I walked by myself. And since I was by myself, I decided to walk through my neighborhood instead of on the indoor track where we usually walk.

There are many lovely things about walking outside through the streets instead of inside on a track. There are people's houses to look at, and their dogs to be barked at by. There are birds singing, and breezes blowing.

In my case, it's particularly helpful because we're going to be visiting the houses in this neighborhood on Saturday with flyers about our upcoming Service of Dedication, and this gave me a chance to notice anything we'd need to know in advance. (Not sure I did though. May have to try to notice things again tomorrow.)

Those are the pros.

And then there's the humidity.

Triumph!

It's September now!!!

The statement is obvious, I suppose, so I should clarify that the exclamation points are because September is my birth month.

And in honor of my birth month, I am going to try to blog every day again. I will warn you, however, that it's highly likely that "my birth month," as it's defined in my head, probably peters out very shortly after my actual birthday.

Then, of course, I will be leaving town for a week, so that will complicate things, won't it?

Anyway, one of the things I thought I would share, as I approach a number that feels more significant than some (like the last 2, for instance), is an observation I made while on a road trip last month.

I was driving along, possibly cleaning my teeth, when I suddenly realized that my gums are a whole new color than they used to be. That is to say, they are finally the pale pinkish, healthy color they're supposed to be. This is astounding to me.

Remember back in January, when I blogged about a list of potential resolutions someone suggested that weren't very hard but could actually make your life a lot better?

Flossing was at the top of that list. And I wanted to do it. But I usually just assume that I will fail at that sort of thing.

But in June when I was at the dentist, my hygienist actually said my gums looked good. That surprised me, but I was so distracted by my first cavity that I didn't really check it out.

So there I am, driving up the highway in Illinois, and I suddenly noticed she was right. My gums look great! I must be flossing more than I realized.

I think the trick was trying hard for long enough to get my mouth used to the feeling of being flossed, so that not being flossed feels wrong, like something that needs to be fixed. (This is quite possibly the secret to any long-term keeping clean project. I wouldn't know.)

Anyway, as I approach this particular birthday, it feels like a minor triumph to know that I've finally overcome (at least temporarily) my life-long unhealthy gums problem.

Did any of you really need to know that? I suppose not. But Happy Birth Month to Me!

Define My New Metaphor

According to more professional bloggers, nothing gets things going on a blog like a contest. I'm pretty sure they mean contests with actual prizes, which this one is probably not going to have. Oh well.

It's been a really, long week full of many things. But for some reason, as I was powering down by reading facebook, it occurred to me that somewhere in professional ministry, there has to be a sort of situation that should be euphemistically referred to as "changing diapers".

It could mean a lot of things. But, minister friends and bold, honest lay folks, what do you think it should mean? In the context of ministry, that is?

I will declare a winner, some day after some people have made suggestions. The prize is probably non-existent, but who knows? If you inspire me enough, perhaps I will come up with one!

bleh

I did not have a good morning. Oh, I suppose it had its moments. But my sermon was lousy and the visitors are not coming back and the copy machine was cranky and the stapler ran out and the microphone was distracting me.

I was going to blog about that some. About visitors, specifically, and the weirdness of them and their effect on me. But I'm too grouchy.

Instead here are some interesting links. Nicholas Kristof wrote a column about medical abortions. It's rather bold and revolutionary.

The NYT also has an interesting article about "The Un-Divorced". I clicked on it, just to see if it was about boringly married people. But it's not. It's about people who are separated from their spouses but not divorced, for years and years. Pretty interesting. My first reaction is "Why don't those people who call gay marriage a threat to marriage get mad about this?" But my second reaction is "Yet another reason why we all ought to just mind our own business. Life is complicated."

The Challenges and Abuses of Story Preaching

So last Sunday, I further exploited that young boy who wanted a Bible and made him the foil in my sermon. It was apparently a big hit.

One person who complimented the sermon mentioned something about how stories really hold people's attention and bring the sermon to life.

And part of me became immediately defensive.

You see, I have a bit of an inferiority complex when it comes to preaching. I do not consider myself a story preacher. And I know people love stories, so I get defensive about it.

I've been thinking about this the last couple days, and I've come to a couple of new conclusions.

First of all, I think part of me is disdainful of story preaching because it has been so abused. Yes, Fred Craddock is great at it. But that's because Fred tells stories that make his point. But then he puts them in books and lets other people have access to them. And you end up with people just telling stories, regardless of whether they have anything to do with the scripture lesson or not. I hate that.

I have sensed that my generation of preachers has the same knee-jerk reaction to sermons that start with jokes. There are simply too many preachers out there who (still) feel obligated to start with a joke, no matter how unrelated, irrelevant or even offensive the joke may be. It seems like starting off on the wrong foot to me.

So part of the reason I don't tell stories very often in my sermons is because I have high standards for when it actually makes sense and is helpful to include one.

I'm pretty sure, however, that I have also thought of myself as not very good at incorporating stories into my preaching. I have felt, historically (can you use that word about your own life?) that I don't remember pertinent stories very well or even notice them when they're happening. (I have a feeling blogging is probably helpful in exercising that particular muscle.)

I also haven't really thought of myself as a great story teller.

Because I don't want to use stories that aren't mine and don't really connect, and because I feel like I don't hold onto the experiences that might connect, it's always felt like it would take a huge amount of work for me to become a story-telling preacher. It would involve a huge amount of cataloging that I simply don't have time for.

So mostly, my sermons don't tend to have stories in them. (I'm also aware that when they do, they tend to be 2 pages longer. But people don't tend to mind, because stories move faster.)

But here's what I've realized since Sunday. I am a decent story-teller. People were eating up tantrum boy, and it wasn't just him. I found the right ways to stretch the story out, maintaining suspense and sprinkling in my reflections and the gospel lesson in a nice balance. I can do drama. I can certainly do funny.

And I clearly didn't have any trouble recognizing the moment as it was happening as a preachable moment, nor did I have trouble remembering how it happened. In retrospect, the idea that I don't remember stories well is kind of bogus. I can sometimes recall conversations word-for-word, because my memory is very aural. So why would I think that about myself?

So here's my new theory about why I don't use stories more often: I don't get out enough for the right stories to happen to me.

Now, part of it is still memory. The perfect thing was that tantrum boy came into my life the week the lectionary directed us to Jesus' bizarre promise that those who ask shall receive. It was a perfect match. If I'd had to hold onto "I want a Bible!" for weeks until there was a passage it related to, I don't know if I would have. Then again, I might have abandoned the lectionary in order to use it right away.

But more than that, my life has become so circumscribed by my ministry that there aren't really stories happening that are particularly usable for sermons. It doesn't do, after all, to tell the congregation stories about each other. I don't have kids to do crazy things, which is probably many preachers' crutch. And my husband is the opposite of excited about showing up in sermons.

I have a feeling this realization means something about where I'm at in ministry right now and how I may need to shift some things back into a better balance. I need to get out more, for the sake of my preaching. And it may not be just me. It's probably most true of us preachers, but I think it could be true of the church in general.

This Is What Comes Before "Post-Racial"

As I hope you are aware, there has been quite a bit of brou-ha-ha lately about race and racism and race-baiting and, um, race-lying in the news lately. And really, there's been quite a lot of it for the last year and a half.

I think I may have figured something out about all that recently. When Barack Obama was elected president, people were (ridiculously) talking about how it would usher in a "post-racial" era of U.S. history. Of course, that didn't happen.

What has happened instead, and what has proved to be distinctly upsetting to a huge swath of people, is that Barack Obama's position as our first black president has forced white Americans to become acutely aware of our Whiteness.

For many white Americans, this is the first time that has really happened. Part of the definition of Whiteness in this country is not having to be aware of it. A huge part of privilege is getting to pretend that you are "normal". "I'm just a person," people will insist.

Picking the centuries-old scab off racism in this country is going to require people becoming aware of Whiteness. But it's not a particularly pleasant process, as evidenced by all the sturm und drang Fox news and their allies have been stirring up since November 2008.

It will be interesting, though, to see what a few years of this does to race-consciousness in America. We can only pray that heightened awareness of Whiteness will not lead to increases in white supremacy activities for most people (though it already has for many). If I had to guess, I would say that it could be the humorists and satirists that will save us again.

Maternal Pride

I believe I've talked a little bit before about ministry being somewhat like parenting. Like as close to parenting as I'm ever going to get, God willing.

Another instance just now...

I was thinking about the achievements (though I hesitate to use that word) of the members of my congregation lately, particularly the community prayer garden that they built. This past week, some finishing touches were completed that really tied it up with a bow. (Figuratively speaking, of course. Bows don't belong in gardens.) And I was, internally, beaming with pride just thinking about it.

I am so proud of them. I mean, they had a lot of help, from other people and the Holy Spirit. But they worked so hard. In the garden, one particular person worked and is still working so hard to make it amazing. And I'm afraid I'm being the kind of mother who assumes he knows that I love him. I'm truly not sure I've told him enough how incredible what he has done is. I should do that.

Confession: Better Late Than Never

I just read this opinion piece in the NYT about how to stop bullying. It was prompted by a new law in Massachusetts that tries to get schools to adopt stronger policies against bullying.

The article talks about different kinds of bullies, and I was convicted. This, for instance -- "plenty of friendly, responsible children dabble in mean behavior" -- could apply to many of us. But what about this? "A clique of preadolescent girls who form a club with the specific function of being mean to other girls."

So here's my confession. It's not that I've never told anyone this before, but I still feel guilty about it. More, I still feel confused about why it even happened.

In fifth grade, I was a founding member of the I Hate Laurie G. Club. I don't remember anything at all about why a couple friends and I started this club. Laurie was a distant-ish neighbor of mine, not a close friend, but not someone I remember having strong feelings about one way or another except in this specific incidence.

Honestly, if I can remember my feelings at all, I'm pretty sure I didn't hate Laurie G. It was just exciting to be part of a club with such a provocative, aggressive name. It's entirely possible Laurie was a randomly chosen target.

I have no memory of who the other club members were, though I could hazard some guesses. But since I get to be "anonymous" here (yeah, right), I'll let those guesses remain undisclosed.

So, I know nothing about our motivation. I know nothing about who else was involved. My primary memory is of exactly where in the middle school building we were standing when we got chewed out by our teacher. The IHLG Club didn't last more than a couple of hours. I don't know whether Laurie was the one who told on us, or whether someone else came to her aid. What's amazing to me is that she didn't retaliate.

I was generally, I like to think, a pretty nice kid. I was taught to defend the weak and vulnerable. I was taught right from wrong. I was taught to respect others, even if they weren't my friends. I was not a bully. But I bullied, at least this one time. I have no idea where this random, narrowly targeted cruelty came from. No idea. But I'm really sorry for it.

Part of me wants to ask Laurie if she remembers this episode, and tell her I'm sorry. I know I could find her on facebook, because I've seen her respond on other people's updates. But it seems like it might be rude to bring it up. Then again, perhaps my hesitation is cowardice. What do you think? Should I contact her?

How Lovely to be a Woman

A recent piece in The Atlantic has made quite a splash. It is provocatively titled "The End of Men". In it, author Hanna Rosin discusses how the global economy is shifting toward skills that supposedly women excel in. I think her case is over-stated, unsurprisingly, given her title, but it's certainly interesting.

Nicholas Kristof, a great champion of the girl child, already has a response, in which he assures us that boys are going to be okay. He's probably right. Balancing things out is likely to have some unfortunate moments of ugliness though. Power is never given up without a struggle.

One of the most interesting things Rosin points out is that while women have entered into most previously male-dominated fields in droves, men have not moved into women-dominated fields much at all, even the ones that used to be male-dominated like teaching and secretarial work. That resistance seems to be holding up, despite the fact that many of these fields are now the only ones growing. We'll see how long that lasts. How poor are men willing to be to maintain their machismo?

The Word Is Ever New?

I was in a Christian book store yesterday, and there was a child having the most fascinating tantrum. When I first came in, he and his family were somewhere in the middle of the store, where I couldn't see them. But as I spoke with the cashier, his volume rose to the point that we became aware of him. He was articulating his demands remarkably clearly for a hysterical child.

"I want a Bible!" he shouted and sobbed. Over and over. The same demand and nothing else.

Eventually, his mother got him closer to the door, where I could see him. (Though I tried not to stare.) At that point, they were near enough that I could hear the mother too. "You have three Bibles at home," she reminded him.

But he absolutely did not care. He kept hollering that he wanted a Bible.

As they approached the door, his refrain changed. "I'm not leaving," he yelled. I wasn't watching, but from his tone, I was imagining him bracing his feet on either side of the door to keep her from dragging him out to the car. Finally, she got him out, and the rest of us were left to ponder the meaning of this child's desire.

As tantrums go, it was probably the most inspiring one I've ever seen. But it seems to me that the meaning shifts a little once you know the kid already had three Bibles. Was it just about getting a new thing and knowing that Bibles are what one buys in that particular store? Has the Bible become a trinket? Was there something he'd been taught to expect from a Bible that he couldn't find in the ones he already had? Were the ones he had at home hand-me-downs?

What would it mean to possess the Word of God? Is that what he wanted? Is that even possible? Is it weird that we sell and buy it in the first place? What would it take for grown-ups to become that passionate about having access to scripture?

Victory in Cheeses

[* NOTE: This post is full of generalizations. Lucky Fresh's tongue is firmly in her cheek. I can't believe I'm even pointing this out, but I know how you people are. Try not to be offended. It's a true story, except for where I make the Southerner look like she was using appropriate capital letters. I really don't think her choice not to was about her Southerness. That was a facebook thing, I'm sure.]

I try not to brag around here, much. But last night, I got into a smack talk competition with a Southerner about food -- and by "smack talk" I mean the sweet, passive aggressive kind Southerners are famous for -- and I won. I was so impressed by myself.

It's not that Southerners are better at this sort of smack talk. It's that they have more to prove, so they just never give up. And truly, when it comes to food, so much of the history there is about a people trying to make do with what they had, so it's kind of cruel to point out how much better things can taste if you don't have to stretch or skimp on the ingredients.

It's like the polenta scandal, only writ large about a whole host of dishes. [You don't know about the polenta scandal? It's peasant food! Fancy restaurants are tricking people into paying big money for it! And it is just not very good!]

Most Southerners don't live in poverty anymore, so they can afford to move on. But they have too much pride.

Like I said, it's a little cruel to mess with them. But some "delicacies" are just too gross to ignore. And sometimes, pride should be poked. Hence, the following conversation:

Lucky Fresh does not understand the Southern obsession with dehydrating cheese.

Southerner: huh?

Lucky Fresh: They have a variety of strategies of combining cheese with flour products and spices and baking the concoction into shapes. "Cheese straws" are the most common iteration, though they sometimes come in thin rounds also. As far as I can tell, it's just a way of ruining cheese. They are dry and gross. It's like they don't get that the cheese and the cracker are better off being two separate foods working in tandem. And yet, people appear to love them. I don't get it.

Southerner: You, obviously, have never had my cheese straws. :-)

Lucky Fresh: Nope. And I never will.

Southerner: I mean, really, who can resist cheese mixed with rice krispies and then baked?
[Yes, she really wrote that, and I'm pretty sure she meant it. shudder]

Lucky Fresh: Me. I am against all cheese abuse.

Southerner: I bet you've never had turnip greens or kale or collard greens cooked with my daddy's secret ingredient, sorghum syrup, either... poor chile, I bet you come from up North somewhere!
[Notice the tendency to broaden the offense: If you don't like one of my foods, you have attacked all Southern cuisine and must not be one of us.]

Lucky Fresh: Greens do not agree with my intestines much, but I do not have a philosophical problem with them. I am definitely in favor of sorghum. And yes, I am a native of the Land of Lincoln.

Southerner: Bless your heart!
[Here is that thing they try to do to shut down the conversation while maintaining the upper hand. Sweet, but condescending, as if they are still in a position to condescend from. Tricky to maneuver around, but I think I pull it off.]

Lucky Fresh: Why, yes, you may. Thank you very much!

Southerner: lol!
[This is where you know I won, because she has abandoned her Southern persona and used internet/texting shorthand to admit that she's just laughing now. She didn't know there was a response to "Bless your heart!" that could turn it around like that. She had no choice to give up, because her weapon of last resort failed to find its mark.]

Lucky Fresh: :)
[I didn't want to be completely rude. Since she had led us out of the competition, acknowledging my triumph, I wanted to be gracious in victory.]

Unsurprisingly, another Southerner later tried to rectify the situation.

Southerner Two: This is about as interesting as your cornbread argument... or should I say corncake, since you Northerners like to put sugar in there...
[Oddly, she didn't use capital letters either, but let's continue to assume that's an internet thing, not a Southern thing.]

Like I said, it's just mean to mock people for not being able to afford sugar or having to stretch the cheese with fillers. So I won't. But I don't have to like the food they make that way either. Bless their hearts.

Ten on Tuesday?

1. I'm not sure I will make it to ten...

2. I probably love Rice-a-roni way more than is healthy.

3. For a Monday, I got a remarkable amount done yesterday. Washed sheets and towels and hung them out on the line to dry. Cleaned and re-dirtied kitchen. Made two batches of potato salad. Read some of my library book.

4. We sang "Living for Jesus" in church on Sunday. I don't really like that song. I didn't even know that song until my gramma's funeral when my grandfather picked it out because it was one they'd sung back in their youth group days. Despite that, it still seemed like an odd choice, because there's no way he agreed with its theology. What does it mean to sing things we disagree with? I think it has something to do with being part of a community. And I'm much more willing to sing things I disagree with than to read them, so it must have something to do with what the music adds. Since I'm the one who picks the hymns, I'm clearly not entirely opposed to singing things I don't approve of. I call it "throwing them a bone." Because there are a lot of things my congregation loves that I do not consider theologically appropriate. What's hardest is trying to work them in, because I like for the hymns to go with the service's overall theme, and mostly, they have nothing to do with anything I would ever preach about.

5. I have had occasion to see lots of people offering their time to work on tedious projects lately. It's been very gratifying.

6. We have a Family Retreat on Saturday (our version of VBS, if you must). I might have the kids dance to something by Pink Martini, my very favorite band. That is hiliarious to me. I have been meaning to post about Pink Martini for ages, but I want to include videos and I'm too lazy. Look them up. They rock.

7. We finally had some rain over the weekend, and it's been much nicer out since then. Doubt that will last long.

8. I've been reading a lot of novels lately, which has been very lovely. I am pretty aware that I need a vacation, since I've been running full-steam and beyond since about April with no break. There isn't much rest planned though, but reading novels is kind of like taking vacation pills for me. Not actual nutrition, but a fair substitute.

9. My husband sent me this link the other day to a list of 25 English Language Oddities. They are pretty interesting.

10. Yesterday was the 31st anniversary of the triumph of the Sandinista Revolution in Nicaragua. Times certainly do change.

I'm a Fan of Tea

I'm sure you've heard of Greg Mortenson's book, "Three Cups of Tea", which tells the story of his experience of getting lost mountain climbing in Pakistan, being nursed back to health by a village and then returning to build them a school. He is now convinced that the world is changed by educating girls and has dedicated his life to building schools that will do so. What's truly amazing is that the U.S. military is now taking his advice, or at least listening to it. Will wonders never cease? The NYT has an article about it.

You Can't Have a Last Word Until There's Been a First Word

Obama's financial reform bill passed the Senate today. John Nichols, of The Nation, has a helpful review of the bill and comments from people who voted for and against it. (He clearly wrote it in a hurry though, so read with mercy if you're a proofreader.) Obviously, it doesn't do everything it should. But it does a lot more than was happening before. Interesting that Scott what's-his-butt from Mass voted for it. And I'm glad Feingold voted against it. Someone had to hold the outer edge by making the point that it's not as strong as it needs to be.

In other good news, the newest cap that BP put on their busted well is apparently keeping oil from gushing into the Gulf. Many people are skeptical that BP is telling the truth, and I even saw someone suggest that there's another leak somewhere nearby that's a bigger problem, but really, this is good news.

Both of these things happened while I was taking a nap today. Clearly, this is a sign that I am supposed to take more naps.

Balancing the "White Man's Burden"

There is an interesting piece on the Huffington Post about writers like Nicholas Kristof and others who cover places like Africa yet seem to find white protagonists for their stories. These are very complicated dynamics.

Process Matters

A rather frightening piece from the New York Times explores the impact of the next generation's understanding of writing and plagiarism. Yes, cheating is morally wrong. But more importantly, if you don't do the work, you don't learn the material. So your educational process is a waste, since it wasn't really a process of education at all, but merely an imitation of education.

Students need to understand this. Unrelated as it seems, I think it might be helpful to send more of them camping. Out in the wilderness, you could cut them off from their usual resources and then ask them questions that make them think. Anyway, we're going to have to do some quick thinking and acting to catch our methods up to the impact of technology.

Luck and Faith

It rained this afternoon. Just for a while, twice. The first time, I didn't even notice it had started till someone on the phone mentioned it. Then I had to get off the phone because I suddenly realized my car windows were down.

I immediately felt responsible for the little shower, because of course it would rain when my windows are down. Mind you, they've been down a lot lately and it hasn't rained till today.

We're weird this way, about weather. Other things too, I think, but hugely about weather. Many people think they can make it rain by getting their car washed. Or forgetting their umbrella.

Superstition is a fascinating thing. It relates to luck, from my perspective, so you know I'm interested.

One of the things I wonder about is how our ideas (my ideas) of luck and superstition relate to our faith. Weather might be a good arena in which to examine the issue.

I believe that God is the source of weather, in a very broad sense. That is, God is the creator of the heavens and the earth, which includes the various atmospheric systems that produce weather. They are amazing systems. (And no, I don't believe they were created in six days.)

But I don't really think that God made a specific, intentional decision to make it rain into my car windows this afternoon. That is where the more ironic, superstitious understanding of the way the world works comes into play.

So I am able to thank God for beautiful, life-giving weather, and yet not hold God personally responsible for crappy or destructive weather. (Works out well for God, doesn't it?)

But what is that other force? Fate? Luck? The ironic spirit of the universe made manifest? I think most of us are entirely aware of it. Even though we might not want to believe in it, the way we talk betrays us. The wry comments noting how things work exactly backwards sometimes. (Though they work out just fine as or more often; we just don't comment on it.)

I thought that by writing this, I could bring some clarity to my own understanding of how our conceptions of fate or luck relate to our faith, but I don't think I have. Maybe, for me, it's a scale thing. The fate/luck thing operates within the universe that God created. I'm not sure what it means, but at some level, perhaps it's part of the complexity of God. Perhaps our creation of it, through our skewed perceptions of reality (that is, noticing the ironic, but not the un-ironic), is one of the ways we're created in God's image.

One only has to watch that movie about penguins' mating habits to see that God has a wicked sense of humor. Yet more evidence that God is Jewish?

Ooops!

So I missed a day. That was to be expected. And in my defense, it's because I was having a real life yesterday. My mother was visiting. We went to lunch and ran errands and stuff. Then we watched "Citizen Kane" because she'd never seen it. (Now she never has to watch it again, and hopefully, I don't either.) Then we had a lovely dinner, despite the fact that all the restaurants we wanted to go to were closed on Mondays.

But I am having some trouble with getting back into blogging. The problem is that I keep thinking of things I want to blog about and then forgetting what they were when it's time to write. Before, I had some better habits for keeping that from happening. I guess my memory muscles are out of shape. I'll work on it. Any tips?

Circles Are Nice

I got to attend an ordination today. It was nice. I have served on our church's committee that approves people for ordination for the last 8 years, so I've been to quite a few ordinations in the last few years. But what was nice about this one -- which will be my last in that official capacity, since I'm now retired -- is that it was a young person. Someone who was, in fact, the age I was when I joined the committee. This was the first one like that in my whole 8 years, I think. So that was nice, for a sense of closure.

Wonderful Labor News

Bob Herbert, of the New York Times, is one of my favorite columnists, as much for what he writes about as for how he writes. Today he is doing the whole world a great service by writing about the new president of the United Auto Workers, Bob King. It is a heartening column that everyone should celebrate.

And I celebrate Bob Herbert for writing about unions at all. One of the things wrong with this country is that those of us who aren't in unions don't hear nearly enough about what's going on with them. Bless you, Mr. Herbert.

Different Worlds

So evidently, as far as I can tell from posts on facebook, something has just happened to someone named LeBron James. I think he plays a sport, but I don't really know which one.

What is weird is how absolutely little I know or care about something that is clearly really important to a lot of people. Let me re-phrase, something that a lot of people care about. It's like a whole other world I've never been to or had the remotest desire to visit.

What is even weirder is that there are people, I assume, who relate to the world of current events (that is, actual political history) in this same way. They do not follow current events, have no desire to do so, and don't get why anyone would have a problem with that.

But I do have a problem with it. We inhabit different worlds, and I think there is something wrong with them never visiting this one and I think there is nothing wrong with me never visiting that one. Because politics are simply WAY MORE IMPORTANT than sports. Politics matter. Sports don't.

There. I said it. Probably nobody reading here is going to care. Because you live in my world. And even if you visit that other one, you have some idea of where I'm coming from. But then again, maybe some lost visitor from afar will be offended. Too bad. I said it, and I mean it.

Variations on a Theme

So I have to say it's a little weird that two major online publications have had articles about squirrels in as many days, but they have! And they're making me like squirrels more and more.

Today there is an article about whether animals like squirrels sweat. And there is the most interesting thing about their circulatory systems.

Supposedly their blood goes a different direction in winter than it goes in summer. In the summer, the blood that got cooled from their tails goes directly to their torso to bring their body temperature down. But in the winter, the blood mixes with the blood that been moving around in the squirrel's body to warm up before it goes back to the organs. Isn't that amazing?

I love squirrels.

"Squirrely" Can Be a Compliment

I think I've told you before that I like squirrels. Sure, we've had our moments, like when they run rampant through the ceiling of the church's Fellowship Hall or chew holes in the wall. And there was the brief period when I thought they were in the attic at home, but mostly, I like squirrels.

Evidently, I'm not the only one. A recent article in the NYT talks about how smart they are. They use "tactical deception" which some scientists used to assume was a primates-only skill. (They use it to trick other squirrels into thinking they buried a nut somewhere, when really, they're going to put it somewhere else.)

Anyway, yay for squirrels!

I Can't Believe I Haven't Told You This Yet

Really. It's a little shocking that this news didn't break through the craziness that was June to warrant at least a brief post. I got my first cavity last month.

It was a rather momentous event for me, never having had one before. What's funny is that I don't feel like I've taken particularly good care of my teeth. They came in late, which may have helped. I didn't lose my first tooth till third grade, and the last one came out by force when I had my wisdom teeth pulled when I was seventeen.

But I finally got a cavity, in the middle of my very back upper tooth. The filling was not even that dramatic, although my dentist is a liar who tries to trick kids into thinking that getting an "injection" is somehow different than getting a shot. It did too hurt.

I bring this all up now because I'm reclining on the couch with ice on my knee. Have I mentioned that I'm turning 35 this year? I'm beginning to think it means my warranty has expired. Teeth falling apart, bad knees, a week to recover from working too hard...

I was always kind of into the fact that I'd never had a cavity, stitches or a broken bone. I've still never had stitches or a broken bone, but I'm not holding my breath. I like to think of myself as Lucky (as you know), but there's no reason to push it.

And Now a Word from Some Other People...

You knew I wouldn't get through the month without posting some links to fill my daily quota, right?

And since I only have 17 minutes to make the July 5th deadline, I'd better do this fast!

Paul Krugman had such a great column that it got quoted as the headline on the Huffington Post. The line they liked was "coalition of the heartless, the clueless and the confused." It's not a bad line.

Frank Rich's Fourth of July musings on race in America are also very worth reading.

And finally, because I've been trying to encourage participation, perhaps someone could read the whole of this four-page article on a new economics book and comment on it here. The first page seemed interesting, but I got distracted and never got back to it. The authors studied 60 some economic crises over 800 years of history. My impression is that there were remarkable similarities, but I may have come to a conclusion way too early in my reading. The book is "This Time Is Different" by Carmen M. Reinhart and Kenneth S. Rogoff. He likes chess.

Enjoy!

The Bear Got Waked

So probably the beginning of July wasn't the best time for me to become a once-a-day blogger again. Because Patriotism season makes me crabby.

I was actually contemplating writing about how I truly love the version of "O Beautiful for Spacious Skies" that's in our hymnal. We sang it today, and it struck me how completely not inappropriate it is and how much I love it for that. It is a sincere prayer to God to make a beautiful country live up to its potential.

And then I thought about writing about something else, which I've already forgotten. So I guess I won't write about that.

But then, I was on facebook and came across this ridiculous statement.

"WTF Bluejays are playing on American soil at Yankee Stadium. and wearing the canadian symbol on jersey. The[y] should be fined and the team no longer should be allowed to play an american sport on american soil. It is the 4th our independence day."

Seriously? He's offended that the TORONTO Bluejays wear Canadian maple leafs on their uniforms on the fourth of July? Really? Because if we're having a holiday, the rest of the world ceases to exist? Or because they're here on our holiday, so they should pretend they're not from Canada, because their foreignness might threaten our ability to celebrate?

Someone had responded to him before I read this post, saying, "Haha they wear the red maple on their jerseys every game and at least they are playin on american soil, it would be un-american if they played in toronto. As much as I hate bud selig at least he did one thing right."

I'm not even sure how that makes sense.

And the original poster replied: "that is true but still dont wear the maple leaf on the 4th only out of respect"

Really!?!?! Really?!?!

I should have just moved on. But I couldn't. It was too stupid, too offensive, too ridiculous, too much. So I wrote this: "Just because we're having a holiday doesn't meant Canada doesn't exist or that they're not from there. I don't get why their having a national identity has any impact on whether we can celebrate or not. Perhaps you could find an actual injustice to be mad about?"

If he's offended by a Canadian team wearing a Canadian symbol, I can only assume he'll be offended by me defending them. Hopefully, he'll decide not to be my friend anymore. I don't have a lot of need to fight this one to even a draw. It's just too stupid. But it makes me grouchy enough that I just might. He shouldn't have waked the bear.

An Uneasiness with the Earth and Sky

I was thinking just now about how this time last year, we were in Nashville visiting friends. We took a special train into downtown to see what had been publicized as the country's best fireworks event. It was pretty cool. But mostly, it was rained out. The concert was cut off early. The fireworks started early. And the second deluge started as the grand finale was getting started.

It was quite an experience. The kettle corn, the cow ponchos, the Nashville PR video that repeated ad nauseum -- these are fond memories. (Well, not the video, but the rest of it.) But then I got thinking how the memories of that big rain must now be strangely distorted for natives by the horrible flooding they experienced earlier this spring.

And there are others. For some reason, it seems like this spring has brought more news of destructive flash floods than any other rainy season I remember. And the earthquakes. For a while there it seemed like there was one a week.

Hurricane and fire season has barely begun. There are so many ways in which the earth speaks to us, warning us to be more careful.

But instead, we have a huge oil spill in the Gulf. "Spill" is clearly not the right word for the gushing spout of destruction pouring into the ocean, but I haven't yet heard a word that works for me. I have mostly been feeling fairly resigned about that -- it will alter the world in ways that will be the new normal for the rest of my life. We can only begin to imagine what that will mean.

On this "Independence" Day, will we begin to notice how dependent we truly are? Will we work to partner with the earth, instead of confining and controlling it in ways that ultimately turn on us? Let us pray that wisdom and humility will prevail.

A Holiday Nod

The Fourth of July weekend is upon us, so I am compelled to be contrary once again. There are very few things that annoy me more than people who insist that we live in "the land of the free because of the brave."

I simply do not believe that Americans have the freedom we do because of soldiers. We have the place of imperial power in the world that we do because of our military might, but that has very little to do with the freedoms that we as individual citizens enjoy.

So here is my contrarian advice for the holiday: If you enjoy your freedom, thank a teacher. Thank a civil rights attorney. Thank the ACLU. Thank the government bureaucrats that others love to despise who spend thankless hours making things more fair than they would be otherwise. Thank a librarian. Thank an artist who's spent their career waking people up to the true threats to freedom. Thank a journalist. Thank the recent immigrants who come here believing our schtick and remind us who we're supposed to be. Thank the union organizers who work to keep us free from corporate tyranny.

Did I leave anyone out? Please let us know in the comments.

Happy In(ter)dependance Day!

Happy Canada Day!

In an attempt to get this blog going again, I am going to attempt to write a little something every day in July. I assume that most of it won't be very clever. But people who are really writers talk about discipline and habits and stuff like that, so maybe it will help.

There are a few things I am thinking about this morning.

1) Today is Canada Day. I like Canada. I also like Canadians. I also like to say that Canadians are from Canadia. And actually, I met the most air-headed Canadian I've ever known last week. She really seemed more like a Southern Californian. It was weird.

2) I worked as stage manager for a huge women's conference last week. It was exhausting. I worked, mostly non-stop, from about 7:00 am till about 12:30 pm for 6 days. When I got home, I slept for 18 hours, from about midnight till almost 6 pm the next day. Every day since then I've had to come home and take a nap in the afternoon before I could finish my work. People have asked me if I'd do it again. I certainly feel willing, but I'm pretty sure now that four years from now (when the event will happen again), my body will not be capable of that.

3) I was musing this morning about whether the number of people who use pictures of their kids or themselves with other people as their facebook profile is a sign of our social nature as human beings or a creepy unwillingness to recognize that children are not an extension of yourself. I find it annoying, myself, because it makes it harder to figure out who someone is. There are plenty of other places to post pictures. Then again, that's the only one a lot of people look at. And maybe there is something sweet about displaying that you're not yourself alone. Because we're not, right?

4) I am still having stage manager dreams. They have combined themselves with the projects I'm back at work on now that I'm home. Last night when I woke up and went to the little room, I realized I had been recently concerned about which side of the stage someone was exiting on. This was also sort of mixed in with which side of the bed I was getting up on. It probably made sense when I was asleep.

5) I got to have my most direct contact with the oil mess yesterday. A young man had come here from Hattiesburg, MS, because he'd been told he could get oil clean-up work here that provided room and board. It didn't work out, and he needed to get home, but had no money. I worked with the Baptists and the Episcopalians and we got him a train ticket home. There is a local organization that had trained people to help with clean up. When they got down there, they were just assigned to do things like pass out water. Within a week or so, they were all let go. My suspicion is that BP or whomever found out that it was a hell-raising community organization that had sent them (as opposed to a regular temp agency) and didn't want the risk of employing people equipped to be whistle-blowers. Corporations suck.

Update

I just wanted to say that I am still very much enjoying my alarm lamp. Even though it's summer now and the sun is up well before I need to get up (most days), it is still a better way to wake up.

There is a large, leafy gingko tree outside my bedroom window (as you've heard), so even though the sun's out, not that much light comes in during the early part of the day. (The window faces west too.) So the lamp coming on still makes quite a difference in the dim room.

I heartily recommend this system to anyone who wants a better way to wake up.

In other news, I'm starting to have bloggy thoughts again. I just haven't had time to write them down here yet. But I think that will come again soon. Meanwhile, I've been experiencing a strange aversion to putting certain things on facebook. Perhaps I'm going through a more private phase. Bizarre.

Finally, Some Good News for the Other Side

You know all those articles about how being happy will make you live longer? The ones that imply you should just decide to be happy in order to increase your longevity?

Well, in case that wasn't working out so well for you, here's another perspective: being grumpy helps you make better decisions. Straight from the BBC. (Figures it would be the Brits to discover this, eh?)

They do note that happiness is better for creativity, which brings into question the whole "tortured artist" thing. So I suppose us moody people must have the best of both worlds.

Bottom Ten

I'm back!

The huge anniversary event at my church was this weekend. The renovation project isn't totally done, of course, but the event is over. I am hoping this will mean I can get back to blogging regularly again.

For instance, last night on facebook I posted a note about the top ten things that rocked about this event. Facebook is a place for positivity.

My blog doesn't have to be. So here are the Bottom Ten Things about the event...

10. People were still mocking my attention to detail (which some people have the nerve to call micro-managing and others control-freakishness) even while we were getting all sorts of compliments for how well organized everything was.

9. A grand piano which was on its side fell over in the night and broke a window. (Technically, this wasn't an event happening, but without the project, the piano wouldn't have been on its side in the first place.) I am going to have to investigate this further because it's not very clear how it happened or who might have been there. But I know it hadn't happened as of about 7:00 last night. Honestly, I'm more annoyed about the window than I am concerned about the piano. It's been an albatross for years and needed to leave anyway. Perhaps now it will.

8. There were many coolers lent to the church for this event. Four of them were ours. Of those four, two had detachable lids. They are currently the only two lids unaccounted for.

7. My forehead has evidently decided to protect itself from the heat, humidity, sweat and sun by covering itself with acne.

6. In unlocking every door yesterday morning, I discovered a graffitti tag on the back steps we never use.

5. Hmmm....

Well, actually, that's about all I can think of to complain about. Whenever people say they can't complain when you ask how they are, I always say (usually silently in my head) "Sure you can. Try a little harder." I have a lot of respect for complaining. As a detail person, I am aware that complaints are one of the paths toward improvement. I'm pretty good at it too, so maybe that's why I like it so much. but truly, there was so much that was right about this incredible event, that I think I just needed to say these few little things in this relatively safe space, so that I can move on back to being amazed and grateful, which is what I am mostly.

I Miss You

I haven't been writing much at all lately. Not sure why, except for the extraordinary level of fullness in my brain and heart lately. There just hasn't been time to process or contemplate much of anything.

But I just wrote a comment on a post from last week, and then I got an email telling me that Lucky Fresh had commented on my blog. The name Lucky Fresh still makes me happy. So I'm sure I'll be back eventually.

Right now, the mantra is "We'll think about that after June." June being my congregation's 125th anniversary party and renovation blitz. I really do think there will be more time after that.

So I guess I'll just keep missing you. Do you miss me too?

New International Holiday

I'm pretty sure I mentioned this last year, but I really think we need to get a movement going to celebrate the three days from May Day (International Workers Day) through May 3rd (today - Pete Seeger's Birthday) as an international holiday devoted to peace and justice.

Think of all the wonderful things you could do with such a holiday.

This one is for my mother

Because big-time military brass agree with her: “PowerPoint makes us stupid,” Gen. James N. Mattis of the Marine Corps, the Joint Forces commander, said this month at a military conference in North Carolina.

Get the full story here.

And be careful. You don't want to get stupid.

I Am Not Alone!

At last, someone has said something sensible, out loud, about lawns! He does still mow though, but oh well.

There's even a rumor about starting a group called GWOTWOW! Which is an awesome acronym. It stands for Global War On The War On Weeds. heh heh

Even the comments on this one are great! (Which is so rarely the case it seemed worth mentioning.)

A number of weeks ago, I was admiring my neighbor's lawn, which was almost solid purple from Creeping Charlie. It was amazing. And the next day, it had all been shaved off! I almost cried out loud. What is the matter with people? (Probably they don't want the neighbors to talk about them like they must about us. There are 2 foot high "flowers" in our back yard right now...)

Art and Life

So I've occasionally looked at a painting and thought, "What a bizarre position for that person to be in! Nobody ever really stands/sits/lies around that way! What silly painters!"

But I'm realizing I should probably reserve judgment. Because I've noticed that sometimes when I'm tired or spaced out, I'll be in a totally weird "unnatural" position that isn't even comfortable, but I ended up that way for some reason and just stayed there, till the moment when I come to my senses and think, "Why am I sitting/standing/holding my arm this way? It's making me hurt/stiff/get tired."

And then I think of all those paintings and wonder. Did the artist realize it was a weird, uncomfortable, "unnatural" position? Were they trying to evoke those weird moments when our brain has left our body to its own devices for a few seconds? Or are they really just not very good painters who didn't do it on purpose?

Socially Unacceptable Thoughts about Weather Events

I know that the ash plume from the volcano in Iceland is causing all sorts of havoc with people's lives and potentially a health threat to people who need to breathe and stuff...

But there's part of me that roots for Nature when it does things that prove that we truly aren't in control.

The media reports I've seen have mentioned previous ash events of this scale. The difference is that they all happened before global air travel. I just saw that President Obama has had to cancel his trip to the funeral of the president of Poland.

Why should we ever assume our lives won't be disrupted? I mean, on the other hand, I'm not a huge proponent of "readiness" as it's called around here. I don't stockpile food and water, and I never got my plastic sheeting in case the local chemical weapons incinerator blows up.

But still. The earth is a lot bigger than us. It can do whatever it wants. (To completely inappropriately anthropomorphize it. But you know what I mean.) And sometimes we just have to deal the best we can. I should tell you the story about driving 19 miles in and 19 miles out of Indiana in 11 hours sometime.

Meanwhile, a friend in Germany, whose wife is Icelandic, is enjoying the lack of air traffic over their house. Less noise, he says.

Letter to a Niece from her Aging, Childless Auntie

[An unfair burden really, since she's only four, but her brother is not yet one, and men don't tend to do these sorts of things anyway, do they?]

When I am old as dirt, with no one but you to look after me, feel free to put me in a nursing home. I only ask one thing. Please get me a haircut first. Get me a radical, punky, spiky do that requires some really strong hair gel, but no actual styling. That way, I can do it while I'm in bed, just by rubbing my hands through my hair.

I've never had a spiky do, but I've always sort of wanted one. With any luck, my hair will grow courser so it will stick up better.

I wasn't a punk rocker in any previous part of my life, but why shouldn't I take the opportunity when I'm old? If you have a child who would like to dye my hair crazy colors, that will be okay too. Just not "old lady blue".

The gel will emphasize how thin my hair has grown (unless it doesn't, which seems unlikely), and maybe you'll remember how thick it used to be. You won't ever remember me without gray hairs, but I hope you'll remember there used to be a lot of it.

Don't let them take me to the beauty shop and give me a permanent wave. I've never understood why people who spend most of the day in bed get hairdos that smush so easily.

And if your brother does help out, he can bring me flowers. And someone could maybe come read to me, if my eyes go. Ah, but now I've wandered into the realm of trying to make it comfortable. And why should it be, really, this growing old thing?

If I can just have my hair spiky, I think I'll be ready for whatever it throws at me.

Pity you won't think I was serious.

Poem

I saw a girl today with shoes the color of hope.

It only looked a little weird, there on her shoes,
instead of perched on the budding trees where it usually lives.

I wonder if it makes her dance when the breeze comes?