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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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!

"Lovely Rita, Meter Maid"

There aren't too many songs about Rita, but there will probably be more after this weekend as Texas and Louisiana pick up the pieces. It's time for the return of the ballad, like "The Ballad of New Orleans II," and "The Ballad of Poor Port Arthur."

Disasters are dominating the news, taking precedence over everything else. Two hurricanes punctuated by a JetBlue landing yesterday and a burning bus today. Colosseum stuff for some. Painful tears of compassion for others. Either way, most of us are addicted to tragedy --- as long as it's someone else's.

Out of the Blue

Of the thousands of lightning strikes here in the valley last night, one of them struck a poor woman going for a walk in Modesto. She's still alive and needs God's mercy as a lightning strike to the head has a way of changing your life forever.

Lightning storms were rare in Paso Robles in the 50's and 60's, I think. Mom would have us kids huddle in the hall until the worst was past. She grew up in Kansas. Thankfully, she didn't have us crawl under the house!

This is turning out to be the weather news year of the 21st century so far. Hold on to your emergency kit and keep that SUV filled with gas!

This Overtime Thing

"In 1967, testimony before a Senate subcommittee claimed that by 1985 people would be working 22 hours a week or 27 weeks a year or retire at age 38. The extra time each week could then be given to church involvement, reading a good book, strengthening the marital relationship, parenting the kids or volunteering for civic organizations. But instead the exact opposite happened. Boredom was predicted, but exhaustion is the reality." Richard A. Swenson, M.D.

This week's whirlwind of overtime, managing a temp worker and driving Barb here and there (Liz had our car while hers was broken down) all add up to that much loved word, 'stress.' Downsizing to skeleton crew status has affected a lot of businesses, including ours. When someone goes on vacation and we're swamped, the hair pulling begins as the more inexperienced goons take up the slack. So I was #1 goon this week, doing my regular job plus another added in for good measure. Sound familiar? They call it 'being flexible.' It's not in your job description, but 'cross training' has been secretly inserted into your contract whether you like it or not.

Am I complaining? Not when so many are out of work and live like peasants around the world compared to me. And God usually plans these times of exhaustion so I can pay for that unexpected and inevitable catastrophe. He gives me the strength (barely, but enough) to do it. It's little wonder everyone died so young 100 years ago. Their 12 hour days plus Saturday killed them early. We're all living on added time in the 21st century, even with the work stress. Quit complaining.

Barnes and Bobo

I dropped Barb off for her class at college before going across the street to our clannish culture center, Barnes and Noble. It's Bobo out of water whenever I enter these halls of hardcore highbrows. It's like going into a bar. People here and there, sipping a few words from a book and glancing around the place to see who's looking at them. "Please don't catch me looking at an art book or making a futile attempt to find a book on Church history or scrounging through the computer and sale books," says Bobo as he lowers his baseball cap. Must be his self-righteous self smelling up the place again.

The parking lot's fresh air and setting sun calmed old Bobo's uneasiness. "Let's not pretend we want to go there for awhile," he offered. "Fine by me, but, man, you're weird," I added as we jumped into the truck and hand signalled all the way home.

Andre the Giant

Jimmy Connors must be loving it as Andre Agassi waltzes his way to the U.S. Open Tennis finals at 35 years old. And that's REALLY old in tennis star years. Here's a picture of the puzzled winner, scratching his head and wondering how he did it.

So how's your tennis game? Are you hanging in there even though you're over the hill and in the bursitis woods? My wicked serve and forehand fossilized some years ago, but it was fun while it lasted. My great regret is not playing more and better, to peak at 35 or 40. The only thing to peak at when you're close to 60 is . . . a . . . let's see . . . oh, I forget!

The Blame Game: In the Crosshairs

As if you didn't have enough to wade through in Katrina's wake, I'll offer a few comments on current blame game. First, like 9/11/2001, this is another perfect opportunity to throw flaming criticisms willy-nilly in the name of political fervor. Poor President George gets the hottest nucular (sic) blast here as commander-in-chief of hurricanes and all other global warming disasters. With his feet to the fire, he is Enemy Numero Uno on the Bush-haters' list of culprits.

We can next blame the Army Corps of Engineers, the governors of Louisianna, Mississippi and Alabama, then the mayor of New Orleans, then the people who were unwilling to leave their homes, then the looters and killers, then the local dog catchers. And let's not forget to blame an American population that has rejected its Godly heritage. And speaking of God, shouldn't we add Him to the list? Isn't he the ultimate reason for these disasters in the first place?

"Then they shall know that I am the LORD, when I have laid the land most desolate because of all their abominations which they have committed." Ezekiel 39:29

"I am the LORD, and there is no other. I form light and create darkness. I make peace and create calamity. I am the LORD who does all these things." Isaiah 45:6b,7

"When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth. He makes lightning for the rain and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses." Jeremiah 10:13

"And when [Jesus] got into the boat, his disciples followed him. And, behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep. And they went and woke him, saying, 'Save us, Lord; we are perishing.' And he said to them, 'Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?' Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. And the men marveled, saying, 'What sort of man is this, that even the winds and sea obey him?'" Matthew 8:23-27

Leave sin and God out of the equation and your answers are just "blowin' in the wind."

Deja Varoom!

Okay, let's get this straight. You were making about $3.00 an hour in 1963, maybe a little more. I was making $1.00 an hour when I pumped gas in 1966. We payed about 35 to 40 cents per gallon for gas, maybe a bit less or more. Our cars got maybe 15 (my Mustang) to 22 miles per gallon on the highway.

Now most breadwinners are making from $15.00 to $20.00 an hour and paying $3.00 for a gallon of gas. For families with two incomes, that's $25.00 to $30.00 an hour or more.

The math is pretty clear. Gas is still pretty reasonable and we've been getting a free ride for a long time. The big problem now is owning two or more vehicles. One of them (that SUV tank) still gets about 22 miles per gallon and our houses are filled with ten times more 'toys' than our parents had. Oh, a lot of us drive over 10 miles one way to work.

The moral: We spoiled brats and fat cats need to start a starvation diet. Simplify your life and the necessities of life will take care of themselves.

That Brave Old World

Not too far down the road Americans will wonder what it was like to fill up the car at a gas station. The kids in the back seat will see abandoned pumps and ask, "Daddy, what in the world is that!?" Then Dad will launch into an extended story about the cost of gas in the 'last gas days' before the Oil Wars, and how his grandfather died in South America somewhere.

"Yeah, didn't they make a movie about that?" little Jetson will say. And his littler sister will reply with, "What's a movie?"