tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-100982172024-03-14T11:49:42.265-07:00Adorable Trivialities"He felt that he was in possession of some impossible good news, which made every other thing a triviality, but an adorable triviality."
-- G.K. Chesterton, <i>The Man Who Was Thursday</i>, Chapter XVJustinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.comBlogger443125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-62476868139902608312015-02-13T09:25:00.001-08:002015-02-13T09:25:43.889-08:00Proclamation of Amnesty Granted to All Men <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic8OaJ7nmt_1yjlSjPINba5pR6-NsdB6SQFqBiYzUEKp1oh-jfpLb-t0u48sjnOBgTj4NcAxizwwMcpYhLiDvVi_cWeQ0FsYDQZN1wFj3U_XT8n7aVrF9Qt6i2NHdBbRilWIbe/s1600/valentines_day_pinata_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic8OaJ7nmt_1yjlSjPINba5pR6-NsdB6SQFqBiYzUEKp1oh-jfpLb-t0u48sjnOBgTj4NcAxizwwMcpYhLiDvVi_cWeQ0FsYDQZN1wFj3U_XT8n7aVrF9Qt6i2NHdBbRilWIbe/s1600/valentines_day_pinata_1.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a>Whereas St. Valentinus was executed by Emperor Claudius II in 270 A.D. for secretly marrying Christian couples during a time of severe persecution; and<br />
<br />
Whereas Valentine's Day is a ridiculous pseudo-holiday as now practiced in these United States that bears no resemblance whatsoever to the magnificent sacrifice by St. Valentinus; and<br />
<br />
Whereas gifts such as the <a href="http://www.vermontteddybear.com/gift-finder/big-hunka-love.aspx" target="_blank">Hunka Love Bear</a> and <a href="http://www.pajamagram.com/Category/hoodie-footie-snuggle-suit-for-women-gift-set-gallery.aspx" target="_blank">Hoodie-Footie Pajamas</a> are insulting to both grown women <u>and</u> the martyred Saint; and<br />
<br />
Whereas gifts such as the ones listed above and the more generic flowers and candy show that you really have no idea what to do to acknowledge this insipid and fatuous arbitrary day that is only recognized to fuel the inanity-driven Guilt Industry until Mother's Day comes around; and<br />
<br />
Whereas men really have enough going on without worrying about Valentine's Day, and women do not need more crap piled up in their homes; and<br />
<br />
Whereas the only true way to honor St. Valentinus is to marry the girl already; and<br />
<br />
Whereas the <em>most beleaguered</em> among you have already completed the aforesaid action and have no need to acknowledge this half-baked holiday at all; therefore,<br />
<br />
I, Justine, by the power vested in me by the possession of double-x chromosomes do hereby and without prejudice absolve all men everywhere of the need to in any way recognize or commemorate the invented holiday currently known as Valentine's Day. <br />
<br />
Seriously, guys, try to show her you love her in small ways every day, and just relax on February 14.<br />
<br />
With your help, dear Men of America, we can see the death of the Hunka Love Bear and Hoodie-Footie pajamas. Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-57709995519686853852015-01-30T17:02:00.001-08:002015-01-30T17:17:15.020-08:00Come, Let Us Reason Together<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIFuN8rRhZz69gj8lIzHzLwRz5VJD41ULV0VQo-ce_1uNuvRtXimRZT7g7Ob-WM8TEJaG5X_EjhTxmXEloVFJdpXQd4hzpDUJhtEpgcyqCexEivXItXMu5exw4g_MHG1IpXPlK/s1600/reason+together.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIFuN8rRhZz69gj8lIzHzLwRz5VJD41ULV0VQo-ce_1uNuvRtXimRZT7g7Ob-WM8TEJaG5X_EjhTxmXEloVFJdpXQd4hzpDUJhtEpgcyqCexEivXItXMu5exw4g_MHG1IpXPlK/s1600/reason+together.png" /></a><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">One
of my favorite stories from Genesis has always been the conversation with
Abraham and God right before the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After hearing His plans,<span class="text">
Abraham boldly stands in the presence of God and says, “Would You also destroy
the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there were fifty righteous within the
city; would You also destroy the place and not spare <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">it</span> for the fifty righteous that were in it? Far be it from You
to do such a thing as this, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the
righteous should be as the wicked; far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of
all the earth do right?”</span> <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
</span></span><span class="small-caps"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> replies, “If I find in Sodom fifty
righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place for their sakes.”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Then
Abraham answers, saying, “Indeed now, I who <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">am but</span> dust and ashes have taken it upon myself to speak to the
Lord: Suppose there were five less than the fifty righteous; would You destroy
all of the city for <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">lack of</span>
five?”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">God
responds, “If I find there forty-five, I will not destroy <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">it<i>.</i></span>” And the two go on like
this for some while, with Abraham’s becoming ever more obsequious and obeisant
in his haggling the </span></span><span class="small-caps"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> down to the barest
minimum of righteous souls that will save the cities from their fiery fate, and
the </span></span><span class="small-caps"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-variant: small-caps;">Lord’s</span></span><span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> becoming – now, I have never been
able to decide – it is more exasperated or more amused by His friend’s
wheedling ways? In any event, once Abraham gets God to spare the cities should
ten righteous men be found, the dialogue ends. Quite an extraordinary
conversation it was, though, in showing the audacity of Abraham in his
desperation to save lives, and God’s willingness to engage his concerns without
rebuke.<o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Compare
this exchange, though, with a quite different one farther back in Genesis. Imagine
with me the scene right after Adam and Eve have fallen to temptation. It is the
cool of the day, and God is walking in the Garden. Our illustrious forebears
are lurking in the bushes, overwhelmed by shame.</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
</span></span><span class="small-caps"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> calls to Adam, “Where <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">are</span> you?”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Adam
mutters, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was
naked; and I hid myself.”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">God
replies, “Who told you that you <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">were</span>
naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should
not eat?”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Adam
manages to throw God and his wife under the bus at the same time. “The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">woman</i> whom <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">You</i> gave <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">to be</span> with
me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span class="text"><sup><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> </span></sup></span><span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">God then turns to Eve. “What <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">is</span> this you have done?”</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Eve
complains, “The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">serpent</i> deceived <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">me</i>, and I ate.” Our ancestors totally
blew it – they did not take responsibility for their sin; but, I am sure that
if it had been I as well as they in that Garden long ago, He’d have found me right next to them in the
bushes, plastered in fig leaves, maligning them both.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">To
me, these two stories from Genesis are a perfect encapsulation of how reason
and rationality play out in difficult situations. In writing about these two
often confused terms in his masterwork, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World</i>,
Iain McGilchrist uses the right and left hemispheres’ varying abilities to
illuminate the differences between them. Setting aside his association of
reason with the right hemisphere and rationality with the left, </span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">what interests me in particular is how
humans use both reason and rationality in relationships, both with each other
and with God. <span class="text">McGilchrist identifies <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">reason</i> as “flexible, resisting fixed formulation, shaped by
experience, and involving the whole living being,” and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">rationality</i> as “more rigid, rarified, mechanical, [and] governed by
explicit laws” So, while the reason of the right hemisphere is used
interpersonally to bring clarity, work toward truth, and grows out of
experience, the rationality of the left hemisphere tends to obfuscate truth by
abstracting situations from relationship, thereby setting up a system of
twisting facts to justify motives. Both of these abilities lie within us, but
only one edifies us in connection with others.<o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In
the Genesis 18 recounting, Abraham reasons with God. He knows that the Lord is
loving and long-suffering and not given to rash acts of destruction. He uses his
intimate knowledge of the Lord’s character to exhort mercy. Of course, the Lord
did not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">need</i> Abraham to coax Him into
mercy. It is His nature. The fact that He lets Abraham reason with Him, though,
shows us something very special and peculiar about the true Deity. As Roger
Scruton writes in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Soul of the World</i>
about the unique nature of the Judeo-Christian God, “The relation between God
and His people [is] founded on a covenant – in other words, a binding agreement
in which God commands obedience only by putting Himself under obligation toward
those whom He commands.” It is from this contextual stance that Abraham knows
he can reason with God. The Lord has placed Himself under submission to His own
laws to be the God who reasons with His creation.<o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In
the Genesis 3 story, Adam and Eve resort immediately to rationalization. That
is the “Yes, but . . .” deflection. They do not lie, exactly, but they cannot
bring themselves to ‘fess up, either. Knowing that they broke God’s explicit
law, they cannot conceive of any way to put things right with their Creator, so
they hide first and then shift blame. The relationship between God and man was
in trouble not because we were <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">reasoned
out</i> of Eden by the craftiness of the serpent, but rather because humankind
lost sight of its own experiences of the goodness of God and so could not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">reason against</i> the wiles of Satan. All
that Adam and Eve were left with was the compulsion to rationalize; and we are
still creatures of rationalization today.<o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"></span></span><br />
<span class="text"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">But,
“Come, let us reason together,” proclaims the Lord. “T</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">hough your sins be as scarlet, they
shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as
wool.” In Isaiah, God was speaking to the faithful remnant a message not only
of hope, but of assurance. To reason with God is to start from the point of
knowing Him, believing in His promises, remembering His wonderful works. He
calls us now as He called His frightened children so long ago<span class="text"> not
to stand at a distance, fearing His wrath; rather He is, as noted in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible</i>,
“pleased to encourage [us] to draw near to Him, and come and reason with Him:
not at the bar of His justice; there is no reasoning with Him there . . . but
at the bar of mercy, at the throne of grace.” It is there that our
rationalizations, our self-justifications, must fall away like the rags they
are. There, we sinners may reason with Him in boldness “from the virtue and
efficacy of His blood and sacrifice.” There, “God reasons with sensible souls
from His own covenant promises and proclamations to forgive sins.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the Judge of all the earth does right,
indeed.</span></span>Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-80425868607374525882015-01-30T15:35:00.004-08:002015-01-30T15:35:56.837-08:00Conversations<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2cSv2VoQBC3RyRX3MSVAiBCupFe7TbHtdxaMHhwIFeeYgYfIDuYR1IbH4jZC0AJcoNbBHz7ZItsF1SovS3G_1H8G2bSeDXusf8ZC7Oev32uQTQqyMM7b-fF8_8tmWmPz-Ks29/s1600/094.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2cSv2VoQBC3RyRX3MSVAiBCupFe7TbHtdxaMHhwIFeeYgYfIDuYR1IbH4jZC0AJcoNbBHz7ZItsF1SovS3G_1H8G2bSeDXusf8ZC7Oev32uQTQqyMM7b-fF8_8tmWmPz-Ks29/s1600/094.JPG" height="150" width="200" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
Pippa always likes to mew</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
And tell me everything that's new</div>
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</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA8QgXrFk1N-Tl53YCo6Y2_mz4lNnTnJuxuElhVK-vOrMEs2_vBWFIqGsHLMZxXw10P-_bkHhERQB5cwpnixCBjrzSaxCsxJhej_GrFElJvKFLnMHjZxWaL78S_fpPF7uqzKp9/s1600/024.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA8QgXrFk1N-Tl53YCo6Y2_mz4lNnTnJuxuElhVK-vOrMEs2_vBWFIqGsHLMZxXw10P-_bkHhERQB5cwpnixCBjrzSaxCsxJhej_GrFElJvKFLnMHjZxWaL78S_fpPF7uqzKp9/s1600/024.JPG" height="150" width="200" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
But her sister Katiesocks</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Looks everything, but never talks.</div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-71576068359154747282015-01-22T09:18:00.001-08:002015-01-22T09:18:34.850-08:00"This Town is Like a Frozen Junkyard . . ."". . . and even if it looks like this forever, it will look forever temporary."<br />
<br />
I just found that delicious quote in Roger Scruton's <em>The Soul of the World</em>. Made me think of this architectural abortion I'll see today at Seattle Center:<br />
<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY4WP0cOZ2iTbXu0s_DSBb5lzF9pXTBhjTfErBIHnTcDFshQN0YQSdB20ecDiwo34DAISJfK3bmb2cDq7sP67fUgchk7sgwAV2zo2uhclUPmILTmxoyII-QEPRnjguvVrbYnoC/s1600/Experience-Music-Project-Seattle%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY4WP0cOZ2iTbXu0s_DSBb5lzF9pXTBhjTfErBIHnTcDFshQN0YQSdB20ecDiwo34DAISJfK3bmb2cDq7sP67fUgchk7sgwAV2zo2uhclUPmILTmxoyII-QEPRnjguvVrbYnoC/s1600/Experience-Music-Project-Seattle%5B1%5D.jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
I hate modern architecture.<br />
<br />Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-70783368349737198722014-10-16T16:26:00.000-07:002014-10-16T16:26:38.891-07:00Christmas: The Story of Stories *The Review*<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6xOMCY-OHxuUMV_hM8EhpMa-fR7ZP21quvvIKUfQfSLavL3Xgvy1MD5R_0tRPk2xUb_1_t1le6BypQ9LKTVFnzlrmHWeBPpO5IIC7GAPWrkQEV6S4YkoXokM_Pe3ctmAmenFJ/s1600/ArendsChristmasCover2014-300x300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6xOMCY-OHxuUMV_hM8EhpMa-fR7ZP21quvvIKUfQfSLavL3Xgvy1MD5R_0tRPk2xUb_1_t1le6BypQ9LKTVFnzlrmHWeBPpO5IIC7GAPWrkQEV6S4YkoXokM_Pe3ctmAmenFJ/s1600/ArendsChristmasCover2014-300x300.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
Album: <em>Christmas: The Story of Stories</em><br />
<div align="left">
Artist: Carolyn Arends</div>
<div align="left">
Label: 2B Records (Oct. 2014)</div>
<div align="left">
<br />
<em>O little town of Bethlehem, I think it is a lie/That you were still and dreamless on that first Christmas night . . .</em><br />
<br />
With those words, <a href="http://www.carolynarends.com/" target="_blank">Carolyn Arends</a> takes on the first of several Christmas song classics whose iconic imagery needs to be challenged in "It Was a Holy Night," the opening song on her new album, <em><a href="http://carolynarends.com/site/catalog/products/christmas-story-stories" target="_blank">Christmas: The Story of Stories</a></em>. The quiet, empty streets so long imagined give way in the mind's eye to a real place teeming with soldiers and politicians; a place far from reverent and peaceful, but rather overcrowded, cruel, and hungry. She sets the stage vividly so that she can remind us that "And then the Baby came . . . and when the Baby came . . ." Well, there probably <em>was</em> some crying going on away in that manger, and those herald angels we harken unto may well have gasped and trembled to see God make His home as a babe in "such poor and broken place." They truly must have wondered how we could deserve a gift like Him. "Ah, but just the same, the Baby came . . ."</div>
<div align="left">
<br />
Silent night? Probably not. Holy night? Most definitely!<br />
<br />
That's just Carolyn being Carolyn. When you spend your creative life wrestling with the Holy Spirit, and your theological joints have been knocked out of place more times than you can count, you're not afraid to take on even the most sacrosanct of holiday hymns. I get what the writers of these classic songs were trying to do: create an atmosphere of holiness by bathing this crazy, radical juncture of history -- the Incarnation -- in serene, majestic splendor. I cannot help but think, though, that Carolyn's vision is much closer to the truth. God came then and comes now in the midst of the mess and the chaos and the dirt and the rebellion, and He makes it holy despite all of that, despite all of us. "Ah, but just the same, the Baby came . . ."<br />
<br />
<em>Christmas: The Story of Stories</em> is, in some ways, not a very Christmasy album. That is, it eschews all the gimmicks that you usually find on even the most artistic of Christmas albums released by the most talented songwriters and sincere musicians. "Well, it sounds like a Carolyn Arends album," one of my friends told me, a quizzical look upon her face. Um,<em> yeah</em>. She wrote nine of the thirteen songs. The sound is quintessentially Carolyn, too: folk-pop with a laid-back vibe; heavy on the myriad strings, light on back beat; lyrically-driven, deep-rooted, authentic; with unexpected touches of funk and fun. The most Christmasy arrangements are probably on "Everything Changes at Christmas," which manages somehow to evoke church bells ringing in the middle of snowfall, and two of the classics, "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" and "O Come All Ye Faithful" which are very traditional. So, this may not be the album you put on for background music at your office Christmas party. As such, it is not an album merely to be listened to; it is an album that needs to be heard.<br />
<br />
And what will those who have ears to hear find? Nothing less than a bold -- audacious really -- attempt to get at the core of exactly what the mystery means of a God who puts on humanity in its most vulnerable state and comes to dwell with us and eventually die for us, all because He cannot stand to let us go. Carolyn respects her listeners by assuming that we are as interested in grappling with this glorious riddle as she is; that assumption has led to a really fine collection of songs that transcends seasonal affiliation. It is the Story of stories.<br />
<br />
"Vacancy" is one of my favorites. It is that rarest of things: a new Advent song. When I spoke with Carolyn about it this past summer, she commented on the paradox that she was immensely happy playing a song with the melancholy themes of longing and emptiness. She attributed that to the bouncy presence of the ukulele -- that interminably Pollyanna-ish instrument. Indeed. I think, too, that while the song might have been written in a "blue space," the lyrics are ultimately so hope-filled (as every Advent song should be), that it is perhaps a happier lyric than she had intended. Sometimes when you're quite hungry, but you know that soon you are going to eat something very good, you really appreciate the hunger, even if it hurts a little. Just the knowing that the fulfillment is on its way makes the hunger at once both more intense and less awful. That's Advent for you.<br />
<br />
"Everything Changes at Christmas" was released in a different arrangement as a single a few years ago. I was a bit disappointed when I heard the new version on the album, because I had so long loved the old. This new version has grown on me, though, as I think it matches the flavor of the album as a whole better in its latest rendition. I really like the way that it builds at the end with the sound of bells ringing out "Ode to Joy" and "Joy to the World" -- was that the glockenspiel??? -- and now my only wish is that they had run with that theme for a wee bit longer; it is over far too soon.<br />
<br />
"Christmas Magic" could have used a line about After Eight dinner mints, but I'm not going to go around telling Carolyn how to write her nostalgic Christmas song. I joke. It is lovely, especially the line about not being ashamed to hang dollar-store tinsel, because "there is great worth in reflecting the light."<br />
<br />
"God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen" is my favorite traditional Christmas song. What a treat and a surprise to find it on this album! This arrangement has a funky klezmer sort of sound that is a lot of fun. Comforting and joyful, indeed.<br />
<br />
The song that most surprised me was "The Sound." I was not quite ready for the rush of emotion that overcame me when I heard, "Hush now, listen, that's the sound of the Kingdom coming, the Kingdom coming, the Kingdom coming to your town." Goose bumps and tears. I thought that the seamless transition into "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" was well-done and <em>apropos</em>. That could have been pulled off as an instrumental interlude, but it is always nice to hear Carolyn sing, too.<br />
<br />
My daughter loves "You Gotta Get Up," a Rich Mullins song which is basically a kid's take on Christmas morning -- all mixed up with reindeer and presents and peace on earth and "that Baby born in Bethlehem" -- with the recurring plea to Mom and Dad to "get up!" already. It has a nice, bright, cheerful sound and is altogether charming. What I find funny is that not once in the eleven Christmases we've now had with Sadie has she ever awoken before us on December 25. Ha!<br />
<br />
I get a particular kick out of "Long Way to Go," because I like the lyrical device of Carolyn's using mild expressions of amazement that I usually associate with the American South to pack a punch into the chorus: Goodness gracious, have mercy! Goodness gracious, man alive! Goodness gracious, glory be! I feel in the need of a mint julep after hearing that song, bless her heart.<br />
<br />
"Story of Stories" is the anchor here, the title song. Of course, I love the reference to Philip Yancey's summation of human history from <em>The Jesus I Never Knew: </em>"In a nutshell, the Bible from Genesis 3 to Revelation 22 tells the story of a God reckless with desire to get His family back." <em>He could have just started over/Left us alone in the dark/But our God is not like that/He wants His family back/He's had a plan from the start . . . </em>"What Kind of King?" complements "Story of Stories" in such a way that it makes sense that it follows right afterward. OK, so we know that our God wants His family back, and so He sends us -- well, what kind of king exactly? Only Himself incarnate to dwell among us in the lowliest state. <em>What kind of plan ever goes this far?/What kind of mercy puts itself at ours?/What kind of Maker walks the earth He made/From the cradle to the cross and leaves an empty grave?/What kind of love? . . .</em><br />
<br />
"Dawn on Us" was another surprise; it is a gloriously happy, radiant song featuring my favorite unsung hero of the Christmas story: Joseph. <em>Let it dawn on us/Like the morning sun/Let it chase our night away/Let it dawn on us:/This is God with us/In the light of Christmas day.</em> And in the light of every day. This is then followed by "O Come All Ye Faithful" which is simply done, beautifully rendered, and ends with Carolyn, <em>a cappella</em>, singing "Christ the Lord" into the stillness.<br />
<br />
OK, that was another of my way-too-long reviews. Please forgive me. It's been five long years since I have had the immense pleasure of listening to and then writing about a new Carolyn Arends album. That's what blogs are for; I will self-edit and put a more succinct version on Amazon. I almost wish I did not love it so much -- that I could find some flaw at which to pick in a picayune way simply to bolster my reviewer creds -- but, nope; to my ears, there is not a false note. <br />
<br />
Ah, here is one slightly disappointing thing: On the past few albums that Carolyn has done as an independent artist, she has included something funny in the midst of the typical legal warnings on CDs about unauthorized reproduction. She had five years to plan something amusing to put on the disc for this release, and I was giddy to think about what sort of secret, sly thing she would work into the fine print; and, she did not put anything. <em>Nothing.</em> I am sorely crestfallen. <br />
<br />
If that's the worst I can say, though, then verily I am blessed. You will be, too, if you make <em><a href="http://carolynarends.com/site/catalog/products/christmas-story-stories" target="_blank">Christmas: The Story of Stories</a></em> a part of your music library not only for this and every Christmas, but for random year-round listening when you just need a reminder about how glorious and seismic and extravagant this holy tide of Christmas truly is.</div>
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Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-9831023882402729392014-10-15T18:12:00.001-07:002014-10-16T08:22:38.419-07:00Christmas: The Story of Stories *The Interview*<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6xOMCY-OHxuUMV_hM8EhpMa-fR7ZP21quvvIKUfQfSLavL3Xgvy1MD5R_0tRPk2xUb_1_t1le6BypQ9LKTVFnzlrmHWeBPpO5IIC7GAPWrkQEV6S4YkoXokM_Pe3ctmAmenFJ/s1600/ArendsChristmasCover2014-300x300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6xOMCY-OHxuUMV_hM8EhpMa-fR7ZP21quvvIKUfQfSLavL3Xgvy1MD5R_0tRPk2xUb_1_t1le6BypQ9LKTVFnzlrmHWeBPpO5IIC7GAPWrkQEV6S4YkoXokM_Pe3ctmAmenFJ/s1600/ArendsChristmasCover2014-300x300.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I was
enjoying a beautiful August day at </span><a href="http://www.barnabasfm.org/" target="_blank"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Barnabas Family Ministries</span></a><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> on Keats Island,
a bucolic fragment of Eden that has surfaced off the coastline near Vancouver,
British Columbia, when I got that familiar knot in the pit of my stomach: only
153 shopping left until Christmas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More
dire, though, was the fact that I hoped to write something festive and true about Christmas
by October 15. How was I ever <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>to find anything
new to say about my favorite holiday when I had less than eight weeks to do so?
<em>‘Tis the season to try to get someone else to do your work for you.</em> <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Luckily for me, Carolyn Arends was also at
Barnabas. Earlier this past summer, the Canadian singer/songwriter had been knee-deep
in Yuletide joy as she completed work on her second full-length Christmas
album. When I waylaid her for a little chat about her project – which she
graciously supplied – I was able to glean fresh insights from her that would
have otherwise eluded me. You see, of the thirteen songs on her new album<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">, Christmas: The Story of Stories</i>
(October 2014, 2B Records), Carolyn wrote nine. You would have to walk
many a mile (or kilometer) to find someone who has meditated more fully and
fruitfully on the Incarnation and all its wonder than she. We found
a place to sit, cracked open a box of After Eight Dinner Mints, and toasted the
album with Diet Cokes. Carolyn brought the stories and perspective; I brought a
questionable work ethic and a digital voice recorder; the following,
interspersed with some lyrics and edited for clarity, is what came about:</span><br />
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<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">O little town of
Bethlehem, I think it is a lie/That you were still or dreamless on that first
Christmas night . . .</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Justine:</b> When I
listen to your songs, you seem to revisit a lot of themes, but with increasing
depth, or complexity, or a slightly different viewpoint. I know that you have
written a Christmas song for your church each year for many years. The
narrative of Christmas in the Bible is basically two chapters in the Gospel
According to Luke. How do you write a song from that every year? How do you
face that?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Carolyn:</b> I’ve
been doing it for 20 years – which is a lot of Christmas songs – and I think
that is what I like about the tradition. It’s an annual spiritual discipline of
looking at the Story and saying, “What is the Story saying to me or to the
people that are around me this year?” I hope in circling around and revisiting
the same themes, it is going deeper. I think the last few years there has been
more the vision that the story of the universe is happening in four giant acts:
Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Restoration. And, I kind of see that little
passage in Luke as a fulcrum or pivot point that everything <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>hinges on, and that radiates out with a
million implications that run backwards and forwards; and actually, that’s a
lot to write about.</span></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is the Story of
stories/This is the mystery of old/This is the Glory of glories/All that exists
comes down to this: Newborn Baby Boy</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Justine:</b> <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That idea seems to fit in with the title song
of the album, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Story of Stories</i>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Carolyn:</b> Yes, it
is very much about how that story fits into the Big Story. In fact, there is a
quote in the song from Philip Yancey about God’s wanting His family back. [“<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">In a nutshell, the Bible from Genesis 3 to
Revelation 22 tells the story of a God reckless with desire to get His family
back"</span><span style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">(<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Jesus I Never Knew</i>)] Also, I am in a
different place every year. Some years, I can’t wait for Christmas to come; and
other years . . . I can. And so, I need to sing different exhortations to
myself.</span></span></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There is a vacancy
right here inside of me/It’s been that way for quite a while/But there’s a
blessedness in this great emptiness/If it makes room here for the Child </span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Justine:</b> One
thing that I found very interesting in your song list was the inclusion of an
Advent song. What can you tell me about the song, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Vacancy</i>? </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Carolyn:</b> I grew up
in a church tradition that did not follow the liturgical calendar, so it is
only in recent years that I have begun to learn about the four Sundays of
Advent. I love the idea of reminding ourselves that the world was waiting – and
in some ways, we’re still waiting, and in some ways, He’s come – But, yeah, in
the year that I wrote that, for whatever reason, whatever was going on in my
life, I was not feeling very Christmasy, and I had this little bit of an empty
feeling leading up to Christmas and I was working through that, praying through
that, and I was reminded that emptiness is necessary to make room for the Truth
that is coming. That is why that song talks about the blessedness in the
emptiness and the longing that reminds us how all of Creation waited for Him to
come, and now we are waiting for Him to come again.</span></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Let it dawn on us like
the morning sun/Let it chase our night away/Let it dawn on us: This is God with
us/In the light of Christmas day</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Justine:</b> I know
that the song <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dawn on Us</i> came out of
a series of silly puns you were <s>torturing</s> amusing your friends and
followers with on Facebook and Twitter. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I stayed up all night to see where the sun went. Then it
dawned on me. </i>Tell me about writing songs
that surprise you.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Carolyn:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, it really delights me that what ended up
coming out of that silly joke was a serious take on the Christmas story; and,
it reminds me of what Frederick Buechner said about hearing the gospel as a
“wild, marvelous joke” – it really is great news, and it should involve laughter.
Also the song <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Vacancy</i>: I was in a
fairly blue space when I wrote it, but because I ended up writing it for ukulele,
now it makes me really happy to play it. You cannot be unhappy on ukulele,
right? So now when I play it, I am so happy – and it’s supposed to be my
melancholy song.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Friends that’s the
reason we need this season/To help us remember, joy can still come/To a
world often troubled and tragic . . ./So bring on the old Christmas Magic </span></i><br />
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Justine:</b> Have you
found inspiration in other unusual places? Quotes? Experiences? Readings?</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Carolyn:</b> You know,
I’ve been a part of Vancouver’s Pacific Theatre’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Christmas Presence </i>for several years. Well, there is one story that
gets read almost every year – a nostalgia piece – by a local journalist who
writes about his mother’s going over-the-top for Christmas; it’s very warm and
sentimental. He talks about how his mom would go to the bargain basement of The
Bay and find broken crystal ornaments and buy them for nothing and repair them,
because she understood that things did not have to be perfect to be beautiful.
At the end of the story, the writer reveals that he has cerebral palsy. Anyway,
probably my current favorite song on the album is one called <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Christmas Magic</i> that came out of that
piece. We have a reaction to all the commercialism at Christmas and all the
hype – and we do need to be careful about that stuff – but there is actually
something beautiful about tradition, about having one time a year when we make
the effort –imperfect as we all are – and try to come together and make
something beautiful together.<o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;">May
your Christmas season be merry and bright, and may your heart resound with
comfort and joy as you live again the Story of stories, that pivot point of the
universe when <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Come, Thou Long-Expected
Jesus </i>turned into <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">O Holy Night</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you would like more information
about Carolyn Arends and <em>Christmas: The Story of Stories</em>, please visit her website (</span><a href="http://www.carolynarends.com/"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.carolynarends.com</span></a><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #444444;">). Merry
Christmas!</span> <span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"></span><o:p></o:p></span><br /></div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-84040862066364535002014-10-06T13:04:00.000-07:002014-10-15T20:00:21.848-07:00Getting a Kick out of Kickstarter<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz97iwOHBoYYUxEIFMBpqMjvH-nKthI0RnTYE5GHrMv34NtQFBJeI9ouWsQthiJg7qnoumuoHTxA5pNSvsEvYGzEyF3SABpdbWqeqzIZf_fGNv7MhsZ1uKTBPP2cJepX1MKpvr/s1600/thH0VEIZGJ.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz97iwOHBoYYUxEIFMBpqMjvH-nKthI0RnTYE5GHrMv34NtQFBJeI9ouWsQthiJg7qnoumuoHTxA5pNSvsEvYGzEyF3SABpdbWqeqzIZf_fGNv7MhsZ1uKTBPP2cJepX1MKpvr/s1600/thH0VEIZGJ.jpg" height="100" width="200" /></a></div>
I have been privileged to support the projects of some extremely talented musicians via the crowd-funding site Kickstarter. I love their music so very much that it gives me quite a thrill to be involved, no matter how tangentially, in their creative process. Because I am shameless in promoting artists that I love, I also have been known to send out harassing e-mails to friends, trying to convince them also to kick in on Kickstarter. The fruit of my overbearing personality was in evidence the other day when one friend told me, "Thanks for getting me addicted to Kickstarter." Addicted? Oh yes. Apparently, there are nigh innumerable projects on Kickstarter, not just the ones by artists I know. My friend's new obsession made me decide to look around a bit on the site and see what there was to be seen.<br />
<br />
My oh my.<br />
<br />
So, it turns out that there are a lot of creative, artistic dreamers out there looking for a good kickstart. And, some of them are outrageously untalented, no matter how creative and dreamy they may be. I won't name names or give links, because who am I to rain on anyone's project parade -- or, really, to disparage anyone's dream? If they can find backers, then more power to them and God bless. But, still . . . it can be quite an amusing adventure to wade the congested waters of project proposals, whether they're sublime or absurd.<br />
<br />
The best part -- the ABSOLUTE best part -- is to look over the tiered rewards. I cannot decide whether my favorite one is the artist who promises that for $200 he would give you two front row tickets to one of his concerts that were certain to come should his album project be fully funded and he became as famous as he was surely about to be OR the musician who promised she would become an ordained minister and officiate your wedding, should you scrounge up $5000. <br />
<br />
So, I am toying with my own kickstarter project. Not through Kickstarter, of course. They have rules and stuff. Nope, I'll just do it on my own, through my very popular blog. You see, I've written a few songs, and I think the showcase among them is one called "Tabby Dreams" -- at least, that is the one my husband brings up most often to mock me. He should not mock me; the song is not just about my tabbies, but also about Boudicca; mock Boudicca at your peril! In homage to the erstwhile comic strip <em>Bloom County</em>, I shall call my first album project <em>Tabby Dreams and Stranger Things</em>. The six or seven songs will be mostly about animals*, and all will be played (very poorly, indeed) on guitar by yours truly. The singing may or may not be on key. The rewards, though, will be amazing! <br />
<br />
For $5, I will plant a pea vine in my garden and name it after you.<br />
<br />
For $10, I will cut the letters of your name out of various printed sources and mail you a collage of my creation.<br />
<br />
For $25, I will send you one page of my daughter's Latin workbook.<br />
<br />
For $50, I will mail you a live tadpole. And a tank ambience rock. (tank not included)<br />
<br />
For $100, I will glue together a pasta portrait of your visage or Vincent Van Gogh's -- your choice!<br />
<br />
For $250, I will eat the large helmet sundae at Safeco Field and send you a video of it.<br />
<br />
For $500, I will rename one of my cats after you. (Limit 2)<br />
<br />
For $1000, I will write you a poem in Latin that totally kind of rhymes and might be grammatically correct and make some sort of sense.<br />
<br />
For $2000, I will tell you a secret that I have never told anyone.<br />
<br />
For $3000, I will knit you a sweater out of my cats' hair.<br />
<br />
For $5000, I will root for your favorite NFL team for an entire season and wear the team jersey while I watch every game. This will be done at great personal sacrifice (I hate football), but that is the kind of intense musical artist I am.<br />
<br />
You will notice that not one of these rewards actually includes sending you my music or playing it for you in any way. That is because they are<em> rewards</em>, not <em>punishments</em>.<br />
<br />
My goal is $100, 000. I estimate that this project will be completed NEVER. And I shall cancel it if not fully funded by October 6, 2014 at 3 PM, PST. So, get on it, people!<br />
<br />
*So far the song list, in addition to the eponymous "Tabby Dreams," will include "The Duck Song," "The Dog Song," and a few that I haven't written yet about bunnies and squirrels and such. Also, there is a blues song about Latin grammar that I am sure will thrill and might be included as a bonus track.Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-31558108684598338502014-08-14T14:00:00.000-07:002014-08-23T10:36:22.623-07:00Soft Eyes and Fractured Vision<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH4mZDKxbfxlSIzrCtxltDeUnaVo6p4TCGgoxWkZ9Ila5GZCJJOXEcsoeJkj_QtLLp6HhC_c3X7dU_G-FgtMsTdgwpOb75PGxRy-nujKgus6an3icWXV7pABxLlcVfkYySs2XL/s1600/rider's%2Bpoint%2Bof%2Bview.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH4mZDKxbfxlSIzrCtxltDeUnaVo6p4TCGgoxWkZ9Ila5GZCJJOXEcsoeJkj_QtLLp6HhC_c3X7dU_G-FgtMsTdgwpOb75PGxRy-nujKgus6an3icWXV7pABxLlcVfkYySs2XL/s1600/rider's%2Bpoint%2Bof%2Bview.jpg" height="200" width="150" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When I
was a girl, I trained for equestrian eventing. This is comprised of a dressage test,
a cross-country jumping course, and a stadium jumping course. The training
hours were long and intense, as my horse and I learned to move and act as one
entity. More important, though, than contact with my legs or my seat or my
hands was the contact that I made with my eyes. My horse, of course (of course!),
had his eyes on either side of his head, which limited his field of vision so
that there was a blind spot in the three to four feet directly in front of him
– which is something you don’t want to contemplate too closely when you’re
cantering toward a three-foot jump! I had no problem seeing what was directly
in my path, but it was not enough simply to focus on what was in front of me.
“Soft eyes! Soft eyes!” my trainer would yell from the arena railing, meaning
that I was concentrating too hard on what was straight ahead. “Soft eyes” was a
reminder that I needed to pull back the focus and see in the panorama. If you
are too narrowed in on what is immediately before you when riding, you do not
see what your horse sees, and he knows it. His knowing it makes him nervous and
less likely to trust you. And trust is the key to a successful horse-rider
relationship. His sight is fractured, and he needs yours to be whole.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I remembered
this when I recently read a book that changed my life. It is called<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Master-His-Emissary-Divided-Western/dp/0300188374/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408050172&sr=1-1&keywords=the+master+and+his+emissary" target="_blank"> The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World.</a> I had never thought of my brain
before in terms of the right-left hemisphere divide, but the author of the
book, Iain McGilchrist, makes a compelling case for what this divide means, why
it matters, and how a tilt culturally and intellectually toward what he sees as
the usurpation of the left hemisphere into the realm of responsibilities that
ought to be given to the right has diminished and impoverished us. It is not a
religious book; but, I wholeheartedly agree with G.K. Chesterton’s assertion
that “if Christianity should happen to be true – then defending it may mean
talking about anything or everything. Things can be irrelevant to the
proposition that Christianity is false, but nothing can be irrelevant to the
proposition that Christianity is true.” The book is a masterpiece of scientific
and philosophic scholarship, and its scope is too wide for my purpose here;
however, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to share the central
idea that Mr. McGilchrist posits, and how it has made for me a bit more
translucent that glass through which we now see so darkly. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The primary
idea is found in the relationship of the hemispheres. Both halves can receive
information. The right brain, though, receives information in a holistic,
contextual way rife with empathy, implicit meaning, and a sense of seeing
things “as they are.” The left brain receives information in a more abstract or
impersonal way, being analytic and reading explicit meanings. The left brain
wants to classify and categorize and tends to take an outside, invariant view
of information. Mr. McGilchrist contends that the human brain was originally
designed to be right-hemisphere dominant. Ideally, our right brains would
receive information, send it over to the left brain to organize, which would
send it back to the right brain to internalize and act upon it. The title of
his book, though, refers to a story Nietzsche told about a wise and loving master
whose extensive realm was run to ruin and collapse when an ambitious and clever
emissary, entrusted to rule on the master’s behalf with the same fairness,
honesty, and kindness, wrested the power unto himself and brought tyranny
instead. In such a way, McGilchrist sees the left hemisphere, made to serve the
right, now in ascension over it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All the
left brain can offer without the right is a fragmented, impersonal vision of
the world. And does that not ring true in our world today? Where people have
400 Facebook friends, but no one with whom to share a cup of coffee? Where
families are ripped apart because the individuals rebelled against the whole? Where
we run in circles, splintering our time between projects that never seem to reach
completion? The right brain, with its emphasis on looking outward, seeing the
Other, is our key to comprehending something very important about God and our
relationship with Him. Without its point of view, we see in the shards of a
mirror, reflecting only ourselves; with our right brains, God gives us a
window.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We fall
into a trap whenever we try to “explain God” on the left hemisphere’s terms. Isn’t
that Satan’s original ploy? He fractures and makes incomplete our perceptions
of the Most High. <span class="text">“Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">any</i> tree in the garden’?” </span>Then,
he narrows our focus, encouraging us to “judge” God in human terms. And even
today: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">How can you believe in a God that
would let a child die? How can you believe in a God that would let an
earthquake swallow up a town? How can you believe in a God that would . .
.?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></i>The Bible may not make sense when
taken in pieces. But, the Story was never meant to be told in fragments. It is
a whole that is even greater than the sum of its parts. It is gestalt. Just as
you cannot begin to understand the sacrifice of Jesus without an understanding
of the<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>helplessness of your own sinful
state, you cannot really get a grasp on the utter depravity of the human will
until you hold it up to the light of the holiness of Christ. <span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Things
that stand as roadblocks to our relationship with God usually have to do with
traits that are typical of left-brain dominance. One thing our left brains
cannot stand is any sort of paradox – the apparent co-existence of two
irreconcilable ideas or entities. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Fully
God and fully man? A kingdom that always was and is to come? The wisdom of
fools? Losing life to find it? </i>If we ponder these truths too closely, we
start to lose the beauty of them; we begin to believe that we must justify them
in human terms. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If, though, we just let
them wash over us, they make perfect sense. Mr. McGilchrist writes that,
perhaps, the things that our left brains tell us are paradoxes, our right
brains intrinsically understand.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As I
walk into my nineteenth year of faith this autumn, I think of those days long
ago, training with my beloved Thoroughbred. Today, I am not preparing for a
blue ribbon in an event, but for a far more glorious prize.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am trying to retrain my eyes again to be
soft, to see more than I think I can see, to behold the whole picture and not
just a narrow focus. I want to see the Story – from Genesis 1:1 all the way
through Revelation 22:21 – as the narrative, not only of ancient peoples, but
of my life. Now, though, it is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">my</i>
vision that is fractured; I need to trust Jesus, day by day, to make my sight
whole. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-80184110868785107662014-07-25T18:45:00.000-07:002014-08-05T17:46:39.515-07:00A Poem for PippaWhen I posted a wee bit of doggerel that I wrote about our kitty, Katiesocks, a few months ago, my dad sent me an e-mail saying, "You'd better post something about her sister, Pippa, now. You know how cats are." He's right, of course. Sibling rivalry kicks into overdrive when fostered in the breasts of tabbies. Today, while I was roaming about the house, cleaning and doing laundry, little Pippa was following close behind me and taking advantage of any pause in my endeavors to find a flat, elevated surface onto which she could leap for loves. That is what inspired this little bit of rhyming, which I offer to all the cat lovers out there:<br />
<br />
<div align="center">
</div>
<div align="center">
For Pippa</div>
<div align="center">
</div>
<div align="center">
I have a soft, grey shadow</div>
<div align="center">
Not of my shape or size.</div>
<div align="center">
But one who has a stripey tail,</div>
<div align="center">
Four paws and two bright eyes.</div>
<div align="center">
And on those paws she follows</div>
<div align="center">
Where'er my steps may lead -- </div>
<div align="center">
Up the stairs and down again -- </div>
<div align="center">
For we are both agreed</div>
<div align="center">
That she will be my sentinel</div>
<div align="center">
And guard me from behind;</div>
<div align="center">
And I will be the best two-legged</div>
<div align="center">
Friend she'll ever find.</div>
<div align="center">
</div>
<div align="center">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheoILoPOlDtPCfEb187lOdAub9VzSgRDh99j211VOP2Zi9PdtAIKbSeSF0wwnh7X7NZkuqwUKkZ1VNG2U9Jss8AlDl8gT4dNzDYgYXrUlIUXW6Ydjc2NvNbE3FK7UCLBkV94mO/s1600/099.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheoILoPOlDtPCfEb187lOdAub9VzSgRDh99j211VOP2Zi9PdtAIKbSeSF0wwnh7X7NZkuqwUKkZ1VNG2U9Jss8AlDl8gT4dNzDYgYXrUlIUXW6Ydjc2NvNbE3FK7UCLBkV94mO/s1600/099.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Katiesocks (left) and Pippa<br />
Of course I had to include a picture of both! You know how cats are!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-41610246486475535792014-07-18T08:28:00.000-07:002014-07-18T08:28:57.234-07:005 Reasons I Switched from Google to Bing<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj85SLgHcrgpw-ZGC9Jn_sKyFxivVNWx6Jl5FGkNqHTCkPFs9I-Fs56wlYKz0CYAqkhFO59jqskuwVXa_dyew7XrbID54l_oYqgC4DraLXcE8Fc_WSkoIx7nfcKyz9d6zVUtLUB/s1600/Bing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj85SLgHcrgpw-ZGC9Jn_sKyFxivVNWx6Jl5FGkNqHTCkPFs9I-Fs56wlYKz0CYAqkhFO59jqskuwVXa_dyew7XrbID54l_oYqgC4DraLXcE8Fc_WSkoIx7nfcKyz9d6zVUtLUB/s1600/Bing.jpg" height="81" width="200" /></a>5. Google is a company out of California, the most stupid, morally reprehensible state in the union. Bing is out of Washington -- beautiful, beloved, often-misguided-but-never-malevolent <em>Washington</em>.<br />
<br />
4. Google encourages their employees to bring their dogs to work. That is gross.<br />
<br />
3. Bing's trivia encoded photos are intriguing and educational. Today, for example, you can learn about the <a href="http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=adult+puss+moth+%28Cerura+vinula%29&form=hphot1" target="_blank">Puss Moth</a>. How about that?<br />
<br />
2. Google's doodles are obnoxious -- especially the endless World Cup series. That was the final straw.<br />
<br />
1. Wouldn't you rather Bing than Google? It just sounds more genteel and sophisticated -- sort of British: "Let's Bing a bit, and then we'll stop for tea." -- where as 'google' sounds like something two teens are doing in the backseat. <br />
<br />
Let's make a better world! Let's Bing!Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-19977472153978614782014-04-17T08:18:00.000-07:002014-04-17T16:45:02.805-07:00Everyday Miracles<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0gtvKoLU6BtDykqHQknSlii3VcveiOkQYaZo5WioBwVAVfwBaEI-lMGYs49xpFYZ6S38NKYoAXwvoIUlyfyjZCQWQSs6TByVyKFXKL50EkcjMR3GCnXsOlAUgI-XBShz4LPyK/s1600/seeds.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0gtvKoLU6BtDykqHQknSlii3VcveiOkQYaZo5WioBwVAVfwBaEI-lMGYs49xpFYZ6S38NKYoAXwvoIUlyfyjZCQWQSs6TByVyKFXKL50EkcjMR3GCnXsOlAUgI-XBShz4LPyK/s1600/seeds.jpg" /></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There
was so much I wanted to write about as the summer begins to take its hold, and I find it far less enjoyable to sit in front of a computer screen for any length of time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">this</i> subject was too unformed in my mind; <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">that</i> subject was too in need of better research; <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">those</i> subjects needed me to actually
finish the books<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was reading before I
could broach them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Plus, you know, life
in all its glory comes crashing in from all sides like the relentless waves –
leaving my life a breathless, wild, holy mess! So, what to write, what to write
as the rains begin to fall less often and a middle-aged, web-footed Pacific
Northwesterner’s fancy turns to thoughts of sun?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why, I shall write about seeds.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gardening,
like playing guitar or writing blog posts and NaNo novels, is one of
those things where my desire far outweighs my talent, but that I cheerfully
pursue, nonetheless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I see a grand
and bountiful garden, something leaps inside my heart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps it is the echo of a memory of the
Garden of my forefather and mother that brings that sudden stab of joy. To see
that immense goodness filling a well-planned and ordered space is to wish to
create my own; and so I try year after year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Some years go better than others, but every garden I’ve ever planted
starts in my mind as a stray piece of Eden and ends up a bit of a
disappointment. I guess when you set your sights so high, you’re looking for a
letdown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This
year, I am gamely trying again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
convinced my long-suffering husband (who points out every spring that we live
within walking distance of not one, but two major grocery store chains, both of
whom are stocked year-round with every imaginable type of produce) that I
needed an enclosed raised bed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
enclosure will serve the dual purposes of insulating seedlings from our chilly
spring days, and later keep out the neighborhood deer that feast off of the yearly buffet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After we had set up the bed,
which I will refer to as VegTrug, because that is its name, I stared into the
mixture of garden soil and compost that reached, as we had been instructed, to
within 2 – 4 cm of the top and felt a thrill of anticipation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What scrumptious veggies would I harvest in a
few months’ time from its fertile reaches? What ought I to plant?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, it
was seed shopping spree time at Lowe’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I came home with a veritable cornucopia of possibilities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Beets, Swiss chard, eggplants, carrots,
butternut squash . . . all danced before my eyes, fully grown, ripe for picking,
delectably juicy and crunchy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But right
now they were tiny, numerous, blink-and-you-miss-them seeds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Scratch that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Right now they were tiny everyday miracles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, as I poked and scattered them into the
rich soil of my VegTrug, I realized that I most wanted to write about these
everyday miracles – the kinds that turn seeds into smorgasbords, acorns into
oaks, farmers into poets, fighters into friends, and sinners into saints.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>L.M.
Montgomery wrote a trilogy about a girl named Emily Byrd Starr.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the first book, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Emily of New Moon</i>, eleven-year-old Emily experiences “the flash.”
“It had always seemed to Emily that she was very, very near to a world of
wonderful beauty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Between it and herself
hung only thing curtain; she could never draw the curtain aside – but
sometimes, just for a moment, a wind fluttered it and then it was as if she
caught a glimpse of the enchanting realm beyond – only a glimpse – and heard a
note of unearthly beauty. . . And always when the flash came to her Emily felt
that life was a wonderful, mysterious thing of persistent beauty.” When I read
those words as a teenager, I understood them without really knowing why I
did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had always felt, too, that there
was a kingdom of wonder just beyond my fingertips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It surrounded me, called to me, led me gently
to itself, though I could neither name it nor express it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I came to know Christ, it fell into
place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That “thin curtain” that
separated me from the “very near world of wonderful beauty” was torn in two by
my Savior, as surely has He rent the veil the terrible Friday so long ago. When
I catch those glimpses of the “enchanting realm” nowadays, I know that I have just
had the experience of placing one foot momentarily into eternity through His
grace and love.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I live on those moments.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The
thing about those moments, though, is how grounded they are in the
everyday.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A seed is a wonderful miracle
– something that, if contemplated long enough, would make any philosopher weak
in the knees.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet, what could be more
deceptively ordinary, more fundamental than a seed?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Reams of information are packed into the tiniest
vessel that can lie dormant, inactive, and to all eyes dead, until it meets
with sun, soil, and water – then, voila! You have beets!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What an amazing Creator to have thought of
that!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An
acorn, buried for winter to sustain a squirrel, lost and forgotten, lies under
the snow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The snow melts in spring and
gives water to the acorn; it awakes and sends forth roots
and stems.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Left alone, it will be an oak
tree.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A rodent’s neglected snack may
become his great-grand-progeny’s home.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Father must laugh to see it happen again and again, just as He planned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A man
arises at dawn and labors his days away under sun and clouds and storm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As he works the land, it gets into his blood;
when it gets into his blood, it becomes a part of him; when it is a part of
him, he needs to put it into words. We are people of the Word, that sustaining
mark of God, whose ever-unfolding revelatory Word writes His redemption on our
hearts. We put into words whatever we can, and give a tribute of silence to whatever
we cannot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, the farmer becomes a
poet, caught up in the grand song of life that awoke the stars and formed the
mountains.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Peace,
peace,” was the cry, but there is no peace for the two sworn enemies. Their
quarrel was commissioned by persons unknown to either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They fight for God and country.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, even for the same God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And Christmas comes and falls upon them both,
as quietly as the winter snow. “Peace, peace,” the angels sang near Bethlehem,
“and goodwill to all men.” And one soldier picks up the old tune and begins to
sing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The other hears and joins in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their languages are different; their songs
are the same.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They lay down their arms –
and, if it is only for a night, at least it is one night where the memory of a
Baby’s birth turned fighters into friends.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There
is no “burning bush moment” in any of these examples.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I have always secretly wanted a burning bush
to come and tell me what to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I say
that, though a real encounter like the one on Mt. Horeb would surely leave me
singed to the soul.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I do not think I
could stand the holy fire like Moses did.) There is no sun standing still in
the sky. There is no parting of the Red Sea. There is no water-into-wine, no
bodily resurrections, no speaking new life into existence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is only the wonder of the everyday; the
wonder that permeates everything our Lord touches. He touches us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when He does, the foremost so-called
everyday miracle occurs: He turns sinners into saints.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><br />
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I pray
that, even when I am aging and fading from this world and finding both feet
straying ever further into eternity and ever more reluctant to return into time,
I never forget that first miracle of my life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Without that transformation, without that piercing, consuming<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>encounter with Christ almost twenty years
ago, I would not even see the miracles all around me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I feel so sorry for people who do not know
the Lord and who might look at my VegTrug full of seeds and say, “Miracle?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What are you talking about?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s just science.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Just
science</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sheesh.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As though all of science were not God’s giant
treasure hunt to lead us to greater awe in His astoundingly creative glory! Or
for those who cannot see that a farmer who recites poetry that is a paean to
the One who first thought of the land that fills his soul is a more complete
man than one who composes verse on nothing beyond his own belly-button
lint.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or for a man who might discount
one moment of true peace in the midst of war, because war still rages on – not
understanding that one moment of true peace is worth a year of a fool’s
paradise. Not that I mean to be harsh to anyone. Until I knew Jesus, I might
have said the same. Not now, though; not now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>One of the best gifts, of oh-so-many-wondrous gifts of belief, was when
He opened my eyes to see that all that lives and breathes does so at His
command and for His pleasure in a glorious harmony. There is not one mistake;
there is not one forsaken. Then, by His grace, He brings us, sinners like you
and me, into the dance.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you
are reading these words, I hope you have a beautiful summer, filled with times
of refreshment and renewal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hey, I’m
feeling generous: I’ll wish the same for you, even if you’re not reading these
words!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this world that truly is “a
wonderful, mysterious thing of persistent beauty,” I pray that you are blessed
by those everyday miracles of seeds and songs and salvation.<o:p></o:p></span>Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-39294311240146310522014-03-17T17:55:00.002-07:002014-03-17T17:55:23.444-07:00In Honor of My Irish Friend from VermontIn honor of the Vermonster who is as Irish as a shamrock stuck into a Guinness that's being drunk by a leprechaun on the Hill of Slane, and is also a very proud Vermonter (hence her screen name), I have duly celebrated St. Patrick's Day by funneling a good chunk of money into her home state via two of my favorite companies: Vermont's <a href="http://www.kingarthurflour.com/" target="_blank">King Arthur Flour</a> and Vermont's <a href="http://www.gardeners.com/" target="_blank">Gardener's Supply Company</a>. Behold:<br />
<br />
Cloche-style Ceramic Baker: <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGSsVZlHSNuFf3vFPtePahVSgke88niCn0VpmPJ3Dggxx2_hHBwI2Lm4hx5xKj1hyphenhyphenSnzg1jNLAN8-LmrovgULMk9X0I-s6fKQ1XvzzjpBs4FHL4zahuKu6rTkU_5nsAHneVW_Z/s1600/Cloche+Baker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGSsVZlHSNuFf3vFPtePahVSgke88niCn0VpmPJ3Dggxx2_hHBwI2Lm4hx5xKj1hyphenhyphenSnzg1jNLAN8-LmrovgULMk9X0I-s6fKQ1XvzzjpBs4FHL4zahuKu6rTkU_5nsAHneVW_Z/s1600/Cloche+Baker.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
VegTrug Elevated Patio Garden: <br />
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And oh-so-much-more! Happy St. Patrick's Day to Vermonster and all!</div>
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Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-7456007721903384362014-02-12T11:29:00.001-08:002014-02-12T11:40:35.109-08:00Each in His Own Tongue<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRCP6h9o1AyDBNVs7vHOD5mLKYNMKaWGOvMlxD8Q8PXqsJD9tUD-BKCGMuJJ-kq7XnNS70BbyHaR2wtV7I92GJdeF0eKUk0B6yd6A_jWaWBbj86skY3k44j5dXZSeLQlk522Gv/s1600/chronicles+of+avonlea.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRCP6h9o1AyDBNVs7vHOD5mLKYNMKaWGOvMlxD8Q8PXqsJD9tUD-BKCGMuJJ-kq7XnNS70BbyHaR2wtV7I92GJdeF0eKUk0B6yd6A_jWaWBbj86skY3k44j5dXZSeLQlk522Gv/s1600/chronicles+of+avonlea.jpg" /></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> <span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">L.M.
Montgomery wrote many short stories set in the idyllic province of Prince
Edward Island.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In one of them, Felix
Moore, age twelve, is a gifted violinist being raised by his grandfather. This
grandfather, Mr. Leonard, is a minister, deeply devoted to the son of his only
daughter; however, he refuses to allow the boy to practice his gift, as it
reminds him of the boy’s vagabond father, a fiddler of popular tunes who had
stolen away the minister’s daughter and had broken her heart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mr. Leonard fondly hopes that his grandson
will follow in his steps.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Felix laments
to a sympathetic ear that, “Ministers are good things to be, but I’m afraid I
can’t be a minister.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Not a
pulpit minster. There’s different kinds of ministers, and each must talk to men
in his own tongue if he’s going to do ‘em any real good,” the friend replies.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> M</span>s.
Montgomery wrote, “Mr. Leonard thought rightly that the highest work to which
any man could be called was a life of service to his fellows; but he made the
mistake of supposing the field of service much narrower than it is.” In a
terrible moment, the minister exacts a promise from his grandson that the boy
will never again touch a violin. The very soul of the child is his music, but
he makes the promise out of love and respect.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Ah, but
Naomi Clark is dying. Naomi Clark is “an awful, wicked woman” who has “lived a
life of shame” and “mocked and flouted” every effort of the minister to reclaim
her from “the way that takes hold on hell.” But, she is dying, and she wants
the preacher.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mr. Leonard does his duty.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Can
you help me? . . . I was skeered I’d die before you got here – die and go to
hell. . . . I can’t go to God for help. Oh, I’m skeered of hell, but I’m skeereder
still of God. I’m sorry for living wicked. I was driven on by the fiends of
hell . . . but I was always sorry.” The woman’s voice is desperate. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The minister offers to her that all she must
do is repent and God will forgive her; He is, after all, a God of love. Naomi,
though, will have none of those truths.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>To her, God is “wrath and justice and punishment,” and though she fears
the outer darkness, she cannot let in His light.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
minister, in great anguish of spirit, falls to his knees to pray for this sin-sick
soul. “O God, our Father!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Help this
woman!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Speak to her in a tongue which
she can understand.” Naomi falls back on her deathbed in a spasm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">*****<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>My
daughter and I were biking to her Tae Kwon Do class the other night when we
passed a demonstration at the main intersection in our neighborhood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some church’s adherents were at every corner
with signs proclaiming the Lordship of Jesus and the need of repentance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is an unusual sight in the Northwest in
general, and our neighborhood in particular; however, I always admire those who
put their convictions on the line and subject themselves to ridicule, violence,
and indifference.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mentioned the sight
to my friend, Shirley, while our daughters took their class together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She whispered thoughtfully, “Do you think
that sort of thing ever <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">really </i>works
to bring someone to God?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Well,
I don’t think it would have worked for me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But,” and I paused a moment to choose my words carefully, “If it works
to save just one soul . . . if it is that little nudge of consideration that
starts one person onto the path of reconciliation and redemption, then it must
be worth it.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I was
reflecting upon this shortly afterward when we read over the second chapter of
Acts in our family Bible study.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
apostles began to speak in tongues – known languages of the many nations of
pilgrims in Jerusalem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The people, of
course, marveled at this wondrous thing in those days before Rosetta Stone and
asked, “How is it that we hear, each in our own language in which we were born?”
Acts tells us that the apostles spoke “the wonderful works of God” in a way
that left the people amazed and perplexed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Are we, too, not left amazed and perplexed when we first hear the truth
of God spoken in a way that moves our hearts toward Him, filled with awe that
He would speak to us in our own tongue? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Ever
since I became a Christian, in all my thousands of prayers lifted to the
heavens, there has been one constant one: that God would use me in some way to
help bring at least one sinner to His salvation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And, who knows?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe He has.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In teaching Sunday School, my great hope is
that when one of my little Kindergartners is someday at that crossroads between
the narrow way and the wide one, he might just remember his Sunday School
teacher who long ago showed him Jesus’ love in a real way, and that memory will
help him choose to seek the Holy One.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Some
people have a natural gift for walking unbelievers through every step toward a
belief that culminates in complete and true redemption; how I admire those
people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was not how I was saved.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The final work of my salvation was done very
privately through God’s Holy Word and a heart long-prepared. You see, when I
look back upon my life, to those days when I walked in foolishness and pride, I
remember those who planted the seeds of faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>My soil was not yet ready to bring forth harvest; but, I had faithful
sowers who showed me God’s love in real ways. Three, in particular, come to
mind: Robin Stapleton, Carolyn Pon, and Juan Barba.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I write their names as a benediction; they
put the goodness of His Word into my life when I was a feckless, shallow
teen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They spoke to me in my own tongue,
though not one of them knew it at the time. I can hardly wait to tell them when
we meet again in the Kingdom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit; mso-spacerun: yes;">*****</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Back to
Naomi: Felix appears at the door, worried about his grandfather’s long absence
in the raging seaside storm. Naomi, in a last burst of consciousness, asks
Felix to play her something on her old fiddle, needing music at her final
moments, because “there was always something in it for me I never found
anywhere else.” Felix looks at his grandfather, who nods an ashamed assent. So,
Felix plays for the dying woman. The tune winds its way from mirthful innocence
to rapturous love to agonized despair to indescribable evil. Then, the tune
changes again to a tortured repentance and rests at last upon “infinite
forgiveness and all-comprehending love.” And Naomi whispers, “I understand now
. . . God is a God of love . . . He sent you here tonight, boy to tell it to me
in a way I could feel it.” By daybreak, she is dead, but no longer lost,
because she has heard God’s truth in her own tongue.</span><span style="font-family: inherit; mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-72552310347384884672014-01-17T11:24:00.002-08:002014-01-24T14:05:01.739-08:00A Poem About KatiesocksA more faithful alarm than even my clock's<br />
Is the daybreak ritual of my Katiesocks<br />
Each morning at precisely six <em>ante meridian</em><br />
She leaps on my bed and starts up her kittyin'<br />
Biscuit-kneading paws and whiskers that tickle<br />
Put my half-conscious brain in a bit of a pickle<br />
For her message is one that I both love and dread<br />
For I've too much to do to be seductively led<br />
By her rhythmic purring and the tilt of her head<br />
That say so convincingly, "Just stay in bed.<br />
Oh just stay, oh just stay, oh just stay in bed."<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWCd-nyie-AOL5PT19HFKe6NzuHgY2VLmxDN-qAwMGUNIaasv3Xf2JNjqgnxhJHMli5Fx2nI1JWDXkuhHLRZJRBZ4Nnlfcma80rpktaFvGzv1jAWWLcnP5sJNVEfIP6AUnz8tZ/s1600/p&k.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWCd-nyie-AOL5PT19HFKe6NzuHgY2VLmxDN-qAwMGUNIaasv3Xf2JNjqgnxhJHMli5Fx2nI1JWDXkuhHLRZJRBZ4Nnlfcma80rpktaFvGzv1jAWWLcnP5sJNVEfIP6AUnz8tZ/s1600/p&k.jpg" height="150" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Katiesocks and Pippa, both of whom make getting out of bed <br />
even harder than it already is!</td></tr>
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Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-79663209741337668252013-12-09T10:13:00.002-08:002013-12-09T15:38:54.236-08:00The Anti-Dog Song Of all of the creatures on God's good, green earth,<br />
Lacking in wisdom and whimsy and worth,<br />
There is one possessing of these greatest dearth,<br />
And that, my friends, is the dog<br />
<br />
From their big, lolling heads to banal, wagging tails<br />
An aura of witlessness surely prevails;<br />
When they clickety-clack cross your floor on their nails,<br />
You know the heartache of owning a dog<br />
<br />
<strong>Chorus:</strong><br />
Oh, cursed be the man who first lured to his cave<br />
A creature once noble, ferocious, and brave<br />
And watered it down to a slobbering knave:<br />
Minus <em>lupus</em>, add <em>canis</em>: the Dog.<br />
<br />
As frightfully absurd as a man eating quiche<br />
Is the bubble-brained cur at the end of a leash;<br />
A potpourri, medley, composite, pastiche<br />
Of inanities make up the dog.<br />
<br />
When you try to avoid them, it's a futile case<br />
As their owners so clueless, ignoble, and base<br />
Let them shit in your yard and yap loud in your face<br />
And hate you if you don't like their dog.<br />
<br />
<strong>Chorus</strong><br />
<br />
You can give them a bath, and yet still in one hour<br />
A smell that no shampoo can yet overpower<br />
Will emanate forth, sending you to the shower<br />
If you've been forced to touch someone's dog.<br />
<br />
Some people dress dogs in sweaters or put them in hats<br />
Whether they're big as Goliath or smaller than rats<br />
Y'know who won't put up with that crap, folks? Yep, cats!<br />
Who are a hell of a lot smarter than dogs.<br />
<br />
<strong>Chorus</strong><br />
<br />
****<br />
This is my "Anti-Dog Song" which makes the dog-lovers in my life sad, mostly because in their hearts they know that every word is true (except the part about quiche -- I really do think it's OK for a man to eat quiche). I wrote it this past summer, when I was in the throes of depression over the fact that we had a dog.<br />
<br />
My dad said that I ought to remove from this blog my post from May 2013 about our dog, Daisy, that we had adopted. But, I do not believe in erasing history. We did, indeed, adopt a dog -- only to find out that we had made a dreadful mistake. <br />
<br />
There was nothing wrong with Daisy, other than that she is a dog, and we are not dog-people. She really was our <em>Bellis Perennis, Canis Optima</em> -- the best possible dog that we could have ever had. She did not bark or have accidents in the house. She did not chew. She was not aggressive. She was sweet and nice and eager to please. But, her fatal flaw for us was that she was a dog, and -- as I said -- we are not dog-people.<br />
<br />
Here is the happy end to the story -- one with which dog-lovers cannot quibble: When we collectively realized as a family that nobody loved the dog, we immediately made steps to have the adoption agency put her back into the system to try to find her a forever home. We fostered her for about two weeks until they found a lady to come look at her. It was love at first sight for both of them. I am delighted to report that Daisy went to a loving home -- one that could appreciate her many stellar doggish qualities -- at the end of August, and we have been dog-free more than three months. We have since adopted two kitties, whom we love with all our hearts. Everyone wins!<br />
<br />
Anyway, I still think that this song is pretty funny, in a painful, truth-telling, cathartic sort of way. Here in western Washington State -- where there are more dogs than Christians -- our family is surrounded by the "Children of Dog," as I have taken to calling the cult of canine that has sprouted all over the world in recent years. Two of our neighbors have each a little rat-like mutt, both of whom come regularly into our backyard to eat the bird food I put out and then leave stinky deposits. I hate them. However, friends and family have nice enough doggies with whom I do not mind having occasional, friendly interactions.<br />
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I guess if you think dogs are one step removed from angels, you can leave a comment telling me how utterly wretched a person I am and how I am going to hell and all that. I won't believe it, but you can vent. But, I am really posting this for the oppressed fellow travelers out there who know that dogs are not really all that great and are rather a nuisance than otherwise and maybe have to deal with obnoxious dogs in your neighborhoods or homes. YOU ARE NOT ALONE! <br />
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<br />Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-42403293113393603522013-11-25T18:50:00.002-08:002013-11-25T18:50:31.927-08:00WINNING!<div style="text-align: left;">
I got through word 50,000 on my <a href="http://www.nanowrimo.org/" target="_blank">NaNoWriMo</a> project today! Today! I'm still not done with the dang book, though. But, I validated the word count anyway so that I could put this on my blog:</div>
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Huzzah!</div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-85575018229590112262013-09-18T16:04:00.001-07:002013-09-18T16:04:33.921-07:00The Best Thing About Being a Grown-Up?<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKYoBkfHxuDlw4Q2thTH_woCmH59XRl8FXkY680pC2kwE0ygLljGVFiT_jh9nOcdXgXaUSGPNRcm3qnXy_iZnStqhWRe0Q6NaARmZcFUePa0MTI1ojbO3NvwuW73O3ex15x8Dg/s1600/untitled.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKYoBkfHxuDlw4Q2thTH_woCmH59XRl8FXkY680pC2kwE0ygLljGVFiT_jh9nOcdXgXaUSGPNRcm3qnXy_iZnStqhWRe0Q6NaARmZcFUePa0MTI1ojbO3NvwuW73O3ex15x8Dg/s1600/untitled.png" /></a>It is getting to eat ice cream any time of day that you please. Definitely.<br />
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-25094028419904470992013-07-04T14:48:00.000-07:002013-07-04T14:51:18.907-07:00Happy "Independence" Day!From the creative folks at <a href="http://reason.tv/">Reason.tv</a>, via Mollie Hemingway at <a href="http://www.ricochet.com/" target="_blank">Ricochet</a>:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="169" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/V1weRo8uWA0" width="300"></iframe><br />
<span style="font-family: arial;">A lot of American principle is contained in the two words: "Just don't." Much of the rest is encompassed by the suggestion of minding one's own business. The whole is summed up in the word "liberty."<br /> --Isabel Paterson</span>Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-68152874042520777832013-07-02T14:37:00.000-07:002013-07-02T14:37:02.036-07:00The Agony and the Ecstasy of Top Pot<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5ZrExeDRmw_H7-2zT4abSY6nIIxtG1Vc7xpEAxpuQCBKM1nxWJe5KpkzFXY9OsQVv31YgLzlaKw81pKF6jf_fZE7beTvFPXyDrARHWzT3bv7tgF57c6b8XCMDV0lhSnz-vaHq/s200/top+pot+logo.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5ZrExeDRmw_H7-2zT4abSY6nIIxtG1Vc7xpEAxpuQCBKM1nxWJe5KpkzFXY9OsQVv31YgLzlaKw81pKF6jf_fZE7beTvFPXyDrARHWzT3bv7tgF57c6b8XCMDV0lhSnz-vaHq/s200/top+pot+logo.png" width="200" /></a>I just received a mid-year notification from <a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/" target="_blank">Map My Run</a> that, so far, in 2013 I have logged 232 workouts on 49 different routes for a total distance of 1,002.6 miles over the course of 192.5 hours and have burned 95,662 calories. That last figure would be more impressive if I had not countered it proactively by eating all and then some of those calories back in the form of <a href="http://www.toppotdoughnuts.com/" target="_blank">Top Pot Doughnuts</a>.<br />
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Ah, Top Pot -- that glorious palindrome that represents all that is delicious and unholy in deep fried pastry. Better than Tim Horton's (sorry, Canada); better than Krispy Kreme. Simply, the BEST doughnuts ever. And now, for the rest of the summer, I must bid them "good-bye."<br />
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Why? Because I am in training for this marathon thingy in Sioux Falls, SD in September. And, I want to lose another 10 pounds before running it, as every pound of weight you carry becomes four pounds worth of pressure on knees and ankles when you run. I really do not want to train my heart out and then come up injured before the run (as almost happened to me before the half-marathon in Seattle last November). So, sadly, I say<em> Auf Wiedersehen</em>, Top Pot; implicit in which expression is the promise that I will be back come the post-September 8 world.<br />
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Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-46509118808422109882013-05-06T18:09:00.001-07:002013-05-06T18:09:42.759-07:00Bellis Perennis (Canis Optima!)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyPDtxOO5I0c78aGmo7b-ZPDKQVMarpCs_wKX4ou7sUt-4MXQ8n_DjIesal6iPY4x3gBtGeMztTtChsGNArR9YHWsu5JOSKqWevu3bvPboiKnL9D_quQIqf4gZCLa2kPKm35NT/s1600/daisy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyPDtxOO5I0c78aGmo7b-ZPDKQVMarpCs_wKX4ou7sUt-4MXQ8n_DjIesal6iPY4x3gBtGeMztTtChsGNArR9YHWsu5JOSKqWevu3bvPboiKnL9D_quQIqf4gZCLa2kPKm35NT/s200/daisy.jpg" width="200" /></a>Otherwise known as the common daisy, <em>Bellis Perennis</em> has become the first nickname of our not-so-common Daisy, the newest member of the family!</div>
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Yesterday, we welcomed one brown-eyed, wet-nosed, two-year-old into our home for a trial 2-week adoption. But, we do not need 2 weeks to know if this is the ONE. She just so totally is. <br />
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Behold the cuteness of Daisy Girl:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjn_L_Wo4r41c25iDV8m6B5JUJMLUdvviNs_OIP1LuNiZLMFni3_xiND1ztD5tWtIJg-gtoYJxk4s-WVSDvBGminO8_d65Lx_UGDerc11WfVkCZWfS2GCoBIiZhSvk4ngFQXBRQ/s1600/patootie.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjn_L_Wo4r41c25iDV8m6B5JUJMLUdvviNs_OIP1LuNiZLMFni3_xiND1ztD5tWtIJg-gtoYJxk4s-WVSDvBGminO8_d65Lx_UGDerc11WfVkCZWfS2GCoBIiZhSvk4ngFQXBRQ/s200/patootie.png" width="200" /></a></div>
Sadie is now, officially, the happiest girl in all the realm. And I am now, officially, the most vacuuming-est mom that has ever been. My new scourge: dog hair. Ah well, the things you do for love.Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-29323542458438903832013-05-03T08:02:00.002-07:002013-05-03T08:02:29.142-07:00Small Washington School Closes Because of Nice WeatherThis story made me smile; it's just so <em>Washington:</em><br />
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SEATTLE (AP) — In sun-deprived Washington state, the promise of nice spring
weather has prompted a small private school to give students a day off to enjoy
the sunshine.<br />
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Friday will be a "sun day" of sorts for 205 students at Bellingham Christian
School in Bellingham, Wash.<br />
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Principal Bob Sampson announced the day off on the school's site.<br />
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Sampson says he wanted to give students a chance to enjoy the weather and
re-energize. He says he surveyed parents and floated the idea with the school
board before canceling school.<br />
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The sun day was also made possible because there weren't any days off because
of snow this school year.<br />
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Friday is not the first time the school has given students the day off
because of sunshine. The last time was two years ago.<br />
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Truly, it is a glorious day. If you have never been to Western Washington when the sun is shining, then you are missing out on one of God's great gifts. I'm glad that the Bellingham principal sees things the same way. I hope not one of those lucky-ducky children wastes the day inside playing video games!</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeydKOCJsMtQpnxCiCgJ4iKTCEWSlBkLnCfKImm-5eNhUJ0vHmJGUeUj9yqXXjQoAEpC8AHe5ED69I4u_oNy7To2rcc5Mkfdz9Bmw3QVQ46dmcG2_10ajunFRadmdOqMRK2trO/s1600/apple+blossoms.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="120" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeydKOCJsMtQpnxCiCgJ4iKTCEWSlBkLnCfKImm-5eNhUJ0vHmJGUeUj9yqXXjQoAEpC8AHe5ED69I4u_oNy7To2rcc5Mkfdz9Bmw3QVQ46dmcG2_10ajunFRadmdOqMRK2trO/s200/apple+blossoms.jpg" width="200" /></a>I am also thrilled to report that our baby apple trees in the backyard have blossoms on them this spring -- for the first time! Yay! The blueberry bushes are looking great, with countless delicate, pale buds that look like poofy skirts from the Gay 90's. The strawberries are making their own sweet show in greens, whites, and yellows. And, I have planted my geraniums and marigolds and peas. I love my rainy, grey winters here in the PNW; but, I love my vibrant, flashy springs, too!</div>
Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-37243874452810762352013-04-30T07:55:00.003-07:002013-04-30T07:55:51.446-07:00Running for a Cause!<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs-J3841yt-_JjwuZN5Be-DUG6mEm994WQ50BXrLrVPpjquMiqaUjw_mXyzZtI9FGanbfc4WFvR2-j6HfiX3XnI9bmV-JnUY96xXgGc6tEEipvHA_kY4XbYBAmkfATrRQ2ZJqb/s1600/Free+Them.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs-J3841yt-_JjwuZN5Be-DUG6mEm994WQ50BXrLrVPpjquMiqaUjw_mXyzZtI9FGanbfc4WFvR2-j6HfiX3XnI9bmV-JnUY96xXgGc6tEEipvHA_kY4XbYBAmkfATrRQ2ZJqb/s1600/Free+Them.png" /></a>Please consider signing up or donating to World Concern's "Free Them" 5K/10K Fundraiser to fight human trafficking. My whole family is signed up to run -- Sadie and Jason are tackling the 5K part, and I will grimly face the 10K. I think it is in Fremont, so <em>there will be hills</em>. <br />
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If you're interested at all in donating, here is a link to our family's fundraising page:<br />
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<a href="http://give.worldconcern.org/fundraise?fcid=245876" target="_blank">The Olawsky Family's World Concern "Free Them" Page</a><br />
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Thanks so much!Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-9617105265675955802013-04-29T09:33:00.002-07:002013-04-29T09:33:55.038-07:00Like a Rag DollYesterday evening at Safeway, we had finished loading our groceries into the car and I was returning the cart when a crunch of metal caused me and Jason to both look up. A huge, old Ford truck was pulling quickly away from the Toyota Camry into which the driver had just backed. Then, a woman was running across the parking lot, pushing her cart filled with groceries, screaming at the truck, "That's my car! You hit my car!" The truck continued to drive away, so the woman pushed her cart to the side and sped up after the truck, screaming the whole time, "You hit my car! That's my car!" I ran after her, and caught her grocery cart, pushed it out of the way to safety and started after her. I guess I figured that, if the truck's driver didn't have the decency to stop at the moment he hit her car, he was not going to stop just because she chased after him. I wanted to get close enough to see his license plate number so that I could help her file a police report for hit-and-run. <br />
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The truck had to stop at the parking lot driveway to make a left turn out onto SE 140th, which is a fairly busy road in our neighborhood. There was a car in front of it waiting also to turn, which allowed the woman to catch up to the truck. She started beating on the passenger-side window, yelling repeatedly for the driver to stop, because he hit her car. The car in front of the truck turned left onto the street. Then, to my and everyone else's horror, the truck started to turn left, with the woman clinging onto the side window. She managed to run a few steps with the truck, then, as it picked up speed, it began to drag her, and then -- Lord, have mercy and drive this vision from my mind -- she lost her grip and I saw her body bounce along the ground like a rag doll. The truck sped off.<br />
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Thank God, she did not die. Thank God, she did not lose consciousness. Some good people on the other side of the street were able to drag her out of the road quickly. She was cut up terribly -- flesh just torn from her legs and feet, blood pouring from her forehead and the back of her head. Those of us on the Safeway-side began to stream over to offer what assistance we could, and to make sure that, when the police came, we were able to give our witness testimony. Jason, on the other side in the parking lot, stood guard over her car and her shopping cart. The poor woman was just crying and crying, "He hit my car . . . he hurt me . . . he hurt me . . . he hit my car . . . he is a bad man . . . he did not stop . . . oh, he hurt me . . ." Someone found her cell phone and called her husband. The firemen came, the sheriff came, police officers came. <br />
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What I did not know at the time, but found out soon afterward, was that another man had just gotten into his car in the Safeway parking lot when the hit occurred. As he watched the unbelievable scene unfold, he quickly sprang into action. He turned right behind the truck onto 140th, stopped but a moment to help get the woman out of the road after she fell, then back into the driver's seat to follow that truck, cell phone in hand, so that the police were able to stop the truck driver within a half and hour. "They got him," the sheriff apprised us with triumph; a cheer went up among the witnesses and bystanders. The man who followed the truck came back at the end, to finish giving his report for the police. Jason and I were able to shake his hand. Hero.<br />
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The woman, whose name is Twee, had been reaching out a hand to me during the wait for her husband and police. I grabbed her blood-soaked hand and held it gently, promising her that we were all there to help her and that none of us would think of leaving her. I saw the cross necklace that she wore. When I met her husband later, I told him to tell Twee that our family would be praying for her. And so we have.<br />
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You may wonder why she was so tenacious in pursuing the man who hit her car. Why, you may ask, would anyone put themselves at such risk, simply to avenge a cosmetic aberration? Her husband had the key. See, Twee was from another country -- somewhere in Asia, I did not find the specific one -- and she had had a very hard life of grinding poverty before coming to the States and marrying her husband. This car that had been hit was her first <em>new car</em> -- a 2010 Camry with 26, 000 miles on it. She had had it for only 4 weeks. And so, I can only guess, when that man hit her car and drove off without any acknowledgement, it was a slap in her face rather than a dent in her trunk. I imagine all the desperation and injustice of her youth came flooding back to her in that moment and every fibre within her cried out, "I will not be a victim again. Not today. Not ever." And I can understand that.<br />
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Please pray for Twee's speedy recovery. And for justice to be served for the man who acted with no honor and almost took her life.Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-59411522060120826042013-04-19T09:20:00.000-07:002013-04-19T19:04:31.836-07:00The Happiest Show on TV<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoac20HqY2lRtyaV6S44IjDhpLBFGhyphenhyphenYRPra4SqXgf9hHPogO2QOy44k2XrZt-w7godUc461JBKBTjhYnFjGff_HAfYlmlovD4HIocr0Pt3samxlb0lJsUXMuh6SZAqyeqwpok/s1600/D&G.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoac20HqY2lRtyaV6S44IjDhpLBFGhyphenhyphenYRPra4SqXgf9hHPogO2QOy44k2XrZt-w7godUc461JBKBTjhYnFjGff_HAfYlmlovD4HIocr0Pt3samxlb0lJsUXMuh6SZAqyeqwpok/s200/D&G.jpg" width="158" /></a>From 1997 through 2002, I had two recurring events around which I structured my schedule: church on Sundays and <em>Dharma and Greg</em> on Wednesday nights. Go ahead: mock and deride, if you will. I don't care. D&G was my favorite show back then in those work-full-time-go-to-school-full-time days, and it remains in my top three all-time favorites today. <br />
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On a week that has seen inexplicable horror and unimaginable evil, it is good to revisit things like D&G that are pure happiness and light. The powers that be have only released one season to DVD in the U.S.; however, some very good souls have risked copyright infringement charges and who-knows-what-else to post further seasons on YouTube. Huzzah!<br />
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Dharma Finkelstein and Greg Montgomery: not only the best-looking couple ever assembled in the sit-com labs, but also the most innately sweet. If you have never seen the show, the premise is this: Dharma is a happy-go-lucky, new-agey chick raised by hippie parents in <em>that</em> part of San Francisco; Greg is a lawyer in the Justice Dept. from an old-money family in <em>that</em> part of San Francisco; they meet on BART and get married on that same day. Chaos and hilarity ensue. While the two sets of parents and their culture and values clashes are certainly amusing, it is the chemistry and joy that the two stars (Jenna Elfman and Thomas Gibson) bring to their characters that just made this show must-see TV for me from the get-go. Dharma was created, as was revealed in interviews on the first season's DVD set, to be the antidote for the unhappy, tightly-wound career woman of the 1990's who was miserable in her personal life. They wanted to make a character who was simply happy with who she was, absolutely in love, and able to spread delightful sunshine to everyone in her day-to-day life. I think they succeeded. And Greg was the perfect complement. <br />
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So, when my<em> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Michelle-Tumes/dp/B000JCF27K" target="_blank">heart is crying and the world is dying, I hold on to Jesus</a></em>, yes, and fall to my knees. But, I also turn my radio to 98.1 KING FM and listen to the soothing, interesting awesomeness of <a href="http://www.king.org/Announcers/9716749" target="_blank">Sean MacLean</a> as he hosts hours of classical music. Or, I read and read and read. Or, and definitely increasingly this week, I pull up YouTube on the old laptop and watch the Happiest Show on TV.Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10098217.post-46557837314437610772013-04-01T08:49:00.000-07:002013-04-01T16:39:59.757-07:00We Are Advancing ConstantlySadie will start 6th Grade mathematics (Saxon) this month. She is still technically in 4th Grade.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivuMBwARzcyp0wTR8gcUCxmQNvOxkoMw61JpDXU8SlaHaRMakZznbpjPA642PFvgxJL-gNKxzMhwTnVGieCsQaJG4Mfze5BZ9hmLq9nYpkQiQo8g5y7p0DBQwRWB-nzBZd3OXj/s1600/patton.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivuMBwARzcyp0wTR8gcUCxmQNvOxkoMw61JpDXU8SlaHaRMakZznbpjPA642PFvgxJL-gNKxzMhwTnVGieCsQaJG4Mfze5BZ9hmLq9nYpkQiQo8g5y7p0DBQwRWB-nzBZd3OXj/s200/patton.jpg" width="160" /></a>When we chose to homeschool Sadie two years ago, it was in part so that we could incorporate things like Latin and Greek into our curriculum. Even Catholic schools do not teach those subjects at Elementary levels anymore. In part, too, was the idea of not missing a huge chunk of Sadie's childhood -- after three years of sending her off to school in the morning, I was feeling disconnected with the person she was becoming. Some moms make great classroom moms and get totally involved with the school experience. I am not one of those moms. The last great part of the decision was finding a schedule that really works -- for that optimal (<em>optare</em> - "to wish") balance of academic vigor, life-enhancing experiences, and plenty of dreaming down-time. I think we are getting very close.<br />
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I have set up the school year as follows: In September, we officially start a new academic year. This is so that, if Sadie ever goes back into a traditional school, she will be in sync with the school calendar. But, she will be "in school" year-round. We do three weeks on, one week off, from September through August, with four special times of the year when she can have two weeks off in a row. That gives us a typical 36-week school year, with a good dose of field-tripping and goofing-off time thrown in.<br />
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Because we are eschewing the 3-month wasteland of summer break, in September there is no "waking up the summer-slumber mind and snapping it back into academic mode" month of remedial learning. In the words of<em> Patton</em> (the movie, at least, if not the man), "we are advancing constantly." Even on her "off" weeks, Sadie needs to do a <em>little</em> math, a <em>little</em> Latin and Greek, and a <em>little</em> memory work (be it poetry or geography or both!). This is just to keep her awake. I have tried to give her time with absolutely no schoolwork, and have found that, when we start again, she inevitably tries to claim that she has forgotten how to conjugate <em>ambulo</em> into pluperfect or how to subtract fractions. This is because she is a weasel. So, math and Latin and so on we do -- and, if she does not fuss, it takes less than an hour and she can go climb up a tree and commune with the birds, or whatnot.<br />
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Also, by adhering to this schedule, we are still able to be ready for testing at the end of May. At first I was worried that our strung-out timeline would make Sadie only 3/4 of the way through her grade level by testing time. I have found, though, that homeschooling allows us simply to get through more things quickly, as well as thoroughly. So, we can finish a 4th Grade science curriculum in April, or US History in May. And math is just something that spirals around anyway, with piecemeal additions of new concepts interwoven with constant repetition of old ones. Sadie did very well on her tests last year; I know she will do the same this year. And the <a href="http://www.nle.org/" target="_blank">NLE</a>, starting in 5th Grade? Piece of cake (fingers crossed/knocking wood)!<br />
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I never thought that I would advocate for year-round school. I believe with all my heart that kids need lots and lots of dreaming alone time and robust playing time and time out of their seats and into the world. But, I am pretty sure -- and I'll have to wait for the years to bear witness as to whether I am or not, ultimately -- that this mixture is just right. At least, it seems to be working for our family. The seamless advance from year-to-year in our various curricula just plain works. Far be it from me to wish to sentence any child to more time in public school; but, for homeschoolers or nontraditional and private schools, this schedule is something to consider. Justinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07675442512111141220noreply@blogger.com0