hot hot hot friday five

RevGals Meme ...
Many areas of the United States are having a heat wave. Global warming, anyone? Look on the bright side of melting glaciers and enviro-destruction by taking a crack at the Friday Five:

1. What's the high temperature today where you are?

Wowzers ... it's supposed to be 90. But who know's what the heat index (that's the "feels like" temperature) is going to be

2. Favorite way(s) to beat the heat.

Is there anything besides air conditioning?

3. "It's not the heat, it's the humidity." Evaluate this statement.

Humidity sucks the life and oxygen out of everything. Here's how it works. Hydrogen comes sashaying along wearing sexy perfume and a lowcut dress. She sweet talks Oxygen into a romantic night on the town. Before you know it they've run off to Vegas for quickie marriage and just-our-luck it lasts. Since there are 2 Hydrogens for every Oxygen we have to assume they are into polygamy! Humidity is actually a sin.

4. Discuss one or more of the following: sauna, hot tub, sweat lodge, warm-stone massage.

Saunas are wonderful, awesome inventions ... the only exception being when you step out your front door and find that the entire out of doors has been turned into a sauna. Then ... they stink. Saunas are especially wonderful after a swim in the winter. Hot tubs are equally wonderful inventions.

5. Hottest you've ever been in your life

102 ... I think.

Or maybe it was when I used to go out clubbing with my friends ... I was pretty hot back then.

Non-temperature related bonus: In your opinion... who's hot? Johnny Depp ... ummm hm.

Lemons

I've used that old hack, "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade." so often that I've forgotten what lemons taste like. I've incorporated it so deeply into my life that lemons just automatically become lemonade. For many years I've thought that to be positive was a good and necessary trait. This morning I realized it's not always so. I think that it's a tragedy of our culture that we do not allow ourselves to engage with the lemons before turning them into lemonade. To feel them, smell them, taste them ... in short allow ourselves to feel whatever pain we need to feel in order to move on.

In April of 1998, LightHusband suffered what we thought was a short term back injury. It turned into a three year odyssey which included weekly doctor visits to Walter Reed, a year and a half on convalescent leave and high-powered narcotics. His condition remained undiagnosed for more than two-thirds of that time. Many of the treatments actually aggravated his condition and made it life-long. Much of the time he couldn't sit or stand for more than ten minute periods. The children were quite small; it began shortly after LightBoy's first birthday and we knew we were finally out of the woods around his fifth birthday. It was, to put it mildly, a nightmare.

We met way back when. Way back when we were both enthralled with fife and drum music. He was in The Old Guard Fife & Drum Corps. We both belonged to a civilian corps. We wrote music together, put together shows, wrote marching drill, taught students. But mostly we dreamed about the day when he would retire from the Army and we'd go back to New England with our own children and march in a fife and drum corps back there. That dream was shattered forever in April of 1998. He will never ever be able to march again. He can barely play his snare drum through a song or two without being in pain for several days. We're still enthralled with the music. I love to play. I'm still quite good, the fingers remember. But how can I? It just hurts too much.

The Israelites called it "mara" or bitter water. I think it's lemon water ... lemonade with no sugar. I'm learning to experience the lemons; to feel the pain in order to move on.

Hard To Define, That

I'm experiencing that rarest of gifts for a parent, peace and quiet. The LightChildren are visiting their grandparents for two weeks. They are with my parents this week, and with LightHusband's parents next week. They are in Vermont. We are here. Ahhhh. I love those two dearly, but sometimes they leave me with my ears bleeding from all the words I have to hear. The ramp up to this trip was hair-raising. I have to apologize to the BrickDude. He and his lovely wife, GoldenGirl, came to visit and trade cars with us the evening before the LightChildren left. There came a point in the evening when both children were talking at the same time, in ever increasing volumes, about different subjects to BrickDude. It was horrifying. He handled it with aplomb. But they left shortly thereafter.

The next day, packed and ready to go, we set out for the airport. We stopped for lunch at a favored Indian restaurant. We got to the airport with plenty of time to spare for any "unforeseen circumstances," such as identity needs, long lines, who knows. Nothing happened. There were no "unforeseen circumstances." With one tiny exception. We checked the LightChildren in at the ticket counter, checked their luggage, filled out the "unaccompanied minor" paperwork, had a lovely chat with the ticket lady (who was very kind and just the tiniest bit frazzled when her key got stuck in the drawer) and then she spoke the words of doom in the most cheerful voice imaginable, "So, which ONE of you will be accompanying the children to the gate?" Me (reeling and looking around and the millions of people and imagining shepherding the children through the masses of evil humanity alone ... and remember my lingering panic disorder which gets worse in crowds): "Ummm ... One? You mean BOTH of us can't go with them?" Cheerful Ticket Lady (who's name was Eva): "Oh no, I can only allow ONE of you to go. So who will it be?" LightHusband is rather desperate to relieve himself of the duty because he had spent all morning with them while I went to a guild event and his ears were bleeding. Really. But I. Just. Could. Not. Go. I also could not stay and not go with my dear children. In the end, LightHusband graciously gave way and allowed me to stay back. We dawdled around as long as is possible in place that is so clearly NOT designed for people to wait. There are no places for sitting, only places for standing in line or walking. One is clearly expected to complete one's business and go on one's way here; do not dawdle.

In the end, I found a Cinnabon stand, purchased a tasty treat, a cup of coffee and a couple of magazines to read. It was interesting to me that when he got to the gate LightHusband also bought a magazine to look at. He got Food & Wine. This is a fun magazine. What do I get when I have a few hours to myself in a busy airport? The Economist, U.S. News & World Report, and another magazine about living green. That's sad; it says something about my inability to relax.

On the other hand, I really enjoyed my little piece of time to catch up on some reading about world affairs. It's a passion of mine that I've had little time to indulge since the advent of children in my life. I've even gone so far as to subscribe to the on-line version of The Economist. I used to read it frequently, now I'll be able to again.

I spent most of my time reading about the current crisis between Israel and Lebanon. It's a situation that is heartbreaking. Lebanon was just struggling back to her feet. There are times when I'd like to give Syrian president Assad a real talking to. Seriously, the Syrians need to own up to the underhanded work they are doing. A small splinter group in Lebanon has demolished it yet again. The picture that went with the article made me cry.

Then I read this sentence or two:

On each of these fronts the fighting was precipitated by an audacious attack on Israel's army by fighters belonging to extreme Islamist groups that combine the functions of armed militias—“terrorists”, says Israel—and elected political parties.

The phrase, "armed militias," caught my eye. We bluster on here in the U.S. about our highly touted "War on Terror." But what was the Revolutionary War? It was many groups of "armed militias" using guerilla tactics against a much larger, colonial power who was trying to take away freedoms that our forefathers thought they had a "right" to.

I'm not sure how far out we or I can draw this analogy, but I have to wonder what tactics our forefathers would have used if they had had the weaponry at their disposal that the Arabs do today. I wonder if we were British would we consider them heros? or terrorists? Just what does it look like when it's your land, religion and way of life that is at risk?

It's really hard to define, that.

What a Blast!

There has been an ongoing "discussion" between LightHusband and I.

I maintain that words have precise meanings. That they should be used within those meanings. I love words and I love to use them properly and appropriately. I think that being able to communicate well and clearly is a fine art. I enjoy this.

LightHusband, on the other hand, likes to play fast and loose with his words. He throws them around willy-nilly. They fall from his mouth in a waterfall.

Here's a current debate. We both love to use WeatherUnderground to look at the weather forecast. We look at the radar blast.

He is fond of saying, "Look! The radar says there's not a cloud in the sky. But there's clouds all over the place." I respond with, "The radar measures precipitation, not clouds. Therefore, the clouds will not show on the radar blast. They'll show up on the satellite scan."

He waves me off with a sigh, "Oh! You're always so precise." I roll my eyes and think to myself, "Well, isn't that the point?"

Random Thoughts in the Heat of Summer

Overheard at my quilt bee on Monday morning, "I'm not on a diet. I'm done with it. I'm just focussing on drinking water and walking every day. I figure at age 45 it's time for me to start liking myself and how I look." I loved that.

This morning during a discussion of what clothes LightGirl has and what she needs to take to camp at her grandparents, she surprised me with this, "I don't like to wear shorts, Mom. I have fat legs. Especially up here." and she indicated her thighs. And my heart shriveled and died for her. "She's only twelve," I thought, "I've done my best, I don't want her to have that voice in her head." I wanted to weep. I hope it doesn't take her til 45 to learn to love herself. How does our culture do this to our girls?

Yesterday LightHusband and I went to the grocery store around supper time. Well, it was before supper because we needed to get food for supper. We also needed milk and stuff. Like envelopes, because our envelopes are buried in his former office closet which is now a nuclear dump zone (but you didn't hear it from me). Anyway ..... as we walked around the grocery store sort of aimlessly without a list because all we knew was we had to get dinner, I noticed that a grocery store is a leveler. Everyone who is there is on equal footing. Some people get expensive bread and some get cheap bread, but everybody has to go to the bread aisle. There isn't a hoity-toity aisle and welfare aisle. The food and other goods are sorted by type and within type by price, so everyone has to mix together to go up and down all the aisles. It's the one place (at least in my town) where everyone from all income levels from illegal immigrant on up to the mayor comes together. It's kind of nice.

On Women and Fabric

Quilting is more than a hobby for me. It has become part of my dreams. When I look at scenery, or paintings, or anything of beauty, I see quilts. I see color and fabric and ponder how to best use fabric to represent that. Perhaps some would say it is a sickness.

Saturday several women from my guild gathered together to sew quilts for our community service projects. We make quilts for babies at our local hospital who's mothers have nothing, and for the local Medicare nursing home, for children taken from their parents under stressful circumstances and for soldiers in the amputee unit at Walter Reed Army hospital. I have custody of the community service fabric and with the help of a friend made up kits to sew on Saturday. I loved the design process. Some of the fabric was, well, ugly would be kind. But in the right setting, it became lovely. I'm learning to design outside my box. I love that.



This morning I went to a bee. A gathering of quilters to sit and sew for a couple of hours and chat about everything and nothing. The conversation wandered down many paths. At a certain point we had to inquire as to the whereabouts of our hostess' husband because the conversation had wandered into a canyon where only the bravest man might dare to go. The group involved many different women from all walks and times of life. Most of us have known one another for a long time. There is something about holding fabric and thread that breaks down walls and allows talk to flow. The masks come off. Stories get told and the atmosphere is one of acceptance. Gifts and experiences are shared with little thought of rejection. I realized this morning that it is a true joy to me that I share in this art of my foremothers and in so doing, I am participating in this dance of relationships that women have shared throughout the ages. That quilting uses fabric, but it also weaves the fabric of society. That I could not do this alone, and that my life is so much richer for it.

Historical Importance

I wish I could remember who said, "Those who don't remember history are doomed to repeat it," but I can't. However, the world is learning this lesson this week as we watch Israel and Lebanon strafe each other with rocket fire, among other things.

Why, oh, why was it so important to bust Iraq back to it's borders when it overran Kuwait, but we are not even looking at Israel's gross misconduct in Lebanon? Lebanon, which I might add, is a Christian nation in the Middle East. It's not important to me. But that seems to be important to the Right wing these days.

I haven't been keeping up on events there. I can't. It hurts too much. I have Lebanese friends from college. It was the flower of the Orient. Beirut was the Paris of Arabia. The people are warm and friendly.

We have such leverage with Israel and we choose to remain silent in the face of this atrocity. We could do so much with so little and yet we ignore the bully on the playground. Diplomacy and our aid money can be used without ever sending one soldier. We have a history of brokering peace. But Israel is counting on this administration's ignorance and/or hubris to do nothing.

On Freedom

I try hard not to wax political here. I get my dander up sometimes and I don't like to get the dander of others up. But this gets under my skin and I can't let it go. My mother drew our attention to it. Here's a link to the whole article, but this is the paragraph that caught my eye:

The intelligence reform act incorporated recommendations from the commission that studied the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks; President Bush signed the bill in December. Supporters have argued the measure is necessary because terrorists could use vital records to steal identities, according to a Congressional Research Service report on the law.

You know, the critical word in that paragraph is the word "could." Yes, the terrorists "could" do all sorts of evil things. But to date they have only done one. We have a lot of checks and balances built into our society and our culture that we have forgotten about. Our federal government (and for some reason the institutional church is playing along with it), is strumming the fear that we all have since 9/11 to institute all sorts of bad laws.

Ninety-nine percent of our population is honest. We are hard-working. We love our neighbors, we love our country. Yes, there are a few bad apples amongst us. There are in any population. So what? So we come together and look out for one another. The protection against bad apples is not more laws that restrict the freedoms of us honest people. The way to protect ourselves is to know each other. It's to smile at one another on the street. To talk and laugh together. Greet one another. Hold each other up. Be gracious and kind and understand that while we all have faults, we all want what's best for our children and our grandchildren. Laws do not change hearts or morality, people do. The government doesn't know best and we've forgotten that. It's time to remember that we do know better and we know how to take care of ourselves and each other. Let's get together and do it!

Of Minor Miracles

I soldiered on yesterday evening. Doing my daily battle with my mortal enemy, the weeds! I am becoming triumphant; taking back more and more ground. I enjoy this battle. It is far more satisying than housework because once done, it largely stays done. I have to return and pick a few strays that pop up here and there, but as I come and go from the house, I can see tangible evidence of the work I have done. For the most part the work remains and does not get undone as so much of my other work does.

Part of my garden is centered around a large flat rock. The LightChildren used to use this rock as a battle station, or a lookout point in their many games. Now it is (or used to be before it was overrun with weeds) a focal point in my garden).

Yesterday evening as I clipped away the leggy yarrow and dug up the insolent weeds, I came across a miracle next to the rock. I had seen it there and wondered what this plant with the strange small red flowers was. I knew I would get to it soon. Yesterday I did. They were not flowers at all, but the beginnings of blackberries. Somehow I have a blackberry plant in the midst of my flower garden! How wonderful. If I had weeded earlier in the summer I would have pulled it up in woeful ignorance.

I'll have just enough blackberries to have some for breakfast one morning. Lovely!

A Lighter Heart

The sun is down and the day is almost done. My ennui is lighter now. I spent the day with a friend, talking quilts and pulling weeds. Full spectrum sunlight and doing battle against my mortal enemies is always good medicine for the soul. Not to mention all the little bugs I saw scurrying away as I uncovered them.

Oh Happy Day

Today is the first anniversary of this blog. Happy day to it. Or to me. Or both of us. I thought I'd be happier today, but I'm sort of tired. It's been a long hard week or two. Falling over the edge of the cliff in January is taking a long time to get back from. I'm doing better now on many days. But today is not one of them. Today I feel the Balroc coming closer.

I drove out to the back of beyond yesterday. Two friends and I joined a Community Sponsored Agriculture farm. We each bought shares and take turns driving to pick up our shares. Yesterday was my turn. It takes about three hours for the round trip. Three hours of guilt and whine-free listening to my music and thinking my thoughts ... uninterrupted by anyone. Other than my own other thoughts.

I found another favorite song part yesterday. It's this: the tom-toms in Burning Down the House by Talking Heads. It was their breakthrough song and album in about 1983. But I'd been listening to them since the late 1970's. What I like about the tom-toms is that those drums are deceptively simple and almost totally arrythmic. Very cool ...

I'm struggling with LightGirl these days. This does not reduce the issues with the Balroc. She is growing up. It's a good thing. Independence is good. The process of achieving it is painful for all concerned. I keep reminding myself that if the butterfly does not struggle to remove itself from the chrysalis, it will not develop wings.

Beautiful weather today. I keep watching the birds on the roof across way. Hoping that they will lift my spirits to match the weather. I think I'll go sew or design something instead. Happy blog birthday to me.

Cars

We took the LightChildren to see Cars this evening. It is a really good movie about hubris and the need for community. I really recommend seeing it. It's worth the price of admission for the cow tipping scene alone. There is fodder for laughter for children and adults.

Pixar did the animation, so it was flawless. I won't ruin it and tell you about all the little extras they threw in, but when you go, watch the screen carefully. It has a lot of texture.

Being Pixar, they threw a short feature in at the beginning called One Man Band. This short, of course, had nothing to do with the main feature. It was about a one man band in an empty town square playing for no one with an empty cup in front of him. It seemed as tho the poor one man band was to go hungry that evening, when along came a tiny little girl with a single gold coin. She stopped at the fountain in the middle of the square and knelt to make a wish. Just as she was about to throw her coin into the fountain, the one man band began to play his very best, brightest tune and smiled in her direction. The little girl looked over at him and then walked toward him. She reached out and began to drop her single sparkly coin in his cup,

When another one man band began to play on the other side of the square; a plaintive love song on violin and harpsichord. The little girl turned her head and began to listen to the other one man band. Pretty soon she walked over to him and reached out to put her coin in his cup and just as she was about to let it drop,

The first one man band struck up again louder and brighter and using more instruments,

To be met with the second more plaintive and wistful and more strings,

And back and forth until it became more about the contest than about winning the coin until at last the two were in head to head battle in the middle of the square in front of the fountain and the little girl stumbled and the coin fell through a grate into the gutter; lost to all.

Now this all happened in less than 5 minutes. But it made me think of the church (as in the Church, as in the body of Christ worldwide.) Not everyone, not all Christians. But a large portion of Christians and certainly some churches are doing battle with the wrong things. They/We have entered into a contest with other churches and are trying to win the wrong prize. As a result, the true harvest is slipping through our fingers and falling down the drain.

What He Said ...

Brother Maynard has an excellent post today on children taking communion. He gives his own brief history with communion, which I, for obvious reasons, do not share. He ends with a beautiful description of their reasoning for including children in communion at their church, which I do share. It's really lovely ... enjoy your read.

Perspectives

I've begun my battle against the demon weeds.

I'm gaining ground against them. Slowly but surely. Every evening about 8 I go out to spend 15 or 20 minutes doing battle. I've taken back a good 12 feet of garden thus far, only about 30 more to go. I suppose I ought to have taken a before picture. Oh well ....

LightHusband comes out and sits on the steps to chat with me and drink a glass of wine while I dig in the dirt. We catch up with each other. Sometimes one or the other of the LightChildren join us, or perhaps a pet or two.

Yesterday evening, LightBoy joined us briefly. He came out, sat with his dad and joined in the conversation. He said, "You know what I'm thankful for? I'm glad we get that beautiful sunset at the back of the house almost every night. It's really pretty." LightHusband and I just looked at each other, and he said, "Oh really, you like that?" LightBoy said, "Yes. I do. It's the prettiest thing here. We're really lucky." He asked his dad another question about a tree we'd had to take down last year and then he went back into the house.

LightHusband and I sat back in amazement when he left. We do love the sunsets, but they have always been marred for us by all the houses at the back of our suburban tract home. We always think, "Well, that's pretty, but it would be better if it weren't for all the houses around." I have three windows over my kitchen sink that I sort of love. I'd really love them, if I could see something besides more houses. The view I had from the kitchen sink when I was growing up was forests and mountains, but I didn't appreciate it then. Now I keep wondering if I'm cheating my children. But it turns out that they think what they have is pretty wonderful.

I tend to forget that they don't know the things that I know. Their memories are not my memories. Their life is different from mine. They know what they have, not what I have. All of which sounds as if it should be a duh, but it's surprising how hard it is to keep that separate. Then when they announce it to me in an off-hand way, I get to smile and think, "oh ... yeah. I can relax again." It really is all about perspective.

One More Thing

Here are a few more things I love about my church.

We meet in a coffee house ... in the part where there are usually rock concerts. It looks sort of industrial, but when we're there it really is sacred space. I can't explain it, it just is. Even when people walk right through the middle of communion to get to the bathrooms.

I love that worship is different (almost) every week. We use all of our senses. Here is a picture of what we did this week. We painted on fabric. We painted things that represented the bounty and freedom that we're thankful for. I'm going to sew those pieces of fabric together to create a new cloth for the communion table that's really ours. A cloth that in and of itself is worship and art. The paintings are drying on my schoolroom table now and I get to go in and stand in awe of their beauty.



I love the joy that greets me on everyone's faces each week. One guy greeted me with this on Sunday morning, "Hello family!" and he meant it. I love that. There is grace there and love. To be sure, there are moments of strife and discomfort and all the other things that go along with family. But the umbrella that covers us is grace and joy.

I love that when I unwittingly disconnect the microphone from the cord and make faces, the teenagers come up to me afterwards and laugh with me about my faces. I love that my children are comfortable sitting with any other adult there during the service. And that all of the other adults will talk to my children and love them back.

I love my little church.

On Freedom

Here are some things that I love about my church.

I love that we operate with a flat heirarchy and in a team-based environment. I love that we show up on Sunday mornings with about a third of a service and know that the Holy Spirit is going to show up and fill in the rest. Sometimes that feels very irresponsible, but it always works and it's always beautiful.

Yesterday it felt downright scary. I was more nervous than I've ever been. We were set to explore the Beauty of God in Freedom and had left a few more holes than even I am comfortable with. Actually, if I can be totally honest, I was being lazy or crabby or something. I just didn't feel like filling them in. I couldn't find the time and desperately needed to spend some time with LightGirl after she'd been at hockey camp all week. So I should have done it while she was gone, but I lacked the inspiration then.

Setting up for worship was crazy ... crazier than usual. Someone backed into our van in the parking lot. Someone else came in and said, "We have a slideshow of our time at Young Life camp, can you put it in the computer to show?" LightHusband handled both without my knowledge or stress. Except the bit about the slideshow and my response (after it was too late) was, "We can't have people coming in 15 minutes before service and throwing this at us." Except ... well ... really, that's kind of what we're all about and I need to let go of it. We're about people bringing their gifts and talents to the Common Table to share.

Then as I watched this unasked for, unprepared for, stress-adding slide show, I felt my pinched little heart grow a few sizes. I gazed in wonder at the Holy Spirit yet again doing His thing amongst us. For ... there it was. The perfect opening for a service on freedom. It was the Young Life camp for young people who have special needs and our three high school students had gone to be buddies to them. When they got up to speak afterwards, I heard them say that by the end of the week, there was neither special nor normal, but all were one in Christ Jesus. And all were free, because they had heard the truth and it had set them free. Of course ... being teenagers they didn't actually speak those words. They said it like this, "Wow, I couldn't believe it. We loved those kids. And ahh by the end of the week we were like you know all of us together intertwined and like we couldn't tell anyone apart anymore. It was so way cool." And they had big shiny authentic grins on their faces.

Because of the time that took, we had to cut a couple of elements of the rest of the service. We didn't have any open prayer. We didn't sing the Doxology. We didn't really have enough time to paint the pieces to the new communion table cloth we're making. But we had left ourselves free to hear God speak to us and somehow that was more important.

Beautiful

When we experience the Beautiful, there is a sense of homecoming. Some of our most wonderful memories are of beautiful places where we felt immediately at home. We feel most alive in the presence of the Beautiful for it meets the needs of our soul. For a while the strains of struggle and endurance are relieved and our frailty is illuminated by a different light in which we come to glimpse behind the shudder of appearances the sure form of things. In the experience of beauty we awaken and surrender in the same act. Beauty brings a sense of completion and sureness. Without any of the usual calculation, we can slip into the Beautiful with the same ease as we slip into the seamless embrace of water; something ancient within us already trusts that this embrace will hold us. (Beauty: The Invisible Embrace, by John O'Donohue)

For such is the beauty of God.

All-Time Best Song Parts Meme

My BrickFriend started this. Then CityGirl picked up the gauntlet. Now I can't stop thinking about it either. So here's my list.

1. The opening riff from Know Your Rights by The Clash ... This is. A. Public. Service. Announcement. .... WITH GUITAAARRRRR ...

2. Any GOOD lone bagpiper playing Amazing Grace.

3. The solo part in Le Chanky Chank Francaise by Beausoleil. It's amazing how smooth the transitions are in the leads from guitar to fiddle to accordian ... you never realize it's happening til after it's done. Beautiful.

4. The opening shout in New Year's Day by U2 ... never fails to give me goosebumps and open my imagination up. I love that shout.

5. Real cannon shots in the 1812 Overture (not a timpany roll) ... the kind that make your sub-woofers shake.

6. These lyrics from Quiche Lorraine by the B-52s.

Has anybody seen.
A dog dyed dark green
About two inches tall,
With a strawberry blond fall;
Sunglasses and a bonnet
and designer jeans
with appliques on it?

I know there are more, but I can't think of them now. I'll pick this up another time. But I'm enjoying really listening to music now for what I like and what is ... well ... just okay.