Friday, October 28

Life of Seasons

My birthday will say 'gotcha' again in a few days. The decades keep unfolding like clockwork, each row of quilted squares revealing another 12 month snapshot. Not much left to discover at this point, but the colors are much brighter and filled with promises.

"O God, You have taught me from my youth; and to this day I declare Your wondrous works. Now also when I am old and grayheaded, O God, do not forsake me, until I declare Your strength to this generation, and Your power to everyone who is to come." Psalm 71:17,18.

Tuesday, October 25

World Series President


"Woodrow Wilson was a serious fan, and during his freshman year at Davidson College he played baseball. Wilson was the first President to ever attend a World Series, and he never once used his Presidential Pass — choosing instead to pay for every game he attended!" This program of the 1917 World Series game shows Wilson throwing out the ball, but the photo was taken the year before in Washington, D.C. when the Washington Senators beat the Yankees 12 to 4 in the first season game.

Just a little trivia you don't really need to know --- excess weight on the drag strip of life. Sorry.

Tuesday, October 18

The Circle Game

Joni Mitchell's earliest fare includes her best poetry and melodies. Her
Blue album combines youth's sad yearnings and loves with truly original music. Ladies of the Canyon featured the CSNY cultic Woodstock and the universal Circle Game.

The Circle Game paints life's seasons with a simple brush and captures little Angel with the words, "Yesterday a child came out to wonder.
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar.
Fearful when the sky was full of thunder,
And tearful at the falling of a star."
That's Angel and most little kids at five years young.

Thank you, Lord, for this gift of grandparenting.

Friday, October 14

Vicarious Viewing


With the world's daily woes increasing at home and abroad, our sypathetic nerves are stretched to the snapping point as we try to relate (compassionately, mind you) to every tragedy offered in the media. The current overload of major disasters pushes our stress buttons as never before, and we're thinking and saying, "those poor people" more and more.

We pray, send money, devour the news and try to get a true perspective of cause and effect and how it all relates to us. But eventually, living with this vicarious trauma starts to kill us, too, so we retreat to a safer place. Compassion seems to have a half-life. Probably better to be in the war, survive the floods, or be buried by an earthquake to learn what lasting and true compassion really mean.

Sunday, October 9

Brave's Old World

Poor Atlanta goes up in flames yet again as they battle their perennial battle fatigue. Losing to the Houston Astros in the longest inninged (sic) post season game ever, these once-hot bat boys just didn't have the spark to send them to the World Series ---- again.

Houstonians reveled in the glory as Chris Burke popped an 18th inning home run into left field. Veteran Roger Clemens closed the last three innings with four strike outs and a perfect bunt. The old man in him disappeared as he hefted Burke onto his shoulder during the field celebration. Then it was off to the locker room for champagne and lots of Icy Hot.

Congratulations, Astros. You'll probably be back here playing the Braves again next year.

Tuesday, October 4

Hey, Rich!

Rich C., I've lost your e-mail address. Please send me a note pronto, please. Thanks. Dave

Little Pig Dreams

Little 5 year old Angel doesn't scrimp on expression and matter-of-factly relates her last scary dream about being in a barn with 4 pigs. One of them was little and had a rectangular-shaped hole in its back so you could see its backbones. The little porker proceeded to chase her around the nightmare before the real world rescued her.

We probed for reasons and learned the source: she had been thinking scary thoughts that day. Out of the mouth of babes zings another golden tidbit of truth, and we have to ask ourselves, "what scary thoughts have passed through our own cranial crevices today?" The Scriptures tell us that dreams come from the day's events. Little snippets of life mixed with a depraved imagination and a large measure of fear combine for the fixin's of a perfectly horrible dream. An illogical, preposterous, out-of-character, fearful, crazy and often sinful collection of vivid video on steroids. Recurring themes, faces and memories reveal a secret part of us that we don't share with anyone else. Our consciousness usually erases the trauma during the day, but not always.

How intriguing that science dictates that a night's craziness is necessary for a normal life. Lord, deliver me from a normal life!