Feelings...♪whoa whoa whoa...♪feelings...

.

"Feelings...whoa whoa whoa...feelings..."
Young ones, Google it for that reference. Or take an elevator, anywhere. It will pop up eventually.

Feelings. Our very soul consists of them, invisible, powerful, ephemeral. The soul lies housed in the body, which creates endorphins, or enhances toxins, depending on how the soul disseminates the environment shaping the emotions. 
Your heart races at the sight of your lover, or it pounds at the sight of a nemesis. 
You can spring up in joy after winning the championship game!! or sink down to the depths at the death of a loved or respected one. 
Our body and soul literally function at the whim of our emotions.
Yet, from the time we can sit up, we begin receiving stern admonition to suppress, appropriately express, not regress to, and only address in private the very unseen mechanism that fuels our existence. 

Feelings house our memories, guide our decisions, shape our judgments.

As a society, we have no idea how to manage this mechanism emanating from others, save for social mores and norms. It varies with the generations. Kingdoms won and lost over a disagreement. Dynasties ruled by indifferent rulers, following a strict code. Puritanical views on emotion and sin shaped this country. " BE strong. " " Don't let the devil get you down." 'Idle hands make devil's work" In other words exhaust yourself to keep from thinking about how you feel.

A generation ago, we still taught our children to contain themselves, at least in public. Now public has lost all boundaries, and everyone, everywhere, has the right to free speech on social media. True. Awkward, but true. We communicate a thousand more times a day than folks did one forty years ago, and so our feelings receive a thousand times more speculation and assessment, causing us to doubt who we are and what we believe. 

Therein lies the dilemma.

Fervent emotions and passions have zero tolerance in "the real world" of business and commerce.( Unless, of course, you loathe your competition and pour your energy into either dismantling or surpassing his kingdom. At that point you have wielded passion into a profit margin and achieved the American dream by nefarious means, as opposed to the long-suffering way of planting and waiting for harvest. Either way takes passion.)

Emotions, generally perceived as weakness, don't get tolerated so much in the great big bouncy world of organized religion either -- unless it's the divine ecstasy of revelation, singing praise at the top of your lungs, or joyful tears in the richness of blessing. 
Crying in worship, sharing doubts, showing anger tends to be sshhhed! in the hallowed halls of the great sanctuaries. "Not here! This IS THE HOUSE OF THE LORD. No one wants to see you crying. God Loves you, honey! Cheer up! . < hmmm...I thought He loved me as I am??>

Every mainline church, and several rogues, should post a huge sign with this at the top

Only Happiness and Holiness Allowed
( experience not needed, will train )



Not to say we should share our life story at length, in church or elsewhere, but we do not exist in a vacuum. 

Our essence, who we are, lies in those very emotions. We sentient beings have that inherited right, as it gave us courage in the Neanderthal days to survive. 

We remain hard-wired to feel, not behave serenely in the face of distress. Even Queen Elizabeth, a lifelong model of stoic decorum, did not sip tea and sit princess-like, gazing demurely out the palace window as the bombs fell on London -- she raced through the streets of her bombed out nation retrieving soldiers as an ambulance driver. 

We certainly have social and civil requirements in interacting with others, addressing issues, sidestepping toxic waste -- and a certain self-responsibility in avoiding self-toxicity. 

Nothing hurts a loved one more than to hear their beloved loathing themselves. However, experiencing pain is not " from the Devil". Dispensing it, maybe. ( Don't want to give negative forces any credit, so let's get back to the so-called "sin" of emotion).

The Bible says we are created in God's image. Right there in the first few pages of Genesis, chapter 1, verse 27. The rest of the Bible references a God who floods the earth, sends meteors to destroy the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, lets His people wander in the desert for 40 years, slays a vast civilization with plagues, and then changes His mind to offer redemption. Sounds like every dynasty, kingdom, or corporation, ever...minus the redemption clause.

" We are made in the image of God." Seems we have been indoctrinated, over the centuries by the early Church ( formed in secrecy under oppressive governance), to believe/know that God is a remote judge who will hypocritically sent eye us to the depths of hell us for a) not attaining sainthood and b) by possessing the same emotions which we inherited from Him.
Indoctrinated to believe that emotion does not dovetail with devotion. Indoctrinated to believe that the same Creator who spent eons painting the universe in exquisite detail would condemn us for being the very creation formed in His hands. Indoctrinated to believe that an ancient "headstrong woman" condemned all women to pain and to bear the curse of humanity. Indoctrinated to believe that other people, who existed on earth at that same time, were somehow out of the realm of His creation -- not to mention the dinosaurs -- and that all of the angst of humanity hinged on one "sin" of eating a forbidden fruit. God is love. Absolute love. Love forgives, sees past mistakes, stills the waters.

Surely there has to be more to the story. Surely the tribal nomads who passed along the Judeo-Christian chronicles around the fires of their kinsman could have left out a f e w things over the years. Surely the coming of Messiah did not mean the end of passion. Surely it meant the onset of it. .

We possess intuition and perception for a reason -- not extraneously or something to be feared, like some emotional appendix buried deep within our gut, out of sight out of mind. Certainly not suppressed, simply because we have chosen to believe in God. The true meaning of salvation does not equal excision of emotion. 

It means celebration of it -- eternally! Beware of suppressing the authentic you. Everyone knows what happens if you ignore an inflamed appendix...

...so allow feelings into your heart, but don't let them build up. Bottlled emotions muddle the mind. Panicked minds shut down the frontal lobe, which in turn lead to attack mode at perceived enemies. Remember, our cache of emotions did not come equipped with an arsenal, so making prison shanks out of the ones you possess also has zero tolerance. Not cool. If you are in prison of any sort, it is by your own hand. Don't stab the ones who come to visit.

Abundantly allow feelings into your mind, combining them with the facts at hand to make informed decisions.Great theologians, especially the ones with the big auditoriums on television, will tell you that your feelings gain strength from the devil "whispering in your ear", and so you should " ignore your feelings... clear your mind... so you can hear God and God alone." Not bad advice. However...

...if the devil is close enough to you to whisper, you have more problems than your emotions.

God gave you those feelings. You inherited them from Him. Don't deny your inheritance by ascribing to "church face theology" in which no negativity is allowed. God had, and has plenty of negative emotions. Anger, sorrow, jealousy, remorse. He also abounds in joy, which counteracts all of those. You are a unique creation, and your emotions make up your spirit. 

That spirit DOES lead the flow of your thoughts, yes, so examine your negative feelings as though you would a splinter -- or more serious injury. Evaluate what need to be done to heal the wound, and give it the air and time it needs.


Let not others tape down unnecessary bandages which keep it festering, simply so your pain is out of their sight. Feeling sad, angry, jealous and vengeful is in your DNA. So also joy, excitement, charitable and gracious. Day-to-day emotions ebb and flow like the tide. All were given for a purpose, to help us learn of the wonderful creation that is us.


Be real. Do no harm, but be real. It's your divine inheritance, and also the crux of one of the greatest emotion of them all. Love.

♪ The Church is Not a Building, The Church Is Not A Steeple ♪

...The church is NOT a resting place...the church is people.

Three weeks ago I met up with some longtime friends ( we are actually old HA but young at heart, so...) at Starbucks. On Palm Sunday.

I had never missed a Palm Sunday church service in my life, until last year. Even the year prior, when my long-suffering eldest awaited a surgery that would either heal or end his life, we went to Palm Sunday, and then spent Easter in the ICU post-surgery.

That was the day I stopped going to church in my heart, because no one came to see us. No one. Church was more important to our friends and our pastors than the reasons they recite in the pews every Sunday.

I studied the Church for an entire year after that, ever my father's daughter in the quest for knowledge and basis in fact.

Once upon a time Easter was celebrated every Sunday. In fact the Catholics still celebrate Easter every time they take the Eucharist, one of the many ancient traditions perpetuated, along with many others, documented over the decades,  that we will not revisit here.

Used to be that folks celebrated by prayer and petition to be worthy of the Easter story weekly, giving cause  during the week to behave themselves accordingly OR confess their sins to such if not, just in case The Rapture happened whilst they were elsewhere than the sanctuary.

It was NOT the Once-A-Year-Eggstravaganza following a month-long Lenten Gloom-to-The-Tomb. The season when so many Protestant pastors work themselves into a frenzy vying for the market share of once-a-year parishioners with The Best Easter Sermon/Power Point/Praise Band Ever in the History of Mankind. The season after the dead of winter has passed,  when everyone who didn't get zapped for their year's transgressions sobs on Maundy Thursday in penance. The season to celebrate by dressing up and dropping inordinate amounts of money into the Easter Sunday offering plates in gratitude.

The Church became a business, after the Apostles were all martyred and couldn't stop them. The apostolic church, founded on spreading the Good News, cornered the market on guilt and demanding dollars for dispensations somewhere in the 4th or 5th century. Martin Luther nailing 500 theses against this practice 1,000 years later has not lessened the rush to fill the pews, be the best, show those (take your pick) Catholics Methodists Baptists Lutherans Presbyterians how to "reach the unchurched with love and grace and the good news of Christ.". Often, not always, code for, " raise more revenue to keep our building up and running."

Three weeks ago, we discussed all of this at Starbucks, which is not a church, although folks do bow to the goddess of caffeine there quite frequently. We discussed real love, real sacrifice, real forgiveness, most of which goes on outside of the church, which makes perfect sense.

No business model includes love, forgiveness, and sacrifice. Business models, according to MIT students  Weill, Malone,  D’Urso,  Herman, and Woerner in 2004, fall into these categories:
"(Creators, Distributors, Landlords and Brokers). Next, by considering the type of asset involved (Financial, Physical, Intangible, or Human), 16 specialized variations of the four basic business models are defined."

Which one does your church fall into? Hopefully none...but so many sadly do.

My granddad, born 109 years ago today, never had a big congregation ( probably much to the chagrin of my socially-driven and formerly wealthy grandmother). He pastored little tiny churches across the Midwest and in Colorado, tending to one small flock at a time, with his soft-spoken, sincere, level-headed wisdom which he sought from the worn Bible in his hand. His father had been a blacksmith. His mother, a bright-eyed wisp of a thing, quiet like her son, big-hearted, and faithful.

No mega church. No radio hour, no book signings, no gift store/coffee bar just across from the sanctuary. No 20,000 seat auditorium, no congregation tied to a General Assembly, General Conference, Presiding Bishop, none of that.

Just a quiet, heartfelt, never in your face ministry that touched countless lives, mine included, over 60 years.

I would love to go back to church. I don't know how. I am neither a huge financial contributor, nor am I needy. I don't ascribe to any dogma, and they all have it. I don't need to be nurtured, comforted, or surrounded by people who love me. I have that in my life. I'm sure I could learn so much more about God if I went back, but I'm also sure that what I would hear might, j u s t might be slanted politically or denominationally ( which go hand in hand these days).

I felt more spiritually nurtured by the non-church fellowship at Starbucks than I have in a long time. Like a kid at summer camp, away from tradition but still hearing the Good News.

The world needs more men like my granddad, who did not seek glory, did not force his faith on others, but simply lived to share it. The world needs more fellowship unfettered by denomination and the expectations assigned to each one.

The world needs Jesus. Not the Sunday School Jesus, or the Jesus Christ Superstar Jesus, but the Jesus who came to be born, live and die here, who never flipped the switch and struck up the band to get the show started. Instead He went quietly into the darkness.

The world needs Jesus.

Nelson, Ollie, and Jesus, Convicts All

I can almost hear the gasps (on FB and the HIDE button being slammed) as "people of faith" read this headline. JESUS WAS NOT A CONVICT!! HOW DARE YOU BLASPHEME THE SAVIOR???!!!

I'll get back to that...if you'll keep reading.


Recently I have been privy to a gathering of strangers singing together in public, not once but twice. No patriotic song at a sporting event, or hymns at a church service, but spontaneous choral singing of common melodies dear to our hearts for one silly reason or another.

While taking in the splendiferous "Saving Mr. Banks", the audience around me joined in unbidden to sing "Let's Go Fly A Kite", as actors portraying the brilliant Sherman brothers rolled out the finale for P.L Travers to consider.

A few short holidays later, the chatty crowd at the New Year's Eve celebration burst in to song nearly every time a new tune poured out of the sound system. Those who didn't know all the lyrics ( like me ) joined in heartily to swell the chorus.

We sing...we like to sing the same tune as those around us, for the most part, if the majority carries the melody. It gives us a sense of belonging, camaraderie, kinship even.

Humans tend to think collectively.

Primitively hardwired to unite against common enemies, we've banded together over millennia to combat saber-toothed tigers, dragons ( real ones -- check Job 41 or Google "Dragons in the Bible" ), opposing kingdoms, Huguenots or Catholics, Redcoats or Colonists,  Yankees or Rebs, Nazis or Allies, Communists or Capitalists ( again, depending on geography ), etc. etc.

We sing together or fight together depending on who and what we're listening to. With the exception of defending hearth and home against non-human creatures, every epic battle commences with a rallying cry for or against an idea, an idea or full ideology that an opponent espouses or rejects.

In our very recent history... Nelson Mandela, a statesman who brought his nation out of apartheid after serving nearly 30 years in prison, passed away and a global contingent of statesmen and women turned out at his funeral to laud his life accomplishments. Time tends to rewrite the script...because Margaret Thatcher referred to Nelson Mandela as a terrorist, and, in fact, he remained on the U.S. terrorism watch list until 2008, when then-President George W. Bush removed him from it. 

This past October Lt. Col. Oliver North visited the bookstore where I spend my days, doling out caffeinated beverages to a global cross-section in our university/military town. About the same time that PM Thatcher dismissed the African National Congress and "Mandiba" as typical terrorists, National Security Council Dep. Director "Ollie" North covered his backside by shredding documents and claiming the inability to recall facts when questioned about the Iran-Contra scandal. He was convicted and sentenced. Yet, over the last thirty years he has also become a national hero to many who honor his service to his country, despite his failings in the Iran-Contra affair. A New York Times best-selling author, once a criminal, now a hero.

Ollie North is no Nelson Mandela. They share the common passion of loyalty to their fellow countrymen, to the point of sacrifice. 

Back to Jesus of Nazareth. 

In our sanitized, Prosperity Gospel, Buddy Jesus culture, we have forgotten that Jesus of Nazareth served a three-day sentence, and was indeed a convict. Arrested, imprisoned, albeit briefly, and convicted of His alleged crimes. A conviction resulting in a crucifixion, the mort-du-jour of the Roman Empire.

We have forgotten that a deity deemed mere mortals precious enough to live among us, as one of us.

A deity who could have descended on a cloud of glory, ten thousand angels as His command, laying waste to anything unfit and establishing a kingdom on earth. Instead, He lived a quiet life building furniture in a Galilean town filled with fisherman and other lowly residents, in the shadow of Herod's palace, until His words and actions landed Him in Big Trouble. Did He defend Himself? No.

He served out His brief sentence leading to death, in silence. For His loved ones.

The very human Jesus broke Talmudic law any number of times, to include picking grain on the Sabbath, traveling with women, touching the unclean. (To date, there remain 39 edicts regarding Shabbat, alone, to include not using scissors, baking, and writing or erasing two or more letters. I'm breaking that law a dozen times over typing this blog on the Sabbath. That's 39. Just for the Sabbath.) There are a gazillion others, including the type of fabrics one might wear, the attendance by fertile women to a mikva/bathing facility to become COMPLETELY clean, separate utensils. Etc.

Later on, more men wrote the myriad number of Catholic edicts on Holiness (and Hell If You Don't Follow Them), and the Protestants followed suit substituting grace and peace for such strict discipleship. Ad nauseum.
God did not write those 'laws'. Men did. God only handed out 10, setting a course for civility and honor among His people.

The rebel Rabbi Jesus' ultimate arrest did not end in a conviction for those particular crimes against the Sanhedrin edicts -- yet the Pharisees pushed for the local governor to convict and execute Him as He threatened their well-established religious hierarchy and tradition. They whipped the mobs into a frenzy encouraging Pilate to "Crucify!!". He was indeed, a criminal in his society. They got the people to sing a common song...and some of them didn't even know the lyrics, or why they sang. They joined in the chorus, as we often do, aligning ourselves with people we respect.




It took thirty years for Mandela to be revered and remembered as a great hero, a wide shift from his 'terrorist leanings'. It took thirty years for Ollie North to evolve into a hero instead of a evil conspirator.

Both of them paid for their present hero-status. Jesus paid with His life.

In the thirty years since graduating from high school, while socio-political paradigms shifted, I've observed Jesus of Nazareth, believed to be the Son of God, reduced to:
  a character on Saturday Night Live;  a preferred baby Jesus, prayed to by an irreverent ass in a movie; twice-a-year spectacular glories at Christmas and Easter; a cartoon figure on Facebook;
a bobble-head doll in retail stores;  a Sunday morning/Wednesday evening/faith retreat Warm Fuzzy Addictive Fix to get us through the Evil Secular World Until We Get To Heaven and The Heathens Go To Hell.

The very common carpenter-turned-criminal, who inspired the verse, " greater love has no man than he who lays down his life for a friend"  has often been reduced by popular culture to the same ranks as Mandela or North.

A news story of a fallen hero. A "celebrity sighting" at a church or Christian concert. My Buddy Hero Jesus, with ten million Likes on FB.

What other religion has reduced their god to such humble esteem, even if he did arrive and live humbly? Only our comfy, cushy, American Christianity.

He was a man. And a Messiah, who saved people. Not by magically redecorating the world into fileds of flowers and butterflies, but by performing simple acts of kindness... and to those who believe, One who will save them from eternal death.

A simple man, embodying God, who preached love, healed the sick, ate with sinners, turned over money-grubbing stalls in the Temple, giving up His life for a singular purpose -- fulfilling 414 Old Testament prophecies to the letter. He lived, ate breathed, broke the law like we do -- speeding and such.

A simple man who loved in an unknown manner. Unconditionally. No 39 Rules for the Sabbath.

10 Commandments to honor and respect God and others, and one invitation.

Just... "believe in Me".

That common carpenter-turned criminal remains the singularly most studied figure of all time. Whether you believe Him to be Messiah or not, He's worth getting to know.

What have you got to lose? In thirty years, you might think differently about Him, too. :-)

The Spirit of '76 Hallowe'en

Halloween, 1976...

Unfamiliar curls in my stick-straight hair bobbing, with my little sister Alyson and a few other younglings keeping up with my hasty pace, the gypsy-to-be in me skipped/raced for once to Mrs. Hayward's b o r i n g 6th grade classroom. The great granite boulders of the hillside looked coolly down upon us, and the palm trees waved us along in the fresh autumn air. Gripping paper sacks with our costumes in our sweaty hands, we raced over the train bridge, and two long blocks down, joined up at the corner of Jurupa and Riverside Ave with dozens of other paper-sack grippers en route to school.

Our feet crunched the bushels of fallen pods, along Briscoe Street, under the canopy of pod-laden Limburger cheese-scented carob trees while the sacks' contents met with approval or disapproval amongst the walkers.

The morning dragged on inexorably through a bog of spelling lessons, math drills, and chapter readings.

Bursting forth from all exits for lunch and our longest recess like a flock of sparrows, we kids tittered and chirped during foursquare, tether-ball, and on the big concrete pipe under the pepper tree in anticipation of the parade. The teachers in our modular class block headed for their lunch break in varying stages. Mrs. Sompayrac snuck off to the gate by the parking lot to grab a quick smoke with Mrs. Ryno during the exodus, Mr. Stephenson popped his head into Mr McGoon's to tell a bad joke, and Mrs. Hayward and Mrs. Bates ambled slowly to the teacher's lounge in weary anticipation of the 33rd Halloween Parade of their teaching careers. At that same school, no doubt.

It took approximately 128 hours in kid-time for them to return, after the bell rang, as we all lined up in boys' and girls' lines at each door, poking each other and engaging in general grade-school stupidity.

 Finally, finally, the gaggle of upper grade teachers were spotted -- walking as though to execution down the long covered sidewalk from the office, past the library doors, and disbanding reluctantly with great jangles of keys in hand to their respective doors.

It took approximately 5.3 seconds for every kid in the upper grade block to bust out their own paper sack, as soon as the word was given, and costume up.

My unfamiliar curls had somehow miraculously lasted through the day, thanks to copious amounts of Dippity-Do and my mother's Final Net hairspray lacquering them in place. My colorful skirt (snagged from my older sister Karen's closet), her hand-me-down white fluffy peasant blouse, strands of my mother's costume jewelry, and a big colorful scarf holding back my curls greeted me as I checked my gypsy-image in the wavy mirror over our classroom sink. I'd been given some old mascara, for the occasion, from Karen, and my lashes darkened ever so magically in that fluorescent light. Transformation not yet complete, I held a tiny sample tube of bright-red lipstick from the Avon Lady's most recent visit with my mother. As I applied it I thought of my mother and every Avon Lady in my childhood looking at lipsticks, over cups of fragrant tea.

The girl in the mirror became suddenly beautiful. The awkward sturdy girl with a giant forehead and big shoulders and big teeth disappeared into a vision of gypsy loveliness. Blonde curls bobbing, red lips smiling, the for-once-in-my-life-pretty-as-BeckyBottel-in-the-class-next-door beautiful. My gypsy feet floating, I  paraded out with the class for the school festivities.

From the sidelines, as the Oldest Kids in School, we 6th graders had to fawn over the kindergartners, which were too cute, the first graders -- among whom my sister dressed-as-a-fairy-Alyson numbered -- and then the rest of the young ones, until it was our turn to stroll along in the last Halloween Parade of our Official Childhood. We strutted and sauntered through the halls, at the lofty ages of eleven and twelve, owning the moment. Having skipped kindergarten, I was ten, yet still sauntered in my gypsy-euphoria as though I were as old as my peers.

The euphoria lasted through the evening, at least for me, when my dad let me go with a gaggle of my older peers, on our own to trick-or-treat, way down on Sunnyside. He had escorted me with Alyson on our own cul-de-sac and up on Pachappa Drive, skipping Dr. Kushell the Dentist who gave us apples and lectures on good dental hygiene. ( You'd think he'd be happy in the rise of business after such an event...) We had to solemnly swear to stay in the horseshoe ( a great curving of streets leading back to the walkway, which led to OURS) and then we were off. Margaret Kish, aka the Wicked Witch of the West and Jeff Cassidy,  dressed as Einstein of course with that shaggy hair, and a few others raced down the seriously scary-at-night walkway which gave passage from the canal bridge on our street to the neighborhood below.

Between two fence lines spanning the length of  back yard/house/front yard, we held our breath and thundered through the inky darkness expecting to be murdered any second by Unseen Forces Behind the Slats.

Emerging unscathed, with pillow cases in hand,
we plundered every trick-or-treat bowl offered along the way.
Both sides of the 1950's-built neighborhood of comfortable one-story homes witnessed our journey, including hitting the two houses on the short segment exiting to busy Riverside Ave. Briefly considering doorbell opportunities along the homes half way up the block on the Forbidden Outer Street, we turned inwards, back into "the horseshoe" as promised, to pinball back and forth up Mono Drive and out onto the OTHER side of Sunnyside, right by the gate to our old playground of our former school. Now home to what were then-labeled TMR students
(trainable mentally retarded), we glanced over, momentarily saddened at the locked gate to OUR PLAYGROUND.
 Short-lived reminiscing gave way to Our Mission.
We soon cheered up as we made the final dashes back and forth towards home.

Once again surviving the seriously scary walkway, Jeff promising to get Margaret safe to her house as the bottom of his seriously scary hillside driveway, I ran down my now-empty street.

Was it midnight? How long had we been out there??? Creepy noises creaked from behind the cypress trees at the corner house. I scrambled past our next door neighbors' house because they freaked me out during daylight, charged through our front door armed with my loot, and safely shut it behind me.

Sitting under the billowing hood of my mother's beauty-case hair dryer like a mouse under a mushroom, Alyson looked at my pillowcase containing unknown treasures. Her big brown eyes bugged out.  She had already sorted out her candy, put away her fairy costume, and taken her shower. The antiqued-olive green kitchen clock read 8:15!! I had never been out that late on a school night! Without parents!!

I snuck her a few fun-size Milky Ways to enjoy while her hair dried, stashed some others  in the folds of my gypsy skirt to stash in my room -- then dumped the rest into the big wooden bowl for my mom to inspect, my dad to plunder, and for me to pretend to limit myself to two pieces a day until consumed.

Halloween, 1976. ♪ Those were the days...♪

Aurelius, a pecan tree, the American dream

Yesterday this scene emerged in varying shades of grey, on a rainy cold morning. An hour ago, soft morning sunlight gilds the towering pecan, creating the illusion of autumn on yet-green leaves. 

Minutes later the light reveals the 'true' color of the leaves, which, as every second grade science student should know, appear green due to chlorophyll  (reflecting green in light). Late this afternoon, the branches will appear black, silhouetted against the setting of the sun.

Second graders also know the only true light comes from the sun, and that Thomas Alva Edison managed to invent a device to create artificial light, which we utilize in proliferation to this day. In so many regions, our man-made illumination blocks the stars from view during the night. 

We've created cities shimmering with artificial starlight. Night falls in the big city: skyscrapers reflect the glitter of signage advertising enticing venues; streetlights and security lights billow clouds of light into the heavens while protecting the millions of inhabitants scurrying around at all hours of the night. 

Granted true light for a portion of each 24-hour turn of the earth, and powering our own illumination for the other, we generally use light to see things in a manner in which WE want them to appear. It's all perspective. What our mind accepts as reality and truth remains eternally subjective to timing, weather, and perspective. How we see and understand remains completely at the mercy of  the weather or events surrounding us, and where, why, and who we are. "Everything we see is perspective, not the truth. " Marcus Aurelius 

Case in point. A southerner might see this pecan tree as a source of holiday pie offerings, crunchy bites of pecan deliciousness in a glazed delirium of sugar and butter. City tree crews might see it as a nuisance to power lines, while environmentalists embrace it as a gift of life-giving oxygen and sustenance, never to be touched.  

From the ground, a lofty haven for chattering squirrels just out of reach from guard-dog Labradors. From 30,000 feet up, a speck on the passing prairie below the clouds.   

Regardless, this pecan remains a pecan tree in any light or shadow, windy, rainy, snowy, or sunny day, until such time as it evolves into firewood or furniture. Light cannot morph it into an apple tree or an ash, nor can rain rearrange its' atoms into a palm, nor can wind reshape it into a rose bush, mesquite tree, or anything else. Long ago, a pecan dropped into the ground by chance or design. There it grew and flourished. So it shall remain until it is removed. 

America grew as the pecan did. Planted, watered, harvested again and again. Perceived in a myriad of ways, from foreign observations to domestic grumblings and accolades. Seen as a bountiful source of life, a nuisance, a lofty haven for lofty chattering persons. A territory still fought over, harbored greedily, held for ransom in domestic political battles. 

Yet America itself remains constant. Mountains soaring into the heavens, deserts stretching, plains reaching, forests teeming with life, oceans lapping at the shores. Ever beautiful in sunlight, shadow, ice, heat. Ever sought after, lustily, by explorers, settlers, politicians, and enemies alike. Ever divided by her own settlers, as to how to live within her borders, and by whose rules. Ever squabbled over as to the rights of so and so, instead of working together to honor the privilege of all. Working together to honor America. 

"Oh beautiful for spacious skies for amber waves of grain for purple mountain majesty above the fruited plain
America! America! God shed His grace on thee, and crown thy good, with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea...

O beautiful for glory-tale, of liberating strife, When once and twice, for man's avail, men lavished precious life. 
America! America! God shed His grace on thee, Till selfish gain no longer stain the banner of the free.

Oh beautiful for patriots' dream that sees beyond the years, thine alabaster cities gleam, undimmed by human tears
America! America! God shed His grace on thee, till nobler men keep once again thy whiter jubilee..."

Keep dreaming. One day, we will wake to a new dawn where nobler men keep once again a whiter jubilee. 

two score and four years ago

My oldest son Randall, my niece Rachel, and Jon's #4 (out of five) daughter, Hope, all arrived in 1989. Rand showed up in time for Mother's Day, after a L O N G last three weeks of expectations HA. Rach and 'HopeE' arrived within 4 days of each other in September. :-) 

Sweet, sweet, sweet babies. The world at large...turbulent year, much?

•The Exxon Valdez oil spill in which the tanker hit Prince William Sound’s Bligh Reef and spilled an estimated 11 to 30 million gallons of oil on March 24. 

•Salmon Rushdie published  The Satanic Verses.  Ayatollah Khomeini ordered a ‘fatwa’ on him – a command ordering followers of the Muslim faith to kill him. The fatwa was lifted in 1998.

•Students protested the Chinese government, at Tiananmen Square, filling public spaces with masses of citizens in early June. No one knows what happened to “Tank Man”, who stood in front of government tanks .

• The Loma Prieta earthquake struck San Francisco minutes  before Game 3 of the World Series, flattening roadways, destroying neighborhoods, claiming lives.  

•Major League Baseball all-star, Pete Rose, gambled on the Game as a manager. The all-time leader's glorious reign came to a tarnished end. 4,256  hits, 3,562 games played, 14,053 at-bats, 10,328 outs still stand in the shadows of Charlie Hustle's gambling hustle. Unless decided otherwise, Rose won't ever be entered into the MLB Hall of Fame at Cooperstown.

•NBC carried the #1,#3, and #4 most popular television shows, with the second runner up from ABC. "The Cosby Show", a jazz-loving obstetrician with an attorney wife and hilarious kids in a posh brownstone, played against "Roseanne" -- chronicling an overweight blue-collar couple raising obnoxiously hilarious kids in  middle-class America . "Cheers", a Boston tavern, housed an ersatz family of one-lining lonely middle-aged adults. "A Different World" showcased the college lives of  one of the Cosby Show kids  and her counterparts,Yuppies all. 

Like the Griswolds in 1989's "Christmas Vacation", women sported big hair, over-sized geometric jewelry, and quarterback-sized shoulder pads in all of our clothing. Even our T-shirts, for crying out loud. Sweater patterns, male and female,  ranged from prim polka dots to abstract mayhem ; men wore wildly printed genie-type pants or equally broad-shouldered suits or equally bad sweaters, and we all wore these types of eyeglasses. 

Two score and four years ago, Randall James, Rachel Christine, and Hope Elaine, you were each welcomed into this crazy world by sets of parents who loved you, despite our bad hair and seriously horrid fashion choices. ( Rachel's dad, my brother Kirk, and the Hopester's pop, Jonathan, never really made any bad fashion choices. HA ) We meant well. We still do, even if some of us are a quarter bubble off plumb. ( Not naming any names, since mine would be in the mix. HA )

Two score and four years later, this insane culture seems to have run amok. Take heart. This world runs amok all the time. Look at the elimination of the dinosaurs, the Dark Ages, the Crusades. Then look at the Age of Enlightenment, the American Revolution, the astronauts on the moon. 

While you grew up, the Hubble telescope launched, the Berlin Wall came down, apartheid ceased, dictators were deposed. As mortals, we often look bad in retrospect, yet we make improvements moving forward. 

Here's to the next 24 years, 1989 Trio and your counterparts.  May you each have the ability to look back and laugh at folly and success, silliness and strength,  and learn from triumphs and also turbulence. 

Be blessed. 

sea scents

Bargain shopper that I am, I picked up a pack of blue crabs on Friday in the seafood case, in the Day Old Fish section. HA Not Yet Day Old, and 40% off! Snapped them up with a portion of sockeye salmon, and popped in the freezer upon arriving home.

Yesterday I put on a crab boil for my lunch. ( My sister Alyson and I each fell in love with men who do not happen to share our love for seafood/fish, so we indulge when they are away. :-) It works out for all of us. ) I have never prepared a crab boil. Dunno if I did it right, and don't really care. I liked it. :-) Corn cobbettes, little blue crabs, a slice of fried bacon, some clam juice, pepper, and potatoes. Jumbled the steaming assortment in a big soup bowl, dabbed all in real live butter, and ate heartily, thinking, "Ahhhh... the smell of the sea." 

Briny, earthy, salty. Took me back to childhood days, bobbing along the jetty at Corona del Mar on the Southern California coast, checking out the mussels clinging tightly to the rocks at the base of the mile-high structure. Unseen, over on the other side, yachts and sailboats floated out of Newport Harbor out to sea while I scraped my knees on barnacles, poking at sea anemones when the tide went out.

Took me back to the homecoming Jonathan and I shared in the fall of 2011. Bob Seger softly wailed, "down on Main Street..." while we breathed deep of surf-spray and sea scent, along the palm-lined Carlsbad avenue. "Ahh, the lovely funk of the ocean," my practical man remarked, and I giggled, at him, and the apt description. Lovely funk it is. Beach air. Lovely Funk. It is lovely, and it does funk...but in a delicious way. 

I suppose it could be labeled "Sweet Sea Sweat" if one could make scented candles of it. Not such a great marketing idea, but accurate. I suppose Sweet Sea Sweat would NOT entail a lucrative endeavor. No, not so much. Candles scented with real beach air wouldn't sell. At all. Those labeled WITH sea-supposed scents rarely smell of the sea. Laundry, laundry, or laundry lingers in the air after one breathes in supposedly sea-scented wax.  Yankee Candle offers one that comes close, mostly smelling of  Coppertone lotion -- like saltwater taffy. Not the lovely true funk of the coast. 

Yeah, no. True cents of shell smell, seawater, mussels -- no market for stinky scents in the home fragrance realm. After all, Stink-Elimination IS the intended purpose of the home fragrance realm. Roses, raspberries, vanilla, lavender. Flowery, fruity, fresh-baked. Fishy? 

Mmm mmm nope. No roses or raspberries along the rocks of the jetty. Only salty/sunny/sandy scent memories. Happy ones. So true for the scent of the sea in my recent culinary adventure. Closest to home I could get out here on the prairie. 

This morning I retrieved the crab-boil pot from the refrigerator to shell the remaining corn and crab meat. Pulled off the heavy lid, and the 'beach air' rose into my kitchen like a welcome friend. Straining the butter-bacon-clam-crab broth into a freezer container, I thought lovingly of all the Good Days at the beach back home. Away from work, away from school, away, away, away, in a rare retreat from reality. I cradled corn cobbettes in my hand to shell, dug my fingers deep into the sharp shells of the now orange-y blue crabs while my memories plopped into the briny broth with the boiled bits.

Sun on my skin, sand under my feet, surf drumming a slow, inexorable, hushed heartbeat on the curved stretches of coastline. 

Good days where friends and I played in the water, achieving the Perfect Tan with Hawaiian Tropic; later my kids and I jumping the waves, making drippy castles, finding hermit crabs. Happy days with my nieces and nephews, their perfect little-kids-skin glistening with saltwater, their eyes bright, and their seaside naps deep with the hush of the waves. Hours spent on the end of the jetty with a friend, watching the water swirling among the rocks. 

If I close my eyes today, all those years later, I can still see the water rushing and bubbling and lapping around my feet. If I close my eyes today, I can see the palm trees against the blue sky and feel Jonathan's hand in mine as we went home, together, two autumns ago.

When next I pull the frozen corn-crab broth from the freezer, to thaw and simmer; add milk, butter, and more potatoes for chowder, I'll be 'home' again. For a few moments.

Lovely Funk. Better marketing. :-) Sweet Sea Scent. As Anne Morrow Lindbergh would say, a gift from the sea.