Innocents Abroad Part 5: Bedouin Life

One of the most entertaining and interesting jaunts on our trip to the Middle East was the opportunity we had to spend time with a Bedouin family. Our Archeologist Guide spent a lot of time at a dig in Petra, Jordan and got to know some of the Bedouin workers there. He arranged for us to share and evening meal with this man, his two wives and his children. We literally broke bread together and got a small bit of insight into the lives of the Jordanian Bedouins.

The only “furniture” in the room was couch pillows arranged on the floor around the walls of the room. The walls were decorated with murals painted by our host of sunsets over the Persian Gulf. Our first “course” was a choice between a sweet tea or a high octane, concentrated coffee in cups the size of shot glasses. I chose the tea. Rushing in and out of the room were the children of our host who were introduced and became immediately shy as a result. The women prepared the meal as each child made an appearance and sat for a while with the father so he could display them like all proud parents.

Next a plastic, tarp-like mat was placed on the floor in front of us and soon after a huge platter with rice and various cut up pieces of chicken. Our host then poured a sauce of some kind over the whole mixture and then threw down a paper thin form of bread made on a rock out back. He then sat next to me and reached into the pile of food with his right hand (common plates ALWAYS demand use of ONLY the right hand) and quickly formed the rice mixture into a golf-ball sized bite and popped it into his mouth so quickly I wasn’t sure if he hadn’t just thrown it behind him. No utensils, no plates, no problem. I tentatively tried it and it tasted good but the rice and sauce spilled all over me and the mat. He smiled and said “no problem” and proceeded to down another golf ball with hardly getting his hand dirty. I went back to the old standby of using the bread to grab my food and ate that way. The pile in the middle was hardly touched as we motioned that we were full, I wasn’t; I was just tire of working so hard to get food to my mouth. How sad is that?

The Bedouins seemed to me to be a study in contrasts and contradiction. They are a loving people who will kiss you on both cheeks and smile easy yet carry an offence even longer then they carry a gun. I see them in their tents made of wood poles and rugs but also air-conditioning. I would see some come meandering up perched on the hump of a camel chatting away on a cell phone. They would proudly show off their children in the home yet keep them dirty with ratty hair for the sympathy of the tourists and a few more Jordanian Denars. Contrast and contradiction between their actions and their words and, wait a minute, that kind of describes us too. Hmm.

Innocents Abroad Part 4: Camels

Every day I grab a Diet Coke and walk outside to open the door of my truck with my only worry being spilling my soda before it get it into my cup holder. I sit comfortably in my nicely upholstered chair and calmly drive to wherever I am heading that day. I live in Las Vegas so there are plenty of hills and even a mountain or two to climb. I feel my truck downshift as I begin up the incline with, again, my only concern being whether my soda spills as I calmly sip it.

The camel is down and calmly chewing a cud from some long forgotten meal. On his back is a saddle with two horns, one in front and one in back. The saddle is tied down and a few ratty camel hair blankets are thrown on for a little extra padding. I sit calmly on the saddle as the Bedouin gives him a few light taps with a stick and says something in Arabic to get him up. All my calm went south as the camel rose. You have to understand that a camel doesn’t rise like an elevator; a camel rises more like a folding table. First the back side goes completely up while you are hanging on for dear life to keep from falling on your face in the camel droppings in front of you. Then the front side comes up to level experience with a thrill ride that compares with most roller-coasters.

Now that we are up we begin our slow rolling gate up the side of the mountain. The camel does well on the ancient carved steps following a path it has walked thousands of times with thousands of tourists. Sometimes it is a little close to the edge as remarked by one co-travelers who had a slight fear of heights. The ride up was not bad once you got used to the rolling steps of the camel. We got to our destination after about an hour of this riding, enjoying the sites. Then came the downward journey. While going up the camel would take the steps in his slow rolling gate but coming down the camel had a tendency to get both front feet to the edge of a step and jump down. Need I remind you of the two horns on the saddle? No more rolling gate enjoying the scenery, this we replaces by jumps and jolts surrounded by brief periods of respite. While protecting myself from the front horn on the saddle by pushing back in preparation for the next jump my tail bone was in perfect position to be assaulted by the rear horn. After a grueling hour return journey the camel folded his front legs under him pitching me one last time into the forward saddle horn and finally settled itself on the dusty desert floor. He calmly regurgitated his cud again and began chewing. As I walked away I swore I heard a smirk-like grunt.
A week later my tailbone was still sore and bruised. I was reminded with smirking of my co-travelers as I had to gently sit for the rest of the trip. We have it so good here in the States and when I got home one of the first things I did was hug my truck. Seriously.

Innocents Abroad 3: A Gun Assumption

Growing up on a farm in Indiana with my brothers involved a lot of war games. Many times I would be mortally wounded and the gun from my hand would go flying as I would tumble down the side of the ditch and end up in the muddy water, seemingly dead. My brother would rescue me and shoot the enemy while dragging me from certain death. I would retrieve my gun and commence shooting again until it was time to save him in his dramatic tumble into the ditch. Our guns were fashioned sticks and our enemies disappeared from our minds when we started home in our drenched clothes laughingly pulling leeches from our skin.

At the airport in Cairo we saw armed guards but we see them at airports in the States now. Outside we see taxi drivers with pistols on their hips. On our bus we pass by farmers with rifles strapped to their backs. At every tourist site were armed Egyptians both military and civilian. We passed check point after checkpoint and more than a few times had to show our passports to armed security. We were told to make sure we take no pictures of them as we passed or as they questioned us. One in our group was so nervous at a check point that when a friendly guard asked “Where are you from?” while she sat strait and still in her seat. She nervously whipped up her arm saying “HERE’S MY PASSPORT!”

Our trip across Egypt to Sinai and on to Jordon included our own personal security. A young man who was drafted without a change of clothes and with little notice to sit in our bus and hide behind his pressed suit and sunglasses. The goal was to make him laugh over three days journey with him but the bulge of his automatic weapon under his suit barely let him crack a smile.

During our trip we saw guns, guns and more guns; from all the check points to our security guard, to the heavily armed border crossings. In Israel the guns seemed to be carried by teenagers, and I am sure some of them were since mandatory service goes from 18-20 years old for both men and women. I had to wonder that these “kids” were not too much older than me and my brothers as we played our war games on that farm in Indiana. A typical picture in Old Jerusalem was a Sabbath teaching of young kids by their Israeli Sabbath School Teacher. There were 30 or so kids with a few adults mixed in to keep order while the teacher was giving his lesson. Yet each of the adults had an automatic weapon strapped to their back or sitting on their knees. I have a hard time picturing our Sunday school classes in the same way. I talked to an Israeli about this and his comment stuck with me. He said “Guns give us the assumption of safety. Without the guns we feel we are not protected, not safe.” So everybody carries guns.

In the States we have the opposite assumption. We assume guns mean there is no safety. Without getting into a gun control argument I believe there has to be a line somewhere in between that needs to be walked. I was innocently shocked by the guns everywhere I looked but I also understood the need. They make the assumption that guns mean safety but that also means they make the assumption that their neighbor is trying to kill them and the threat of killing them back is the only thing that prevents that. A mini Cold War rages in our assumptions. What a beautifully fallen world it is that we live in.

Innocents Abroad 2: Panic Tunnel

Ever since my primary toys were Legos I have been fascinated with Pyramids. I would fashion Pyramids out of my fresh, red blocks and even make attempts at the Sphinx. I would read about the mummies and be scared by a dusty, linen-wrapped Boris Karloff. My parents took me to the Chicago Field Museum to see actual mummies and artifacts and I pressed my nose and stubby fingers against the glass to see if I could see them breathe or something. I have always been fascinated with Egypt.

At first our guide in Egypt teased us with passing glimpses of the great pyramids of Giza as we drove to various OTHER places in Cairo but finally there I stood. The fine sand would whip up into little desert tornados in the blue-skied backdrop while I stood looking at the immense structures built 5000 years ago. I just stood there taking it all in, it just didn’t seem quite real to me. It was kind of like my Grand Canyon experience: you know it’s there, you know you are there, but it all seems like you are looking at a huge, two dimensional photo and not reality. For a few Egyptian Pounds you could talk one of the security guards into letting you get your picture taken on one of the millions of huge stones hauled from miles away to form the Pyramids, so my wife and I get our picture taken next to them.

One of the things I could not have pictured was how many pyramids there were on the Giza Plateau. From the Cheops and Knufu pyramids you can see another 60-70 other ones across the desert. The Pyramids of Pharaohs and officials alike were bumping up like teenage zits on the desert landscape. Some just mounds, others excavated but all having a hidden story beneath them.

Our guide directed us to one that we could go into, go under and discover some of those hidden stories. My mind when back to the labyrinth Boris and even Abbot and Costello explored. I was looking forward to being handed a torch made out of a stick and mummy linen, soaked in some oil reserve, and like Indiana Jones go down exploring through all the cobwebs. Reality was much different. I am over six foot tall and the opening was MAYBE four foot so I had to bend over. The tunnel was not a labyrinth it was simply a way down, down, and more down. It was well worn steps in this small tunnel that I had to walk bent over. There were no torches but a simply a poorly wired string of fluorescents. After an eternity of downward steps we came to a small room a mile or two below the pyramid. The room was about 20 foot square with only the one entrance. I finally arrived there, out of breath from all the steps and realized I could not breathe. There was no oxygen pumped into the place, we were miles underground, there were hundreds of other people filing in and out breathing all my air, and I was feeling panic well up inside me like some kind of mental regurgitation. So this is what a panic attack is like, I thought. I fought the urge as I bent into the task of climbing all those steps again. The light at the end of the tunnel seemed more like heaven than I have ever experienced and as I finally burst out of the opening I felt that I needed to do an “I’m alive!” victory dance.

My boyhood fantasies were crushed and I put away my Indy fedora as I enjoyed air like never before. But quickly questions and a thirst for knowledge overtook my disappointments: How did they get the sarcophagus down there? They must have built the pyramid OVER the burial chamber with all the stuff in it right? How did the thieves get all the stuff out through that little hole? How did they find that little hole in the first place? While my boyhood dreams were pushed to the background I didn’t mourn them because they were replaced by experiences I will never forget and by new questions to research. And that really is what education is all about.

Innocents Abroad, Part 1

My wife and I embarked on a once in a lifetime tour of Egypt, Jordan, and Israel with a personal side stop in the Netherlands. I have done some traveling in the past but NOTHING LIKE THIS and here I sit, less than a week after returning home and sill feel the after-effects of the trip. One book in our list of “suggested reading” before the trip was “Innocents Abroad” by Mark Twain where he took a similar trip, lasting MUCH longer but journaled about it in this book. While the experiences were different I can’t help but believe the title fit my impressions of the trip and over the next few columns I hope to take you with me as an innocent abroad.

“And then we buried it”

The phrase that sticks out in my mind which became an amusing catch phrase for us to kid our guide was “and then we buried it!” Our guide was an American archeologist who worked on digs in Jordan and Israel. These digs led him to research into Egypt as well because of their influence on the nations as the area superpower for so many years.

Our guide would take us through ruins and point out what they once were. We would look at a stone with a few carvings on it and a square edge but is no bigger than a Rubik’s cube and he would determine that it was once a temple to the god such-and-so along with the date and what the pharaoh ate that day for lunch. All from a Rubik’s cube sized stone. He would point out a mound covered by scrub grass and a stony sand and tell us that it was a temple built by the Egyptians where they would prepare bodies for burial, which was taken over by the Romans and used to house troops, which was taken over by Coptic Christians who used it for a church, which was taken over by the Byzantine Christians who made it a monastery, and now was a large pile of scrub grass and stony sand. Everyone in our tour group would stare in wide-eyed amazement at the mound of dirt trying to grasp and picture what was just said. Finally a brave soul would crack into the awed silence and say, “Umm, how the heck do you know that?”

He would take a deep breath and then “Well when we started digging we found mosaics of the Byzantine monastery, then we went a little deeper and found iconic paintings on the walls that matched those of Coptic churches in Egypt, then as we went wider and found stone that had grooves in them that Roman soldiers would use to sharpen their knives on and matched that with similar grooves from Roman troop shelters, then as we looked at those original stones we found hieroglyphics that show the embalming process and we also found tools that were used in that process, the deeper we dug the more we found out and could date the time periods and found that they embalmed Pharaoh Tutmosesaknotaminohapchetsuit III here in 2436 BCE, on a Thursday afternoon at 4:37, after a light lunch of dates and fresh bread.”

In awed silence the whole group turned again to the mound of scrub grass and stony sand and stared. After about fifteen minutes of mental processing another brave soul turned to our guide and said, “But it’s just a mound of scrub grass and stony sand!”

“Yes, I know, but I got great pictures of the dig, the mosaics, the icons, the stones and hieroglyphs!”

“But it is just a MOUND! Where’s the stuff!”

Our guide looked at the trusting tourist and said with confident understanding, “Well, sure its just a mound, we buried it.”

You could have heard everyone’s neck snap as we all turned to our guide in undisguised confusion. “You did WHAT?”

All of that time and work on a dig to uncover everything, painstakingly documenting every square centimeter, removing tons of dirt and debris with a pickaxe smaller than your hand and a toothbrush, taking pictures and then what do you do? You BURY it!

We would drive by “tells” or mounds of dirt in our bus and our guide would talk about what that mound represented and was then he would end by saying, “and then we buried it.” This would happen to the point where our group would complete his great description of dig sites by chorusing together: “and then you buried it.”

It seems that exposing ancient tiles, paintings and even stone to the normal elements will degrade and even destroy them. So it is common practice on archeological digs to find out everything they can, removed any pottery or other artifact, photograph it and then bury it again. This protects the site until someone can come along with the money to preserve and maintain it for tourists to see. If the money to buy a safe, protected environment is not there, it remains buried AND protected.

As I write this it reminds me of a few hearts I know. This precious artifact is buried away in a lot of people until it finds a safe, protected environment that will allow it to be exposed without destroying it. Sometimes it never happens and it stays buried and eventually forgotten but sometimes, just sometimes that heart is given a save environment for all to see and enjoy. That would make all of us archeologists. We must work on ways to get a safe environment for all those precious artifacts to be exposed to the world and enjoyed by all.

Captain Obvious

Let me give you a list of some of the studies that are being done right now according to Popular Science Magazine:

“Why do teenagers drink?” is a study in the by Prevention Science and what do you think there conclusion is? After years of studying and millions of dollars they have come to the conclusion that teenagers drink to “have fun.”

“Are vacations better without cell phones?” is a study being done by US university professors along with Tel Aviv University. After another million or so they have come to understand that vacations ARE BETTER without cell phones.

“Are un-athletic kids unpopular at school?” is a study in The Journal of Sports Behavior. There conclusions after their million dollars is YES they are more unpopular.

“Do long ambulance drives make you more likely to die?” is a study by Emergency Medicine Journal in September of 2007. YES, they found, in fact you are more likely to die the longer the ambulance ride.

Another study found out that “Loneliness sucks” and still another found that “You can catch the flu more likely in winter” and the king study of them all is that “Sleep will cure sleepiness!”

All of these studies spent millions of dollars and hours of research to tell us what all of us already know. But now “it is quantified and can be quoted” the professors tell us. Okay, it is time I apply for a grant too. Here are a few of my grant funding request ideas:

“How watching Basketball on TV and eating blueberry tort effect my midsection” I propose to sit during the who March Madness and NBA finals season in my Laziboy and eat blueberry tort to see if my midsection grows.

“How vacations effect relaxation” I propose to use the grant money to vacation all year and measure my stress level periodically.

“See if people are really happier with money” I propose to use the $10 million dollars per year of grant money to see if it makes me any happier or not. This might take a few years of research.
What do you think? I should be able to get mine funded with what the government is already funding. Sometimes you just want to give people a V8 bump on the head don’t ya?

Decision Making

How do you make a decision? I am asked a couple of times a month how to answer that question. How would you answer it?

I know some people that make decisions like they jump into a pool; they just hold their nose and close their eyes and jump. Others will check out the depth, check out the temperature, check the prevailing wind, go buy a nose plug, and then finally jump.

The fact is: we make decisions every minute of our life, we just forget we do it. More than “what do you want to do?” “I don’t know, what do you want to do?” “I don’t care, what about this?” “Nah, we did that yesterday” and so on. Every step you take involves a decision, literally. Try getting around with a bum leg or twisted ankle and you will remember what I mean. You mind makes decisions subconsciously ALL THE TIME. I have always been fascinated watching people negotiate a crowded mall, hallway or airport. Whether they gracefully glide from one opening to another to get ahead or whether they simply follow the crowd. Whether they worry about bumping shoulders with oncoming traffic or just bum and move on. Decisions, decisions and more of them.

First: Decisions are based on experience. Your body knows it and reacts to it. If you step on ice YOU KNOW IT! How is your experience in the area you are making a decision? Have you been here before? What worked and didn’t work last time?

Second: Decisions are based on education. If you haven’t been there before then learn about it as much as you can. Get informed. Do you know everything you can know about both horns of the dilemma? Have you asked all the right questions? It is better to ask now than after you decided.

Third: Decisions are made in the “gut.” Does it feel right? Does your body resonate with either one or does it make your gut cringe to take that step? Test your gut reaction.

Fourth: Decision are made with close friends. This may be part of your educational process but; what do your close friends and trusted advisors say? Often they see parts of you other do not see.

TRUMP CARD: I believe in all of this there is a spiritual trump card. God may be making this decision for you. Even though you experience tells you no, your education says no, you gut is uncomfortable and you friends are calling you crazy; you still are called to do it. Fortunately if you stay close to your God you will find your decisions easier.
I find that God doesn’t eliminate all possible doors and give you just one. What God does, depending on your closeness to him, is start dropping doors one at a time so you have less and less doors to choose from. He will rarely give you just one door to walk through because that will eliminate freedom but he will take it from 100 potential doors down to a handful for you to pray about, research, and discuss with friends. Decisions are made all the time by you so don’t be afraid of them. Look at all your decisions as an opportunity to grow and get closer to your dreams and goals. I’ve decided to end this column here.

Trip of a Lifetime

So I prepare to go on vacation. I leave tomorrow morning and I have not even BEGUN to pack. I will be gone for three weeks; so what do you take for three weeks away from home. My wife and I will be going on a trip to Egypt, Jordan, Israel, and ending in Northern Europe for a few days of bum-around-time.

I study. I took a CD class on Egyptology and got all the recommended books for the tour. I even bought a few extras for good measure. I looked at maps of where we are going and I checked online for temperatures. Clothes are a problem, normally I go to Walmart and buy some cheap golf shirts and then leave them there so I have more room in my suitcase for trinkets on the return journey. My wife and I did some experimenting with underwear, believe it or not. There is “special” underwear out there that washes easy and dries quickly so we only need to take a few pairs. As we get close to leaving I will pack to airport standards: carryon size, no liquid, not overweight, get there early, have passport and ticket in hand, take off shoes and belt, and so on.

We have been planning for a year for this trip, the trip of a lifetime. But packing only a few hours before and I know I will forget something important, like my camera or my special underwear. Planning for trips take time and energy.

How is your planning going? Are you ready for your trip of a lifetime? I mean really THE trip of your lifetime. We spend all this time and energy on going from the US to another country, even another state or even grandma’s house but what about THE trip of our lifetime?
The greatest journey you will ever take is the one that begins the second you close your eyes on this earth for the last time. You will breathe your last breath as if in anticipation of this great journey. Shakespeare called it “The Undiscovered Country.” But most of us don’t spend anytime preparing for this journey. We spend no time studying about where we will spend eternity. We spend little time packing the things that are going to last in this country. The Bible calls that storing up treasure in heaven, meaning that we can actually send “stuff” ahead to be there for us when we get there. We don’t even worry about the monetary exchange rate there. Oh yes, there is a use for money in heaven but you have to exchange it for the currency you can take with you. So before you head off on that journey you need to exchange all your money and possessions for the one thing that you can take: LOVE. Exchange your dollars for love of your neighbor and love of God and you will not only lighten your burden on this world but you will find bags and bags of love waiting for you on YOUR trip of a lifetime.

It is a matter of the Right Question

I cannot tell you how many people have told me that they cannot believe in a God who would allow this and that to happen. Or, I cannot believe in a God that would allow some people into heaven and condemn others to hell. Or, how can there be a God when there is so much evil in the world? Or, how can I believe in a God that would allow little babies to go to hell? My answer is always that you are asking the WRONG question.

It is a matter of perspective and worldview, NOT a matter of God’s goodness or existence. Let me lead you through an exercise.

A guy falls in love with a girl but the girl’s parents won’t let him date her. Are the parents being unfair? Should the guy date her anyway? What if I told you that the guy was 50 and the girl was 13? Are the parents being unfair? Should the guy date her anyway? What if they met online and the 13 year old girl was actually a 45 year old cop pretending to be 13 in order to catch a deviant 50 year old? Should they arrange a meeting to arrest the guy?

How can you really answer the questions or even ASK the right questions when you don’t know the facts behind it. All you have is one perspective, only one view. That is the way it is with the matter of God and his goodness. You ask how can a good God allow anyone to go to hell, how can there be bad in the world if God is good? Let me give you different perspective.

God created good and part of that good creation is a creature with the freedom to choose to do good and love God OR chose to do bad and hate God. Unfortunately, to the pain of the creator, the creature chose BAD and to not love God at all. The good creation grew into a dark and dim place with the creatures constantly fighting and hurting each other until EVERY action and EVERY thought was evil all the time and darkness enveloped the good like death. Into this land of the living darkness steps goodness and light in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus grabs the hand of many of the living dead and pulls them into the light, sometimes kicking and screaming, but irresistibly, inevitably some come into the light.

You ask: How can a good God allow bad? But the real question should be: How can a good God stand to save even one of us when we are all dead, ugly, nasty and spitting in his face?

You ask: How can there be evil in the world if there is a good God? But the real question should be: How can there be ANY GOODNESS in this world that is so corrupted by these creatures?

You ask: How could a good God allow this to happen to me? But the real question should be: Why should I even think that anything will turn out good when I do such bad things?

You ask: How could a good God allow anyone to go to hell? But the real question should be: Why would God choose to pull any of us out of the hell we created for ourselves?
As we celebrate Easter wrap your mind around the fact that Jesus stepped into hell itself to grab his chosen people from the self-imposed darkness and death, he bore the pain, insults, abuse and even death so that many will be able to walk in the light of life again. THAT is not just a good God, that is a GREAT GOD!

The PERFECT Hamburger!

My wife buys the burgers from our local grocery store and they are thin and frozen but something magical happens when I throw them on the grill. They thaw, then sizzle, and sometimes catch fire if there is too much fat in them but it really doesn’t matter. I would complain and send back that burger if it came to me in a restaurant but coming off my grill it is the PERFECT hamburger.

I know people who spend a lot of time with the hamburger itself by putting secret ingredients into the raw ground beef, mashing it together into a thick burger, and THEN slapping it on the grill. Some consider grill time the key by perfectly flipping it at the right time, creating a cross pattern on the burger and just the right amount of brown to pink. Others believe it is the type of grill itself that makes the perfect burger: charcoal vs. gas. Others now want turkey-burgers or veggie-burgers.

Popular Science Magazine now has the perfect hamburger for you. The Bun is vitamin enriched through genetically “enhancing” the wheat gene. The Bacon you might want to throw on it now can be grown in a dish by adding glucose and amino acids to pig stem cells. The cheese now comes from engineered cows and by adding an enzyme to the cheese that takes out a bitter taste. The beef is from enhanced steers is leaner and tastier. The ketchup is from tomatoes that are engineered to be 10% sweeter. Even the lettuce is packed with high vitamin C content by combining it with a rat gene that is a vitamin C maker. (Yea, you read that right, a RAT gene in our lettuce). They call this the perfect hamburger.

Okay, now I don’t have a problem with genetic engineering like a lot of people do. In fact we have been doing it for decades and the effects on the population has not been Frankensteinish, the effects have been more production for farmers, cheaper but better for you food, food that will last longer, starving countries now having a crop to grow in their climates, and many other benefits. But the perfect hamburger has nothing to do with its genetic makeup. The perfect hamburger has more to do with the people you share it with than with its condiments.

The perfect hamburger can be burned at the edges, thin, store-bought, and even dropped on the ground, brushed off, and put back on the grill again to have the bugs burned off it. The perfect hamburger is the one you share with friends and family in a back yard party, in a tail-gate party, or sitting in front of the TV watching American Idol together. The perfect hamburger is best served with a heavy dose of love and acceptance, the BEST kind of genetics.

There is Something about the Sun

The Sun has come back out in Las Vegas and I love it. There is something about the sun.

The sun draws me back to the carefree days of summer on the farm in Indiana. Lying down on the grass with a new batch of puppies, rolling around and around down the slight decline in our yard getting covered in the newly mowed and fresh smelling clippings.

The Sun reminds me of pulling our tractor up to the deep end of the pool and raising its bucket high to form a high dive for us scrawny, pre-teen, crazy boys. We pretended to be Olympic high jumpers as we laid a garden hose across the pool to form the high bar and in slow motion we did the Fosbury Flop in perfect form. We challenged each other to see how many lengths of the pool could be swum on one breath. Then, breathless, we would lie in the sun and soak in the rays.

The Sun reminds me of driving the “old time” tractors. Not those new-fangled ones with cabs, CD playing stereos, and air conditioning but the ones out in the sun, where I would sit at the edge of the seat so my tan would not have a “farmers-tan” line from the back of the seat; where I was dust covered from the rich Indiana soil sticking to my suntan lotion and the whitest thing on me was the teeth exposed by my smile.

The Sun reminds me of my in-law’s cottage with family close by, little kids in little lifejackets playing in the shallows following fish in the sun sparkled water, the smell of hotdogs or hamburgers on the grill, and boats going by pulling multicolored skiers.

The Sun shining on my face reminds me of good times and a blessed life. The Sun shining tells me of smiles on farmer’s faces as it feeds their crops. The Sun smells of spring and new life. The Sun fills the earth with the warmth of its creator as if God himself is shining his smile across the world, moving carefully, chasing away shadows and darkness, and reminding us every day of his goodness and attention.
There is something about the Sun. In fact, what am I doing here in front of my computer? Sunshine, here I come, again, it’ time to play hooky.

A Platonic Body Slam

Have you ever gotten yourself into a philosophical rut? I get into those quite often. This is not the kind of rut where you simply do the same thing over and over again and cannot seem to get out of it. This is the kind of rut where the there are two equal and opposite sides that you keep bouncing around in and cannot seem to get out. Back on the farm after a good hard rain you would drive out into the fields and unknowingly create ruts in the soft dirt. The dirt bakes in the sun and suddenly you find you have no other options but bouncing around in the sun baked ruts even though you try to break out you end up back in the same place. An existential rut is the same thing.

In early Greek, pre-Socratic times there was a guy named Heraclitus (500 BC ish) who taught that “whatever is, is becoming.” His nemesis was another Greek philosopher called Parmenides who taught that “whatever is, is.” These two greats of their day did battle arguing opposite philosophies. Parmenides yelled that things have always been and always will be the same, there is nothing new under the sun. While Heraclitus yelled back that EVERYTHING changes, every time you breathe or move you are changing and changing the world around you. They fought and came to no conclusion in the minds of the people that heard them so the people threw up their hands and dropped all this philosophy junk like so much verbal trash. They thought that if the two greatest minds of our age cannot agree then we don’t have a chance and they dropped into a philosophical malaise, or rut, and did whatever they wanted. It wasn’t until Socrates, and really Plato came along did this quandary get solved and people started listening to philosophers again. Throughout history when two equal and opposing ideas did battle for an extended period of time the “masses” tended toward malaise and inaction. A philosophical rut.

Today we have mental ruts too. In simple terms your parents tell you one thing is right and just and true and the world and friends tell you the opposite is so you dissolve into a philosophical rut. You don’t know which is true, which to believe, which to make happy so you just ignore the whole argument and do what you want. In more difficult terms the world and your own body tells you one thing but your parents, your church, your religion tells you that thing is wrong, evil or just not good for you. You get tired of the battle so you just pull back, stay away from parents, church, friends and just sit at the bottle of your rut hoping the problem will just go away.

What you need is a Platonic body slam. (That is a joke for all the philosophers out there who knew that Plato was his professional wrestlers name, his real name was Aristocles) We something to wake us up and getting thinking NEW THOUGHTS; or something that will challenge us with new ideas. Take a trip. Read a totally different book. Volunteer at a homeless shelter or mission. Take a college level class in something totally unrelated to your field. Find a different way home from work, longer but more scenic. Climb a mountain. Eat raw fish.

I stole this first from John Maxwell, who stole it from someone else: A Play in Four Acts.
Act 1: I walk down a street, I see a hole but I fall in it, I get out and go on my way.
Act 2: I walk down a street, I see the hole and attempt to get around it but I fall in, it is harder to get out but I finally manage and go on my way.
Act 3: I walk down a street; I see the hole and attempt to get around it, this time I almost make it but I fall in, this time I need help getting out and I go on my way.
Act 4: I walk down a different street.

Head Girth

Roger was an expert. As a new supervisor I relied on him to keep our CNC Router going. The CNC was the lifeblood of our department as it shaped all the desk-tops and table-tops our furniture factory produced. The raw top came to our department and was set on the CNC where the routers shaped the top into the size it needed to be and cut a groove in the edge so we could attach a “T” shaped edging to it; then the CNC drilled holes in the bottom so we could attach hardware and so the installers could attach legs or brackets to hang the worksurface. Finally we date-stamped it, labeled it and shoved it in a box for the customer. EVERYTHING depended on the CNC and it’s expert operator.

The problem was: Roger new he was THE expert and that the whole department depended on him. It went to his head. He would come to work just a little late and stay his breaks just a little long to make sure I knew he was the expert and I needed him. He would quit when he wanted to and start cleaning up even if we were only two tops away from finishing an order. I was the boss, the supervisor but he was the indispensable expert and made it clear to me that he ran the department.

John Maxwell, the leadership guru said, “You cannot lead those you need.” Even as a young (25 year-old) production supervisor I recognized there was something wrong with this arrangement. At first I started by calling him in the office and trying to be his friend and getting to know him but that backfired into even longer breaks and earlier cleanup. When he refused to stay a little longer for overtime to finish an order I “wrote him up” which was the first step in discipline. He laughed at me and didn’t change. When I gave him a second disciplinary letter over another refusal and he still didn’t change I began to document his tardiness to prepare to fire him. I can still, 20 years later, hear him say to me: “You can’t fire me, I keep this department going. They will fire you because you will get nothing done!”

What he didn’t know was that I was close to the First Shift Supervisor and I had sent one of my best employees to first shift to train with their CNC operator. Tim came back to my Second Shift ready and trained and I moved Roger to pounding the vinyl edging for a week as Tim ran the CNC and ran it well. From that time on, Roger was one of my best employees. You cannot lead those you need.

I learned some life lessons from that experience. I learned that, while being friends is great and good, you cannot befriend everyone if you want to be a leader. I learned that NO ONE is indispensable and EVERY ONE can be replaced, including me. I learned that befriending someone with a big head only makes the head bigger and you smaller. After a dose of humility and recognizing he really wasn’t indispensable Roger and I had a great working relationship and I had the respect of the department.

Are you an expert? How’s your head girth?

Genius

I have to admit, I cheated in Seminary. That sounds pretty bad doesn’t it so let me soften it a bit. In seminary I got really good at killing two birds with one stone. I would have a huge paper due on one particular book of the Bible and so I would “just happen” to be preaching from that same book at my church. My masters thesis “just happened” to be on the VERY THING I was doing out in my community at the time. The research I did for my class I used in my sermons, the surveys and community involvement I did for my church also was the research for my master’s thesis.

In the 1700’s and 1800’s there were composers that would compose a complete opera for one particular opera house in a matter of two weeks. Rossini was one of those wandering composers who came to the Valley Theater in Rome and was asked for a quick opera. While a genius, many thought he was more lazy than genius and would often not compose the overture until the very day of the performance. The composers often did battle with the singers, especially the “prima donnas” who would take their composition and “enhance” it with all kinds of extra runs, high notes and even drop out songs to make themselves look better; after all, people came to the theater for the soloists not the composer. Rossini composed this opera in two weeks, turning over the overture a full day before the performance. The opera was a hit and Rossini became a legend. The opera was called The Barber of Seville and it’s overture was it’s second most famous piece. (Figaro being the most famous piece) Most of us grew up with the overture to the Barber of Seville from Bugs Bunny’s rendition: The Rabbit of Seville. You can find it on Youtube if you forgot.

What we don’t know is that the overture for the Barber of Seville was used not just once, but this was the FIFTH TIME he used this overture in one of his operas. You wonder how a composer can produce an entire opera in a few weeks. He borrows from all his previous operas, changes a note here and there and reuses it. He could get away with it since nothing was recorded in the 1800’s and composers would often wander from town to town. Talk about killing two birds with one chorus.

There are some preachers I know who believe they only have a certain amount of good sermons in them. Once they start running low they take a call to another church and start over again. Is this cheating and underhanded or is this smart and efficient? I have come to discover that if you give a lazy man a job that he HAS to do, you will find the most efficient and quick way to get things done. I think it all depends on your expectations. If you pay someone to produce a great opera for you, HOW he did it didn’t matter as much as how GOOD he did it. If you are expecting God to move through a preacher and touch you, should the fact that he gave that sermon 5 times before detract if the message truly moves you?
You will find many a genius is a master of efficiency. Or he could simply be lazy

By and Large

By and large I am a pretty simple guy.

By and large I don’t get riled up about much.

By and large my peccadilloes are relatively miniscule.

Whoa. Let’s stop a minute before I get too carried away with my excessive verbiage. I like words. I like to look up the meanings of words, this is called the etiology or more precisely the etymology of words. By and large it is kind of a geek pastime.

By and large. That is an interesting phrase isn’t it? A friend of mine gave me a desk calendar that has etymologies on it and “by and large” showed up. This is a nautical phrase. A phrase used by sailors. When you have a LOT OF wind or a “favorable” wind, one in your direction, you say you have a “large” wind. You then use you large square sails to catch the most out of this large wind. “By” is a little more difficult, because it means the opposite: sailing against a large wind or you sail “by the wind.” So when you have a ship that can sail in a large wind, in a favorable direction and by the wind in the opposite direction you have a ship that can handle anything: by and large. It was used first that we know of in 1669 in the Mariners Magazine “this ship handled in fair weather and foul, by and large.” Since then it has come to mean “generally” or “for the most part.”

We use those phrases all the time in English and it is confusing to those who are learning the language. I have a Korean friend that I golf with and I will say things like, “You are ahead of me by one stroke” or “I can’t get down on the ball in my swing because my back is killing me” or “I have a serious case of aquaphobia.” Think about these phrases as a person learning English would. Ahead by a stroke even those you have LESS strokes to lead in golf? Get down on your ball? Back killing you? Aquaphobia?

Words can be very powerful and very confusing. Words can sting and can calm. Words fascinate me by and large.

As to peccadilloes and miniscule? Well, I’ll let you look them up.

Rendering to Caesar

I just got done filing my taxes. It is still early in the year so you probably know that I am not paying into the IRS. You can tell people who are getting money back with how quickly the file their taxes after getting their W2’s in the mail. It may come on January 31 and their taxes are filed and off to the IRS electronically on February 1 in anticipation of their bonus check in three weeks. Others will wait until midnight of April 15th and slide it in the mailbox at the last possible moment to make sure the check will float for the longest period of time until it hits their bank. I am somewhere in the middle. I don’t pay in and I don’t get back so I am in no hurry, it is more of a nuisance than trauma or bonus check excitement.

Taxes are an interesting phenomenon. Taxes are what helped start our country in rebellion to England. Taxation without representation has been an issue every year since. Too much, not enough, taxing the wealthy, taxing the middle class, taxing death, taxing birth, taxing luxury, taxing winnings and even taxing losses. As much as I like the idea of a postcard tax form I realize it is not practical but my telling the government that I don’t owe them anything takes 16 pages of tax forms is not practical either. Now that I can file electronically at least I don’t waist all the paper and postage to do it but it is still a bit frustrating.

Republicans will tell you that they want to cut your taxes because they think you can handle your money better than the government. Democrats will tell you that they don’t want to cut your taxes but they want the rich to pay more because you have proven you can’t handle it better than the government. Taxes support our schools, our military, and they support many of the things we take for granted but there is also a lot of waste in our distribution. Since we are human and the people who distribute our taxes are human and the people who receive the support are human you will inevitably find that there will be abuse and waste. We can demand accountability from our political leaders for our tax money but that costs more money.

I wait at a light and see a scruffy looking man limping by me and carrying a beat up piece of cardboard with “Hungry, homeless, God bless” scrawled on it and I wonder about all that charitable contributions I just listed, I wonder about all the money for social services I just paid in taxes, I wonder whether it is a scam, and I wonder about whether I should look him in the eyes or ignore him. I wonder what happens when you render to Caesar and he turns out to be a people-hating tyrant. I wonder how my few dollars will impact a trillion dollar budget one way or another. Then I quit wondering, roll down my window and hand him a fresh bottle of water.

Minding your Spiritual Business

Memoirs from a New York City Bus 3

The numbers were confusing but the maps helped on the busy New York City Street. We watched cabs weave in and out of traffic as they battled for a half car advantage over the vehicle next to them. Getting the nose of your car there first means everything. I saw very few personal vehicles, the New York street was filled with cabs, limos, delivery vans, construction trucks, and busses. It was one of those busses my wife and I waited for. Our Metro Card worked on busses as well as the Subway. Apparently you get close with the Subway and then walk or take the bus to your specific destination. So here we were, standing at a pole that told us our bus would stop here and then it came.

Our first attempt at a bus was a failure, while we had “exact” money we didn’t have exact “change”. I didn’t know people still used change anymore. While my wife rifled through her purse the bus took off anticipating our $4 in change. Seeing our typical tourist embarrassing dilemma, a good Samaritan close by offered us change. I gave her my paper money and a smile of thanks and used her coins to jingle through the box at the entrance of the bus. We sat in our seat waiting for time to erase the embarrassed tourism stain we just covered ourselves with.

NOW, we were old pros and armed with our Metro Card we calmly slipped it into the slot on that same box and waited for it to spit it back out at us as we smoothly moved to find a seat. As we sat looking out the large windows at the NYC building and activity an elderly man worked his way up the steps to that threatening box. He put a Metro Card in the slot and it spit it out for a different reason, it was expired. The bus driver attempted to take it to throw it away but the man was quicker and put it back in his pocket. He tried another, then another, then another. The bus driver was getting impatient and apparently knew the trick. All the man said was “I’m 95 years old! I can’t keep track of these things!” Card after card was thrown into the garbage until finally the man just went and sat down. The bus driver, in a Brooklyn accent, told the man he had to pay. “I’m 95 years old! I can’t keep track of these things!” I was about to get up and pay for the man but I realized, again, I didn’t have correct change and the Metro Card only works once. But before I could complete the debate in my mind the bus pulled away from the curb and solved the problem. He sat calmly, like he’d pulled this trick for the hundredth time and would a hundred more. “Next time get a good card!” said the driver as the man exited. “I’m 95 years old, I can’t keep track of these things!” and he was gone.

I smiled at the man as his years, glass eye, and cane covered up an amazingly sharp mind. I wanted to know him, I pictured him as that grandfather that sneaks you candy when mom and dad say “no.” I pictured him as that penny pincher who, when finally dead after 110 years, has millions stashed away under his bed and in coffee cans. While the bus driver had to play the annoyed child of the crazy parent, I got to be the grandchild he slipped the candy to and I would have loved to sit on his lap and hear the story of his 95 years.

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Memoirs from a New York City Subway 2

The plastic benches are surprisingly comfortable as my wife and I sit. They are colored in 70’s tones but there is a lot of chrome around and chrome, like blue jeans, never goes out of style. As we move along south, at least I hope its south, on Manhattan Island the subway fills with people heading to work. Soon the comfortable bench becomes crowded and people begin to stand in front of me. They hold the vertical chrome bars first but as more and more people crush into the car they begin to grasp the horizontal ones above my head and I have a great view of armpits in front of me. At every stop the deck is reshuffled as people move about to get out, get in, get a better grip or get an open seat.

Businessmen read papers folded strategically with one hand while holding on with the other. Young people with backpacks are wired into their iPods as they bob their heads to the bass drum even I can hear across the aisle. Moms with children pulled close to them like hens protecting them from the crush of people in the car. Women in short skirts and fashion purses check their makeup in small mirrors. Rough workers with Thermos lunch boxes and Yankee caps pulled down over their eyes sleep in corners. Magically they understand the garbled announcement of the upcoming station and the next one as my wife and I look at each other questioning what the announcement was. It sounded more like a bad fast-food drive through box. More likely the experienced “feel” when they are at their stop, there bodies know when to wake them or nudge them out of their iPod induced stupor and exit the train.

As I feel the car accelerate and decelerate with each passing station I watch the people. Not the individuals anymore, the PEOPLE as a whole. Everyone is in sync. The subway takes off and we all lean the same way in the crush of people. The subway stops and we all lean the opposite way together. We reshuffled the deck and all lean the same way as it takes off. I smile at the subway dance. All equal, all participate; all are a part of the dance. Businessmen lean with the construction workers, short skirted women lean with moms and their children, and we tourists join in the dance and lean and shuffle with all of them.

I smile as I watch the subway dance until I am nudged by my wife that we are at our stop. From outside I watch the reshuffle and the lean as the train takes off again. A little sadness creeps in as I miss my fellow dancers. We are not so different after all, we people. My fellowship moves on without me as my wife and I move through the hall and into the real, sunlit world again.

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Memoirs from a New York City Subway

My wife and I headed to the wedding of a family member a little early so that we could spend a few days in New York City. We had never been there and we wanted to take in the sites, see a few shows and buy a few gifts. Apparently taking a personal car on Manhattan Island is suicide both physically and financially so we were trained by a friend in the City on how to use the subway and bus system.

Armed with a subway system map, a Metro Card giving us a weeks worth of riding, and our belief in humanity we found the nearest stairway leading into the unknown. I have rarely ridden on public transportation. No buses other than the ones I needed to get to school and no trains other than trams around airports and amusement parks.

I could feel my heart racing as I walked down the steps. They were concrete and swept but still stained black from millions of shoes and ground dirt. The lights dimmed as we descended and then we faced our first test. It was a twisted metal jungle with a turnstile in the middle. I swiped my Metro Card and pushed through the metal thicket to the other side. We slowly merged into the traffic of experienced riders searching for any clue: number, letter, or even color that would take us to our train. Finding the clue we picked up speed and hoped we didn’t look too much like one of those annoying tourists. (Although the wide-eyed Bambi expression, Hawaiian shirt, and camera’s around our neck probably gave us away). We went through hallways, stairways and escalators to find our train and finally there it was.

I stood on the concrete pad earnestly looking down a dark tunnel to see my train. Across the tracks was a tile wall with the name of where I was currently standing “42nd Street” written in different colored tile. I remembered the first Matrix movie where Neo and Mr. Smith did battle and busted up a similar looking subway station. All around me were people avoiding each other’s eyes, in their own cocoon sometimes looking at their watches, sometimes looking down the tunnel but mostly looking into their own little world.

The air was hot and stuffy and so were the people. Then a cool breeze wafted down the stairs in the form of music. Music being played on some kind of pipe flute and it was good. We, my fellow travelers and I, looked up the stairs together to see where it was coming from. When we could not see anything we were about to go back to our own worlds when down the stairs came a young man with his hands raised high yelling “I can fly, Jack, I can fly! I am the king of the world!” All around my smiled and some even laughed out loud as we all now knew where we heard that music before. It was the theme to Titanic. The young man disappeared into the crowd; the people went back to their own cocoon and with a whoosh of air that preceded the coming train my attention was back on the business at hand. The young man filled his backpack with a hundred smiles and a few laughs. I happily gave him a smile and resolved to steal a few from other people that day.

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The Merry-go-round Pole

As I drive through the Sierra Nevada Mountain range I notice my automatic transmission downshifts as I make my way uphill. My air conditioner is making it a little too cool for me and so I turn it down a notch. I reach over and munch on a snack bar and take a swig of my bottled water and then turn up the volume on my CD player as a great song is now on. I look off to the snow covered peaks in my protected shell and marvel at the beauty there. Multi-hues of gray and black are mixed in with the snow-white peaks; the white salt flats shimmer in the sun and look as if they are holding up a blue lake a few feet off the ground. Joshua trees extend their arms in praise along the highway seeming to wave at me as I pass by at 80 mph.

I caught a show on the first white conquerors of the American West. Not so much the conquering and killing of the Native Americans and Mexicans as much as the conquering of the land. The things that I now look on as beauty they looked on as another unassailable wall. My truck simply downshifts to make it up and over the mountain passes but they had a much bigger challenge. First they had to find the pass through the mountain, or around it, or the easiest over it. Next they had to blaze the trail, mark it, and memorize it. Then they dealt with bears, dead water, extreme heat and extreme cold. Finally arriving in California they had to make their way all the way back again through the same hostile land. Next came the rails connecting the country; then the roads and finally the expressway that I was driving on.

I never knew the telegraph, my kids will never know rotary phones or party lines, their kids will never know landline phones. I never road a horse and buggy, my kids don’t know regular vs. unleaded and their kids won’t know fossil fuel. To me the Nazi’s are in the history books, my kids studied Viet Nam and the Cold War as history, and their kids will look at the Middle East wars as too long ago to be important. We move at an ever increasing rate of change. It is as if we are on a Merry-go-round going faster and faster as we try to reach for something stationary to hang on to but all we can manage is a touch of memory or a short grip of a flash photo in our minds. I notice even when we put our pictures into albums all nicely dressed up we cut out the background to keep what we think is important. We leave a cutout of us at that time with no context to surround us.

As I hold on tight to the pole of my Merry-go-round I wonder what is next and what I have to look forward to. It is exciting and scary and that is life. Then I open my hands folded around a solid pole in the midst of the chaos of change and I smile. I smile because “I don’t know what the future holds, but I know who holds the future.” Do you?

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