Camping at Standing Indian in April

It rained. Friday night through midmorning Saturday,
drizzles, streams and steady showers.



The Weasley tent and the Taj Ma Herman tent both leaked,
but mine stayed snug and dry.
Weasleys and Hermans maintained
a positive attitude,
especially when the sun came out.

The young ones whittled. They carved.

They chipped and smoothed, and sharpened.

We had nice pointy stakes,

all ready for an invasion of vampires.

We didn't eat that shoe...
it was just one of the
casualties of the rain that needed drying a bit.



We did eat the lovely chicken and potatoes rolled into those tin foil packages on the fire. They were very good eating. As were the s'mores, the morning pancakes and eggs and all other eatings. I love camping food.

Hoping to camp again soon.

Bees

Note that I have added a new blog, "Backyard Swammerdam."
It is about my adventures in beekeeping.
The link is over there to the right under "My Other Blogs."

Weary Cats

After a hard week,
it is good to get to the weekend.
We stretch out in our favorite spots
and snuggle in,
staying in touch with the world around
with attentive ears,
while letting all the muscles in our bodies
melt away to a state
of total
relaxation.

Sleepy Spring Days

After my recent bout with the flu
I am finally feeling like I'm back to
my normal level of energy.

For too long, I dragged
through every day
and collapsed in a heap
every evening.

Even so,
today was a sleepy day.
I stayed awake,
but three out of four
hospice patients slept
through my visit.

Hard to stay peppy
when everyone around you
is snoring peacefully.

Hello, Handsome!

Welcome to the world, Paul Thomas.

Paul is the brother

of Julia the Goddaughter,

whose world is in the process of being rocked.

Little brothers are wondrous, annoying,

life giving, horrifying and delightful

contributions to humanity.

As one of Julia's godmamas,

I welcome this new source

of spiritual challenge, growth,

and support for her.

And doesn't he have the cutest face?

Pink

Red Sky at Night

Shiny

Anna Maria Island, Florida

Late February

Job Appreciation

So, an update on my career
from my chair on the sunporch.

I interviewed for the manager position
and felt good about the interview.

Didn't get the job
and feel pretty darn good about that as well.

The three weeks between
finding out the job was open
and finding out the outcome
gave me some good soul searching time
to look at why I like being a chaplain,
and what I would miss were I not one.

I would miss a lot, it turns out.

Plus, since my interview,
my supervisors have been
bending over backwards
to make sure I'm feeling
adequately challenged and engaged.
I think the universe has been doing the same.
I've had more interesting referrals
in the last month...
alert people with challenging questions.
All while gaining a new appreciation
for the quiet hymn singing time
with the demented folk.

It is good being a chaplain.

I'm glad I interviewed, though.

It helped me take myself more seriously...
which I need to do.

While I love clowning around,
it pays to remind myself and others
that there is substance lurking
below the surface.

I think one of the things I discovered
during the last month
is that the people around me
remember there is substance to me
even when I have begun to forget.

No Vacation at All

If you read back through my blog,
you'll note that one of my consistent topics
is whining when I'm sick.

This be one of those blogs.
I had an AWFUL respiratory bug
three weeks ago...
bad enough that
I thought it might be the flu.
Completely sapped my energy.

Was fine for two weeks
then came down with a hacking
fevering plague
this week.
At first I thought the hacking
was just residual from the first bout of whatever.

Yesterday, continuing to feel
worse and worse,
went to the doctor's office.
They swabbed my nose,
disappeared for a few minutes
and pronounced me positive
with influenza.

They don't know what I had
three weeks ago,
but figure it weakened my immune system.

So...I'm home until at least Monday.
Up at 6:00 to suck on a cough drop and complain.

Quarantined at home
and not feeling well enough to enjoy it.

Bother.

Dreaming of Vacations

We found out this week
that the grand tour of Turkey and Greece
did not make, since only four college students
signed up.

So...suddenly my vacation time
is mine to plan again.

I want to spend at least a week
in my own house,
on vacation
with no where particular to go.

I spent a couple days
of Paid Time Off
at home this week,
but they were less exciting,
since they were spent
blowing my nose
breathing through my mouth
and watching mindless television
from my sickbed.

When the season warms
I want to go camping...
a local joy.
Picnic in the woods.
Cook on the Coleman stove.
Sleep with the song of crickets.

I want to hike,
and garden,
and play with my bees.

I want to be here.

That, and cruise to the Bahamas
at Thanksgiving.

But mostly here.

Major Art Purchase

You may remember the 90 year old artist
whom I met at a local nursing home...
again, not one of my hospice patients.

When I was visiting one of his neighbors last week,
a staff member came by the desk where I was charting
and announced an art show.

Stan periodically has a show
and sells his paintings,
using the proceeds to buy more art supplies.

I did not hesitate,
but pulled out my wallet
and headed for the show.

I initially was looking at a painting of a train,
but a staff member from the facility
saw me admiring it
and swooped it up from under my nose.
SOLD.

I was a little more cagey after that,
not showing obvious interest
until my windmills were safely
in my grasp.

Art critics agree,
this is the best stuff
since Grandma Moses.

Crow Raises Kitten, People with Cool Accents Observe

http://www.slide.com/r/hD6DvyAOxD9ClUhvUpVcUMABW9QzpGnQ

Geodes from Andy

Fun with Resumes

Ah, resume, "to pick up where one left off."

Sparky has offered me some coaching today
to get my resume updated and up to par.

I've decided this is a worthwhile activity
every few years,
whether applying for a new job or not.

I found my resume file
and was shocked to discover that it dated
all the way back to high school.

My God, I was a frightening high school student.
Geek, with a capital G.

Hmm. I appear to have misspelled "scholar."
But it was a manual typewriter, so once you finished
the row, there wasn't a lot of going back.

I even had a section titled "Government Sponsored Activities"
that sat right between the extensive
"School Recognition and Awards"
and "Community Activities."

I listed my height and weight.
I was shaped basically like a pencil.
I'm better for my additional 50 pounds, I think.

By my seminary application
I had signs of human life
mixed in with continued geekdom.

Listed below all my churchy leadership
was the following:
"First runner-up, Ping-pong championship of the universe....1987."

On that resume I listed my life goals:
"In my lifetime I would like to be ordained a United Methodist minister, hike the Appalachian trail, learn to play bagpipes, write a novel, and pay off my seminary education."

I've done the first and the last.
I frequently hike, occasionally on the Appalachian trail
but never too far, or carrying too much on my back.

I've gone from wishing to write a novel
to blogging on occasion.

I'm good with that.

Looking at 25 year old resumes
does put things in a certain
humbling perspective.

What are my life goals now?
Floss daily,
be kind to people who tick me off,
stay curious,
grow a summer garden,
teach others the worthwhile things I know,
keep my sense of humor,
make music with whatever is at hand,
keep my focus.

Sudden Shifts

While my main focus in recent weeks
has been slow and steady practice-based progress
(see previous blog entry)
there is a second way to get to Carnegie Hall.
Get on the internet,
buy a concert ticket,
buy a plane ticket,
pack your bag and
GO GO GO!

Or, as Emeril would say,
BAM!

I had a BAM moment today.
My company posted a position in administration
and after an instantaneous sweeping wave of nausea
I decided to apply.

My stomach is better, thanks for asking.

I think I could do the job.
I think I would enjoy the job.
I think I might be ready for that kind of radical shift.

If they don't hire me,
I can keep my current position, which I love.

If they do...

BAM!

How Do You Get to Carnegie Hall?

One of my coworkers tried this old joke recently,
only to receive the response, "What is Carnegie Hall?"
Cultural literacy makes all the difference.
If you are of an age and station in life
where you a) don't know what Carnegie Hall is
and b) haven't actually heard this old joke...

a) Carnegie Hall is a performance venue for truly great musicians.
b) How do you get there? Practice, practice, practice.

I've been practicing lately.
I finally got the long desired piano.
My 8 years of piano lessons
were 25 years ago.
How is that possible?

I decided I wanted to play
the Maple Leaf Rag.
I discovered that piece of music
was way beyond me.

So, I've practiced it
one hand at a time,
VERY SLOWLY.

And you know what? I'm picking up
both speed and accuracy.

One day, with practice,
I'll be able to play it
with much less effort.

I've also started juggling again.
I learned to juggle in high school
and college,
back when I had no internet,
cable TV or social life to attend to.

You improve
by practicing.
I'm currently working
on throwing a ball behind my back
and catching it.
Sometimes I catch,
sometimes I pick it up.

More and more often,
I'm catching.

So here is the thing.
Everything worthwhile
requires slow painful effort
that slowly becomes second nature.

Ghandi told his followers
that he didn't want them to start out
as pacifists.
He wanted them to understand
to acknowledge
and to claim the fact
that they really would prefer
to shoot their enemies.
BANG.

Only by honestly examining
their natural tendency towards violence
could they slowly begin
to practice a more peaceful
way of relating to the world.

How do you get to spiritual wholeness?

Practice, practice, practice.

Not Easy Being Green

On this Martin Luther King, Jr. Day...

after a sermon in church yesterday
about white privilege, injustice
and the miles we have yet to go...

after watching a bit of Oprah
(while sitting with a hospice patient
who was parked in the middle
of the nursing home TV room)
and the history Oprah shared
of a biracial couple
who married within my lifetime
and who were taken from their bed,
from their home,
and put in jail
(after first having to leave their home state
to marry, seeing as it was illegal
in their state and many others at the time
for them to tie the knot)....
did I mention this was within my lifetime?....

after thinking all day
about my own experiences
of people waltzing right over
my own wounds
and feelings of exclusion
with their own ignorance,
blindness
and naivete,
(and occasionally
their intentional
coldblooded meanness)...

after remembering
what it was like
to go to public schools
in racially diverse
cities in the south
only a few years
after desegregation,
and remembering how TENSE
it was, how DIVIDED it was,
how ALIENATED it was....

after remembering
how often across my life
I have trampled
on the traditions,
differences,
opinions
and personhood of others
(and that's just the times
I was aware)....

I find myself perplexed.

Human relationships
are so very complicated.

Respect is hard to find
and harder to give.

Remembering Green

In the bleak midwinter, it helps me to remember
that these kinds of shades of green are available
when the world returns to May.
Stay tuned, oh dark and brownish world.
Stay tuned.

Shepherds Quake

Okay, I know we are past Christmas
and into Epiphany,
but wanted to share a revelation
(an epiphany, you might say)
about the difference between
the Methodist and the Baptist hymnal.

My cousin Rhonda
plays the piano
for some of the churches in her area,
both Baptist and Methodist
as the need might arise.

She plays out of the Baptist hymnal,
because that is her familiar version,
and occasionally has to count her verses
when playing in the Methodist church
to make sure she and the congregation
end at the same time.

Well, she noted that the Methodists
when singing "Silent Night"
had a verse that wasn't in her Baptist hymnal.
"Silent night, holy night,
shepherds quake at the sight."

We Methodists in the family were stunned.
Baptist shepherds don't quake??

Nope, she said.
Never heard that verse before.

We decided that Baptist shepherds
don't quake,
for fear someone might think
they are dancing.

Did I mention that my
number one New Years' Resolution
for 2008
is MORE DANCING
(but mostly not in public).

The Simple Past

Back in the late sixties,
my family lived in a tiny little house
in Atlanta.
I can picture it in my head...
the furnishings
and all of our accumulated belongings
would probably have fit in
a very small truck.
The glass dish pictured above
was a wedding present
and one of the few treasures
that decorated the simple coffee table
of my youth.
The small black and white tv
had rabbit ear antennae
and picked up only two or three stations
at most.
But I can remember
astronauts walking on the moon
on the screen of that set.

Young families don't tend to start
with such simple furnishings these days.

It seems like most folks
drown in clutter and technology
and credit card bills.

Isn't it strange
that some part of me
longs for that first house
that simple kitchen
that dearth of clutter
that young family just starting out.

Maybe I'm just old enough
to begin to understand
why hospice patients of advanced age
spend so much time
remembering their childhoods.

Maybe I'm just wise enough
to begin to see
that less is really more.

Maybe.

I Love Pictures of Bugs

Of all my links,
the one most regularly updated
is Curieux Jardin
which has great photography
and many great bug pictures.

I now bring you another great bug link
which also has wonderful birds
and other creatures and scenes of Florida.
Click on 'Paul's Pictures' to see,
well, you know....
pictures by Paul.

Paul is a great fellow
songwriter
woodcarver
snorting laugher
birdwatcher
photographer
all around cool guy.

Enjoy his photos.

Three Year Old Christmas

If you have been following the blog for a while,
you may remember my youngest goddaughter, Julia.
She is three now, and her mother sent the following
a couple days ago.

Julia had a Christmas party at school yesterday:

The morning conversation:
Julia: I don't want to go to school today.
Mom: But, today's your Christmas party, you don't want to miss that.
J: Whose birthday is it ?
Mom: Well, it will be Jesus' birthday next week, and you'll be celebrating that early today.
J: Will there be cake?

The afternoon conversation:
Mom: How was your Christmas party?
J: Katie said it was Jesus's birthday.
Mom: Yes.
J (with great concern and seriousness): But Jesus didn't come to school today, so he didn't get any cake.


Clear here for the original post about Julia's baptism.

Dam grateful

Unlike Georgia and Florida,

Western North Carolina is

simply not chock full of ponds and lakes.

Up here, unless there is a dam,

everything is a creek or a river.

This picture is one of my favorite

dam spots in North Carolina.

So to speak.

I've skipped a rock

across the surface of this small lake

with over 20 hops.

Of course, the temperature

had been blow 20 degrees for a couple weeks,

and the lake was frozen over.

Hence the good hoppage.

I've come here in the spring

and in the summer.

A beautiful area for hiking,

for skipping stones,

for just relaxing.

I'm grateful for leaves and rocks and water

in all seasons

of peace and renewal.

This photo was taken in November

when the leaves were still showing their colors.

A Boy and His Bug

Some pics from the week of Thanksgiving

down in Georgia with my kin.

Looking Up in October

When I'm 97 I'll be Painting

I met a man this week
while visiting in a local nursing home.
He was not a hospice patient...
just someone I met along the way.

He was sitting in his wheelchair
in his room,
bald and almost completely deaf.

I noticed two paintings of ships on the wall
and pointed to them.

He first showed me his certificate
of service in the Royal Navy,
then rolled himself over
to a bookshelf next to the bed
and began pulling thin canvases
off a foot tall stack.

He showed me painting
after painting
of ships
and flowers
and even the penguins
carefully copied from this month's calendar page.

I noticed the shelf above
covered with painting supplies
and he laughed as he showed me
the paint on his pants and shirt.

He nodded towards his roommate,
asleep in another wheelchair.
"He's 97," the man said.
"I'm just 90."
He studied his sleeping roommate carefully.
Then he swept the air with an invisible paintbrush.
"When I'm 97, I'll be painting!"

I decided right then
that I wanted to be him
when I grew up.

I came home and got out my watercolors
and painted a sunset.
Better start practicing now.

Energy Conservation

I've been working full time lately,
a full day-a-week more in hours
than I worked for several years.

So far, so good--
but I do get a little weary of being around people
by Friday evening.

Today (Saturday) I went to a one day retreat at church...
dreading it a little, because my extroversion tank
felt completely empty. (Ever the true introvert....)

But the morning was great.
Fun activities...a chance to get to know people better.
Veggie soup with ample hot bread and hot sauce for lunch.

When I reached my next limit of energy,
I helped keep the babies in the nursery for a couple hours.

Rocking chairs and flirty little round faces with fuzzy hair.
Happy laughs, the good kind of baby smells, rolling and kicking fun.
And then I left...still at least a couple hours before the event ended.

I'm feeling tired, but glad for the time with my church family.
A quiet evening should help round out the day.

Sometimes it pays to push yourself a bit.
Sometimes it pays to pace yourself a bit.
Generally it pays to do a bit of both.

Cats' Eye View

Cats Contemplating Color

Home Brewed Whine

And now we've moved into the exciting new

realm of video. It is a wee tad slow the first time

through, but seems to pick up speed on a second

showing.

Spring and Summer garden

As I look out my window, the corn is still standing,

but it is brown, with a few bare cobs clinging to the plants,

after squirrels shucked them and ate the goods.

The squirrels have had a hard summer

due to the early spring freeze

that nipped the acorns in the bud

and the summer drought.

They've been picking Roma tomatos...

even burying a few,

despite me telling them,

"Honey, that's not going to keep."

I'll have to provide some nuts and corn this winter

so they can make it through the thin times.

I'm sad, in a way, to see the garden turning brown,

but also looking forward to the quiet fallow time.

Here are pics of the garden in spring and mid-summer.

The Wisdom of Grandfather Mountain

Take Care of Your Eyes

Okay, so I admit it.
Sometimes I use hospice patients
like a horoscope or a magic eight ball.
One of my dementia patients
who goes months without speaking
will look me in the eye and
speak a complete sentence
and it will sometimes feel like
a word straight from God.

Today I visited two women of advanced years
in two different nursing homes
on two different sides of town.
Both were still in their right minds...
both were able to converse with comprehension
and both have shared many visits with me.
Both are also legally blind.

For some reason, both ladies
took me by the hand today
and said earnestly...
"Take care of your eyes."
In the past, both have shared
the incredibly frustation of blindness,
but I don't remember either of them
saying this to me before.
Why both in one day?

I don't think this is a warning from
the heavenly powers...
perhaps it is just good advice.

Kind of an odd thing
when visits run parallel.

Tonight the vision I need to keep clear
is vocational.

Why do I love my job?
I need to keep a clear sight on
what it is about being a hospice chaplain
that has meaning for me.

This week I got a little caught up
in the politics of administration
and productivity
and other bean counting controversies...
which made me cranky
and threw me off kilter.

I need to keep my eyes
open
to the things that matter...
and keep the other details in proper perspective.

Daisy Loves Walter

Joy to the world, peace has come to my home.
When Ernie died and Walter moved in as our replacement cat,
I first thought we had broken Daisy.
Our playful, friendly girl retreated under beds,
growling and hissing her dismay and misery.

Then, she came out, still NOT HAPPY, but at least more present.

Now, where there is one cat, there are two cats.
They play, they wrestle, they chase, they snuggle.
They are the best of friends, two peas in a pod.

When company comes, there are now two cats greeting,
doglike in their affection.
Two happy kitties. Peace in the home.

Baby ducks and clergywomen

I like to joke that everyone in south Georgia
has their own fishing pond.
It is not much of an exaggeration...
most folks with more than an acre
seem to have a small pond as part of their estate.
Even my dad's property has it's own little fishing pond,
with turtles and catfish and bass and brim.

On my trip to Georgia in April
I went to my cousin's little pond
to see the 18 ducklings they had released there
the previous day.

At first we thought some thing had 'et them,
because the pond was still and clear,
with no sign of baby birds.
But then I looked with my ears as well as my eyes,
and heard a persistent peeping
just down the bank from my feet.

All 18 ducklings were stacked in a little duck pile,
peeping and wiggling and snuggling
as close as they could get.

We're not sure if they were resting
after a busy day of swimming and adventuring,
or if they had been startled or frightened...
but they had returned to their huddle
to protect and warm each other
in the face of the big wide world.

It reminded me of the gathering
of the southeastern United Methodist clergywomen
at Epworth by the Sea only days before.

One evening after worship,
we threw out a few quick invitations,
and ended up with somewhere between
20 and 40 clergywomen from Florida
lining the perimeter of our hotel room.
Sitting hip to hip and shoulder to shoulder,
we shared our names,
our current life situation...vocational and domestic,
and offered one another laughter, support
and salt and vinegar potato chips.

People wonder why I stay United Methodist,
why I keep driving back from North Carolina
for Florida events and gatherings.

It all goes back to the ducks.
While the world is a grand and wonderfilled place,
it is nice to return occasionally
to the huddle
with my family peeps.