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.