Nathan's Web Log

Mid-Year Book Review

2011-07-07T21:39:00.016-05:00

Somehow we are already well into July 2011. More than six months of the year have been dispatched into the annals of history. Time moves along at an amazing velocity. And I use the word "velocity" purposefully, rather than "speed". As you no doubt recall from your high school physics class, velocity is the measure of speed and direction. You must define both in order to talk about velocity. The velocity of time is remarkable. Naturally it moves along at a rapid pace, but the direction that our lives take is equally impressive. And mysterious. While we can be assured that time marches on at the same rate it always has, 24/7/365, the direction our lives move within that time frame is entirely unknown, until it happens. This is just a wordy way, I suppose, of saying that we can't predict what will happen in the future.

But this is not to say, of course, that we shouldn't make plans. We (collective mankind) are always planning things based on what we think the future might bring, and in fact planning things in order to actually bring about some particular desirable future outcome. Earlier this year, or really very late in 2010, I made some plans about a few things I wanted to accomplish during 2011. Included among these plans was a desire to read 12 books during 2011, roughly one book per month. Now that we are halfway through the year, it seemed fitting to look back and consider what I have read thus far. I feel like if I wait until the very end of the year, too much time will have passed and I will have forgotten much of what I may have learned from my 12-ish books.

So what have I read so far? Believe it or not, I am ahead for the year, having read eight books in six months. Frankly I was shocked when I realized this was the case. But it may turn out for the better, given the ninth book I am attempting to undertake, which will certainly take longer than the month of July to read. More on that later. Before I name the eight titles, I'll also say it was not strictly "one book per month." One particular title was read over the course of four or five months, and a couple of titles were both read during June, while I still was finishing up the title from May. So it was somewhat fluid, rather than a rigid reading plan. Here they are, generally in chronological order:

1. Attributes of God, A.W. Pink

2. Adopted for Life, Russell Moore

3. Parenting in the Pew, Robbie Castleman

4. Shepherding a Child's Heart, Tedd Tripp

5. Life in the Father's House, Wayne Mack and Dave Swavely

6. All Things for Good, Thomas Watson

7. Nine from the Ninth, Paul A. Newman, Bob Wallace, and Jack Bick

8. Swiss Family Robinson, Johann David Wyss

(Sidebar: Just occurred to me I also re-read Melville's Town-Ho's Story, which is a chapter from Moby Dick, but can also stand alone as its own short story. I guess maybe that's eight and a half, or more like eight and a quarter. I won't elaborate on the Town-Ho in this post, though I've blogged about Melville before here.)
There is a fair amount of variety represented on the list, though 75% of these titles have a religious bent to them. The remainder are, respectively, a Vietnam War memoir, and the well known children's novel about a Swiss family shipwrecked in a remote, uninhabited land. So how did these eight books come to make up the list? Read on...

1)The Attributes of God, A. W. Pink

This may be Pink's most well-known book. I have read his The Sovereignty of God in years past, and I have heard of his The Seven Sayings of the Savior on the Cross, which can be a popular work for pastors to co-opt for a seven-sermon series on Jesus' final words before his death and resurrection. As for The Attributes, it is a fine little book that very quickly gives an excellent, on-balance view of what God is like.

Pink describes sixteen characteristics of the God of the Bible. To name a few: Holiness, Mercy, Patience, and Wrath. I imagine the book would be good for small group study, focusing on one attribute per week.
I found the book helpful in broadening my appreciation for God's communicable attributes, that is, those that attributes that can also manifest themselves in His people. As we are created in God's image, there are a handful of His attributes that can manifest themselves in our lives, such as Patience, Love, Grace, or Goodness. Certain attributes we cannot manifest as humans, such as Supremacy, Foreknowledge, or Sovereignty. As much as I know that I myself can struggle with being patient, loving, and gracious in my own life, it enlarges my worship of the God who is perfectly patient, loving, and full of grace.

But of course His incommunicable attributes are not to be sneezed at either, and in fact serve to remind me that He is God and I am not. Consider this quote from Pink's chapter on God's Immutability:

"Human nature cannot be relied upon; but God can! However unstable I may be, however fickle my friends may prove, God changes not. If he varied as we do, if he willed one thing today and another tomorrow, if he were controlled by caprice, who could confide in him? But, all praise to his glorious name, he is ever the same. His purpos is fixed, his will is stable, his word is sure. Here then is a rock on which we may fix our feet, while the mighty torrent is sweeping away everything around us. The permanence of God's character guarantees the fulfillment of his promises." (p. 49)

Now that is theology that leads people to doxology! If ever a book can drive you to thankfulness and praise for who God is, Pink's Attributes is it.

2) Adopted for Life, Russell Moore

Stephanie had highly recommended this book to me some time ago, and I decided to prioritize reading it early in the year to see if it was worth all of her hype. I can safely say it was. The book's subtitle is "The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families & Churches." As such, I knew what I was in for, or thought I did: a 216-page plea for Christian Families to follow the Biblical model for true and undefiled religion, which according to James 1:27 is to look after widows and orphans in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world. I knew this book would push very hard, with the weight of Scripture behind it, for Christian parents to adopt children.

Moore certainly did push very hard for Christian parents to adopt children, but he did much more than that. Really Adopted for Life is a treatise on the Biblical doctrine of adoption as much as anything. That is, the doctrine that God chooses who His children will be, and brings them into His family on no account of their own worthiness, but all for His grace and good pleasure, and gives His children all the rights and privileges of being within God's household. It really is the Gospel, pure and simple. Moore describes adoption as two-fold:

"Adoption is, on the one hand, gospel. In this, adoption tells us who we are as children of the Father. Adoption as gospel tells us about our identity, our inheritance, and our mission as sons of God. Adoption is also defined as mission. In this, adoption tells us our purpose in this age as the people of Christ. Missional adoption spurs us to join Christ in advocating for the helpless and abanonded."

There you have it. A sound Biblical approach to Adoption. A book worth reading for anyone who wants to know more about who you are as a son or daughter of God, and for anyone who may consider how they can truly get real with pure and undefiled religion that our Father accepts. After reading Moore's work I am more encouraged that hopefully, if it would please the Lord and he wills, someday our family will grow again, but rather than from the inside out, from the outside in.

3) Parenting in the Pew, Robbie Castleman

The third book I read was probably the least-enjoyed of the eight. The subject matter was worthy; Castleman's subtitle was "Guiding your children into the joy of worship." That is a worthy thing to do. My children must learn to worship, and enjoy doing it. It is indeed a joyous time to worship corporately with our fellow believers every Sunday morning. I look forward to Sundays more now than I ever have in my life. I love being with our brothers and sisters in Christ. I love taking my wife and children to church, were we fellowship, pray, worship, and learn.

As such, I was glad to also take Stephanie's recommendation and read Parenting in the Pew, which she had also read some time ago. But why didn't I find it as enjoyable? It could have been that it seemed to me that Castleman was slinging about 20 imperatives at me on every single page, of things I needed to be doing in order to help my children learn to pray, learn, and worship corporately. And it seemed like for Castleman, a mother of two boys, it was no problem to follow through with the dozens and dozens of things she suggests that all parents need to do. I hope that is the case, and praise the Lord if she has been able to so assiduously prepare her boys to worship in the best way possible.

But frankly I finished the book feeling beaten down, with a monumental task set before me that I could in no way hope to accomplish. Often on Sundays I feel like it was a succesful worship time if Ben doesn't talk too loudly during the prayer, and Lucy doesn't ask to go the potty during the hymns. It's hard enough to get us all out the door at 7:45 am for an 8:00 service, without stopping to consider all the many, many ways I should be working to make sure Lucy and Ben will properly engage and enjoy the worship.

Now don't get me wrong. I do take seriously my role as a father to guide my children during worship, and to properly prepare them ahead of time. I probably just need some more time maturing as a Dad before I can appreciate all the many ways Castleman was successful with her two children. Castleman also wrote Parenting in the Pew when her sons were in high school. The expanded edition, which I read, was completed after her boys had gone off to college. I admit that I wonder if her memory is as good as it seems. Looking back over twenty years of parenting, could Castleman really identify all the ways she helped her toddlers behave and participate in worship? I think she may have had the benefit of hindsight. If a mom were to write a book during the throes of bringing toddlers to church week after week, I doubt that mom's book would be as chipper and full of success stories as Castleman's is.

In the end I may revisit Parenting in the Pew in a few years, and see if I feel the same way about it. Until then, I will commit to be sensible and prayerful about how to engage my children during worship. I trust God will bless Stephanie and my efforts, feeble as they may be.

4) Shepherding a Child's Heart, Tedd Tripp

After finishing Parenting, I was loathe to pick up my next book, which was the last of Stephanie's recommendations for me. I was deeply concerned I was about to receive another beat down. Thankfully, Tripp's book proved to be excellent, and while it certainly reproved me for several areas I was failing as a Dad, much more like Adopted for Life, I felt encouraged afterward.

Shepherding a Child's Heart talks about parenting children in the most Biblical way possible - recognizing that sin and righteousness are a matter of the heart. When my children misbehave, it is because something is wrong in their hearts, and that is called sin. And it is the same for me. When I do wrong, it is because I have a sinful heart. It is not that I had a poor upbringing (I had a good one, thanks Mom and Dad). It is not that the environment or circumstances around me compelled me to do something wrong. It is not even that "the devil made me do it." Bad behavior, whether it is lying, stealing, looking lustfully at a woman, hitting someone, or telling a ribald joke, is always a result of a sinful heart.

On page 3 of Moore's book, he quotes Jesus from Mark 7:21: "... from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly." On the very next page Moore elaborates on how this is brought to bear on child-rearing:

"'What is the problem?' you ask. The problem is this: Your child's needs are far more profound than his aberrant behavior. Remember, his behavior does not just spring forth uncaused. His behavior - the things he says and does - reflects his heart. If you are to really help him, you must be concerned with the attitudes of heart that drive his behavior."

Now that's about the best parenting advice I've ever seen. It really is revolutionary. Most parents (me included) focus on our children's outward behavior. That is the most irritating. When Samuel is writhing on the floor crying because I took a crayon away from him to keep him from eating it, his writhing and crying are what I find annoying. I would like for him to stop and be quiet. When Benjamin takes a book out of Lucy's hands it is very frustrating. I would rather him not take things from his sister. When Lucy blows up and freaks out because Ben took the book away, I would also like for her to silence herself. I naturally want peace in the house. But these fits of anger and selfishness, while irritating to behold, only belie a deeper issue - their little hearts are sinful, and there is only one solution for that: the Gospel.

Shepherding a Child's Heart gives two main means to impart the Gospel to children: communication and the rod. Tripp says that rich communication is critical to understand the nature of the struggle the child is having. This can be comical in practice, when attempting to communicate seriously with a three year old after he has misbehaved. But I agree it is essential to do my very best to talk it through with Lucy and Ben when they have clearly exhibited sinful behavior - attempting to understand why they did what they did. Helping them see that their behavior is driven by sin is key. And of course the rod. Tripp makes a very cogent argument from Scripture why the rod must be utilized to discipline children. I won't repeat his argument here, but it is important to understand that the rod is always redemptive in nature, not punitive. Helping them see that sin always has consequences, often painful consequences, even death, only points up their need for a Savior.

Toward the end of the book, Tripp gives some more practical advice and encouragement for parenting children of all ages, and while I may not be ready for his chapters on later childhood and teenagers, I will be sure to keep this book on the shelf for when the time comes.

5) Life in the Father's House, Wayne Mack and Dave Swavely

Whenever I am able, I like to participate in our church's I.S.I. Men's Ministry. I.S.I. stands for Iron Sharpens Iron, taken from Proverbs 27:17, which says "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." Each semester Men's Ministry offers two studies to choose from, either a Tuesday evening or Saturday morning. This past spring, the Saturday morning study, led by the inimitable Brent Osterberg, used the book Life in the Father's House as its study.

Wayne Mack and Dave Swavely offer a compelling portrait of what it is to be a member of the local church. Each of the ten chapters ultimately focuses on "equipping the saints for the work of service," as Ephesians 4:12 puts it. Chapters include topics such as "Choosing a Good Church," "Using Our Spiritual Gifts," and "Praying for One Another." Occasionally I felt like I was re-reading things I already knew. They were good things to re-learn, of course, but not every Chapter was a treasure trove of new information. Still, there was much I did need to learn.

In Chapter 4, "Relating to Church Leadership," the authors expand on Hebrews 13:17 in an interesting way:

"...the writer of Hebrews...says you should obey and submit to (church leaders) because 'they keep watch over your souls, as those who will give an account.' ...That imagery underscores the grave responsibility God has entrusted to the leaders of a church, but it also reveals the tremendous necessity of their ministry. Individual believers... are in need of watchmen to warn us of the encroaching enemies of the soul that would wage war against our purity or rob us of our joy. We often fail to see these enemies coming, but our leaders, who are better equipped than we are, can help us to recognize their presence and fight them more effectively."

In an era of "every man for himself," or "I can take care of myself," this underscores our real need for Biblically qualified church leaders. I may not feel like I always need someone watching over my soul, but thank the Lord that He has called and properly gifted men to do so.

6) All Things For Good, Thomas Watson

I finally made it through a Puritan Paperback. A slight 127 pages took the better part of two months to finish. Admittedly I took a break right about when Annie was born, and interspersed titles 7 and 8 (below) while I took a break from Watson. Not that Thomas Watson is in any way boring, or even particularly difficult to read. Watson is much easier than John Owen, whose The Death of Death still have not completed. Indeed our Pastor Dan Kirk describes reading Watson as candy. That is, if Owen was a tough piece of meat. It could be a good analogy.

I had asked for half a dozen Puritan Paperbacks for Christmas last year, and my Mom graciously obliged. I had planned to read a few of them early in 2011, but instead I took up Stephanie's recommendations first. So when I finally came to place to choose a new book, I knew it would be one of the Paperbacks, but which one? Try Owen again? What about Jeremiah Burroughs? Or Richard Sibbes? Ultimately I was intrigued by Dan's description of reading Watson as the literary equivalent of eating candy. Not that Thomas Watson is junk, but just ever so sweet and delicious to the soul.

Indeed reading Watson is good for the soul. It took some time, but I found my way through it, and am glad I did. Most days when I was reading All Things for Good I would come across a great phrase or sentence that was just so wonderfully descriptive or enjoyable I wish I had made a list of them. I'll try to give a few of those quotes here, but first, just a quick description of what the book is about.

All Things for Good, first published in 1663, is an exposition of one of the most well known verses in the New Testament, Romans 8:28: "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to His purpose." In his introduction, Watson describes this verse as having 3 facets: first, a glorious privelege (all things work for good); secondly, the persons interested in this privelige (those who love God and are called); thirdly, the origin and spring of His calling (according to His purpose). Watson makes cogent arguments from Scripture that indeed ALL things work for good, including the best things (such as God's promises and the prayers of the saints), and the worst things (including the evil of affliction and the evil of sin).

Hear what Watson says of affliction: "Afflictions to the godly are medicinal. Out of the most poisonous drugs God extracts our salvation. Afflictions are as needful as ordinances. No vessel can be made of gold without fire; so it is impossible that we should be made vessels of honor, unless we are melted and refined in the furnance of affliction. As the painter intermixes bright colors with dark shadows, so the wise God mixes mercy with judgment. Those afflictive providences which seem to be prejudicial, are beneficial."

Regarding the mercies of God: "The mercies of God have a melting influence upon the soul; they dissolve it in love to God. God's judgments make us fear Him, His mercies make us love Him...Every mercy is an alms of free grace; and this enlarges the soul in gratitude. A good Christian is not a grace to bury God's mercies, but a temple to sing His praises. If every bird in its kind, as Ambrose says, chirps forth thankfulness to this Maker, much more will an ingenious Christian, whose life is enriched and perfumed with mercy."

Regarding our love toward God: "...it is dangerous to abate in our love. Love is such a grace as we know not how to be without. A soldier may as be well without his weapons, an artist without his pencil, a musician without his instrument, as a Christian can be without love. The body cannot want its natural heat. Love is to the sould as the natural heat is to the body, there is no living without it. Love influences the graces, it excites the affections, it makes us grieve for sin, it makes us cheerful in God; it is like oil to the wheels; it quickens us in God's service. How careful we should be to keep alive our love for God!"

Finally, an exhortation regarding God's call: "Admire and adore God's free-grace calling in you - that God should pass over so many, that He should pass by the wise and noble, and that the log of free-grace should fall upon you! That He should take out of a a state of vassalage, from grinding the devil's mill, and should set you above the princes of the earth, and call you to inherit the throne of glory! Fall upon your knees, break forth in to a thankful triumph of praise; let your hearts be ten-stringed instruments, to sound forth the memorial of God's mercy. None so deep in debt to free grace as you, and none hsould be so high mounted upon the pinncale of thanksgiving."

Ultimately, reading All Things For Good was a strong kick in the pants for me. Or more like a stab to the heart. I was reminded of the lowly state of my obedience, and the slow progress of my sanctification. It seems reading the Puritans just makes me feel like I'm much, much less committed and engaged in love and service for Christ than I should be. I trust God will use this for my good.

7) Nine From The Ninth, Paul A. Newman, Bob Wallace, and Jack Bick

This was my second read of Nine From The Ninth. I received the book in 2009 from one of the authors, Bob Wallace, who is my brother-in-law, David Wallace's, father. I read the book right then, in 2009, when I got it, and immensely enjoyed it.

Right after Annie was born, life takes on an entirely new pace and cadence. Some nights I was sleeping on the couch, and of course I was home for 2 weeks, off work. I had a fair share of time where I needed to read something, but nothing heavy like Watson. So I picked up a book that I knew I would enjoy, and decided to give it a go again. I was not disappointed.

From the book's dust jacket description: Three soldiers who served together with the Ninth Infantry Division in the Mekong Delta in Vietman during 1969 have successfully complied three stories each to produce Nine From The Ninth. Two of them, Paul A. Newman and Bob Wallace, Rangers of Co. E, 75th Infantry tell of their experience on small patrol missions and the fun and frustration of the base camp with a perspective of thirty years. The third soldier, Jack Bick, a photographer and Public Information Officer, who often went on missions with the Rangers, portrays a different perspective of the Rangers versus a regular line company. These soliders were friends during the war and remained friends for the past thrity-two years. That friendship, bonded in combat, has culminated in these nine stories that arise from the Ninth Infantry Division.

Nine little war stories. Some stories are humorous, others gruesome with violence, all of them are thoughtful reminisces of a War that I know almost nothing about. In fact, Nine From The Ninth is the only book I have ever read whose subject matter is the Vietnam War. I have not studied modern wars, and have only really read one other book focused on a 20th-centry war, John F. Kennedy's PT-109, an old copy of which my Dad gifted to me some years ago. In college I took semester-long courses on both the Revolutionary War and the Civil War, but since then I have not attempted to learn much about our Nation's wartime past.

As such, I considered Nine From The Ninth a quick history lesson as much as anything, but also part entertainment, and part reminder that I am grateful I have never been in a position to be a soldier. The stories these three men tell are many times frightening, in an almost incredible kind of way. Did thousands of men REALLY serve their Country by roaming around rice paddies under cover of night to root out and kill small groups of North Vietnamese soldiers, and in turn get killed themselves? What a horrible, horrible time. Newman, Wallace, and Bick paint vivid pictures of a small piece of that horrible time. They do it ably and with care. I'm sure this is not the last time I will read their work.

8) Swiss Family Robinson, Johann David Wyss.

This title was another choice I made, when I needed to read something mostly for entertainment, that didn't require a lot of serious thought. Indeed Wyss' book is very enertaining, as it is meant to be, especially for young children, and young boys most of all. I can certainly imagine reading this aloud to Ben and Sam in a few years.

I will not delve into the plot - I think the book is well enough known - a family stranded on a strange, uninhabited land after a shipwreck. But what you may not know, or at least what I didn't know is the religious undertones within the book. The author was actually a pastor, and wrote this work as a means to impart important lessons to his own four sons. Throughout the book the stranded family looks to God in prayer for safety and provision in their desperate situation, each evening the father lead his wife and children in family worship. Toward the end of the book, which is written in the first person from the father's point of view, we find this:

" 'We spend our years as a tale that is told,' said King David.

These words recurred to me again and again as I reviewed ten years, of which the story lay chronicaled in the pages of my journal. Year followed year; chapter succeeded chapter; steadily, imperceptably, time was passing away.

The shade of sadness cast on my mind by retrospect of this kind was dispelled by thoughts full of gratitude to God, for the welfare and happiness of my beloved family during so long a period. I had cause especially to rejoice in seeing our sons advance to manhood, strengthened by early training for lives of usefulness and activity wherever their lot may fall.

And my great wish is that young people who read this record of our lives and adventures should learn form it how admirably suited is the peaceful, industrious, and pious life of a cheerful, united family to the formation of strong, pure, and manly character."

Good lessons for boys (and girls) are imparted in this far-fetched tale of a castaway Swiss familiy. And good reading for anyone who has time and the interest to learn all about how to survive in the wilderness by relying on God's provision.

So there is six months worth of books, half of 2011. We'll see how many more I can get to before 2012 rolls around. Next on the docket is actually one of the texts from my Revolutionary War history class in college, Decision in Philadephia: The Constitutional Convention of 1787 by Christopher Collier and James Lincoln Collier. It's a somewhat fat book, so it will surely take more than July to get through it, but I was just feeling somewhat patriotic around July 4th, and it seemed an appropriate time to read up on our Nation's foundations.

After that, who knows? I'm open to suggestions.

Beach, Babe's, and Boo-hooing

2011-05-25T21:48:00.004-05:00

Last Saturday we took a spur of the moment "vacation" that lasted about 4 and a half hours. I got home from a Men's Breakfast at about 9:30 am to find the wife and kids pressed and dressed, with bright smiling faces. All dressed up but with no place to go, as it were. So we decided since everyone was ready, we should plan a last-minute outing of sorts. About 45 minutes later we were in the van, headed southwest on US Hwy 377 for Granbury.

Among other things, Granbury is known as a place for old couples to visit, stay in bed and breakfasts, and piddle around the saccharine, quasi-historical downtown square mostly populated with antique shops and knick-knack emporiums. It is also known as a "lake town," since Lake Granbury (a.k.a. wide spot in the Brazos River) exists right in the middle of town, and provides both plenty of water recreation and over-priced real estate.

Related to the water recreation, we had learned not too long ago that there was a beach in Granbury. A legitimate beach, on the lake, with sand and everything. We were curious to see this for ourselves, so off we went, with only very sketchy plans of what we would do when we found this beach. We did not think we would actually want to get into the water. I figured it would be exceeding cold to begin with, and frankly I wasn't sure of the water quality until I could see it with my own eyeballs. While in principle it was hard to imagine it being much worse than any other Texas beach on the Gulf, still I just wasn't sure what to expect.

We were very pleasantly surprised. We arrived to find a fair number of parents and little kids decked out in their swimwear and floating toys, splashing and swimming along happily. A long L-shaped pier wrapped around the swimming area, complete with very code-compliant guardrails, so we took a stroll down the pier, with no fears of any of our progeny falling into the water a few feet below. After we looped back around to the beach, we found the sand to be of first quality, far and away better than any sand that exists in Rockport, and there were even picnic shelters complete with palapa-style thatched roofs.

We dropped our stuff on a picnic table and let the kids take off to play in the sand, not thinking they would really want to get wet. We were wrong. While we had the foresight to bring some sand toys (and spare changes of clothes), these toys didn't really hold their interest when splashing in nearby water was available. It was all we could do to keep Ben from stripping down naked and running into the water. Lucy hiked up her pant leggings and got acceptably wet. It felt somewhat cruel to keep telling the kids, "Sorry, we came to the beach but didn't bring your swimsuits. Just play in the sand." Eventually after enough almost-fun was had, it was almost lunch time, so we decided to head back to the van, get dusted off and find some food. We also resolved that we would someday definitely make a return trip to the Granbury beach, with all of the appropriate swimwear for a proper beach outing.

Anyway, it was lunchtime. And apparently Babe's Chicken Dinner House exists in Granbury, which should not have been surprising. Babe's is neck-and-neck with Kincaid's these days as far as their expansion plan business model. The goal seems to be something like this: Since our historic original location restaurant is so well-liked and popular, let's recreate the same "historic" atmosphere in as many other towns as possible, thereby making our historic original location no longer original and not nearly as fun to visit, since we've diluted and reproduced it, making it a "brand" instead of original. Babes now has 9 locations; Kincaid's has 6. That said, you could probably say the same thing about our other favorite haunts, like Chuy's or Rudy's. I haven't even been to the original Rudy's in San Antonio. Whenever we visit Kincaid's Arlington or even South Hulen, I often look around and wonder, "Have any of these yahoos even been to the real Kincaid's? Do they even know where Camp Bowie is?" I guess I'm that yahoo at Rudy's whose never been to the mother ship. Alas. Some day I'll make the pilgrimage.

Anyway, we availed ourselves of the Granbury Babe's, and had a lovely lunch until something totally unexpected happened. If you have been to Babe's before, you probably know that it is the custom for the waitresses, every now and then, to line up in the middle of the restaurant, and dance the Hokey-Pokey while the music plays on the loudspeaker. Well, I had never seen this before, but our waitress asked Lucy if she wanted to go to the middle of the floor and dance with them. Now when someone asks Lucy to dance, what do you think the answer is? No brainer. Of course the girl will go dance with a perfect stranger to a song she's never heard before in front of a hundred other perfect strangers. And Stephanie and I didn't stop her. She was out of her chair and walking away before I could really consider what was going on.

So there Lucy was, maybe 15 feet away from our table, at the end of the line, with our waitress telling her how to "put her left arm in" and "put her left arm out" and so forth. Lucy was a bit slow to catch on, but eventually it was clear she was having fun, especially when it was time to "shake it all about."

This was totally unexpected, to have Lucy dancing in the middle of a restaurant. I was just grinning like the Cheshire Cat watching her have fun, and what is Stephanie doing? She's crying. Tears on her face crying. I didn't realize until I turned back around after the Hokey-Pokey was finished. Soon enough I realized it wasn't necessarily tears of sadness, and truth be told I got a lump in my throat, too. Lucy was now back in her chair, eating her chicken like nothing had happened, and Stephanie and I were marvelling that we actually had a child old enough to dance the Hokey-Pokey at Babe's. Really?

Now there will come a time when we will not want our daughter to be in front of a bunch of strangers shaking her hips all about, but last Saturday was just an example of a four year old girl having a silly time. No harm there, I don't think. But really, was she really old enough to go by herself, of her own volition, and have fun for a few minutes without us? It was an arresting moment. Our four, nearly five year old Lucy is growing up rapidly. She's about to be a big sister thrice over, and that in itself should clue us into the fact that she is no baby. Still very young and needy, but getting older and just a little bit more independent by the day. I suppose that is one of the many joys of being a parent. Watching your children mature.

Surely the next time we see Lucy dance the "Hokey-Pokey" it will not seem like such a momentous occasion. But soon enough she'll do something else that we're not expecting and we'll marvel again at a little girl growing up.

The Old 100th

2011-05-02T21:39:00.007-05:00

I don't recall a time when I have struggled more with a web log post. I have been known to blog several hundred words, maybe even more, and then get stumped. So I leave it alone, and come back a few days later to finish it, usually. On occasion, the entire draft may get dumped altogether. In this case, this will be the fourth time I've started this post. The previous three efforts I have either gotten stumped or just plain didn't like where the post was headed, so I dumped each one in turn, over the course of the last 2 weeks.

Basically the following are the main points that are rolling around in my head, which have yet to coalesce into a cogent, blog-worthy composition:

1) This is my 100th web log post.

2) This upcoming Sunday (May 8th) is my 7th Wedding Anniversary.

3) I like organ music more than most people.

4) We used "The Doxology" in our wedding program as the Postlude (as the crowd leaves for the reception).

Now, if you were me, how would you fit all those together? There in lies the challenge.

It does somehow seem fitting, first of all, to memorialize my 100th post. Not that the past 99 posts are anything to write home about, but still, it's a milestone.

Added to that, here I am, right on the cusp of a wedding anniversary, so it seems fitting to somehow document that milestone.

So I have 2 disparate themes in mind, yet I do have one concrete thing to tie them together - an oh-so-clever blog post title that becomes a play on words, "The Old 100th." Clearly the 100th stands for the 100th blog post, but also it stands for something from our wedding, some seven years ago. Anyone who has a hymnal (or wikipedia) handy can determine the significance of The Old 100th. And in case you don't have a handy copy of our wedding program from May 8, 2004, here it is. Click for a larger view.

There, at the end of the program, you can see The Old 100th. Expertly played on the organ by the ever impressive (and very affordable) Owen Griffin. Not that Owen is cheap. His skill is first rate, and in fact I gave him quite a challenge for Stephanie's bridal march. More on that later.

As I said earlier, I probably like organ music more than most people. Now, it is not at all my favorite type of music, but frankly the organ is just an amazing instrument. The variety of sound that a good, old fashioned pipe organ can produce is remarkable. From the highest pitched, most fleeting little trills, to the pull-out-all-the-stops, shake-the-rafters blasts, the organ is an instrument unmatched in the musical world.

That said, somehow not everyone likes organ music. When the organ comes to mind, some people may think of dingy funeral parlors, with the canned organ music constantly lulling everyone into a more grievous state. Others may simply find the organ too old fashioned, fine for Bach and Handel but way too passe for today's musical tastes. So be it. Seems to me it is becoming more and more difficult to even hear an organ played these days. Some concert halls have them, and a minority of churches do. What used to be one of the mainstays of church music has been relegated to a position like the dusty tuxedo in the back of your closet. It just hangs there collecting dust, until the odd opportunity arises when you need to get all fancied-up for a night out on the town. Most church organs have been replaced by electric keyboards and "praise bands." If, per chance, an old-school hymn is on the Sunday morning docket, then maybe the keyboardist will flip the switch on his keyboard for the "pipe organ" setting, and then let his 120 volts of an electric noise-making-device do its best to replicate thousands of pipes sounding off to the Heavens. As Bach rolls in his grave.

Anyway, I digress, and am a hypocrite, but more on that later. Back to Owen. Given Stephanie and my limited budget for our wedding, we needed an affordable musician. We considered a string quartet, as well as a trumpeter, but found them to be fairly costly. Now friends, it's not that Stephanie wasn't worth a trumpeter, or that a string quartet wouldn't have been sublime, but really.... we simply chose not to splurge on a musician. We chose instead to splurge on, well... nothing. It was a simple affair. Doesn't mean it was "cheap" necessarily, but simple. Owen was the full time organist on staff at the church, so it was a sensible decision. And I liked organ music anyway, as you are by now well aware. But now for the hypocritical part: Also, as a means of cost savings (and since we saw no need for 2,200 seats at our wedding), we opted for the smaller (read cheaper) venue, the measly and sometimes strange-smelling 800 seat chapel.

Mind you, the 2,200 seat sanctuary was outfitted with a grand pipe organ that shook the building every Sunday morning quite nicely, at Owen's expert fingertips. The chapel was outfitted, however, with a fake organ. Indeed, it was much more than simply an electric keyboard, but there weren't no pipes. Just big speakers up in the ceiling somewhere. It was loud enough, just not a real-and-for-true pipe organ. But it was affordable.

So there we were, a wedding venue with a fake organ but with a legit organist. Pretty much all the music on the program was "typical Southern Baptist" stuff, at least as far as I knew. Nothing out of the ordinary, I don't think, except the wedding march. Since we were locked into the organ, the question was, which march do we use? The ubiquitous Wagner? Boring. The also well known Mendelssohn, though it was usually used at the end of the ceremony? Nah. We liked the idea of the original Rogers & Hammerstein's wedding march from The Sound of Music. A great piece of organ music. Trouble was, 2 friends of ours had been married the year before (in the fancy 2,200-seat room with real pipes), and used that. Can't do that, or we'll look like copy-cats. So, I decided to get creative.

Frankly I didn't know a whole lot of other organ music out there, except there was this one piece I liked, and it was unique. Buried deep within Camille Saint Saens' Symphony #8, exists a 40-second long organ riff (in the linked video it goes from 1:10 to 1:50) that seemed to me to fit the bill for a wedding march. Just the right length for a leisurely trip down the aisle, and very grand, more than appropriate for a bride's entrance. (Full disclosure: this same tune was set to words in 1977 and became a smash-hit in the UK and Australia, and is used extensively in the 1995 movie Babe. Throughout the duration of the wedding planning I had secret worries that for some reason someone at the ceremony would make the connection and wonder something like this: "I wonder why Stephanie is coming down the aisle to the tune that James Cromwell sang to his sheep-pig Babe? Is there any latent symbolism here? Surely Nathan is not equating his new wife to a pig, is he?" I will assume that since no one has voiced these concerns to me in the last 7 years, I must have just been needlessly paranoid.)

So, with the wedding march selected, I had to determine how to communicate this to Owen. What I did next probably ranks up there in the same category as the Joshua Tree expedition as an expedition highly unlikely to succeed. All I needed to do was get the sheet music for the organ riff, which was buried deep within the 2nd movement of the 8th Symphony. So one day I plucked up the courage and trekked over to the TCU Music Library and started looking. Kind of like a needle in a haystack, especially for a guy that cannot read music, much less a symphonic score. Finding Symphony #8 on the shelf was easy enough, but the score was a thick as a Bible, so I had to wade through until I found where I thought the actual 40-second-long organ riff occurred. (Thought process: Am I looking at the organ part? Or is this the violins? Horns? Well, this page looks pretty loud, based on all the fff, so this might be it.) Somehow I located what I thought must be those little black notes, so many random dots and lines on a page, and I plopped it down on the photocopier, and copied several pages, hoping I caught it all. I also bought a CD of the Symphony, and sent both the photocopies and CD to Owen, along with my desired wedding march instructions.

Amazingly, it all worked out. Well, mostly. I think Owen played it a little slower than 40 seconds, since he had to play the organ part with his hands and the entire orchestra with his feet (or something), and I think Stephanie and her Dad must have booked it down the aisle in about 10 seconds, so we were all left to stand there and enjoy the fake organ shaking the rafters for a good while. I didn't mind, as I figured that most of these folks standing behind me hadn't heard any worthwhile organ music in a long time, so it would do them good. And as I stood there, I gazed deep into Stephanie's eyeballs and hummed the words in my head from Babe, reminding myself that I should not start dancing a jig right then, a la James Cromwell.

So the wedding march was ended, we were successfully wed, and soon enough the ceremony was concluded. As everyone filed out, we were treated to some more excellent work by Owen, this time The Old 100th. It was a fitting conclusion to our ceremony, and certainly a fitting Doxology for our first 7 years of marriage, which really is the thrust of this web log post. Stephanie must be in this marriage for the long haul if she's willing to march down the aisle to bizarre organ music, and that's a good thing. Hopefully 7 times 7 more years to come, or more.

Praise God, from Whom all blessings flow;
Praise Him, all creatures here below;
Praise Him above, ye Heavenly Host;
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen

High Flying High Roller? Highly Unlikely.

2011-04-11T22:00:00.011-05:00

The Internet is a strange thing. I suppose the Internet is considered a form of "mass media," in that it reaches millions of people, similar to television or radio. But at the same time, the Internet attempts to personalize itself. By now we should all be aware that, somehow or other, the Internet "knows" the sites we visit and how long we linger. As such, this mass medium pretends to know what products we like to buy, what kind of news we like to read, and to some degree, what our interests are. Obviously when we are on a news site, the advertisements are geared toward whoever the Internet thinks we are. It is remarkable, really. Television cannot do this, nor the radio. Certainly not a newspaper or magazine. But the Internet thinks it knows us. But sometimes the Internet gets us wrong. Today, while testing my 20-article limit at the NYT, this ad was displayed alongside the story I was reading.

Now I know that not every single advertisement on the Internet is specifically geared to each individual Internet user. Still, the bevy of NYT advertisers expect to reach their target audience, generally, by putting up their ads on people's screen. But this gem was wasted on me. I almost laughed out loud. Maybe I am really dragging down their demographic. Soon enough the 20-article limit will kick in, and I'll be weeded out, burned up like the plebeian chaff that I am, unfit as a NYT reader.

The more I considered this advertisement, the more dumbstruck I was. Obviously I will never charter a jet from New York to Aspen. Even if I had $18K in the bank, unallocated for any other purpose, I doubt I'd spend it on a private jet to a swanky mountain ski resort. But then what do I know? I'm not in the proverbial "jet set."

But who is, anyway? Who is really reading that NYT article, and actually has that kind of cash to throw around, and might possibly decide he wants to go to Aspen, so he dials up the number on the ad? Really? Aren't really rich people who jet around the country supposed to just "know" how to do stuff like that, rather than have to call a website advertisement?

Compounded to this was the content of the article. It was about how to not get bumped from your airline flight, or conversely, how to get bumped on purpose and get free trips from your airline that bumped you. One of the premises of the article was that, if you planned it out carefully, you can manage to get very CHEAP or FREE trips from airlines because you allow yourself to get bumped. Theoretically, people interested in this article might be very interested in cheap or free airfare, which is not exactly how I would describe an $18,000 trip from New York to Aspen. I guess at least you wouldn't get bumped from your private charter jet.

Still, you may be wondering, why was I interested in this article? Good question. Just passing the time on my lunch hour, I guess. I hardly ever fly - once a year perhaps. Clearly I am not someone who is in great danger of getting bumped from flight to flight. It's never come close to happening. Ultimately I'm kind of an airplane and air travel nerd. I admit I like airplanes. They are amazing machines.

When we drive to Ikea, we drive right past the airport. We always see planes taking off and landing. I generally keep most of the airplane nerdery to myself, lest my dear wife wonder why she got paired up with such a dweeb. But sometimes I let it slip. Lucy will see a plane flying overhead, and say, "Wow that's a big airplane." If I'm not careful, I'll say something like this, "No, actually Lucy, it's just an MD-80. It's a fairly small plane. Now that one over there, look that way, that's a 777. That's a big airplane." If I say this, Stephanie looks at me, and shakes her head, "Why do you know this?" All I can do is reply, "I just know these things. Why shouldn't I know what the different airplanes are?"

Seems to me airplane fascinations are fairly common for little boys. Most types of large machinery are interesting to boys. Ben is quick to point out buses, garbage trucks, tractors, and of course trains and airplanes. Even when we're inside the house, and if a plane can be heard overhead, Sam even points up to the ceiling, and makes a point of the airplane noise. Boys love to play with little cars and trucks and such. Ben and Sam spend quality time around the train table. I know I was the same way. I personally had a fondness in my heart for big over-the-road trucks, 18-wheelers, that is. Maybe it started with playing with Transformers. Optimus Prime, of course, was an 18-wheel truck.

My first and most fervent career aspiration was to be a trucker. Truly. To sit behind the wheel of a Peterbilt 379, at the command of 80,000 pounds of cargo, hauling across America at 70 mph. Just imagine! But then, nowadays, when I look at that career path romantically, all I have do to is visit a truck stop restroom and remind myself, "No, thanks, I stick with buildings, which, while they don't move at 70 mph, they weigh a LOT more than 80,000 lbs, and the restrooms are much cleaner."

At some point in junior high I teased myself with being a pilot. But I figured the only respectable way to become a flyboy was to serve in the military first, so I jettisoned that idea fairly quickly. There was another kid in 8th grade that was already working on his pilot's license. He had it all planned out - he was going to flight school to become a commercial airline pilot. He wanted to fly the 757, which is also a plane I have always admired. (Nerd alert... The 757 stands up tall on the runway, unlike the MD-80, which seems to me the aviation equivalent of a low-rider. Drives me crazy. See for yourself, MD-80 in the foreground; 757 background:)

As I think back, my first airplane trip was in fact a private charter of sorts. In Nacogdoches, one of the pastors at our church had his pilot's license. He took me up in a single engine craft of some kind for a personal introduction to flying. I was probably 5 or 6 years old. It would be 10 more years until I flew the friendly skies again, until our family took a legitimate summer vacation, all the way to Cancun. Somehow we convinced Dad it was in fact too far to drive, all the way down to the Yucatan, so we boarded the probably 20 year-old DC-10 operated by the once-defunct Sun Country and were conveyed with 300 other sun and fun-seeking tourists to Olde Mexico.

It is the return trip to DFW that sticks in my memory. Strangely enough, our family was seated in Row 1. In front of us was a partition, behind which I guess where bathrooms or something, then the flight deck. No first class in Sun Country. All coach. Anyway, during the climb out of Cancun on our return trip, my dear sister screamed loudly and repeatedly, "We're going to die!" as my Mom tried her best to console her, while I quietly peered out the window, marvelling at the crystal blue water of the Caribbean, and pondering the possibility of impending doom. Clearly, Erin was not yet a proponent for air travel, nor would she become one for years to come.

Probably not long after this, I embarked on a few adventuresome flights with by best childhood friend Jess. His dad worked for American Airlines, and at the time (mid 90s), he could get free stand-by tickets for family and friends. So Jess and I took two trips on stand by, just for fun. The first was a day trip from DFW to Minneapolis/St Paul to visit the Mall of America / Knotts Camp Snoopy. Why did 15 year olds want to do this? Go figure. It WAS the largest mall in the whole country, you know. Even had a roller coaster inside it. Looking back, the mall was pretty much like Grapevine Mills. Not too special. Our 2nd adventure was actually an over-nighter, which required my Dad to make a hotel room reservation for us, and vouch for our maturity, since we'd be under 18 and travelling without any adult supervision. We obviously didn't destroy the hotel room, but we did enjoy our trip from DFW to Cleveland to see the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. Cleveland was a nice town. I was captivated by the train ride from downtown to the airport. Very industrial, backside of town. Old red brick factory buildings. Gritty, and very cool, for a kid from Suburban City USA, Arlington. Those images still stick in my mind as (possibly) my first experience of a truly URBAN environment, with commuter rail to boot.

Our respective airplane trips were uneventful. For our Minneapolis jaunt, we dressed up (khaki pants, button-up shirt, and dress shoes), in case the only stand-by seats happened to be in first class. In fact we came very close to riding in Row 1 in the wide, luxurious leather seats of a Fokker 100. After everyone else boarded the plane, the gate agent put us on board - in first class. We were seated in Row 1, buckled in, about to push away from the gate, and suddenly this fancy old couple comes rushing down the jet way, storms onto the plane, and sees us teenage kids sitting in their seats. We were quickly sent down the aisle to Coach. It was so shameful to give up our seats, and have to go back behind the curtain with all the rest of the flying public. The other Coach-sitters looked at us like, "Uh-huh, not good enough. Not first class material." That initial 3 minutes, before we were booted back to Coach, is only time I've ever sat in first class. My closest encounter to being a high roller didn't last long.

Flying adventures are few and far between. I participated in a College Missions Trip to Peru, which is a fair jaunt from Austin to Lima, by way of DFW. A study abroad semester sent me to Europe, some 10 hours on an Airbus A340 from DFW to Frankfurt. Probably my finest flying experience. Of course it was long, I probably didn't sleep, but the Germans know how to run an airline. I was grateful our student travel agent booked us on Lufthansa. Another college student was seated next to me (not a classmate of mine), and he was enamored with the fact that the flight attendants would serve free alcohol throughout the flight. I can't recall how many Screwdrivers he drank during that flight. He probably doesn't remember either.

Nowadays my flying occurs for business, rather than pleasure. And only very rarely. In the past three years, I think I've taken three trips. In today's world of Homeland Security, flying is very demoralizing. Packing just the right size shampoo, waiting in the security line, getting your shoes and belt off fast enough so Joe Blow behind me doesn't start getting impatient. I try and look like I know what I am doing, like I fly all the time, but inevitably my fingers fumble with my shoelaces and I get stuck taking my shoes off for 45 seconds. As I am lamenting to myself that I need some slip ons, Joe Blow breezes past me with his roll-along bag and laptop case, looking at me thinking, "Amateur."

Indeed. An amateur. I know just enough about flying and airplanes to be a nerd about it. Not a professional, who by nature HAS to learn these things. No, I just keep looking stuff up, like reading useless NYT articles about getting bumped that will never come in handy. Maybe someday all this knowledge will pay off. Unlikely. At least if Ben or Sam someday become an airplane nerd, when I'm old and gray I can tell him, "You know son, in my day, it ONLY cost $18,000 to fly from New York to Aspen." Surely they would be impressed. And maybe Lucy will remember that an MD-80 is in fact a small plane. Probably not. But at least she'll know how to get to Ikea.

Fish Story

2011-03-26T14:33:00.007-05:00

I have enjoyed fried catfish ever since I was a little kid. My fondest, earliest fried catfish memories were at an East Texas all-you-can-eat fried fish emporium called Catfish Junction. As I recall, located halfway between Nacogdoches and Lufkin, in the sandy Angelina River bottom, it was a treat to have dinner there with my family and my parents' good friends from Nacogdoches, Ann and Joe Sweat. I think the Sweats must have enjoyed eating out - I recall numerous meals with them at Catfish Junction, The Red Barn (where I learned to eat chicken fried steak), Western Sizzlin, Casa Tomas or La Hacienda. Perhaps I learned to love to eat out way back then, when I was just a kid. One thing Mr. Joe did not like was Chinese Food, so we never had Chinese, though I'm not sure you could even find a Chinese restaurant in the Piney Woods of East Texas, or if you did find one, not sure you'd want to eat there. Mr. Joe's aversion to Chinese may have also influcenced my early cuisine preferences, as I don't recall eating Chinese myself until I was at least sixteen years old, at Arlington's venerable (and probably rat-infested) Panda House. Of course after I tried it, I immediately liked it, and continue to.

But back to the catfish. Catfish Junction was probably also one of the first all-you-can-eat restaurants I was exposed to. Certainly a ten or twelve year old kid and put away a lot of fried catfish, if given the opportunity. I can recall the atmosphere of the place - the picnic-style tables, the orangey wood wall paneling, and of course the buffet line, with which I was intimately familiar. Piping hot catfish, encrusted with a crispy, fried layer of cornmeal is hard to beat. Especially in deep East Texas, where I think the catfish was invented.

After we vacated Nacogdoches, and moved to the Metroplex, my fried catfish cravings largely went unmet. I just never found it. For some reason, even to this day, I never made it over to Catfish Sam's on Division Street, which may be A-town's most well known fried fish spot. By the time I was venturing out on my own with my friends, it was usually to the likes of Jim's Hamburgers, Khaki's, Campo Verde, the buffet at Tia-pan or China Cafe, or the suburban banality of Chili's.

I pretty much was on a fried catfish hiatus until I found a reliable spot on the east side of Austin, Hoover's. Hoover's was a great place for comfort food, and plenty of it, though I think some of the shine has been tarnished in recent years. Last time I was there, back in 2007, I decided I didn't need to come back.

After my post-collegiate return to Metroplex, soon enough a new Fort Worth friend introduced Stephanie and I to Zeke's, which was an excellent (likely rat-infested) catfish emporium, though about 180 degrees away from a place like Catfish Junction. There was not a buffet, the wall paneling ran diagonal and was painted kelly green, and on the weekends live music could be heard in the biergarten. Sadly, Stephanie and I were eventually turned off by the Owner's brusque manner with customers and employees alike, and we just stopped going. I still sometimes miss old Zeke's, but I've moved on.

So in the span of at least fifteen years, I had been through 3 generations of fried catfish haunts (East Texas River Bottom Buffet, East Austin Soul and Comfort Food, and West Fort Worth Vintage Dive). What would be Generation Four? At least for now, Stephanie and I have found possibly the best of all worlds - The Flying Fish, just down the street from our house. The kids love it, the fried fish is certainly above average (even has all-you-can-eat on Wednesday nights), and there are numerous non-fried options, which Stephanie gladly partakes in. And the Flying Fish even has a distinct feel about it, different from my prior 3 haunts. I might describe it as leaning toward the Cajun River Bottom feel, but spruced up, bright white, clean, and friendly. I do love their motto: "We catch and release - into real hot grease."

(Sidebar: If you clicked through to the link above about the "catfish shortage," you may (or may not) be surprised to learn that the catfish we eat are likely grain-fed at a catfish farm. Pretty much like the way cattle are raised in a CAFO, made infamous by Eric Schlosser and Michael Pollan. Stephanie was scandalized when she learned that catfish were grain fed in a big catfish farm. I guess I always just took this for granted. How else can you produce enough catfish for every hungry boy in America at a buffet line? I told her, look, if you can find a place that serves grass-fed catfish, we'll eat there. What's the other option, a CAFO that utilizes only stink bait to fatten up the fish before shipping them off to be skinned, gutted, fileted, and ultimately meet their final buttermilk bath and cornmeal doom in a deep fat fryer?)

Admittedly, parking at the Flying Fish can be a chore, as apparently every business owner in a three block radius is opposed to the Fish, and staunchly prohibits any Fish parking on their property, though they do allow you to visit Fort Worth's well known BBQ saloon, the Railhead, across the street. My own contention is that the Railhead, well connected as it is, with a State Congressman for an owner, has lobbied for his Republican bosom buddies nearby to thwart the Flying Fish's success.

At any rate, if you can keep from getting stressed out from finding a parking spot, you're in for a pleasant evening at the Fish. Still, and while it could just be childhood nostalgia, I look back and wonder about Catfish Junction. Would I enjoy it as much today, as I did twenty years ago? I think the place is gone now - replaced by who knows what. I haven't been back to East Texas in who knows how long. It's possible someday Ben may recall feasting on fried catfish at the Flying Fish, and perhaps someday soon he may be able to take advantage of the all-you-can-eat Wednesdays. He can already eat an entire 1/2 lb cheeseburger from Kincaid's himself, so he's well on his way.

Speaking of Ben eating.... Earlier this week, when Ben was scarfing his spaghetti dinner at our table at home, we were reading through the book of Jonah for family worship. Ben was captivated by the Bible's illustration of an artist's conception of Jonah being thrown overboard during the fierce storm, a huge menacing fish awaiting below, his expansive jaws splayed open to receive the reluctant prophet in one giant gulp.

Ben exclaims, "Oh, no, what's happening...gibberish... in the water?" (Ben still tends to insert unintelligable strings of words in the middle of his otherwise normal sentences.) I told Ben that it may not have happened exactly like the illustration was indicating. I don't know that the big fish (or whale) was right there immediately, mouth gaping, ready to swallow Jonah as soon as he was tossed over the gunwale of the ship. I rather imagine there was more of a delay from the time Jonah was thrown to sea and swallowed by the fish. As I read it, the fish that God appointed to swallow Jonah was not (entirely) Jonah's punishment, but rather (mostly) his salvation.

Sure, it was unlikely a pleasant experience to be 3 days in the belly of a fish, but what was the alternative? I think the alternative was Jonah's death by drowning. I imagine some interval of time with Jonah either struggling to remain afloat, or possibly already sinking down into the deep, before God causes the fish to swallow Jonah. The fish was really a means of grace for Jonah - a second chance. Indeed God called Jonah a second time to be obedient to His word, after the fish vomited him up onto the beach. And obey he did, though ultimately Jonah would still not learn his lesson, even after God's message had its intended effect on the hearts of the Ninevites. The wicked people repented in sackcloth and ashes, while Jonah retreats to a hilltop to pout. He would in fact rather have died than to see the city of Nineveh saved.

It is a remarkable contrast that the story of Jonah gives us: God's loving, compassionate grace given to those who least deserve it, whether one of God's own chosen prophets, or the vilest of sinners in Nineveh. I attempted to explain to Lucy and Ben that the story of Jonah was not primarily about a wayward man or a big fish, but was really about God's big grace. But at this point Sam was getting fussy, Lucy was daydreaming and about to fall out of her chair, and Ben was still stuffing his face, oblivious to my paternal exposition. So we prayed, and finished with a hymn, like we always do.

So it would seem that while their appetite for food in general, and fried catfish in particular, is strong, I still need to work on their appetite for the Word. While the Flying Fish's walls full of photographs of folks with their big catch, or the walls dedicated to dozens of "Big Mouth Billy Bass" plaques are intriguing, the challenge is to help the kids see that being sustained by a Fish Story like Jonah's is much more satisfying than even deliciously greasy fried catfish. When I was a kid I didn't understand this. I have only recently begun to understand this now. If Stephanie and I do our jobs right, we'll show Lucy, Ben, and Sam that as good as fried catfish might taste, the taste is only temporary, and even our favorite fish places may not last. Someday the Flying Fish may be gone. Charlie Geren may have his way, and have them run out of town on a BBQ rail. Even if that occurs, we'll still have Jonah's Fish Story, as well as many others, to keep us filled up and satisfied.

Cell Phone Sell Off?

2011-03-21T21:19:00.004-05:00

Several months ago I had iPhone fever. I went to the Apple Store in UPV (first time ever in an Apple Store) and looked at an iPhone in earnest. I played around with it, then played with an iPad, then I left, a bit dejected.

Ultimately the fever passed, or more accurately the fever was cured by the combination of the following factors:

1) We'd have to switch from T-Mobile to AT&T.

2) We'd have to get a data plan.

3) Naturally Stephanie would also get an iPhone, too. I wasn't about to upgrade to a cool new phone myself, and leave her in the technological bone yard.

4) So we'd have to get an even more expensive family data plan.

All of this added up to a considerable amount of hassle and money, so I moved on with my life, and decided we were better off in the technological bone yard, holding onto our "stupid phones" (as opposed to "smart phones). In fact I made the decision to make my phone even stupider at about the same time.

It was last summer when I had my most recent cell phone mishap. I may have already blogged about the fate of all my cell phones, but most recently a phone ended up in a swimming pool, and therefore useless. So I had to replace my phone, thus my opportunity to visit the Apple Store and consider my options.

But as I said, I opted for an even more stupid phone than the one that drowned in the pool. It was almost the cheapest phone in the T-mobile store, and in fact the sales clerk advised me AGAINST buying it, because it was, in fact, so stupid. Now that I have lived with this phone for quite a while, I can see where the clerk was coming from. The phone really is stupid. The camera feature is a joke (practically useless), and I can't even receive photos from Stephanie. Every time she would attempt to send me a photo message, on my end the phone would error and freak out. So she stopped trying, and I no longer get photo message attempts.

I just now learned how to adjust the incoming text message alert, mainly due to the poor design of the menu commands. I had never owned a Nokia phone until now, and I certainly wasn't missing out on anything.

All that said, when I bought this stupid phone, I deliberately chose not to renew my T-Mobile contract. If I had renewed, the phone would have been free. Still, I wanted to keep my options open, in the event that the sweet, sweet iPhone would make its way to the T-Mobile world, like manna miraculously appearing from Heaven. As time passed, I grew accustomed to the stupid phone and learned to dumb down my interface with it, so that we could get along nicely. Just as we were hitting our stride, reaching new levels of companionship (like finally learning to adjust the incoming message alert), I am knocked off my feet by news that Deutsche Telekom is selling off T-Mobile USA to AT&T.

So it would appear, most ironically, that if I just wait a while, assuming the deal goes through, the iPhone will become available to me, since I'll become an AT&T customer in the merger. But of course there will still be the higher rate plans and poor customer service that I am always hearing about. Not sure that I want to go down that road.

Truth be told, my first cell phone provider was actually AT&T, back in college, circa 1999/2000. I don't recall exactly when I got my first cell phone. It was a hand-me-down from my Dad, who I suppose was getting another phone at the time. AT&T was the provider, and I remained with them (happily) until early 2002 when I switched to Voicestream, which soon enough became T-Mobile. So I guess I've been with T-Mobile ever since.

I always tell people about the stellar customer service that T-Mobile provides. It is frankly always a pleasant experience to call 611 and get assistance from the T-Mobile folks. And apparently T-Mobile's pricing is very competitive. I was honestly unaware of this until I started reading the articles about this pending merger. Since I haven't switched carriers in ten years, I haven't bothered shopping around to see what the competition offers. Until tonight. Here's what I found. Please don't be offended that I am sharing some financial information. It's just a cell phone bill.

With T-Mobile, each month (before taxes and fees, which are considerable), we may $115 for a family plan (2 lines with unlimited talk time and unlimited text messages). Period.

From what I can tell from their websites, the equivalent plan at Verizon would cost $150, and AT&T would cost $170! Looks like T-Mobile is competitive indeed. Admittedly we have a "Loyalty" plan, which I guess gives us a break since we've been a customer for many, many years. Naturally hopping over to another carrier, I could not expect to be treated the same. Nor could I be expected to be treated the same if we were absorbed by another carrier, however benevolent they may claim to be. Maybe I need to re-up for 2 years to lock in my $115 cheap plan before the merger goes through.

Or, the alternative is to come to grips with a larger line item in the budget each month for cell phone service, and wade into the waters of the smart phone sea, leaving the stupid phones back in the primordial cell phone soup. I think this is unlikely. I waste enough time on a computer that is tethered to a desk in our house, or at my office. I can only imagine the time-wasting that would occur if I essentially carried a little computer in my pocket everywhere I went.

Which reminds me, I think the VERY first time I saw an iPhone a couple of years ago, a colleague at the office was showing it off. And what did he show me? Some important "app" or useful feature? Nope, ironically he showed me an "app" that made the screen of his iPhone look like a full glass of beer, and when he tilted the phone back and forth, the beer sloshed back and forth rhythmically. What a miracle of technology! If only Copernicus or Kepler or Newton had conceived of such things. I can only imagine if Edison or Einstein had stumbled on this beer-sloshing "app", how the world might be different today. What a joke. Is this what "smart" phones are really good for? If so, I'm probably better off with my stupid phone. Or, more likely with AT&T, the same stupid phone but a more costly bill. Ironic indeed.

Snyder v. Phelps

2011-03-02T22:03:00.004-06:00

I heard about this on NPR today, that the highest court in the land ruled in favor of the bad behavior of the extreme Westboro Baptist "Church". Or more appropriately, the court ruled in favor of free speech, rather than in favor of this misguided group that calls itself a "church."

Two things struck me about this case. First of all, the petitioner in the case alleged "intentional infliction of emotional distress," which was the first I had heard of this phrase. Indeed it must have been emotionally distressing to learn that a group of people were being extremely disrespectful (even hateful) at your son's funeral. Granted. But it seems to me that the phrase "intentional infliction of emotional distress" is really legal jargon for something we know far more commonly as "hurting some one's feelings." This is an everyday occurrence, from the school yard to the home to the office, peoples' feelings are hurt all the time. No doubt my feelings would be very hurt if someone was defaming by son's name or memory, though I don't think I would have sought legal action against someone for hurting my feelings in this manner. Truly the actions taken by the members of the Westboro group (I won't call it a church) were bad manners at best, and disgusting at worst, but I fail to see how it make any sense to seek legal recourse (and in fact punitive damages in the millions of dollars) for hurt feelings.

Secondly, this case made me consider that the ruling may in fact have an ironically positive impact on the American Church. Not because it will embolden other groups to go around spreading bad theology (I hope not), but because the Supreme Court held that free speech is in fact just that, free speech, regardless of what the message is. Many people were scandalized at the things the Westboro group said because the things they said were terribly offensive. But just because someone says something terribly offensive doesn't make it illegal, according to our Supreme Court. Even terribly offensive speech is apparently protected by the U.S. Constitution's free speech clause of the First Amendment.

But what does this mean for the Church in America today? I honestly believe it is a boon for the church, and in fact may someday prove to be a landmark case. Many in the Church have held that the direction our nation is drifting will someday lead us to the sort of environment where believers in Christ are no longer able to freely preach, teach, and share what the Bible clearly says about God and man. The Bible clearly says (among many other things) that all men are hopelessly lost, steeped in sin, and in desperate need of salvation. The Bible also clearly says that there is in fact only one remedy for man's problem, and that is the shed blood of Jesus Christ on a Roman Cross two thousand years ago. The Gospel is plain that we have no hope for salvation apart from Christ's substitutionary atonement for our sins.

However, these Gospel claims offend people, and in some of the same ways that the Westboro group's statements offends people. No one wants to hear it preached that they are a sinner deserving of hell. No one wants to hear it preached that men are hopelessly wicked, with only ONE remedy to be made right with God. These are hard truths, and Jesus was in fact clear that just as much as people hated Him, people would hate His followers also.

To me, the American Church's ability to freely preach Christ crucified was given more legitimacy (in legal terms) by Snyder v. Phelps. Those that see a day coming when the police will storm the church house door (or our own home's front door) and force the preacher or teacher to recant or be arrested should take heart in this Supreme Court ruling. The fact that other nations have suppressed the free proclamation of the Gospel is clear. Many other governments around the world have seen to it that it is not legal to teach the Bible or publicly profess Christianity. Believers in Christ around the world are hauled to prison or worse. Some can imagine that happening here in the U.S. also. While I cannot of course rule it out, I am truly encouraged that our highest court has upheld the fact that free speech is truly free, even if the message is offensive to some who hear it.

Cheaters Never Win?

2011-02-27T14:47:00.003-06:00

Just now I finished playing Lucy at the game of Candy Land. Stephanie found this classic little kid board game at Goodwill for $1.00 recently, and Lucy loves to play it. Now she has apparently played the game frequently enough to find a way to cheat.

I had promised Lucy I would play Candy Land with her after Ben and Sam were down for naps, since these two boys do not allow for successful board game playing. So while I was putting Ben down in his room to go to sleep, Lucy was pulling out the game and setting it up, getting ready for when I returned to her room.

When I returned, she was fiddling with the playing cards. (In case you haven't played Candy Land in a while, for each player's turn, you draw the top card from the stack, and depending on which color is shown on the card, you move your little plastic person accordingly, to the next square on the board of that color.) Very simple, and as a result very possible to cheat if you are so inclined, and have the opportunity to "stack the deck."

This is what I found Lucy doing when I got back. I asked her if I could help stack up all the cards, since she had them spread all over the place, and she got very defensive. "I don't need any help," and so forth.

I pressed the issue, since I wanted to get started (and done with), and she eventually told me, while she was still trying to get the cards the way she wanted them, "But I want the orange card on top." Now the board itself had not even been unfolded and put on the floor yet, but was still in the box. I didn't exactly know why she would want the orange card on top (which I suppose she assumed she would draw this card if she went first), but regardless of her reasoning, I told her what she wanted to do would be considered cheating, by attempting to put the cards in a particular order. The stack was supposed to be randoml, I explained, so you would not know which color card you were about to draw for your turn. She relented, I mixed up the cards, and set the stack down.

Then I pulled out the board and laid it flat in between us on the floor, and quickly realized what she had been up to. At the first orange square on the playing board, just a few squares from the starting place for the game, there is a shortcut that sends a player much farther down the road. It allows you to skip dozens of squares, and puts you way out in front. Apparently Lucy had determined that if she was able to draw an orange card first, this would catapult her ahead in the game, far ahead of her opponents.

Turns out, on her second turn, she drew orange, and was able to still take the shortcut, go far ahead of where I was on the board, and about 5 - 7 minutes later she handily beat me to the finish. I had not yet even made it to the place where her coveted short cut ended. So while I thought I was able to thwart her attempt at cheating, the girl still won.

I'll have to keep a close watch on her from now on, when we play games. Obviously childish board games are not just child's play for Lucy. She may next find a way to rig the game of Chutes and Ladders, or Memory.

Of Rangers and The Reformation

2011-02-22T21:45:00.001-06:00

READ THIS FIRST: I wrote this post way back in October, and apparently didn't ever actually post it. I had forgotten about it, but then ran across it tonight in my "drafts." It surely is not my best post ever, though I do like the title quite a lot. And I think it may offend some people who enjoy celebrating Halloween, but so be it. I'll go ahead and hit the button and post it. I don't have anything exciting to blog about tonight otherwise.

While it may appear that this World Series may be slipping away from our Texas Rangers, I began thinking about my relationship to my hometown team. Indeed, I can truly say the Rangers are truly my hometown team, spending 12 years of my life in Arlington, where the Rangers have played since the ball club was created in 1972. Now that I've been in Fort Worth for 7 years, the Rangers are still close enough to qualify as my hometown team, certainly much closer than any other Major League club.

I think my first memory of a Rangers game was sitting in the center field bleachers at the no longer extant Arlington Stadium. I believe my family must have attended at least a few games not long after we relocated to A-town from East Texas. Soon enough the little, old stadium was replaced with the new, yet ill-conceived made-to-look-old Ballpark. Plenty of memories of attending games there, in several different ways: sometimes with family (or mostly with Dad at least), sometimes with my friends in high school, a couple of years returning from Austin on July 4th to see the game and fireworks, followed by a long, late night drive back to Austin after the game. And one year right after moving back to Fort Worth, Stephanie, Erin, and I took my Dad to a game for perhaps his 50th birthday - at least I think it was in the summer of 2003, when he would have turned half a century old.

But I think most of the memories I have of the Rangers were from the 1996 or 1997 seasons, laying on our living room floor watching the night games on TV. Either a sophomore or junior in high school at the time, I would finish my homework, make a bowl of microwave popcorn, then plop down on the floor and watch the game. I would watch until I would start dozing off, and then eventually trudge upstairs to go to bed. The names I recall were the likes of Rusty Greer, Pudge Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, Dean Palmer, and Mickey Tettleton. Of course I have never been the guy that memorized all the statistics. Friends of mine would talk baseball (or football) all the time, and know so very many individual players and their performance on the field. I never did quite understand how this was accomplished. Even if I watched SportsCenter every free moment I had, and read Sports Illustrated every time I was on the toilet, I don't think I could have committed so many useless facts to memory. Or perhaps I just choose to learn other useless facts, that were not sports related.

Now, in 2010, it has been years since I have been to the Ballpark to watch a game, and even longer since I have seen one on TV. This year, of course, has been a special year for the Rangers, and the last few weeks even I could not keep myself from being excited for my hometown team. Our very own Texas Rangers, the baseball equivalent of composer Antonio Salieri (please comment if you can draw the analogy here), have found their way to the World Series! Unbelievable. Just maybe something like this will happen again before I am gone from this world. But I won't expect too much. You really can't, being a seasoned Rangers fan. The continual disappointment would be crushing.

But of course, the Rangers playing in Game 4 of the World Series tonight is not the only momentous thing about October 31, 2010. Far more momentous, in fact, is that four-hundred and ninety three years ago, a young Roman Catholic priest and professor of theology, did something that at the time, October 31, 1517, did not seem momentous at all. Just nailing some points of debate to the Wittenburg Church door. Nothing out of the ordinary. This was commonly done. But the outcome of Martin Luther's actions that day were perhaps far more unbelievable than even the Texas Rangers playing in the World Series. Undoubtedly the Protestant Reformation was one of the truly seminal events in all of human history.

So much so that even tonight, October 31, 2010, our family celebrated this event, the Reformation, rather than celebrate Halloween. Rather than go round in funny costumes begging for candy from the neighbors, or even attend a now-common "Fall Festival," where kids go round in funny costumes to get candy at church, rather than from the neighbors, we simply enjoyed some grown men in funny costumes (dressed up as Luther, John Calvin, and William Tyndale) tell us a bit more about why we are, in fact, Protestants at all, rather than adherents to the prevailing "Christian" world religion, Roman Catholicism.

What exactly are the Protestants protesting anyway? Exactly what Luther, Calvin, Tyndale, Knox, Zwingli, and others protested nearly five hundred years ago: the Roman Catholic Church's false view of the Gospel. What we evangelical Protestant believers take for granted today, was deadly serious back in the sixteenth century, and cost many Reformers their lives. Luther and his associates' contention that salvation was as Scripture teaches by grace alone, through faith alone, was monumental. Our Protestant churches today, of many denominations and creeds, owe their existence, of course, to God first and foremost, but certainly God used men like Luther and others to bring His Church back into line with sound Biblical doctrine and practice.

Having an opportunity to celebrate what God has done for his Church seemed a far better option than celebrating ghoulish behavior, fearmongering, and death, which is what Halloween is about, at bottom. (Sidebar: why anyone would want to decorate their yard with a mock cemetery, complete with skeletons, tombstones, and cobwebs is beyond me.) Seeing Halloween decorations around town lately has been unnerving. I just don't get it. Why celebrate death and ghosts and ultimately the occult? Isn't that why Halloween exists? Sure, there may be little harm in small kids dressed as animals and princesses loading up on candy, but really, what is this holiday really about? We know that Christmas is not really about a jolly old fat man. Easter is not really about a rabbit that dispenses candy eggs and brightly-colored marshmallows. Is Halloween really just about dressing up in funny costumes and begging for candy from the neighbors? Perhaps it can be for some people. But frankly I just don't see it.

So when Lucy asks me, "Why don't we celebrate Halloween?" (and she does ask me), I answer simply and truthfully, "We celebrate Reformation Day instead." So far she is satisfied with that answer. Perhaps in a year or two she may begin to see she is "missing out" on a bunch of sweets, but at least she won't be missing out on an amazing picture of God's grace: using regular, sinful men like Luther and Calvin to accomplish great things for God. Proving that God's Word cannot long be perverted and misused. He will correct error sooner or later. Some faithful soul will be called upon to courageously stand up for the truth of the Bible. Perhaps someday Lucy, Ben, or Sam may be called upon to stand up for Truth, and not back down. I pray they may be as steadfast as Luther was. A healthy dose of the Reformers may just help them be resolved to answer the call. An overloaded bag of candy and a cat costume will not.

Anatomy of a Saturday

2011-01-29T22:01:00.003-06:00

5:45:00 am - alarm goes off

5:45:10 am - alarm turned off, back in bed

5:48 - 6:25 am - dozing in and out, checking time on clock repeatedly

6:30 am - get out of bed

6:31 - 6:45 am - get dressed, brush teeth, kiss wife goodbye

6:46 am - 6:52 am - drive to Calvary Bible Church

6:55 am - say "hello" to men gathering for ISI and get coffee

7:00 - 9:10 am - ISI Men's Bible Study

9:10 - 9:17 am - drive home

9:18 - 9:55 am - play with kids and help wife finish getting things ready for our outing to the Zoo

9:55 am - load kids into van

10:00 am - depart for Zoo

10:15 am - unload at Zoo, wait for wife to get photo taken for new Membership card

10:20 am - pass through the gates into the Park

10:22 am - primates, rhinoceros, bongo

10:40 am - meerkats

10:44 am - elephants, giraffes

10:46 am - photo op at the bronze baby elephant sculpture "Bonnie"

10:52 am - hippopotami

11:00 am - white tigers

11:05 am - orange tigers

11:15 am - lions, zebras, gerenuks

11:18 am - sun bears

11:19 am - break out the raisins for the kids to tide them over for lunch

11:20 am - photo op at the bronze kangaroo sculpture

11:21 am - great barrier reef, kangaroos, wallabies

11:22 am - Ben spills raisins on floor of barrier reef exhibit, and picks them up off floor to continue to eat them

11:28 am - penguins

11:30 am - an old friend from high school (4 years my junior) appears out of nowhere and says "Hi, Nathan." I completely blank on his name, frantically searching my brain, and almost call him his younger brother's name, but stop myself. It is obvious to him that I cannot recall who he is, so he very quickly tells me his name about 2 seconds before I would have found it in my memory banks. I remain ashamed the rest of the day.

11:33 pm - preempt a photo op with a bronze statue of a turkey - not exactly photo worthy, despite Lucy's entreaties to the contrary

11:35 am - picnic lunch: PBJ's for the kids, along with bananas, oranges, blueberries, carrot and celery sticks with hummus, chicken salad with saltine crackers, and homemade chewy granola bars for dessert. Water to drink. Delicious!

11:45 am - hear the bells chime at the nearby St. Stephen's Presbyterian Church

12:00 pm - the church bells chime the hour, picnic begins to conclude

12:06 pm - gather everything up and head for the front gate, by way of the Herp

12:08 pm - horse

12:12 pm - saltwater crocodile

12:15 pm - gharials, very up close and personal

12:20 - 12:45 pm - all manner of reptiles and amphibians

12:50 pm - try and get Ben off the bronze Komodo Dragon sculpture, repeatedly

12:54 pm - make for the exit

12:58 pm - pick a flower for Lucy on our way out

1:04 pm - loaded in the van

1:05 - 1:20 pm - travel home

1:20 - 1:30 pm - unload and get started with nap preparation

1:40 pm - put Ben and Sam down for naps

1:45 pm - read a story for Lucy, start her "quiet time"

2:00 pm - take a nap. Stephanie gets her haircut at a 3:15 appointment

4:00 pm - wake up, greet Lucy coming out of the hallway

4:02 pm - get the mail, let Lucy play with junk mail

4:05 pm - put on a DVD for Lucy "Awesome Kids of the Bible"

4:08 pm - Ben and Sam are up. Put Ben next to Lucy to watch the show.

4:09 - 4:40 pm - entertain Sam

4:40 pm - Stephanie calls on her way home

4:44 pm - Stephanie gets home, shows off fancy new hairdo

4:45 pm - "Awesome Kids..." is over. Put Lucy and Ben outside to play.

4:50 pm - get a hankering for fried fish for dinner. Look at Flying Fish menu online, take coupon down from bulletin board and put in pocket.

4:51 pm - join Stephanie and kids outside

4:49 pm - Stephanie sees the Flying Fish menu on the screen and I am busted

4:50 pm - decision is made we should try and get there early before the Stock Show crowd floods the place

4:55 - 5:20 pm - get kids ready and cleaned up, diapers changed, etc..

5:25 pm - load up and head out the door

5:35 pm - arrive at Flying Fish

5:40 pm - find parking place after 3 tries circling the lot

5:42 pm - get in line to order food

5:48 - 5:52 pm - place order, find table, get high chair, get drinks, get sauces, coloring sheets and crayons

6:05 pm - order is ready. Lucy says the buzzer "tickles" her hands.

6:07 - 6:30 pm - enjoy very greasy food.

6:31 pm - load up and head out for one more stop before going home

6:37 pm - find parking spot in West 7th Garage

6:39 pm - stop at look inside storefront at LA Fitness to kids can see the lap pool. They love to see the pool, which is about as close as they ever get to a swimming pool these days.

6:40 - 6:56 pm - get ice cream at Sweet Sammies. Ben gets too excited to enjoy his ice cream and instead prefers to jump around on the floor exclaiming "tap, tap, tap." Maybe he was tap dancing, not sure.

6:57 pm - get coffee to go

6:59 pm - make for the Garage

7:01 pm - one more look at the LA Fitness pool

7:04 - 7:15 pm - make for home

7:16 - 7:25 pm - get everything inside and somewhat organized

7:26 pm - check weather online for Sunday

7:27 - 7:33 pm - set aside kids' outfits for church. Get diaper bags ready and near front door.

7:34 - 8:05 pm - play with kids, say goodnight to Samuel

8:06 - 8:25 pm - get Ben and Lucy dressed for bed; read 2 books

8:26 pm - put Ben to bed very quietly while Sam remains asleep

8:28 pm - Lucy reminds me we forgot to take medicine and brush her teeth. Get her toothbrush and medicine.

8:34 pm - Finish helping Lucy brush her teeth

8:36 pm - Sing a goodnight song to Lucy, which she asked to "sing one we have not sung in a long time." I first suggest "Shine Jesus Shine," and she asks for another suggestion, to which I respond, "The Solid Rock." This she accepts. I sing 2 verses.

8:45 pm - Ask Lucy who she would like to pray for. Lucy says "her friend Lucy." I pray for Lucy's friend Lucy (yes, she really does have a friend named Lucy). Tell her goodnight, hugs and kisses.

8:48 pm - Turn out her lamp, close her door

8:50 - 9;30 pm - Come to my room and pull out my Bible, since I shamefully slept in earlier this morning. Spend time reading John chapter 10 for the last time this week. Consult Leon Morris for verses 35-36, which are challenging. Starting tomorrow will be John 11.

9:31 pm - realize my prayers are being hindered because I am dozing off

9:32 pm - pull out pajamas and fresh underclothes

9:34 pm - take shower

9:44 pm - shave (I have begun showering and shaving on Saturday nights because it is always a mad rush out the door on Sunday to make the 8:00 am Service. )

9:50 pm - take allergy meds

9:53 pm - take over the computer while Stephanie takes her shower, again for reasons noted above. But even though the kids' Sunday clothes are already picked out and set aside, Stephanie and I both know what we're wearing, and we've both showered the night before, I know we'll still be hard-pressed to get out the door by 7:45 am, which is always the goal. Usually more like 7:48 or 7:50 am.

10:10 - 10:55 pm - blog

10:55 pm - post and turn off computer

10:56 pm - have a conversation with Stephanie, which hasn't happened yet today, other than possibly at our picnic lunch or dinner

11:25 pm - go to bed

Growing Old in a New Year

2011-01-13T21:20:00.000-06:00

(Sidebar: I began this Post on December 31st, but it has taken me until now to finish it. It was intended to be posted at exactly 12:01 AM on January 1, 2011, but instead it will be posted sometime around 9 pm on January 13, 2011. Doesn't seem quite as exciting to not coincide with the New Year, but at this point I'm just glad to get this over with.)

I have wrinkles.

In my forehead.

That appear to be permanent.

Perhaps it is from furrowing my brow too often. Stephanie said she had not noticed these wrinkles before, but when I pointed them out, she laughed out loud. So I am now showing further visible signs of aging (aside from my hair loss). No way around it, I guess.

In our Dining Room we have a "photo wall," which is a wonderful thing that Stephanie created. You can see a portion of it here. I looked at each adult male on our photo wall, and none appeared to have similar forehead wrinkles except for.... my Dad. Like I said, looks like there is no way around it, and I'm sure they are here to stay.

I think growing up I always considered that 60 years old was certainly OLD. Now, I am on the downhill slide to 60, having reached 31 last month. I have found other signs of aging, also. Forgive me if this is being too free with information about myself, but I have found that most nights I can't make it through the night without having to get up and go the bathroom. Isn't that an old man thing?

Ben tends to get out of his bed fairly frequently at night, though we're not exactly sure why. My own thought is that he simply doesn't know how (or chooses not to) to pull his blankets back over the top of himself. So he stumbles into our room once or twice or three times a night, and he will either attempt to get into bed with us (which we don't allow at his age), or sometimes he just sticks his arms up in the air, wanting us to pick him up, carry him to his room, and put him back in his own bed.

So Stephanie (or I) dutifully pick him up and tuck him back in, putting his blankets back where they should be. But to be honest, at least one of those times I'm glad to get up, because I have to go the bathroom anyway. So I put Ben back in bed, then stop by the potty, then come back to bed myself. Another sign of aging.

I have probably mentioned somewhere along the way that I don't enjoy the current musical or fashion trends, nor do I partake of much technology willingly. Some might say I dress like an old man, and they may be right. In fact I DO like to hike my pants up around my waist where they belong, rather than let them ride down on my hips. But being that my waist is not very shapely, or possibly that I need a new belt, the pants will inevitably fall back down to a stylish level on my hips, until I yank them back up again, often times exposing more of my socks than Stephanie would like. "Your pants are too short," she laments. "No Stephanie, I just wear them up on my waist where a grown man is supposed to." Or at least that's my stance on the matter.

As my very first blog post pointed out, I became a coffee drinker when Lucy was born. That was then. I would just drink one or two cups in the morning. But now, I have a couple cups in the afternoon, too. That is "very Grandpa," as my colleagues at work are quick to point out. Indeed when I was first out of college, working at my first job in Fort Worth, senior men at the firm would brew a pot of coffee at 3 or 4 in the afternoon. I would wonder, "Who in the world wants to drink coffee at this time of the day?" Well, me, apparently. I have become very Grandpa.

But enough of the Old. What is New this coming year, 2011?

Well several things jump to mind, but foremost among them is a new baby that will be making an appearance sometime early June. That will be very new. Or will it? This will be our 4th baby in five years. Even having kids is seeming old at this point. As a friend pointed out last night, it's just a yearly thing for the Carruth's. Indeed, four kids in five years is almost yearly, but not quite. So a new kid. That's new. But what else?

Also last night I was discussing New Year's Resolutions with another friend of mine. I felt like a slacker after we talked, since I had resolved to do 2 things in 2011, and had already welched on one of them. He had made six resolutions, and each of his were loftier than my own. But ultimately as Stephanie and I talked about this coming year (back in December), we determined that 2011 would be the year of Discipline. Not that we would do a better job in disciplining our children, though we certainly should do a better job. But really that we would discipline ourselves. As Paul wrote to Timothy, "Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness." (1 Tim 4:7). I think is it critical to realize that the discipline is not the end in itself. It is really a means to an end, which is to be godly. Not that we would become omniscient or sovereign or immutable, but that we would take on more of His communicable attributes, of love, mercy, faithfulness, patience, and the like.

Indeed the first non-Biblical book I'm reading in 2011 is the old classic, A.W. Pink's The Attributes of God. It is a small book on a very big subject. I recommend it. Stephanie has already finished her first book for 2011, Russell Moore's Adopted for Life, which will be my 2nd book of 2011.

But back to being disciplined. Stephanie and I have found that when we choose to discipline ourselves and set priorities for the most important things, things like Bible Study, prayer, worship as a family and collectively with our church body, and loving and training our children, we have found that other "less important" parts of our lives run much more smoothly. My 2 resolutions were these:

1) Study God's Word everyday in 2011, and pray through what I am studying. Don't miss a day. Not one. So far so good, by God's grace.

and

2) (which I have already broken) Don't take a nap in 2011. I had lofty goals back in December that I would use what would otherwise have been nap time to accomplish important things, whether it was reading, or spending time with Stephanie or the kids, or just something. Anything but just sleeping during the day. But I already blew it on January 9th. A cold Sunday afternoon found me in bed, snoozing away, while Stephanie took Lucy to Awana. All 3 of her boys were out like a light.

So I have failed in my desire to be disciplined to sleep only at night in 2011. I thought that maybe I would change my resolution to

2) Only take one nap per week in 2011.

But really, that's all I really ever did anyway in 2010. Chances are, either Saturday or Sunday afternoon I would take a nap. So that wouldn't be anything different, if I only limited it to a weekly nap. So I'm not sure what to do with Resolution #2.

I considered making Resolution #2 a reading goal. Stephanie and I talked about making a reading plan for 2011, to plan out the books we would read this year. I don't think I have the desire to plan out each and every book I will read, but it is worthwhile to plan ahead. I think it could be reasonable to read 12 books this year - one per month. As I said, I am working on book number one, and I know what two will be, and in fact three will be Stephanie's book number two, which is Parenting in the Pew by Robbie Castleman. And I think Stephanie said she was going to re-read Ted Tripp's Shepherding a Child's Heart for her book number three, which maybe will become my book number four. That way we can discuss these books together. At that point I'll have to get her turned onto my Puritan Paperbacks I got for Christmas, which I look forward to, though she may not.

Regardless of what books I read, all in all I have reason to believe that 2011 will be a good year. 2010 certainly was. 2011 will have some surprises in store, certainly. When 2012 rolls around, I will undoubtedly look back and marvel at what took place in the preceeding year. And I will also certainly be able to count a few more wrinkles in the forehead. No way around it.

Recent Travels

2010-12-15T21:57:00.001-06:00

Last week I was able to travel to New York City, and earlier this week I spent a day in Austin, both for business reasons, although one cannot but also find pleasure in these two great cities. Aside from dusty old Fort Worth, Austin and NYC must be my other two favorite American cities. Admittedly I have only spent a collective six nights in NYC (spread across two separate trips), compared to a five year long stint in Austin. But even after my first trip to the City in 2008, regardless of my initial feelings, I shortly thereafter became fascinated with this Concrete Jungle.

Still, I know I probably sound like a slack-jawed yokel who really doesn't know anything about the City, other than what I have seen, which has been mostly limited to only a few neighborhoods in Manhattan, aside from the car ride from LaGuardia. That said, from what I have seen, it is just an amazing place. The streetscape, the feel of city, the urbanity, is what gets me. Sure, there are numerous great pieces of architecture in the City. You can't swing a dead cat in Manhattan without hitting a building by a famous (dead or alive) architect. But the singular buildings don't make the city. It's the spaces between them. The streets, sidewalks, plazas, courtyards, parks, and waterfronts. And of course, one of the most fascinating inventions I have ever experienced, the New York City Subway.

Anyway, last week I was able to travel back to Manhattan for some meetings on a project we are working on, and a colleague and I found ourselves with more "free" time than we anticipated, which we were glad to spend by enjoying the cityscape mostly on foot. It was cold, and sometimes windy, but at least there was not any snow. I took an early morning walk down to Washington Square Park, which back in 2008 was mostly fenced off for renovations. Most of the Square was open this time, and I was able to get up close to the Arch. I immediately noticed the inscription on the south face of the Arch, which I had not seen two years before. Apparently our first President had a seemingly good grasp of theology:

A bit hard to read in the photo, perhaps. "Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair. The event is in the hand of God." Washington.

Things like that quote are what really fascinate me about the City. Around every corner, on every block, usually in several places on each block, you will find something unique or something you didn't anticipate. Sometimes funny. Other times downright weird. But nearly always educational or thought provoking. Perhaps these kind of things exist in Fort Worth. I'm sure they do, but I've probably found them all already. BUT, I also maintain that these things are not readily visible from an automobile. One must be out exploring on foot to find these gems.

Just one more little unexpected find below.... See this photo, taken in the lobby restroom of my hotel. Can you decipher what this is really supposed to mean?

I guess if the FDNY can't use water, do they throw sand on the fire? Baking soda? Perhaps a big blanket? I don't know. I'm sure there is a clear meaning in this for firefighters, but of course I'm not one of them.

As for my recent trip to Austin, it was even faster than my New York trip. I almost spent more time on the road, there and back, than I did at the destination. It was a whirlwind day, but all was well since I was able to take a brisk walk from the south end of campus near MLK up to the College of Engineering at Speedway and Dean Keeton. Perhaps the finest pedestrian experience in the whole State consists of a walk from the Littlefield Fountain up to the foot of the Tower. Nothing else quite like it. Of course, one of my colleagues was from New Jersey, and even when I pointed out that, from the Main Mall in front of the Tower, we were on axis with the Capitol, he was nonplussed. Oh, well. It was his first trip to Campus. I'll keep working on him. He'll grow to love it.

I then had to think back to my first trip to see the UT Campus. I was in junior high, maybe? I don't recall what year it was. I think we may have been visiting the Campus with Erin to determine if she wanted to go to school there, or maybe she was already committed, and we were just visiting to help her learn the way around. Not sure. But I do recall that day, whenever it was. For the very first time I experienced that axial relationship between the Tower and the Capitol. I think that sealed if for me. I was still years away from matriculating at any School, but I think my mind was made up that day. As she had already done, and would continue to do, Erin was paving the way for me. If you asked me today why she wanted to go to UT, I couldn't tell you. But she did, and I followed. Different courses of study, different goals, different experiences. But that tour of the Campus with our family that day, now probably 15 years past, had a profound experience on me.

I grew up in Arlington, of course. There were no pedestrian or urban environments there. Walking in Arlington meant one of two things: you were out walking your dog, or your car was broken down. There was nowhere to walk TO. But Austin was a real city, with a real urban core and an urban college campus. Tree lined streets, plazas, courtyards, parks, greenbelts, lakes, and such. Really a different world from Arlington, Texas. Different indeed from dusty old Fort Worth. Sure, Fort Worth has its Sundance Square and its Cultural District, but there's also a lot of empty space in between. Austin, wedged between the Colorado River (Lake Austin) on the west, and IH-35 on the east, is noticeably dense, unlike Arlington, which is more like an overweight man who has removed his belt, and allows his girth to flow unimpeded beyond the confines of his too-tight trousers.

Now I realize that Austin, like all Texas cities, has its own suburbs and its own sprawl. Just today, on yet another trip, I travelled to Denton. And on my way back to Fort worth, it was perhaps the longest trip I had ever experienced between the two cities. Best case, the trip can take 40 minutes in no traffic. In moderate traffic, it can take a hour, or slightly more. This evening, it took me 2 whole hours to drive 38 miles. Early Monday morning it had taken us 2 hours and 45 minutes to drive the 200 miles to Austin. And today I never did figure out what the slow down was all about. There was never a wreck on the side of the road, it was just slow, slow, slow. So I did what I could to pass the time. Listened to NPR and stared out the window to the southeast, stupefied at the vast sea of composition shingle rooftops from Keller all the way to Arlington, with Jerry's World just visible at the far horizon. It was a sickening sight. North Fort Worth in all its splendor. I nearly vomited. But the honking of horns behind me snapped me out of my stupor, so I sped back up to 5 mph and crawled along with all the other motorists, wondering, where is everyone going? Why are there thousands of cars on this highway right now? Don't you all live in those houses over there? Get outta my way. I'm trying to get to a real City, beyond this suburban hell with its throw-away landmarks of Rooms to Go, Jared's Galleria of Jewelry, and Applebees. But my lamentations were of no avail.

So I started at a new game. I began to count the number of people who where inching along, concentrating on their phones or other personal digital device. It was a startling game. Based on my unscientific method, it appeared that one in five vehicles were being operated by someone who was looking at his or her device rather than watching the road. Of course I was looking at them, rather than the road ahead of me, so I was just as guilty as they were of being unaware of the motorist in front of me. But nonetheless, there we were, all stuck together, trying to get someplace, trying to pass the time somehow.

Eventually, with no hope of relief, just outside the Loop, I bailed out at Western Center and beat a path west toward North Main Street. This is an approach I have taken half a dozen other times, when I feel like passing under the Loop 820 Bridge is like the entrance to Hell in Dante's Inferno, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." So I rolled the dice and threaded my way through Fort Worth's north side, right through the center of the Stockyards until I was able to make my way further southwest on Northside Drive, to University. Almost home.... but one more stop.

The Bank.

I had promised Stephanie I would deposit a check into the bank today, and I realized that in fact I would be driving right past our bank, and it was still open. So I go sauntering into the bank lobby, ready to get in and get out (See sidebar below), ready to be done with this day, ready to be home, but lo and behold, what do I see, but 10 people in the cattle pen ropes ahead of me. And 2 tellers behind the counter. I exhaled with great vigor (a bystander may have called it a "sigh"), and I rushed to the little table to fill out the deposit slip. Two others were at the table already, filling in theirs. I paused. Do I have to get in line behind these folks? If I fill in my slip faster then they do, can I beat them to the cattle pen? Or should I just slow down and get over the fact that there was one more traffic jam ahead of me before I could get home? I decided to fill out my deposit slip as fast as possible. I managed to beat one other guy into the line, but let the old lady who was at the table ahead of me. Seemed like a good compromise. In the end, I was able to complete my transaction, and make the last leg of my trip successfully, if not quickly.

(Sidebar: I will NOT use a Bank Drive Thru. This confounds Stephanie to no end. Yet I am steadfast in my intention to use the real teller inside the real lobby, rather than the robot canister that sucks your money through a long and twisty tube, to be opened by a garbled voice on the other end, with whom it is impossible to make eye contact. In fact about two weeks ago, I was at the exact same Bank counter, transacting some business of some sort, and I noticed that Richard wasn't there. You see, Richard was the teller whose station was the most southerly position at the counter, or far left as you look at the tellers. Richard was always there, with a friendly smile and eager to help attitude. There was never a time when Richard was not there. Yet on that day, two weeks ago, Richard was somehow absent. So I asked Stacey, his constant teller neighbor to the north,

"Where's Richard? He's not holding down his end of the counter."

Stacey replied, "Yes, I know. Richard doesn't work here anymore."

"What?!?" I demanded. "That can't be. He was always there."

"Yes," Stacey said, "it is sad."

Sad indeed. So Richard is gone, and part of my Bank lobby life has died. But the point is, I would never have been able to enjoy Richard's company if I always used the Drive Thru. Just another reason to get out of your car and take an opportunity to go look someone in the eye, and demand to know where they are if you don't see them.)

Some Dreams Can Come True, or I'll Never Have to Go to Dallas Again

2010-11-21T20:55:00.000-06:00

One of the things that worries me about Lucy's fascination with all things Cinderella, is that she seems to think that anything she wishes will come true. Cinderella wished to go to the ball, of course, and lo and behold, her fairy godmother shows up and grants her wish. Lucy talks about making wishes, she waves "magic wands" around and such, and generally thinks it is a lot of fun. Stephanie and I tell her that wishes do not and cannot affect any particular outcome. Cinderella, we say, is just a story, and not "real life." Things do not always (rarely, even) turn out the way we had hoped, and wishing for something will not make it so. I am hopeful that eventually Lucy will grasp this concept and accept the fact that fairy tale endings exist strictly within the domain of fairy tales, not reality.

That said, a dream of mine has come true, and in fact, another dream may soon becoming a reality. Of course I cannot say that I ever "wished" these things to come true, but certainly I have said to myself, "Gee, it sure would be nice if...." And neither of these things are of any great importance. Convenience, really. Enjoyable, yes, but necessary? No.

The first: Chuy's has finally opened a restaurant in Fort Worth, Texas. FINALLY. I have been waiting seven years for this to happen. Ever since Stephanie and I moved to Fort Worth from Austin back in 2003, we have pined away for our favorite TexMex joint Chuy's. Since 2003, whenever I would have the occasion to dine at Chuy's, be it in Austin, or Dallas, or even Arlington more recently, I would usually try and get a Comment Card and plead with Chuy's management to come to Fort Worth. For seven years I did this.

And Saturday night, we were able to taste the fruit of our patient perseverance. We piled the kids into the van at about 5:40 pm, drove about a mile down the road, and eventually found a place to park. (Sidebar: it was never that hard to find a place to park at Chuy's, even at the original Barton Springs location. And I refused to valet. Fort Worth may be a lot of things, but I will not allow it to become a place were we valet our car. I just won't do it. Not in good old Fort Worth. At some point I'll post a lament about the Dallas-ization of Fort Worth, but that's for another day.) So we parked, and endured a 30 minute wait, and were eventually seated. What's 30 more minutes, after waiting seven years? So I ate my weight in chips and salsa, and scarfed the Chicka-Chicka-Boom-Boom (thank you Travis for turning me onto this dish, many many years ago), while Stephanie enjoyed her regular Chuychanga, and the kids ate mostly tortillas, drank lemonade, and picked at their enchiladas. And Sam loved the beans, as he does at most places. Who doesn't love beans?

I spoke at length with the manager on duty about my seven year long crusade to bring Chuy's to Fort Worth, and she agreed they were glad to finally be here. And I refrained from mentioning that I was tempted to be embittered that they expanded in Arlington and even WACO, Texas before Fort Worth. So much for bitterness. Truly, the fact that I'll never have to go to Dallas again to eat at Chuy's is a sweet, sweet consolation. So that's Dream Come True Number One.

Dream Number Two is still in the works, but is making visible progress. This Dream has not been nearly as long in coming, but may yet be more of a longshot. Earlier in the day on Saturday, I took Lucy and Ben on an outing. Our ultimate destination was the Downtown Library, but I planned a couple of stops beforehand. Our first stop was Burnett Park, not too recently renovated, complete with a rope climbing structure and big rocks to play on. Not the best outdoor place space in town, but certainly not the worst. The kids like it, and I like being in the shadow of the highrises Downtown. A very Urban play space. Some photos:

After they ran around and played and jumped and climbed, we walked 2 blocks east to the corner of 7th and Throckmorton, where a Streetcar is sitting (temporarily). Indeed, Fort Worth is in the midst of allegedly planning to possibly built a Streetcar system. Mayor Moncrief has assured us that the City Council truly will vote "yea" or "nay" on December 7th. We'll see what happens. Naturally there are two passionate camps: Those hipply liberals that love the idea of REAL mass transit in Fort Worth, which will make Fort Worth more of a REAL city - a city that truly gives its citizens mobility that is convenient and efficient - far moreso that a bus system. And then there are those crusty old conservatives that are convinced that Streetcars are a waste of money (regardless of how the funding is secured), and will catapult Fort Worth down the "rail" of becoming that bastion of liberality and homosexuality, San Francisco. Seriously. Councilmen have stated in no uncertain terms that they do not like the idea of "what Fort Worth will be" with Streetcars. Somehow I doubt our councilmen are really against urban renewal and development (which means jobs and expanded tax base). What they are really against is anything seen as remotely "progressive," and Streetcars are certainly that, at least in Fort Worth. Never mind the fact that that cities in Europe (and even in these United States) have successfully used them for decades and decades. In Arlington the argument against mass transit was always that it would bring the bums and hobos into town. I guess in Fort Worth, the argument is similar, except that the city is afraid of another type of "undesirable" folk moving in. Well, let's face it. The hobos and bums have been firmly entrenched in Arlington for years, and certainly there is already a very diverse crowd in Fort Worth that will only grow, regardless of what type of mass transit infrastructure is provided.

ANYWAY, I just wanted to take the kids to see the Streetcar, not really get involved in any political or socio-cultural rant. So, to the Streetcar we went. I suppose they had fun, sat in the driver's seat, and what not, but probably didn't really know what they were doing. Oh, well. Good enough for another photo op: (I guess Ben was tired and sat down, and refused to stand up again).

And then finally we deboarded the Streetcar and made for the Library. We doubled back to Lamar Street, then headed up several more blocks to find that there were two fire trucks parked in front of the Library! Our outing just continued to build with excitement. Lights were flashing, and firefighters were running to and fro. (Regarding the photos below, please forgive me for posting photographs of bad architecture. Disregard the faux Roman temple facade, and just focus on the engines from Company 2. This is in no way an endorsement of David Schwarz.)

We enjoyed the trucks, went inside and I asked the man at the door if everything was under control. He replied, "Oh, yes, just a problem with the elevator." I said "OK" and we went on our way to the Children's Section. Only later did I realize what must have really been going on. Someone must have been STUCK in the elevator. When an elevator just breaks down, you don't call the Fire Department. You just call Thyssen or Otis or whoever. Only if the elevator breaks down with people INSIDE would you call the Fire Department. At least that's my reasoning. So I assume that if this was indeed the case, the FWFD dutifully did their job and rescued whatever poor soul was stuck in the cab. Maybe he had already found a good book to keep him company. (Note to self: avoid the elevators at the Downtown Library.)

Ultimately, the kids played a bit, did a craft, and we finally settled on a few titles to bring home with us. Yet another version of Cinderella for Lucy, a picture book about the first Thanksgiving, and a couple of selections for Ben: one on Dinosaurs, another, appropriately, about Fire Trucks. I found a book on Streetcars, but the story was written around a kid and his two dads, so I bypassed it. Maybe I'll write a book in favor of the Streetcar from a crusty old conservative view. I think it would find an audience in Fort Worth

Of Melville and Moses

2010-10-24T15:51:00.000-05:00

First, Moses.

Family Worship, earlier this week, Exodus Chapter 32, Golden Calf.

Daddy: "Lucy, what happened with the Golden Calf? Were the Israelites obedient to God?

Lucy: "Noooo."

Daddy: "Why not? What did they do?"

Lucy: "They worshipped it."

Daddy: "Why did they do that?"

Lucy: "Because they wanted to."

Daddy: "Why did they want to worship the calf?"

Lucy: "Because they worshipped it. . . " (pause) ". . . they needed to get a spanking."

Daddy: "Pretty much. They actually got much worse than a spanking...."

* * * * * * * * * * *

And now, Melville.

In 11th grade, I think, my English class was assigned to read Billy Budd. I don't recall very much about the story from way back then, except that I thought it was terrible. I don't even know if I read the whole thing, even though it was less than a hundred pages. I hated it. But it couldn't have just been Melville. I do recall enjoying Melville's even shorter story Bartleby the Scrivener, which I also read in 11th grade. But for whatever reason, I didn't enjoy Billy Budd.

Now, some thirteen years later, I just finished reading Billy Budd for the second time in several years, and look forward to reading it again in the future. As I have mentioned here before, I began a new-found enjoyment of reading a few years ago, and I have kept it up. It takes me even longer now to make it through an entire book, but I trod along as best I can, and sooner or later, I can get it done.

But quite unexpectedly, I have found myself enjoying authors who I would not have expected that I would like. Melville ranks at the top of the list, at least for writers of fiction. My memory is already fuzzy on this, but it could well have been that some years ago, I first picked up my little copy of Melville's short stories (including Billy Budd), and read it cover to cover. Having enjoyed that collection so much, I plucked up enough courage to immediately dust off the hefty Moby Dick and give it a go.

I have been hooked on Melville ever since. I will say that I don't find it that necessary to seek the deeper meaning in Melville's writing, though perhaps it is there. I've read some of the commentary, and I can understand what the scholars are saying, but that's not so important to me. I just like the writing. And I admit to being fascinated with the ships and expeditions and adventure of so much of this writing. Being pulled out of 2010 Fort Worth and being plopped down onto the deck of the Indomitable in 1797 is a small thrill.

Perhaps that's why I also enjoyed Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. Maybe I'm just a sucker for high-seas adventure. In that case, I suppose it's time go re-read Moby Dick. It has been a few years. Surely a couple of years from now I'll pick up Billy again, and wonder one more time, why did I hate this back in 1997?

Of Books And Bones

2010-10-13T00:00:00.000-05:00

What is it about books?

I find myself drawn to books. Sometimes I find myself drawing in books. Or at least in a sketchbook. I oftentimes find myself drawn into bookstores.

Not too long ago, I took the family up to Denton to visit my newest bookstore find, Recycled Books. I've never seen a bookstore quite like it. I imagine it may be like a junior version of Larry McMurtry's Booked Up. Someday I hope to make it over to Archer City to see for myself.

But back in Denton, Recycled Books is a labyrinth of books, records, CDs, and such. I was personally dumbfounded on our most recent visit. I had been there twice before, and only just then did I realize the Architecture Section was 50% bigger than I thought it was. I had just neglected to take a walk around to the other side of a particular shelf - and there they were - more and more books on Architecture. Why would this store on Denton's town square have so many books on Architecture? Good, used Architecture books are tough to find. Even good, new Architecture books can be tough to find. Of course Barnes & Noble has an "Architecture" section, but is usually full of Frank Lloyd Wright and "Trendy-Residential-This" and "American-Dream-Home-That." Barf.

Of course for new Architecture books there's the Kimbell or the Modern, which both have respectable bookstore collections. But who wants to pay full MUSEUM price? The trick is to find the book you like in the Museum, touch it, feel it, flip the pages, and then mark down the title, and go back and find it online. Usually this works, and money can be saved by the pantload.

But back in Denton, the prices were so tantalizing low, it was hard to rationalize spending time on the Internet looking for a better price. And there were some titles that I would have never even known existed, if I hadn't seen them on the shelf. There inlies an important distinction to be made, relative to "browsing" online versus in a bricks-and-mortar store. You simply cannot replicate the act of tilting your head sideways a bit, and slowly moving along the shelf, looking at the titles. The online "browsing" experience cannot match this. The online "Search" field cries out for a particular title I am looking for. But usually I'm not looking for a particular title, I'm just looking for a neat book. I can't put "neat book" in the Search field and get the result I want.

Still, all that said, I have thus far spent less than $20 on Architecture titles at Recycled. All I have purchased, Architecturally, is a book that every Architect should own, though I was unfortunately overdue in procuring it. Also recently, we bought some books for the kids - couple of David Macaulay titles, Marcia Brown's Cinderella, a title by Marjorie Flack, and a book about bones.

Bones.

Lucy has been enamored with bones and skeletons lately. She wants to know all about her skeleton and her bones - where they are and what they do. I found a little pint-sized book about bones that she liked, and we brought it home. Coincidentally (or Providentially, depending on your outlook), that week with Stephanie's home school lessons they were focusing on the letter "B." Learning all things related to the letter "B." Bones fit right in. So the Bones book was used in Lucy's school time.

And then bones made an appearance during Family Worship after dinner. Coincidence? Nay. Providence. We've been working our way through Exodus. Soon enough we came to Exodus 13:17 and following.

17 Now when Pharaoh had let the people go, God did not lead them by the way of the land of the Philistines, even though it was near; for God said, "The people might change their minds when they see war, and return to Egypt."

18 Hence God led the people around by the way of the wilderness to the Red Sea; and the sons of Israel went up in martial array from the land of Egypt.

19 Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for he had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, "God will surely take care of you, and you shall carry my bones from here with you."

20 Then they set out from Succoth and camped in Etham on the edge of the wilderness.

21 The LORD was going before them in a pillar of cloud by day to lead them on the way, and in a pillar of fire by night to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night.

22 He did not take away the pillar of cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, from before the people.

Did you notice verse 19? Back in Genesis 50, Joseph had made his people swear to take care of his bones after he died. He wanted to be buried in the Promised Land, not in Egypt. Fast forward hundreds of years to Joshua 24, and his people kept the oath by burying Joseph's bones in the Promised Land.

I had to pause and attempt to convey an important message to Lucy, our lover of bones. Joseph's desire for his bones to be buried in the Promised Land was entirely bound up in his faith in God. Jospeh stated as much in Genesis 50:24. Joseph believed without a doubt that God would take care of Israel and lead them to the land that He had first promised his own great grandfather, Abraham. It had been many years since God had cut the covenant with Abraham, and it would be many more years still until Israel was rescued out of Egypt, and led into their Land. But Joseph believed anyway.

The writer of Hebrews cites Joseph's instructions regarding his bones as one of the many powerful examples of men and women exercising their faith. This was what Stephanie and I attempted to convey to Lucy, and also to Ben, who was probably zoned out by this point. We tried to tell Lucy that Joseph had faith in God even though he couldn't see Him. This is the essence of faith. Believing in something you can't see.

At this point Lucy asked why we can't see God. And of course this opens the door for explanations about the fact that God is holy, we are not, and we cannot see God, lest we be ruined, like Isaiah described. Isaiah was given a glimpse of the Lord, and he immediately pronounced woe upon himself, a man of unclean lips living among a people of unclean lips.

So we concluded, prayed, and sang. And Lucy promptly wanted to read her new book about bones. And now, whenever I read her a book about bones, I'll be reminded that bones can be a powerful example of faith. I will likely never see my own bones (x-rays excepted). They'll remain in my body, Lord willing, giving me structure and shape, so I won't just be a "pile of skin," as we say to Lucy. But there they are, undergirding my body, holding me up, doing their job whether I recognize it or not.

So here comes the analogy, the moral, to this post. It is of course an imperfect analogy, as analogies often are. But here it is: God is certainly there, even though I cannot see Him, giving my life structure and holding me up, undergirding my very life.

(And as an aside, I'll make it easy on my family and not ask them to carry my bones around for hundreds of years after I'm gone. Don't think the kids and grandkids and so on would appreciate that. For Jospeh it was one thing, but for me, it's not going to happen. Just toss 'em in the incinerator and be done with it. May the smoke of my ground up and burned up bones be a pleasing aroma to the Lord, from bones that were hopefully faithful to Him. Or, if that is too morbid of a thought, you can let my bones rot in a casket at Greenwood Cemetery. Just find a cheap plot. I don't want to be caught dead occupying pricey West Side real estate).

Storybook Theology

2010-09-07T16:41:00.000-05:00

Today at lunch, as we sat around the table, Lucy offered to say our prayer to thank God for our meal. After she did, she posed this question:

"Why doesn't Madeline pray in Jesus' name?"

I smiled and said this:

"Lucy, Madeline doesn't pray in Jesus name because she probably doesn't believe that Jesus is the Savior."

Lucy replies, "But we believe Jesus is the Savior."

"Yes, Lucy, we do. We believe that because the Bible says Jesus is the Savior. And really there is no other way to pray, other than in Jesus' name. He is our High Priest; the only One who can allow us access to God the Father. We have no other way to pray other than in Jesus' name. In fact, Lucy, Madeline, her classmates, and their teacher Miss Clavel may not even think they can approach God at all themselves. They probably believe they need another intermediary between God and men - a human priest of the Catholic faith. But this is not the truth of the Bible."

Lucy resolutely repeats herself, "But we believe Jesus is the Savior."

"Yes, Lucy, we do."

Amazing that a children's storybook can open the door for a four year-old to discuss theology.

Steer For The Woods!

2010-09-07T16:05:00.000-05:00

I took Lucy and Ben for a walk on Sunday evening, while Stephanie was helping to prepare dinner. We were in Rockport, visiting Stephanie's family, and I needed to get the kids out from under foot for a while. Stephanie's Dad lives in one of the many condos that sit within the Rockport Country Club. The best place to go for a walk is down the nearby cart paths. So off we went, walking down the 17th hole, from the green toward the tee box.

We weren't going anywhere in particular, and I had no destination in mind. Just a lazy walk for an hour or so. Soon enough, as we were approaching the tee box, probably still 50 yards out, I heard the clinking of golf clubs - the tell-tale sign that a cart was approaching around the bend. For some reason I decided to make our trio into golf course commandos.

"Quick, Lucy, and Ben, get down! Golfers are coming! Quiet! Here, be real still. We'll quietly watch them from behind these trees." And so forth. (I made sure we were well out of range - or at least out of bounds, so as to not get whacked by an oncoming ball.)

The three of us hunkered down and waited. Two carts stopped - a foursome - whose combined ages probably totalled upwards of 300. The first player approached the blue tees. We just barely had line of sight through the gnarled limbs of the numerous live oak trees.

"Watch Lucy. Watch Ben. Very quiet. This is very extraordinary - the wealthy snowbird retiree in his native habitat. Watch him tee off..."

Ping!

I didn't see where the ball went. Apparently the first players' companions were not going to hit from the blue tees. The carts headed straight for us down the path.

"Sssssh. Be real still. Maybe they won't see us."

As the carts approached to pass us, we must have not been very well hidden. All four of the geriatrics began to smile real big and wave at us. Lucy and Ben waved back. So much for my little commandos. Of course, I couldn't help but smile myself.

Some distance beyond us, they stopped at the red tees. All three hit, each in turn, and continued on their way.

At this point Lucy and Ben were up in the trees. Rockport is perhaps well known for its remarkable live oak trees. Diminutive perhaps, but still lovely. Nearer the coastline itself, perhaps a mile from the Country Club, are some amazing stands of these bent over, windswept live oak trees, which have doubtless been buffetted by the gulf winds for decades.

The trees near our 17th tee box were not of the "windswept" variety - just scraggelly and easily climbed due to the many forks in the branches. I put Lucy and Ben up on a branch, each perhaps 5 feet or so off the ground. They enjoyed their new vantage point for a while.

Eventually I decided we should head back to the house, so see if dinner was about ready. Ben protested, but I managed to get them out of the tree, and we set off down the cart path, retracing our steps from before. Soon enough I heard some more golf clubs tinkling behind us - another group of golfers. Rather than have to sit and wait for them to play through, I just wanted to get out of range, and keep going. I initiated our flight.

"Ben, fast! Lucy, fast! Run! Let's go! Gotta get back for dinner! Run!"

Ben is always looking for an opportunity to run, so he takes off high-stepping down the path, leaving me a Lucy behind. I encourage Lucy to pick up the pace, not because we were really about to be pelted with golf balls, but just because of the fun of a speedy retreat, in full golf course commando style.

Lucy finally picked up on our little game. She looked ahead, spied the next stand of trees that were shading the path ahead of us, and she began to run, legs and arms akimbo, and exclaimed, "Steer for the woods!" Ben starts yelling, "A jungle! A jungle!" And off we went, steering for the woods and safety.

Soon enough we slackened our pace in the shade of the jungle canopy, and made our way back to Pa's house. We knew we had reached civilization again when we saw another snowbird on his back porch, smoking a cigarette and tapping on his Ipad.

Talk Talk Talk

2010-08-26T20:41:00.001-05:00

* * * * * * * *

Arlington, Texas
Thursday, October 19, 1995
7:15 AM

Another start of the school day. Sophomore year. Can't drive. Not yet sixteen, just two more months. Dad's taking me to school. Grab the backpack, out of the house, to the car, hop in the passenger seat. Dad starts the car.

NEWS RADIO 1080 KRLD blares from the speakers.

or possibly

TALK RADIO 570 KLIF

or possibly

WBAP NEWS TALK 820

Good grief! Talk radio! Why does Dad listen to this stuff? And why so blaringly loud? Why in the world would someone pass the time driving by listening to these talking heads? Let's just get to school already. And can you turn it down?

* * * * * * * *

Fort Worth, Texas

Thursday, August 26, 2010

7:15 AM

Another start of the work day. No more bus pass. Have to drive. Just over thirty, will be doing this for thirty more years. Kiss the kids and wife goodbye. Grab the messenger bag, out of the house, to the car, hop in the driver seat. Start the car.

KERA 90.1 blares from the radio

Yikes. That's kind of loud. Better turn that down. Ah, National Public Radio. My ever present drive-time companion. Gotta love all these talking heads. Sam Baker. Jean Cochran. Diane Rehm. Terry Gross. Krys Boyd. Michel Martin. Robert Siegel. Melissa Block. Too bad it's only a 10 minute drive to work. Better turn it back up.

* * * * * * * *

What has happened? Obviously my views on talk radio have changed significantly in the past 15 years. Granted, I don't frequent the AM dial like my Dad did. My car's radio pretty much remains tuned to 90.1 FM 95 percent of the time. Except for the occasional frustration of an all-too-liberal-I-can't-believe-I'm listening-to-these-NPR-Socialists / slam-the-dial-over-to-WRR 101.1 FM moment, National Public Radio carries the day.

Strangely, or perhaps not, I didn't know National Public Radio existed until a couple of years ago. I certainly had no clue about NPR when I was a kid, back in the days that I was rolling my eyes at my old Dad and his talk radio companions.

Of course Dad drove a lot back then. I suppose he still does. Being in sales, he has to make his way across his territory, though not quite now as much as he used to. His role has expanded and shifted such that I think he logs more hours in the air than on the road these days. But when I was growing up he was driving all over the place.

As for me, literally until a couple of years ago, my adult life was largely bereft of driving. Stephanie and I, when we found ourselves in Fort Worth, located ourselves close to downtown, near where we worked. Initially in our marriage, we carpooled to work, since her office was about 5 blocks away from time. Back then I preferred (and sometimes still do prefer) silence in the car. I always turned the radio OFF for our 10 minute drive to downtown. When Stephanie retired from her corporate career to begin a new career as a mom, she kept the car at home and I began to take the bus, which you can read about here. So no driving for me. This continued for about three and a half years, until last December, when we became a two car family, which you can read about here. So now I drive to work.

But long before December of '09 I had discovered NPR. It really happened as a result of my regular trips I had to take from Fort Worth to Temple back in 2008. For some reason I switched on 90.1 as I rolled south down I-35, and I haven't looked back since. Suddenly I began to see the benefit of a talking head companion as I was making solo business trips, much like my Dad did fifteen years prior. Of course I couldn't keep the 90.1 KERA signal all the way to Temple. It would peter out somewhere between Hillsboro and Waco. It got to the point that I would attempt to strategically choose which company pool car to take, as I soon enough learned which vehicle had the best radio reception, after trip after trip after trip. But inevitably the signal would eventually become so garbled I would have to give it up, and then I was doomed. Doomed to scan the airwaves in north-central Texas for worthwhile radio. It didn't exist. Mostly Country and/or Latin music.

There were occasions when I was able to plan ahead and bring some of Dan's sermons along with me for the ride, which were almost always better than either Country or Latin music. But being the quasi-Luddite that I am, I have not yet embraced the Ipod technology, so I would have to do things the old fashioned way. Download Dan's mp3 from the website, and burn it to a CD to listen to in the car. More than once I would forget to take the CD out of the player after I got back to Fort Worth and turned in the pool car. So surely some unwitting colleague of mine got a blessed earful of Dan next time he went to use that particular pool car. Who knows? Perhaps that unknown colleague Providentially needed to hear the Word preached.

Which reminds me of when my old truck's CD player was stolen (for the first time). At some point in college my truck, while parked about 10 feet from my apartment's front door, was broken into, and the after-market CD player ripped from the dash. I doubt the thief was interested in the Christian music CD that was in the player at the time. Or perhaps he listened, was convicted of his sin, and repented. But if the latter occurred, he apparently didn't think to return either the CD or the player and apologize.

Anyway, on those trips to Temple I learned to listen to and appreciate talk radio.

Now it's just part of my daily drive, whenever I'm in the car by myself. I don't turn it on in the family van, though let the record show that I have also recently made Stephanie an NPR listener herself. My journeys to Temple are long past, but these days I do find myself on the road to Denton weekly. So NPR follows me. And thankfully the signal stays with me the whole time.

Some may legitimately wonder why I enjoy National Public Radio. It has long been held by Conservatives that Public Radio is liberally biased, as is most mass media. I don't necessarily disagree that there can be a liberal bent to the stories. But to me, NPR is one of the only news outlets out there that still writes and airs intelligent, well-researched, well-delivered news content. Admittedly a fair portion of NPR is not really news. There's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, which while focused on news events, it is an entertainment show. And on Sundays there is This Splendid Table, which is about food. And Rick Steves comes on at some point, as do Click and Clack. Other "variety" shows exist, like The Prairie Home Companion. But again I have to say that each of these shows are supremely enjoyable. It's never about shocking their listeners or yelling at one another. It's just good conversation that can make you both laugh and learn something at the same time.

And I will also admit that this year, for the first time, I put some skin in the game. During KERA's last Pledge Drive, I indeed pledged. I truly felt guilty for getting so much education and entertainment from something for free. Ira Glass finally convinced me I couldn't hold out any longer, and I went online and gave them 60 bucks. Not much, considering. If I listen to NPR for 25 minutes in the car everyday to and from work, and at least an hour and a half back and forth to Denton each week, and throw in another half hour (at least) for random trips during the week, that's 245 minutes a week of NPR. Multiply that by 50 work weeks in a year, and that's 12,250 minutes of NPR in a year. For a sixty dollar annual KERA Membership, I have paid $0.0049 per minute to listen to NPR. Basically one cent for every two minutes of air time that I hear. That's cheap! Maybe I'll need to re-evaluate my Membership level next year. Or maybe not. It is just air.

So there you have it. Not only have I embraced the grown up man's domain of talk radio, I have even been suckered into paying for it. I don't think my Dad ever sent a dime to KRLD, KLIF, or WBAP.

I guess he knew what he was doing after all.

The Seven Year Itch, Part 2

2010-08-07T14:08:00.001-05:00

Quite often I have found that I just never know how things are going to turn out. But that does not stop me from trying to consider just how the future may unfold. Certainly it is evident that I cannot foresee the future with any accuracy. In general I may be able to "know" what I will have for breakfast the next morning, what I will do at work the next day, or next week, or where my family will spend our next vacation, but in reality none of these things are certain. At any moment an event could occur that I had not anticipated, and alter the plans I had made. This occurs frequently.

I think this was evidenced in Part 1 of this 2-Part Post. Just a few examples: When my friends and I were planning our independent travels abroad to the Middle East, we had no way to know that a terrorist attack and subsequent war would change our plans. When I was expecting to continue working at an architecture firm throughout the rest of my schooling, I never would have imagined I would end up at Kinko's instead. When I was coming up on graduating College, I expected (or at least fervently hoped) to get a job in Austin. This appeared to come close to occurring, but not quite. I ended up in Fort Worth.

And let me be clear that none of these turns of events were by chance. As I noted from the Proverbs in Part 1, even as I was attempting to chart my own course throughout college and beyond, it was God who was ordering my steps, and bringing about all of those things that I didn't expect to happen. And more than that, everything that has occurred, and will occur, is for a purpose. That is a great comfort. Even though at the time I didn't really want to work at Kinko's, and even though at the time it was disappointing to have to leave Austin, these were not accidents. These events were purposeful, planned for me and for my family specifically.

So what's the point of all this? Where does the "Seven Year Itch" come into play? Bear with me. We're almost there.

Part 1 began with some photographs from my College graduation back in 2003. Now we are in 2010, seven years later. Those photographs led me on a mental journey through these last seven years, and suddenly it hit me. Coming out of architecture school, on the cusp of graduation, I naturally found myself digging for information on what the architecture profession was "really like." Even though I had come through five years of an architectural education, I had learned precious little of what it was like to really be an architect. For one lone semester I was required to take a course called "Professional Practice," which dealt more in the reality of working in a firm, but of course I still had questions that were not entirely answered to my satisfaction. What could I really expect to be doing in an office, full time? Would it be the same stuff as I had done working summers as a student intern? Would it be anything like my design studio courses? Big firm or small firm? What kind of salary could I expect? What kind of benefits? These were things I needed to ferret out somehow, and so I set about researching.

What I learned was not encouraging. Initially in my career, I could generally expect long hours, not a few mundane tasks, constant supervision, and a low salary with perhaps few benefits, depending on how large or small a firm I happened to work for. This type of work environment might continue for many years, certainly through the duration of my internship, which lasted at least the first 3 years after I finished school. Internships often lasted longer than that, and the only way to move beyond intern status was to sit for a daunting 9-part architectural registration exam. Even then, after possibly passing the exam 3, 4, or 5 years out of school, there would still be long hours and not necessarily higher pay.

More than one source I consulted made note of the fact that up to 40% of architects leave the profession within seven years of finishing school. This brought about a couple of additional questions: Why so many unhappy architects? and perhaps more importantly, why wasn't any of this made clear before I signed up for architecture school? Those statistics were certainly not publicized on the School's website.

But now, here I am, seven years later, and as of yet, I have not exited the profession. To be sure, I have, at one time or another, endured lower pay than I would have preferred, longer hours than both Stephanie and I would have preferred, and much, much crummier benefits that anyone would prefer. Additionally, I used to lament my inability to push my projects forward as much as I would like to, because I suffered from a trifecta of lack of experience, lack of knowledge in the field, and lack of decision-making authority. It was sometimes debilitating.

Yet here I am, with both feet firmly planted within the shifting sands of the architecture profession. I often joke with people when they ask me what I do for a living. I tell them that I had wanted to be an architect since I was seven years old, so here I am, more than twenty years later, living the dream! Of course this "dream" I am living includes neither a vacation home, a fancy car, nor a ski boat. And nor should it.

Instead, this is what I have found, seven years later. The architecture profession includes something much more gratifying than a chalet in Aspen or plying the waters of the Bay in a Donzi. It includes the amazing process of conceiving an idea in your imagination, drawing some lines on paper that represent your idea, and sooner or later, if everything goes according to plan, the idea that you conceived in your imagination transitions from the intangible world to the tangible. From the immaterial to the material. From an ephemeral thought in the brain, transferred to some visual lines on a page, ultimately becomes tactile concrete, glass, and stone. And it doesn't end there. Soon enough people begin to activate the place made of concrete, glass, and stone.

Architecture at its best moves from being just a building to being a place. And there is a difference. A place is where people want to meet, to gather, to live, work, worship, and play. A good place becomes a stage where we live our lives. Does the place enable us to better live our lives, or does it hinder the way the live? I think it is true what Winston Churchill once said, "We shape our buildings, and thereafter our buildings shape us."

This is architecture of the fourth dimension, which is time. A thought in the brain may be fleeting, a line drawn on paper my be easily burned up or tossed aside. A building must inherently last. The moment I have "finished" a project, when construction is complete, is really just when the life of the building begins. There may be thirty, fifty, or possibly even a hundred years that go by with people actively using the building. I am finally coming to understand that the purpose of my profession is not to create drawings, though we of necessity do that. The purpose of architects is to create a place where people spend their lives, and hopefully the place will be successful in ennobling their lives as time passes.

So I can't help but wonder if that 40% of architects leave their profession before they come to realize this. It is not surprising that so many leave the profession early. Buildings are slow. They take time to design, build, and occupy. If you are never able to follow a good project all the way through, to the point of seeing architecture in the fourth dimension, I can understand wanting to give it up. It has taken me seven years to begin to figure this out.

Let's back up in time, back to architecture school, to expand that thought, that buildings are slow. One of my better professors once told our class this simple statement: "Buildings are expensive, so they don't happen often." I think this is one of the keys to the mystery of architects exiting the profession early.

Buildings are expensive, so they don't happen often.

If anyone out there has paid for a building to be designed and built, you can surely attest to the fact that they are expensive. Whenever I review a cost estimate for one of my projects, I am staggered by the cost of construction. For example, on my current project, just the door hardware costs much, much, more than any home that I will ever own. We're talking hinges, locks, and levers. Hundreds of thousands of dollars. Admittedly there are hundreds of doors on the job, but it is still amazing. The cost of construction is enormous.

Contrast the cost of building a building with the cost of building a hamburger. A hamburger is cheap, and accordingly, they happen all the time. Who knows how many hamburgers are being made and consumed right at this moment? Thousands? Millions? I myself have purchased more hamburgers in my 30 years than I could possibly count. But I've never built or bought a building. Too expensive. What about something in between? Say, a pair of shoes. Shoes cost much more than a hamburger, but still they happen very frequently. I have bought probably a couple dozen pairs of shoes in my adult life. Right here, where I am sitting, I can count six pairs of shoes that I own. And there's still another pair of boots out in the car. What about something much, much more expensive than a pair of shoes? Say, a car? This year, or last year technically, was the first time in my life I had purchased a vehicle. It took me thirty years before I needed to buy a car. That's not very often. Lord willing I won't need to buy another one for quite some time, though if past performance is any indicator of future success, I'm not very confident of the Malibu's staying power.

But a building is far more expensive than even a car. Sure, some buildings are "cheap" - the fast food joint, the throw-away strip mall, the self-service car wash. But by and large, certainly commercial buildings are very expensive, on the order of millions of dollars, or nowadays even up to a billion dollars for certain structures. And who really has a billion dollars to spend? Or even a million? Not too many folks, relative to the total number of folks on the the planet.

So what does this mean? It means this: as an architect, at least for my career personally, it has taken seven years before I have truly been able to follow a meaningful project through from conception to completion. As I look back over my career, I have attempted to add up simply the number of projects I have worked on. That is, if I assisted in any way, big or small, the project made the list. The list totaled 35 projects. Out of those, 17 , to the best of my knowledge, have been actually constructed and completed. So less than half of the buildings that Clients thought they wanted to build, actually got built. Out of those 17, I have counted 5 that I was involved in from start to finish, and of those 5 completed projects, 4 of them have come to completion in the last 2 years. That means that for the first 5 years of my career, I was able to see 1 project from start to finish. One project go from conception to the fourth dimension.

Admittedly, I have indeed changed firms in the last seven years, which has meant that I have left some projects behind that I might have otherwise seen through completion. I am at my third employer since finishing College. Some might think I've "jumped around" more that most folks do, but I'm not so sure. Most of my architectural peers do not still work for the same firm they did when they graduated architecture school. Which makes me wonder....

Do folks jump around firms early in their career simply looking for better pay, better benefits, better projects? Certainly, to a degree. In the case of my two career moves, those were definitely reasons for making the switch. But what happens when you move a couple of times, actually begin to advance somewhat, but in the end still not find the profession gratifying or interesting? I really think it hinges on the fact that since buildings are expensive, they don't happen often. You really have to stick around long enough to see one or more good projects from start to finish; to go from the first, second, third, and finally the fourth dimension.

Now that there are people actually working in and working with two of my completed projects, I am learning things I never considered during the design or construction phase. Because people are now spending time in the building, we are seeing from unforeseen problems to fix, and occasionally seeing moments of gratitude or compliment from the Client. Seeing people work in and work with the buildings is an entirely different way to look at architecture than simply drawing lines on a page.

That said, I am still prone to fall into the trap of just wanting to see architecture in photographs - to enjoy looking at beautiful photographs of a well-designed building. We use the photographs of our completed building to show to future potential clients. We use the photographs to submit for Design Awards. I look at photographed buildings frequently in books and magazines. But they can't tell the whole story. A photograph is a two-dimensional representation of a four-dimensional place. The photographs are as staged as a family portrait. Just the right angles. Cut out all the wrinkles and pimples. Photoshop out the undesirable security camera or power lines. The photos make the place look perfect, but often perfectly cold and sterile. Photographers can be such talented artists they can make a mediocre building look great, and a great building look fantastic. But if I just look forward to the moment when the photos come back from the photographer, and wrongly oogle them like a teenage boy wrongly oogles a centerfold, I have missed the point of Architecture with a capital "A."

Back to Architecture School, briefly. We were often tasked with preparing "Case Studies." These were research projects about particular buildings, be they located right in Austin, or across the world in Basel or Bangkok. I distinctly remember a particular Case Study where some classmates contacted the architect who had designed the building which was the object of their study. The building was somewhere in Europe, and none of my classmates had ever seen the building in person. When they got ahold of the architect, and he discovered that this group of students was preparing research on one of his buildings, but all they knew of his building were photographs and the written word, he told them, "Nope, I can't help you. And you should never report on a building that you have not visited in person. Thank you, Good bye." They were disappointed, but it makes sense. Reading words about a building and seeing photographs of it cannot begin to adequately describe how the space really feels or functions. At best you'll get someone else's opinion of how the place felt or functioned. I have adopted this rule for myself. I will not critique a building I have not visited first-hand, spent time in, walked around, seen its context and surroundings.

I think what I am trying to say is that finally enough time has passed in my career that I am beginning to get a grasp of what I am really supposed to be doing. Maybe I'm just a slow learner. When I was frustrated with my job three or four years ago, I considered other options. I thought about chucking it all and starting again. For practical reasons I could never bring myself to do it, but many folks do. In some cases, some are "forced to." In a down economy like we are experiencing right now, I think there are simply more architects out on the street looking for work than the market can bear. Some will find jobs as architects, others simply won't. They will be forced to continue to draw unemployment, or else they will branch out and test the waters of a slightly (or maybe drastically) different career. I think often times the laid-off and desperate end up much, much better off after they change their career. For some, taking the risk pays great reward.

Thankfully I never jumped ship. If I had, I would not have had the pleasure of last week standing atop an elevated deck that was in the final stages of preparing for a concrete pour. The stuff I saw was amazing. I literally couldn't believe that the lines we had put on paper were resulting in such a massive amount of labor - sozens of leathery men buzzing about with hands the size of hams, wrestling with steel reinforcing, beating the formwork into submission, welding, sawing, nailing, yelling about and sweating like hogs. Now that the concrete has been poured, all their work has been covered up. Until maybe someday if the building is demolished, no one will ever see the guts of that concrete slab again. It was an incredible thing to witness.

And below that deck is a large Atrium space, with exposed concrete columns soaring two and three stories high. Walls of brick, stone, and glass will enclose the space. Skylights above will bring in natural light. I stopped for a moment to imagine the way the space will feel and be used when completed. It was exciting.

But I simply had to wait seven years for that particular moment, standing there on site, looking forward to this building's life to begin. My work on this building was nearing completion, but the building's work had not even begun. It could very well be that forty or fifty years from now, when I am long retired or dead, folks will still be walking through that Atrium space, pausing for a moment near one of those beautiful concrete columns, or tracing their hand across the fossilized limestone. Maybe they will take a moment to sit down and rest, or read or study, or chat with a friend. I hope so.

The Seven Year Itch, Part I

2010-08-05T21:41:00.000-05:00

Just to put your minds at ease, tonight I will not be blogging about Billy Wilder's 1955 film starring Marilyn Monroe. I've never seen it, so I would not have anything worthwhile to say.

It may turn out that I don't have anything worthwhile to say regardless of my post's topic, but you probably wouldn't be reading even this far if you thought that was the case.

Almost a week ago I was at a birthday party for one of my (nephews?) (second cousins?). I guess I'm not sure who he was. Well, I knew who he was, but not sure what he was. What do you call your cousin's kid? Anyway, I hadn't seen these family members in quite some time, and it was a good time of fellowship and fun.

One of my aunts was at the party, and she gave me a small envelope with a few photographs inside. She had been cleaning out some stuff at her house, clearing out unneeded clutter, and she thought I might want to have these photos that she found. The photos were taken way back in 2003 - more than seven years ago. The subject of the photos was my college graduation, more specifically, my graduation from Architecture School. As such, seeing these photos gave me pause to recollect all that has transpired in those seven years from 2003 to 2010.

It is hard to believe it has been that long. Stephanie, who appears at my side in a few of the photos, commented that it seemed like another life, a whole other era. Indeed. Stephanie and I were dating at the time, back in May 2003, thought not yet engaged to be married. We would become engaged later that summer. One of my own personal opinions about asking her to marry me was that I wanted to have a job before asking her Dad for his daughter's hand in marriage. It seemed like the "responsible" thing to do. I didn't want to appear like this guy without any way to support and take care of his daughter, diploma notwithstanding, so for better or for worse, the engagement was put off until my first paychecks would start rolling in. Though in hindsight "rolling" is not really the right word. More like trickling. Or maybe oozing.

Indeed, after graduating that day in May of 2003 I had no idea where I would end up employed. I had spent much of the Spring Semester job hunting. I had created a hot portfolio, polished and liberally distributed my resume, worked with our School of Architecture Career Services Center, yet had nothing to show for it. I had already had a few interviews by that time, and had also received more than a few rejection letters. Needless to say, the job hunt was not yet successful. I very much wanted to remain in Austin, as did Stephanie, but it did not seem that any architecture firm wanted to give me a reason to stay.

Despite my previous statement about no one in Austin wanting to offer me a job, there was one startling moment not long after my graduation when I realized that wasn't the case, but by that time it was too late. Let me explain. I'll have to give some background here, and I think I can already see that this post will become at least a two-part post. I doubt I'll get all this in, as I am continuing to type a whole lot of stuff that I had not originally planned on typing.

Anyway, after graduation I needed something to do to pass the time, and to earn some cash before I got the "real" job as an intern architect. You see, by that time, I had already quit my shameful part time job at Kinko's, where I had worked since at least the summer of 2002. I rarely speak out about my employment at Kinko's. My pride keeps me from wanting to dwell on the fact that for a whole year I had to make copies for $8.25 an hour, when at the time I knew that other classmates of mine were working in real architecture firms, and making 10, 15, even 18 dollars an hour! And before 2002 I myself had worked for a firm, a wonderful firm, and I had very much enjoyed doing it. But that all came crashing down not long after the crashes of 4 ill-fated flights in September 2001.

I believe the U.S. economy was already declining before 9-11, and as we all know, the terrorist attacks brought about further woes to the economy. I happened to be enjoying a Study Abroad Program in Europe the fall of 2001 when the attacks occured. After the Program was over in early November, everyone had plans to continue travelling on their own or in small groups of friends to see other parts of Europe that we hadn't seen before. But not long after the attacks, of course, the U.S. began dropping bombs in Afghanistan, and America was suddenly at war. I think my parents, and most other parents of students in the Program, preferred to have their students safe and sound back in the States rather than gallavanting around Europe while the U.S. was reeling from the attacks and engaging in retaliation in the Middle East. When the Program concluded, many students changed their plans and went straight back to the States. Others did stick around and continue travelling.

Three of my friends and I had long ago made grandiose plans to actually visit the Middle East after the Program concluded. Naturally we nixed these plans sometime between September 12th and October 7th, the time between the attacks and when the bombs of Operation Enduring Freedom began to drop. The Program concluded in Venice, where we would all go our separate ways. The four of us had made arrangements to leave Venice via ferry and sail for Athens, from whence we would embark on a Grand Tour of Greece, followed by a visit to Istanbul, then another ferry to Cairo, where we would enjoy the Land of the Nile before finally boarding Lufthansa 581 bound to DFW by way of Frankfurt. In hindsight, I think I (not to say anything of my three travelling companions) certainly would have run out of money long before our Middle East Itinerary was concluded. So despite all the things we lost as individuals and as a Nation on 9-11, perhaps my pocketbook (or more accurately my parents' pocketbook) was saved.

At any rate, I would be arrive home probably 2 or 3 weeks sooner than I had planned. I would have some of November, all of December, and half of January with nothing to do. I needed a job back in Austin! Fortunately for me, I had just come from a job that summer of 2001 working in a firm, where I had also worked the summer of 2000. I enjoyed the work and the people, and was very glad that I had been given a chance to see how a real architecture firm operates, and to earn a bit of coin at the same time. So in October of 2001 I figured I was a shoe-in back at the office. I e-mailed the office while still abroad, and annouced my earlier-than-planned arrival back in the U.S. Then it happened.

Just as I am sitting here, looking at a computer screen, I can recall vividly the moment I read the e-mail reply that came back. I was in an internet cafe in Rome, and couldn't believe what I was reading. My humble request to come back to work for the Winter Break was rebuffed. I was told that there might not be enough work for me. I was scandalized. Can you believe that? Not can you believe there was not enough work, but can you believe I was scandalized? My pride was smashed. There I was, globe-trotting architect-in-training, without a care in the world, and just like that, I was indeed brought very low by the rejection, or if not rejection, at least deferral of my desire to work again at the firm. What was I going to do for 8 weeks? My architecture-friend-and-roommate (who had not journeyed abroad with me) had a long-standing gig with another architect in town - he would certainly be employed during the break. What about me? I was very much focused on my own image as not only a successful student, but successful in the workplace to, student-intern though I may have been.

At this point I must admit my memory goes a bit fuzzy. I distinctly recall the e-mail rebuff about my request for employment, but for some reason I am having trouble recalling if in the end, I ended up working there over the 8 week break or not? Isn't that strange? All I can recall with certainty is my sinful pride and idignation, but not possibly the merciful job that may have actually presented itself after I got home. I truly can't recall what I did for those 8 weeks.

Let me bring that back on point. At some point after that, I began to search and search for another firm to hire me on. There was none to be had. Eventually I suppose I got desperate. I believe I was actually at the Kinko's on I-35 near Highland Mall making copies of my resume, still in the hunt for a student intern job when I noticed a sign at the cash register. Now Hiring. Open Interviews. What did I have to lose? My pride was already smashed. I needed some supplemental income. I was well aquainted with Kinko's, having visited many, many times to make large format copies and scans of drawings for my studio projects. There was perhaps an element of design in some things that Kinko's did, at least graphical in nature. So I gave up my search for employment as a student intern at an architecture firm and showed up at the appointed time at the Kinko's on Burnet Road for the open interview. I was hired.

I worked at the Burnet Road location long enough to actually figure out how to work all the machines fairly well. You can insert your joke here, but making copies is not a easy as you may think. It could be quite difficult - quite stressful in fact. Burnet Road was Kinko's busiest store in Austin, and in fact often times it boasted the highest sales per month than any other store in the State, its closest competition being Kinko's on LBJ Freeway in North Dallas. Indeed it stressed me out far too often. Too many people wanting too many copies in too little time. It truly sounds like a joke, but it was not easy. I have another Aunt who works for FedEx and she has said that FedEx made a mistake when it bought Kinko's years ago. The fact is it has never been profitable for FedEx, and the reason is that Kinko's has to give away so much work. They screw up so many orders! The problem is that you can't expect an 8 dollar an hour guy to be fully committed to taking ownership of complex orders that must be produced in a precise way using complex machinery that often breaks down. Just not a good business model.

But I attempted to make the best of it, and was often implored to go into management at the store, but I always deferred, shaking my head and wondering, "How did I end up here, getting asked to help manage a place that makes copies?" I'll tell you how. In my mind anyway, it was always that crushing e-mail at an internet cafe in Rome that said, "No, Nathan, you may not be able to come back to work for us at the firm." I truly beheld a grudge against my former architect boss, who in fact was a prince of a guy, one of the finest gentlemen you would ever want to meet, an excellent architect, and successful businessman to boot. It was foolish of me, and I probably knew it.

So fast foward to Spring of 2003. I had worked at Kinko's for plus-or-minus a year, was nearing graduation, had a girlfriend who I knew I would someday marry, and needed to seriously find a legitimate job in an architecture firm. As you may recall, the economy continued to stink well into 2003. There were just no jobs to be had, certainly not in Austin. Except, lo and behold, one day I thought I may have found one. I had interviewed well at another firm in town, was called back by one of the partners, who expressed his desire to someday give me a job, though perhaps not right at this moment, but he certainly wanted to "keep me in Austin" for a while until he knew for sure he could hire me. That was apparently good enough for me. I quit Kinko's probably the next day. (I'll never forget one of my Kinko'scoworkers saying on my last day, "You'll be back." So far, so good. It has been seven years, and I haven't been back.)

But that job never materialized. He couldn't find a spot for me afterall. So I was stuck again without a good job, or without even a bad one. So I totally regressed and started to mooch off my girlfriend. Stephanie had long worked for an Insurance Company in Austin, and was well-liked and successful there. So I hit her for for a job. You know, something "temporary" - just to bridge the gap for a month or so until my real job came in. Her employer was gracious enough to give me a part time job filing paperwork. And they even paid me more than Kinko's did! Being a mooch was truly paying off. I got to perform mindless tasks and see Stephanie every day at work. Just the kind of guy her Dad wanted her to marry. Obviously I had to continue waiting for a real job before I could propose marriage, and finally, one day, the call came. Another unforgettable moment.

I was filing away, and my cell phone vibrated in my pocket. I didn't recognize the number, but it was an 817 number, which was the Fort Worth area code. I knew that I had blitzed Fort Worth firms with resumes, just as I had Dallas, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio. Could it be? Could this call that is vibrating in my hand be my first REAL job after graduating college? I stood up from crouching at the bottom file drawer and answered it.

Indeed it was a Fort Worth firm calling on my resume. They wanted me to interview. Long story short, I did (twice), and soon enough had a job offer. Right about when all this was taking place, I got another mysterious call, this time from area code 214. Dallas. Another firm. Another interview. Another job offer. Another decision.

Easy, really. It boiled down to Dallas versus Fort Worth. No contest. I told 214 "no, thanks," and 817, "yes, sir."

Now for good-byes. I had maintained contact with several of the folks I had worked with at the firm from a couple of years before, the one that rebuffed me in 2001. I wanted to head over to their office and tell them the good news that I had found a job after graduating, and was headed to Cowtown for greener pastures. I went by unannounced, what transpired was yet another moment I will never forget. I entered the office, and who but my former boss (prince of a guy)was sitting at the reception desk, doing exactly what I couldn't say. We exchanged friendly greetings, and then these words (my best recollection) came out of his mouth:

"I got a call not too long ago from a John Brown at such and such firm in Dallas. He was asking for a reference for you."

I recognized this name from the Dallas firm that had offered me a job.

My former boss continued: "I told him, sure, I would absolutely hire him if he was asking me for a job, but he's not asking me for a job."

Did you catch that? My former boss, who had "rebuffed" me back in '01, and against whom I had been holding a grudge ever since, was essentially telling me that, now in 2003, if I had asked him for a job, he would have hired me. Not sure if my eyes got big or my mouth dropped open or what, but I was stunned. Absolutely stunned.

Please recall that my heart's desire was to get a job in Austin. Please recall that Stephanie had wanted to remain in Austin, too. There I was, standing at the front desk of the place where I could have been reporting to work again, but I had been to proud and angry to even ask the guy if he might want to give me a job this time around. I purposefully had not sent him my resume or called him as I approached graduation. I truly felt that if he wasn't willing to bring me back in 2001, I wouldn't stoop down and try to come back in 2003. Yet he said it clear as a bell, in just the way he should have. He didn't ask me straight out, "Nathan, why didn't you want to come back to work here?" I think he knew that if I had wanted to, I would have asked. But I didn't.

Occasionally I look back on that jaw-dropping moment and wonder how the intervening years may have turned out differently had I actually asked him for a job when I was graduating. We could have stayed in Austin, just like we wanted to. I could have worked with great people on good projects.

That thought of regret really stung me for while, certainly well into my first or second year into my life in Fort Worth. But since then, as the years have passed, my fondness for Austin has waned, and my fondness for Fort Worth has grown exponentially. Stephanie and I love being in Fort Worth for a number of reasons, and of course the reason we are here (or anywhre) is a matter of Divine Providence.

As such, I thank God that He would choose to use even my own sinful pride and arrogance to accomplish His purpose in our lives. My grudge and selfishness to not look for a job in the one place I may have actually had one, led us to Fort Worth, which has through many turns of events, poured blessings upon blessings into our lives.

Proverbs 17:21 says "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails."

And Proverbs 16:9 says "In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps."

I guess we'll get to the "Itch" next time.

Let The West Side Be Glad

2010-07-10T20:54:00.000-05:00

In my estimation, some of the biggest news to hit West Fort Worth in 50 years has occurred.

Starting tomorrow, Sunday, July 11th, Kincaid's on Camp Bowie will be open on Sundays!

Yes, you read that correctly. The original Kincaid's on Camp Bowie will be open on Sundays. This news probably just barely tops the news some years back when they decided to keep the place open for dinner, instead of closing down after lunch everyday.

The fact that I even had to qualify Kincaid's on Camp Bowie is something worth ruminating about. Back in the old days, that was the only Kincaid's there was. For more than thirty years, since the Charles Kincaid Grocery and Market started selling hamburgers in 1966, there was only one option to choose from. If you wanted to enjoy the best burger in the world, you went to the hallowed confluence of Camp Bowie Boulevard, Collinwood Avenue, and Eldridge Street. Now there's half a dozen to choose from (Southlake, Arlington, South Hulen, Alliance, and Weatherford), which is somewhat unfortunate.

Now don't accuse me of being some kind of West Side elitist. It has nothing to do with that. Instead, it has everything to do with my hamburger elitism. I feel like this is ground I may have already covered on the Web Log in the past, but bear with me. I can recall going to Kincaid's some fifteen years ago, when I was a young lad, too young even to drive. My friend Jess' dad, the inimitable Curly Price, would drive us the 20-some miles from Arlington to Fort Worth to enjoy hamburger heaven. The Price's introduced me to Kincaid's, and I have been doing my best to introduce others to Kincaid's ever since.

All I am saying is that for more than a decade of my life I have been patronizing this restaurant. I don't think I can say that about any other establishment. So it was with some trepidation when I heard a few years ago that Kincaid's was expanding into Southlake, then Arlington, then on, and on, and on. For me, something of the special occasion of going to Kincaid's is lost when you don't have to make your way down the brick pavers of Camp Bowie Boulevard, past the eclectic and overpriced shops, and then search for a too-scarce parking place on Collinwood, Eldridge, or El Campo. Nowadays I am certain that there are numerous folks whose only Kincaid's experience has been dining at the sanitized, strip-mall versions, out in the suburban wastelands of Tarrant County. Alas. (Full disclosure: I myself have dined at the Arlington and South Hulen locations several times, and here's why. The Arlington location is closer to Nana, which is convenient, and probably we only ever went to the South Hulen location for a Sunday lunch or dinner, as the original had never been open on Sundays.)

And in fact, something may be lost now that the Camp Bowie Kincaid's has decided to open for business on the Lord's Day. I tended to appreciate that about the Camp Bowie location, as all the others were open all week long. It does just seem to add to Kincaid's increasingly corporate identity, where profits are perhaps held in higher regard than anything else. Still, it is a family-owned business, in its 3rd generation of leadership, which is rare. It is true that the expanded locations and hours allow the entire family to run the business. One sole Kincaid's on Camp Bowie, open only for lunch six days a week, wouldn't cut the mustard for both Mr. Gentry and his two sons, who both wanted to help run the business after they came home to Fort Worth after college. So I understand, to a degree.

But mostly I understand that I have never found a better hamburger on the planet. So I'm willing to be gracious. If they want to open up on Sundays, I'll take the family over for lunch after church now and again. And in a strange twist of Providence, the little neighborhood church we attend is literally across the street from Kincaid's. Little did I know, so many years ago, that when there was no parking to be found near the restaurant, and I was forced to park a block away on El Campo, the big empty field I was parking next to would be a place I would someday take my family on church picnics on the grounds of Calvary Bible Church. I have actually learned, ironically, that the Gentry's had approached the church in years gone by about helping to building a parking lot on the grounds of the church that would provide much-needed parking for both the church and Kincaid's. I guess now that they are open on Sundays there would be a conflict of interest.

Back to my original thought. The best burger on the planet. Some would take issue with this, but I don't care. Kincaid's is my comfort food. Not that I am co-dependent or addicted or anything, I just love their burgers. I tried for 5 years to find an equivalent burger in Austin, and never did. I have tried burgers across the Metroplex, and have pretty much given up my search. Why bother?

(Sidebar: A few years ago I attempted to take Stephanie to my favorite burger place from my hometown of Arlington, which was Jim's Burgers. I drive her over there from Fort Worth, salivating all the way, and pull up on Division Street, only to see that.... Jim's had been torn down, demolished, scraped off the face of the Earth. What rot!)

To be sure, Kincaid's has far more stiffer competition now, more than ever. It is rare for the old place to win "best burger" awards in Fort Worth anymore. Society is all about "what's new" and "the latest thing." Kincaid's is decidedly old, as well it should be. And Fort Worth has changed a lot since 1966. It has even changed a lot since I moved away from Arlington back in 1998. There are now fancy burger places near TCU, on West 7th Street, in the Stockyards, Downtown, everywhere. The beautiful people hang out at Tim Love's Shack, the college crowd cheers for the purple and white at Dutch's, the Downtowners walk to lunch at Dallas-based Jake's, the Suburbanites don't know any better and take the kids to Fuddruckers, the old hippies get drunk at Fred's (which is not new, but also old), and I guess the rest of us stick with the tried-and-true Kincaid's, or may perhaps be vegetarians, which I do not recommend.

So what I guess I am saying is that what Kincaid's lacks in trendiness it makes up for in staying power. I doubt Dutch's will be around 40 years from now. Don't even get me started on Dutch's. It showed up a few years ago, stomping on top of one of the few other good burger places in town, Jon's Grill. Jon's Grill was a mainstay across from TCU, on the little stretch of University Drive that I refer to as the "mini-drag." But Jon's up and closed down with little warning. Back in 2001 Jon had committed suicide, and his sister Janis took the task of running her departed brother's popular restaurant. She fought the good fight for about five years, and rather than sell the place to someone that would end up making Jon's less and less like Jon's, she just shut it down. I admired that, though I was sorry to see it go. Jon's special sauce was indeed special, and the fries were worth every penny.

Back to Kincaid's. I'm not sure what else needs to be said. It's my favorite place in town for a hamburger, and now I'll have more opportunity to enjoy them on Sundays for lunch on Camp Bowie. For that I am glad. As well should be the rest of the West Side.

Past, Present, Future

2010-06-19T21:41:00.000-05:00

I had a good idea for a Web Log post the other day, but now it escapes me.

So instead, we'll just be stuck with whatever falls out of my brain and hits the keyboard, good or bad.

Let's try for a few blurbs focused on various topics of my own choosing.

Topic 1: On current events:

I suppose that black crude continues to gush out of the ocean floor at an alarming rate. That said, I'm not so sure I agree with calling this catastrophe an "Oil Spill." To me, a "spill" implies a container of fluid that has been turned over, punctured, or otherwise damaged such that the liquid escapes the container. I think the Exxon Valdez disaster qualified as a "spill". But this ridiculous thing going on in the Gulf right now doesn't fall into that category. I think of it more as a massive "leak", or "gusher", which happens to be a fun word to use. I mean, when you turn your water faucet on full blast, which would be a way of assimilating the current condition on the sea bed, you don't say that water is "spilling" out of the faucet. That's just not the right term.

It seems to me that this gusher might have been more easily contained and plugged up if we could actually get real people down to the ocean floor to work on the leak. Having to rely on robots is tedious, and thus far, ineffective. Can we not put Tony Hayward in a diving helmet, send him down with a big stopper and make him earn his salary? Obviously this would not work, though it would perhaps be gratifying to send Tony down there anyway just to see what happens. Obviously the pressure is far too great at the bottom of the sea for people to survive, with current diving technology. BUT, it also seems to me that given enough funding and time, we could have figured it out by now, if it had been a priority. I seem to recall reading about something happening back in the 1960s when real human beings where propelled by rockets, exited the Earth's atmosphere, and put on special suits and were able to "walk" around in outer space. Clearly there is very little pressure in outer space, but the point is that a long time ago the poindexters over at NASA put their brains to the task of figuring out how to:

1) Get a real person out into space

2) Allow a real person to survive in a low-pressure environment

So why has no one called a bunch of poindexters together, and tasked them with the task of essentially doing the same thing the space program did, but insead, with the forbidding environment at the bottom of the ocean? I am certain it could be done, given the funding and time. While I'm at it, would it really be that much more far fetched to attempt to colonize the bottom of the ocean, rather than the Moon, Mars, or some other planetary body in outer space? Who says that colonizing outer space makes more sense than colonizing the sea floor? Seems to me we are missing out on a potentially hugely expensive governmental program that could employ thousands of folks, burn billions of dollars in research, and eventually allow some guy in a funny looking suit to plant a soggy American flag at the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Sidebar: After a quick check on Wikipedia, it would appear that we are closer than I had realized. Apparently, also back in the 1960s, a craft called Trieste sounded the Challenger Deep. Interesting. But I notice that no one got out and hit any golf balls, nor drove around in a dune buggy.

On an unrelated note regarding current events, in elementary school we used to have a particular day of the week in "Language Arts" class that we were required to present a "Current Event" to the class. This consisted of each student clipping a newspaper article out of the (typically) Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and telling the class what's going on in the world. I wonder if this still occurs today in "Language Arts" class? Probably not, at least not in the same format. Since no one subscribes to the Star-Telegram anymore, I doubt any kids even know what a newspaper is these days. Maybe the students print something off the interweb, or just hold up their iPhones to show the class that Nick Jonas or whoever just got his third piercing. OK, enough on current events. I apologize for referring to Jonas brother in a Web Log post. Let the record show that I had to again consult Wikipedia to verify that in fact "Nick" was one of the said brothers. Could have been Steve or Walter, so I had to check.

Topic 2: On past events:

Sidebar: Is it not the pinnacle of irony that my previous blurb was regarding BOTH current and past events? I didn't plan that to happen, but consider my mind blown.

It was determined tonight that I have known Stephanie for more than 9 years. Nine years! We met in the Spring of 2001. Next Spring (2011), will be the "Ten Year Anniversary" of our knowing each other. It was also determined tonight that we have already produced more children than I had originally agreed upon. Sometime in 2004, during our pre-marital counseling, or maybe late 2003, on a drive to Austin from Fort Worth, we had probably one of the lowest moments of our relationship. Perhaps the lowest yet. I don't think we have encountered a more difficult time since that strange trip to Austin for counseling. We were of couse engaged, and our wedding was rapidly approaching in May of 2004. Up to that point I had been less than forthright regarding the quantity of children our upcoming union may or may not produce. That trip to see our friend and minister Bobby Giles opened our eyes to a looming disaster, if Stephanie and I didn't come to terms with our differing views on having children. Come to terms we did, in a manner of speaking. I agreed to two children; Stephanie held fast at four. Those were our terms. Which was better than my previous terms of "zero children" and Stephanie's terms of "then you had better find someone else to marry." She drives a hard bargain, and so far her terms are winning out. We blew past our second child this year by adding a third, and with many years of fertility left, Lord willing, we may blow past her terms, too. Just today we were watching The Sound of Music with Lucy and Ben, and there were all seven Von Trapp children on the screen, and Stephanie looks at me dead serious and says, "See, that's not really that many kids." Hmmm...that's more than we both agreed to, combined!

Topic 3: On future events:

I will have to get back to you on this - let's wait and see what happens.

To Blog Or Not To Blog, That Is The Question

2010-04-27T21:39:00.001-05:00

So who has time to blog anymore?

I would say that I don't, but that would not be a true statement, as I am blogging right now. But in general I think it is true that I have less time to blog than ever.

But that's OK.

I have an adoring (and adored) wife, three fabulous children, a gracious and faithful God, and a neat-o extended family who deserve far more time than this silly web log. So I guess I went on an unanticipated hiatus.

Call it a sabbatical.

And I realized something. Two things, really.

1) In general, one of the reasons I liked blogging was to see the comments that people would make. But lately the comments tended to just be folks in my immediate or nearly-immediate family. So why was I using this impersonal Internet tool to communicate with my family? Should I not just pick up the phone and talk to them? Why did I want to see the comments in the first place? Was I blogging for myself or others? Was my original reason for not having a blog proving my point, that is...

"Is there not inherently some pride or arrogance in having a blog? Not necessarily sinful pride, but seriously, do all these bloggers really think that other people (be they a friend or total stranger) out there on the Internet want to read their thoughts? A blog is really like a journal or diary, only open to the public. What a strange concept. Used to be, personal thoughts and ramblings were closely guarded, to be kept under lock and key. But now every one's personal thoughts and ramblings are put out into cyberspace for all to see. That just seems weird."

I think there was a sinful pride creeping in, in fact. My desire to see what others thought of my posts was fairly strong and constant.

2) Specifically, I realized this was coming to a head in my now discontinued series "The Death of Death." Two things further manifested themselves to me:

a) I should dispense with my theological rantings, and leave people to examine John Owen's work for themselves. No one needed me to be an intermediary to understand Owen.

b) I ran across this very, very illuminating point from Wayne Grudem, regarding the extent of the atonement, which was the subject of my Death of Death Series. The following quote comes from Grudem's Systematic Theology, page 603.

"Although Reformed people have sometimes made belief in particular redemption a test of doctrinal orthodoxy, it would be healthy to realize that Scripture itself never singles this out as a doctrine of major importance, nor does it once make it the subject of any explicit theological discussion. Our knowledge of the issue comes only from incidental references to it in passages whose concern is with other doctrinal or practical matters. In fact, this is really a question that probes into the inner counsels of the Trinity and does so in an area in which there is very little direct scriptural testimony - a fact that should cause us to be cautious . . . Perhaps that is why the apostles such as John and Peter and Paul, in their wisdom, placed almost no emphasis on this question at all. And perhaps we would do well to ponder their example."

So indeed my Death of Death Series is dead. Read Owen's book yourself if you are interested, or another work on the subject. Myself, I have put Owen aside for the time being, and am trying to finish up Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, which has taken me far too long to complete. But I'll get there.

So to answer the question at hand, to blog or not to blog? I give a two-fold response:

Some days, yes. Most days, no.

The End of an Era, Post Script

2010-02-06T21:05:00.000-06:00

Since posting Part 2 a while ago, two things have occurred to me, related to our travels in the Malibu.

I noted that the Malibu took Stephanie and I to Arkansas to meet some family before we became engaged to be married. This is actually not true. We began the trip to Arkansas in the Malibu, but the Malibu only made a little more than one leg of the trip. This much had slipped my mind, until something jogged my memory a day or so ago. Here's what really happened:

Stephanie and I started out in the Malibu in Austin, drove to Arlington to stay a night with my parents (I think), and then set out the next day for Arkansas. That's when trouble hit. And hit was the operative word. We were barely an hour into the trip, headed north on 121 through suburban Dallas. At that time, this portion of 121 was a high-speed divided highway (60 mph +/-) but with intersections with red lights. This type of highway is my absolute un-favorite today, and was my un-favorite then, even before our unfortunate crash. Why anyone (TXDOT) thinks it is a good idea to have cars hurtling down the road at 70 mph (which is the speed cars travel when the posted limit is 60), and then interrupt traffic with red lights is beyond me. As I see it (and experienced it), it seems utterly unsafe. Today I am glad that I don't have to drive this type of highway hardly ever, except for a stretch of the trip to Rockport, on a portion of 183 south of Austin. And that part of 183 is not even divided. It is four lanes of traffic at 70 mph with a yellow center stripe. Not only do you have the hazard of the red lights at high speeds, but also the danger of being about 10 feet from a head-on collision at any time.

Anyway, back to 121, on the way to Arkansas. I was driving; Stephanie was in the front passenger seat. Thus far it had been an uneventful trip. As we approached the intersection of 121 and Denton Tap Road, the light was green. I was proceeding with caution, and in fact I began to speed up as I approached the intersection, to make sure I would make the light, in case it turned yellow. The next few seconds were a blur, but remain fixed in my memory. I recall entering the intersection, and just for an exceeding short moment, I recall seeing a vehicle coming at us from the right side. WHAM! The other vehicle broadsides us in the middle of the intersection. Impact occurred at the rear passenger door/quarter panel area, and the Malibu began to spin around as it continued hurtling forward at a high rate of speed. I recall several thoughts from those harrowing few seconds as we spun around and around:

1) Dear God, please don't let the car flip over.

2) Dear God, please don't let the car flip over.

3) Dear God, please don't let the car flip over.

4) and secondarily, Dear God, please don't let another car hit us while we are spinning out of control.

I cannot say with certainly how many times the Malibu spun around. The car eventually came to rest some hundreds of feet beyond the intersection, facing the wrong way, that is, with our eyeballs looking right at the on-coming traffic that we used to be travelling with. I saw several cars whiz around us, and eventually traffic slowed down and pretty much stopped.

As we were spinning all I could think to do (other than the prayers noted above) was to hold on tight to the wheel and stand on the brakes. Not sure if either of those actions were correct or useful, but at least I was doing something to stop the car, right? Once the car came to rest, I did three things simultaneously:

1) turned off the ignition

2) asked Stephanie if she was OK

3) wondered if I had just run a red light and this was my fault

To the praise of His glorious grace, both she and I were perfectly fine. Not one injury, not one whiplash, not one anything. Also, it was of course very quickly made clear that I had not run the light, but the other guy must have, as I was still seeing traffic come past us that were coming the way we just came.

A city of Coppell police cruiser approached the scene of the accident almost immediately. I think he happened to be headed northbound on Denton Tap, either saw the accident himself, or saw the immediate aftermath, and pulled over to assess the situation.

I think I recall on-coming traffic stopping enough for Stephanie and I to get out of the Malibu, and we both walked over the the curb and stood there, shaking. I looked some distance away on Denton Tap, and could see the guy who ran his red light and hit us. It was a dad driving his daughter in their mini-van, and I learned soon enough that both of them were also perfectly fine, but that he had been talking on his cell phone when he ran the light. (insert early moral to the story here)

The Malibu was in sad shape, though from where we were standing on the side of the road, we couldn't see the point of impact. Some unknown fluid(s) were leaking out of the bottom of the car. Stephanie and I probably marveled for a moment at what had just occurred, and marveled again that we were both OK. At some point I recall a few passers-by rolling down their car windows and asking if we were OK, as well as telling us that the other guy had ran the light. This probably happened while we were still in the car; I'm not sure.

The cop came over to talk to us, and after that it was all the "normal" we-just-had-a-wreck stuff. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and called my parents to tell them what had just happened. Long story short, my Dad was gracious to let us borrow his vehicle for us to drive to Arkansas. Our trip resumed several hours later, and it was a harrowing experience again to drive through the accursed intersection of Denton Tap and 121. But the fact that we saw the Malibu's loose bumper off on the side of the road lightened the mood. I suppose the bumper was never recovered. Even years later we still had only one license plate on the Malibu, which we had to take from the front of the car and put on the new back bumper.

I won't delve into the gory details of our dealings with insurance, car repair, rental car, and so forth. Except for one caveat: Stephanie and I still wonder why the car wasn't "totaled." It should have been, in our opinion, as the frame was indeed bent (among many other problems). The adjuster's estimate of repair ended up being short, and we believe that if the actual amount that it cost to repair it was known ahead of time, it would have been totaled. Oh, well. The Malibu was given a second life.

This was (and remains) the only car-on-car collision I have experienced as a driver. My collisions have tended to be with stationary objects, including a bollard at a Braum's drive thru, and a column supporting our carport when Stephanie and I lived on 7th Street.

As I said, we continued the trip to Arkansas in my Dad's Montero, and much later than expected we arrived at our destination, with quite a story to tell.

Secondly, in Part 2 I mentioned the Malibu took myself and three other companions to Disney World. It occurred to me that this was not the first time I had gone to Disney World in a Malibu. Indeed, when I was a wee lad of 3 years old, my family went on a vacation from Nacogdoches to Orlando in our family station wagon, which happened to be of the Chevrolet Malibu variety. This station wagon was the first car I think I have real memories of. Navy blue. Vinyl seats. Getting to ride in the "way back."

The only other thing I will say about this is that I cannot imagine taking two small children on a 2,000 mile road trip. I don't have any real memories of the ride to Orlando itself, but I'm sure my parents do. Not sure of they are good memories or bad.

The End of an Era, Part 2

2010-01-27T23:01:00.000-06:00

In general, Bus People appeared to come from many walks of life. I cannot truthfully say that they appeared to come from all walks of life. Bus People just seemed to be normal working people, and sometimes their families. Unfortunately, I don't know too much about my Bus People because I tended to keep to myself on board the bus. I don't believe I was ever unfriendly to my Bus People. I just tended to mind my own business, but I would gladly speak up if someone wanted to talk. I was not playing the role of investigative journalist, trying to learn all about Bus Peoples' lives. I knew very few of their names, and sometimes only knew where they may have worked, or occasionally where they lived. In no particular order, here are my Bus People, my fellow riders on the Route Two:

The young lady who rode with her infant daughter. The little girl was always in the stroller, and they were parked in the back of the bus where the stroller wouldn't obstruct too many people's paths. I only ever saw them in the mornings, between 7 and 7:30 am. Never saw them coming home. I don't know their names, or have forgotten, and I never knew where they were going. They were already on the bus when I got on, and remained on board when I got off. All I could wonder was, "I don't think we could ever manage to get a baby up, dressed, and on the bus before 7 am." Somehow this mom did it every day.

The middle aged guy who worked at Oncor Electric Delivery. He had buzzed cut gray hair turning white, and wore sunglasses. I was always struck by this constant supply of bottled water. His backpack had a special attachment meant for holding a little bottle, and it was loaded every day, morning and evening, with Ozarka. He was a well-hydrated man, if nothing else.

Anthony. He previously served in the military, and now worked for AT&T. He was married and had a grown daughter in college far off in North Dakota or something. He attended church and for a while I would see him working on some kind of Bible Study on his laptop.

The crocheting man. This guy was probably in his forties, and everyday he rode his bike to pick up the bus at West 7th and University. He paid cash for his fare and promptly sat down in his seat at the front, right behind the driver, and pulled out his latest crocheting project. With his blaze orange vest still on, his helmet still strapped to his head, his crocheting needles would fly to and fro as the bus sped along.

Mary Hottop. I only know her by name because I read the badge around her neck. She worked for the City of Fort Worth, I think, and read paperback novels on the way home every day. I would never have imagined the last name "Hottop."

Noah. He was about my age, and worked for the City of Fort Worth Planning Department. Noah was the only other Bus Person that I worked with professinally, I think. He could provide all sorts of statistics on neighborhoods, zoning, and the like, and I made use of his services for some research on one of my architectural projects in Fort Worth.

The man in the Goodwill cap. This gentleman sat in the same seat everyday on the early bus, which I picked up at 5:45 AM on Camp Bowie. He was exceedingly friendly, always ready with a smile and a wave. I think he worked for a Goodwill location somewhere, and was always in possession of a "huge" ice chest of a lunch box. I could have fit my breakfast, lunch, and dinner, into that box. He must have eaten well everyday for lunch.

The man who talked to himself, sometimes very expressively with hand gestures. This character also rode the early bus and was in constant communication with either himself, or someone else that I couldn't see at the moment. Often he seemed angry, and his arm waving and vigorous pointing gave further evidence of this. Stranger than all this, I could never determine what he was saying. He had a language all his own.

The disabled ladies. When I caught the bus at 7:00-ish at Hulen and Camp Bowie, there would usually be a group of five ladies who suffered from some kind of mental and/or physical handicap. The certainly had a degree of independence, as their habit was to take the Route 25 up Hulen to Camp Bowie, and then connect to the Route 2. These ladies were fully ambulatory, and able to converse with each other, though I couldn't always make out their words. I never learned where they had come from, nor what their final destination was, but they always rode with lunch boxes and often backpacks. It was not uncommon for at least one of them to take her seat on the bus, and immediately break open her lunch and start eating.

Randall. I know Randall's name because his blue shirt indicated such. He worked for the City of Fort Worth Parks and Community Services Department, and wore brown-shaded aviator glasses rain or shine. I never saw his eyeballs. He would usually pick up the bus on Camp Bowie near the Kimbell, which I never really understood. He carried no bag, lunch, or briefcase, so it didn't seem like he was on his way to work, but it also seemed odd that he may have already been working in that area, as there are not any city parks in the vicinity. He remained an enigma behind those mysterious shades.

Beer for breakfast man. This man rode his bike to pick up Route 2 at Hulen and Camp Bowie. As soon as he dismounted his bike, he would pull out his brown-bagged tall boy and start drinking. By the time the bus came he would invariably polish it off with one last big swig, toss it in the nearby trash can, then put his bike on the bus' rack. He listened to headphones most of the time, so perhaps he liked his early morning booze set to music.

Reprographics lady. This kind lady worked at City Hall, in the Reprographics office. This is where large scale drawings and sets of specifications are produced. Often she would board the bus with a trash bag full of something, which I always imagined was stuff to donate to charity. And when it rained, she was never without an umbrella. I wish I could have said the same for myself.

The obese conspiracy theorist. I didn't see this man but a few times, but his routine was always the same. He parked his wide girth up near the front of the bus, and seemed eager to talk loudly to anyone nearby willing to listen. He had a theory about most things political and finanical. He never painted a pretty picture about the state of things, and seemed convinced that multiple parties were working together to bring about everyone's demise. I avoided him.

Ultra talkative lady. Another real talker that rode up front was a lady who worked somewhere in the Fort Worth Club building. I think she was a file clerk / data entry person, based on the many stories she regaled us with. I will say she was always eager to say hello to me when I got on the bus, and seemed genuinely happy to spend time with her fellow Bus People.

Diane. She has a son who lives in Round Rock, and she worked at Radio Shack headquarters. Diane was friendly and looked like she would be a good Grandma. Not sure if she had grandkids or not.

Elizabeth. Elizabeth rode the bus everyday with her seeing-eye dog. She was a writer for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and I believe she was completely blind. Not a few of us downtown workers and Bus People knew of Liz, because we would see her walking the sidewalks downtown with her dog. I am still not quite sure how a dog can be trained to help someone cross a street at a crosswalk, based on the walk signal. Unlike in Austin, in Fort Worth there are no audible alarms that coincide with the walk signal, which would help the dog know when to safely lead his master out into the street. At the end of the day, Elizabeth got off the bus at Camp Bowie near Frost Bank, and required the bus driver's assistance to cross to the other side of Camp Bowie. The routine involved the driver stopping the bus, getting out, allowing Liz to hold onto his arm, and walking her across the Boulevard until she and her dog were at the sidewalk that would ultimately lead to her house. If Liz got on my bus at the end of the day, I would always pray that the driver knew the routine. If it was a new driver, there was a good chance Liz might not get home safely, or at all. On one occasion, a new driver stopped the bus at her stop, and Liz and her dog went out of the bus' front door and paused, expecting the driver to get up and help her across Camp Bowie. The driver didn't budge, and looked confused. Liz started to speak up, but the driver was eager to close the door and move on. I ran up to the driver and told him what he needed to do. He was incredulous at first, and didn't want to help out. He told me he was not allowed to get out of his seat. I told him all the other drivers do it, and Liz confirmed this. Apparently the guy had a heart after all, for he shook his head, got up, and helped her across the Boulevard. When my stop came up a few blocks further on, the driver thanked me for telling him, but he also said that there are special on-demand buses for the mobility impaired, and Liz should ride those buses, not the regular routes. I told him the other drivers don't have any problem assisting her, and he shook his head again and shut the door as I got off. On another occasion, Michael, an experienced driver well acquainted with Liz, missed her stop and just kept driving. I ran up to him, told him he missed her stop, and that we were now well beyond Frost Bank. Then Michael did something I have never experienced aboard a bus. He hit his turn signal, found the next intersection, and pulled a wide U-turn across Camp Bowie and headed back to where Liz normally gets off. In this situation, we found ourselves already on the correct side of the street, which meant she didn't need help crossing. After she was on her way, Michael pulled another U-turn to get us going the right direction again and we were off. I have never seen my fellow Bus People so confused when he whipped around that first U-turn.

The Wide-Eyed-Bibliomaniac. Of two things I am sure of, regarding this rotund woman: she likes her radio, and she likes her books. I know she likes her radio because she wore noise-cancelling radio headphones everyday, coming and going. This naturally tended to dissuade me and our fellow Bus People from talking to her, and I think she liked it that way. I rode the bus many, many times with this woman, and I never once heard her speak to anyone. I also know she likes her books. She carried with her everyday a big canvas tote bag from Half Price Books with the above phrase printed on it. Just give me my books and radio, and leave me alone.

The liberal. I'm sure there was a good mix of political views among my Bus People. But this long-haired elderly man was vocal about his liberal views. He was actually somewhat my neighbor, living a couple of blocks up my street. This meant that on occasion, if we were on the same bus, we would deboard at the same stop. This meant I had two choices: 1) try and cross Camp Bowie before he can, to get some distance between us, and assume he can't catch up with me, or 2) be a friendly Bus Person and walk with him for a couple of blocks and listen to his liberal rantings. I always wimped out and chose option two. I just couldn't bring myself to run away from an old veteran with oxygen in his nose, despite his stupid political ideas.

The "Sucker Man." In its own way, the Sucker Incident was one of the strangest I have seen on the bus. I saw this guy ride a handful of times, and he was kind of creepy. Sucker Man was overweight, probably in his forties, wore tinted glasses that never quite cleared up, and just had an odd look about him. One day the bus was crammed full and he and I were up front, standing room only. I saw that he is sucking on a sucker, just one of those cheap bank or doctor office giveaway suckers. He also had a couple of others in his free hand, still in the wrappers. Soon enough a young woman got on the bus, and had to stand pretty close to both of us, as there wasn't much room left on board. We got moving again, and Sucker Man looked at the young lady, held out one of his extra suckers, and asked, "Wanna sucker?" The young lady simply replied, "OK," and took the sucker from his hand. She opened it up, and started sucking on it. Sucker Man and the young lady looked at each other, he shrugged his shoulders, and they continued to enjoy their suckers. I just don't know what was more strange: 1) the fact that this adult man was riding the bus holding onto some suckers, while sucking on his own, and in turn offered one to another passenger, or 2) the fact that the young lady accepted the offer without any hesitation. Maybe I'm the only one who refuses candy from strangers, and teaches my kid to do the same.

Roy. Of all my Bus People, Roy was my favorite. Not just because he was a fellow Longhorn. It is true that he attended the University of Texas years ago, and even now he showed his Longhorn pride by wearing a UT cap every day to work. Roy worked in the basement of the Bank of America building, in the Fort Worth Oil Information Library (OIL). He was librarian. I don't know a whole lot about the OIL, but I believe it is a repository of maps, logs, periodicals, and other data related to oil fields and drilling. Roy had this deep voice that would have been great for radio, and he was glad to expound on any subject. He also loved having two eggs, scrambled, for breakfast at the 7th Street Cafe. Roy was perpetually interested in the projects I was working on, and the fact that I lived in an "old" house. He grew up in a really old house in Glen Rose, which he said was impossible to keep warm. Maybe after experiencing that in his youth, he wouldn't grasp why anyone would want to live in an "old" house now. It's hard to pin down exactly what was so enjoyable about Roy. He was just a great companion on the bus, something like riding with your grandfather, only unlike any grandfather I ever had. I'm not sure if Roy has any grandchildren of his own. I hope he does, and I hope someday they get to ride the bus with him.

Perhaps if I was more outgoing, I would have met more people like Roy on the bus. I'm sure that there are many other great Bus People on Route 2, and all the other Routes across Fort Worth. Maybe someday I'll be fortunate to join my Bus People again. I wouldn't mind at all, and if past performance is any indicator of future success, the Malibu can't last that much longer.

The End of an Era, Part 1

2010-01-25T22:52:00.000-06:00

"The Death of Death" Series will resume after this two part post.

As some of you know, the times are changing in our lives. Out with the old, in with the new. The "new" that has come into our lives is of course a baby, Samuel. He was born almost a week ago. He is not, however, the subject of this post.

Instead, this post is about the "old" that has departed from our lives recently - my habit of riding the bus to work. Perhaps ironically, Samuel's arrival and my quitting the bus are related. It kind of went like this:

1) Sam's coming

2) He will need a car seat, if ever we choose to take him someplace with us in the car

3) That would mean 3 car seats crammed into the back seat of a Chevy Malibu

4 We knew this day was coming, but didn't think it would come this soon

5) Let's see if we can cram 3 car seats into the back seat of a Chevy Malibu

6) Never mind, that seems like a lot of work, and inconvenient

7) Let's go ahead and just get a mini-van

I say "kind of" because it was not that cut-and-dried. The process that I distilled into seven little bullet points was a difficult process to go through. Eventually we came to realize that God was being very gracious to us and allowing the way for us to take step number seven sooner than we thought we might be able to, so we took that step.

A little more than a month ago, I did something I had never done before in my life: I bought an automobile. Some might wonder how a man could live in these United States for thirty years without ever purchasing a vehicle. I was hoping I could hold out longer than that. Part of me wanted to get Stephanie to do the deal herself and get it all done in her name, so I could boast years and years from now, "You know, son, I have never purchased a vehicle in my life."

But instead Stephanie watched the kids at home and I went out and did the deal. It wasn't as painful as I thought it might be. I think my eager salesman, Will, was younger than I was, and perhaps unwisely I was very up front with him that I had never purchased a vehicle before.

But I digress. One of our decision points along the way, sandwiched somewhere between steps 5 and 6 above, was "Do we keep the Malibu, or get rid of it?" Keeping it meant I would quit the bus and drive the Malibu to and from work like a regular schmo. Getting rid of it meant I would continue to "bus it" to work everyday. Eventually we decided it was worth more as a vehicle for me to drive to work, than the $500 we could have gotten for it trade-in. (Sidebar: Stephanie maintains it is worth far more than half a G, but I am steadfast in my low estimation of the Malibu's worth, which just rolled over 119,000 miles.) Truth be told, for all the trips to visit Pat Murphy's Auto Service to replace alternators, starters, fuel pumps, head gaskets, water pumps, and emissions systems, the Malibu has been a fine specimen of Detroit craftsmanship. (Sidebar: back in the 2009 "bail-out" days, when GM was on the brink, I was nearly praying for the Federal Government to just let GM die. I would have cackled with delight upon hearing the final nail seal the coffin on one of the worst car makers on the planet. Honestly, I recall in the late 90s/early 2000s watching Chevrolet television commercials advertising their hottest new model, the re-made Malibu! This was the tag line: "The car you knew America could build." I think the point Chevrolet was trying to make was that GM had finally figured out how to build a car worthy to compete with a Camry or Accord. Finally! Patriots unite around this marvelous new machine, this Malibu, which will save the American auto industry! In reality, after being a Malibu driver for some years now, I actually see a sad irony in Chevrolet's tag line from years gone by. I must admit, "Yes, GM, I very well knew that America could build a terrible car. Thank you very much.")

Still, the Malibu has in fact travelled with Stephanie and I through many momentous occasions of our lives. It was Stephanie's car when we were dating in college. It took us on quite a few dates in and around Austin. It took Stephanie, Josh, Tiffany, and I to Disney World in 2002 (2,260 miles round trip). It took Stephanie and I to Arkansas to meet some of my family before we were engaged to be married (806 miles round trip). It was the vehicle that was shoe-polished, decorated, and whisked us away from our wedding, and then on to our honeymoon. It has taken us on a bevy of trips to Rockport (790 miles), several to Sugar land (550 miles), one trip to Tennessee (1,010 miles), another to Arkansas (720 miles), and countless miles around Austin, Fort Worth, and the surrounding environs. It was the vehicle we took Lucy home from the hospital in. It has always been nearby, or if not, it has been in the shop.

All that said, once we acquired the mini-van, we decided to keep the Malibu.

In turn, I quit the bus on December 16, 2009. But it had been a good ride.

Off and on for nearly five years I had relied on The T for my transportation to and from work, as well as transportation to various and sundry other locales as the need arose, such as the dentist's office, or the mechanic's shop to pick up the ailing Malibu. Riding the bus was a fairly familiar thing for me. Going to school in Austin, it was unheard of to drive to campus, so I utilized Capital Metro on a daily basis for my commute down Speedway into campus. The T's bus service is a poor runner-up to Cap Metro, but it works, if you're willing to plan ahead and accept delays from time to time.

Moreso than the logistics of riding the bus in Fort Worth, which could be an entirely different post, or an extra long Sidebar if I was in the mood, my real intent here is to consider my fellow bus riders. An old colleague of mine who had ridden the bus years back fondly referred his fellow bus riders as "Bus People." This phrase was in no way meant to be derogatory towards bus riders; after all, both he and I were counted among them.

Still, a stereotype exists about Bus People. Having been a bus person I can speak freely about this. In my backward hometown of Arlington, Texas, where there is no public transportation system, the stereotype reigns supreme. Really in Arlington it is more than a stereotype - it is a prejudice. The citizens of Arlington by and large pride themselves on the fact that theirs is the largest city in these United States without a public transportation system. As I recall, growing up there, Arlington was not opposed to a bus system itself, but really it was the Bus People they were opposed to. Bus People being, of course, drug addicts, the homeless, degenerates, ne'er do wells, and other reprobate souls who do not own cars. Arlington is a car city par one. It could be the poster child for Jane Holtz Kay's Asphalt Nation, Duany/Plater-Zyberg's Suburban Nation, and Jim Kunstler's The Geography of Nowhere all rolled into one. If you didn't have a car in Arlington, you were literally stuck. No need to provide sidewalks as there were no pedestrians. My biases towards Urbanism have been discussed elsewhere on this blog, so I won't prolong this rant. Just suffice it to say that in the minds of many, there is the idea that a group of individuals known as Bus People exist, and a bias against them very much exists, especially in this part of the country, where population density is low and the car is king.

Often when it was made known to others that I rode the bus, one of two things would happen:

1) Some people would wrinkle their eyebrows, and say something like "are you afraid you'll get stabbed by Bus People?" I would roll my eyes and explain the fact that in nearly five years of bus riding I had only ever once or twice been concerned for my safety, and not because I was being directly threatened or in danger, but only because a couple of other Bus People were getting rowdy and bullying each other. It was always just loud words and posturing. Never any real action. Still there was this look in their eyes that I was crazy for taking my life in my own hands every time I stepped aboard.

OR . . .

2) Some people's eyes would get big and say something like, "Oh, cool, I wish I could ride the bus to work!" I would simply ask them, "Then why don't you?" Not expecting to be pressed on the subject, they would begin to enumerate various reasons why they were unable to ride the bus, even though they very much wanted to. Invariably the main reason would be that they lived too far from downtown, or didn't live on a bus route. I would suggest they simply move closer to downtown, live on a bus route, and get rid of their car. Then they could fulfill their wish of riding the bus to work. I would then get a wrinkled eye brow and something like, "Whatever, I can't do that." And there was the look in their eyes that I was crazy for actually choosing to live near downtown and and have only one car.

Perhaps people didn't really think I was crazy for riding the bus, but certainly eccentric. That may be the case. But what is certain is that we Bus People are in the minority. In my years of bus riding, I have worked in two different buildings downtown, the Bank of America Building and Carter Burgess Plaza. At the BOA Building, I was aware of one other person who worked in the building and rode the bus. At CB Plaza, I was aware of two other people who worked in the building and rode the bus. Granted, there could have been more, but that was all I could determine. In buildings of their size, where hundreds or perhaps a couple of thousand people work, Bus People were indeed in the minority.

But let it also be said that within that relatively small group of Bus People, there was a good deal of diversity. This is the subject of this two-part post. Everything up to now has been introduction. Who were these Bus People? Who did I spend my fifteen minutes in the morning and fifteen minutes in the afternoon with? Where did they come from? Where were they going? I only have partial answers to these questions, but I will share what I do know in Part 2.

The Death of Death, I.II

2010-01-13T22:25:00.000-06:00

From Chapter 2, "Of the nature of an end in general, and some distinctions about it":

Chapter 2 is only three pages long, but it's taken me a couple of days to digest what Owen is saying. It appears he is really just setting the stage for what will come next, in Chapter 3 and beyond.

I. "The end of any thing is that which the agent intendeth to accomplish in and by the operation..." (48)

"So the end which Noah proposed unto himself in the building of the ark was the preservation of himself and others." (48)

"That which the agent doth, or whereto he applieth himself, for the compassing his proposed end, is called the means..." (48)

II. "Between both these, end and means, there is this relation, that... they are mutually causes of another. The end is the first, principal, moving cause of the whole." (48)

"The means are all those things which are used for the attaining of the end proposed..." (49)

"Their existence is for the end's sake, and the end hath its rise out of them, following them either morally as their desert, or naturally as their fruit and product." (49)

IV. "The end which God effected by the death of Christ was the satisfaction of his justice; the end for whose sake he did it was either supreme, or his own glory; or subordinate, ours with him." (50).

The Death of Death, I.I

2010-01-10T16:00:00.000-06:00

From Chapter One:

The end (goal) of the death of Christ includes these two aspects:

I) What the Father intended in it

II) What was effectually fulfilled and accomplished by it

I) The Father's intention in the death of Christ is bound up in the very reason Christ came to Earth. The reason is this: "to save that which was lost," Matt. 18:11. Jesus came to save sinners, which is the Father's intention in His Son's death. Also seen in Luke 19:10 and 1 Tim. 1:15.

Who are these sinners He came to save? Matt. 20:28 says Jesus came to "give his life as a ransom for many." Other verses use the word "us" to distinguish those in the church from the rest of the world, as in Gal. 1:4. Ephesians 5:25-27 speaks of Jesus coming to give Himself for "the church," which also distinguishes that group of people from the rest of the world. Titus 2:14 speaks of those being saved as a people for God's own possession.

II) According to Owen, five main things where accomplished by Christ's death:

a) Reconciliation with God - "removing and slaying the enmity that was between Him and us." Romans 5:10, 2 Cor. 5:19, Eph 2:14-16

b) Justification - "by taking away the guilt of sins, procuring remission and pardon of them, redeeming us from their power, with the curse and wrath due unto us for them..." Heb 9:12, Gal. 3:13, 1 Peter 2:24, Rom 3:23-25, Col. 1:14.

c) Sanctification - "by the purging away of the uncleanness and pollution of our sins, renewing in us the image of God, and supplying us with the graces of the Spirit of holiness." Heb 9;14, 1 John 1:7, Heb 1:3, Eph. 5:25-27

d) Adoption - "with that evangelical liberty and all these glorious privileges which appertain to the sons of God." Gal. 4:4-5

d) Glorification - "neither do the effects of the death of Christ rest here; they leave us not until we are settled in heave in glory and immortality for ever." Eph. 1:14, Heb. 9:15

"The sum of all is - the death and blood-shedding of Jesus Christ hath wrought, and doth effectually procure, for all those that are concerned in it, eternal redemption, consisting in grace here and glory hereafter."

But a third point is made:

III) For those who hold to the general ransom, "then one of these two things will necessarily follow: - that either,

"First, God and Christ failed of their end proposed, and did not accomplish that which they intended... which to assert seems to us blasphemously injurious to the wisdom, power, and perfection of God, as likewise derogatory to the worth and value of the death of Christ;

"Or else that all men, all the posterity of Adam, must be saved, purged, sanctified, and glorified; which surely they will not maintain, at least the Scripture and the woeful experience of millions will not allow."

"They must and do deny that God or his Son had any such absolute aim or end in the death or blood-shedding of Jesus Christ, or that any such thing was immediately procured and purchased by it, as we before recounted; but that God intended nothing, neither was any thing effected by Christ - that no benefit ariseth to any immediately by his death but what is common to all and every soul, though never so cursedly unbelieving here and eternally damned hereafter, until an act of some, not procured for them by Christ, (for if it were, why have they it not all alike) to wit, faith, do distinguish them from others."

I suppose in my own words I might sum up Owen's conclusion to Chapter One like this:

If the general ransom view is accepted, then you must also accept one of these two outcomes: either Jesus' death was not effective (God's intent failed), or conversely every man will be saved. The limited atonement view shows that Jesus' death was entirely effective to secure salvation for each and every one of His elect, and no more. It guarantees that those elect will some day be given the new birth by the Holy Spirit, and in turn come to faith in Christ. The general ransom view shows that Jesus' death may have made it possible for some (or all) men to be saved, but it was not necessarily effective in making it happen. As the general ransom view leaves it entirely up to the individual to make the decision to follow Christ, it would be plausible that absolutely no one might ever choose to be saved, or that perhaps absolutely everyone would. But in any event, His death wouldn't guarantee salvation for anyone, which would make his death meaningless.

The Death of Death

2010-01-09T21:52:00.000-06:00

I think I'll start blogging my way through a book I received for Christmas, John Owen's The Death of Death in the Death of Christ.

But first, perhaps a little background is in order.

A bit of background on Mr. Owen, in the words of James Innell Packer:

"Owen was by common consent the weightiest Puritan theologian, and many would bracket him with Jonathan Edwards as one of the greatest Reformed theologians of all time. Born in 1616, he entered Queen's College, Oxford, at the age of twelve and secured his M.A. in 1635, when he was nineteen. In his early twenties, conviction of sin threw him into such turmoil that for three months he could scarcely utter a coherent word on anything; but slowly he learned to trust Christ, and so found peace. In 1637 he became a pastor; in the 1640s he was chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, and in 1651 he was made Dean of Christ Church, Oxford's largest college. In 1652 he was given the additional post of Vice-Chancellor of the University, which he the reorganized with conspicuous success. After 1660 he led the Independents through the bitter years of persecution until his death in 1683."

Now a bit of background on me:

I do not know much about the Puritans. My earliest exposure to anything Puritan was reading Jonathan Edward's most famous sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, when I was a junior in high school. It was required reading for my English class, though I don't think the sermon left much of an impression on me at the time.

Fast forward twelve years, and through a series of events, some of which are chronicled elsewhere on this blog, Stephanie purchased for me Jonathan Edwards' book On Knowing Christ. It is a collection of ten of Edward's sermons, including Sinners in the Hands... I read the book contentedly, if not slowly, and realized perhaps that my own theological leanings were now at a place where the Puritans could offer me more than I had ever realized. Twelve years ago, I probably cast Edwards aside because he was not a Southern Baptist, and I likely considered all his Puritan brethren anathema for the same reason. But now, years later, Edwards' intelligent, (mostly) straight forward, unapologetic, passionate appeals to Scripture and fervent reverence for the glory of God was compelling.

After reading Edwards I began to wonder what other Puritan writings I should be reading. After browsing through monergism.com I settled on John Owen. Owen was English, whereas Edwards was American, and Owen had lived nearly 100 years before Edwards. And Owen was more of an academic, whereas Edwards' ministry was mostly pastoral. I put The Death of Death on my wish list of books, and time passed.

Some weeks ago, during our Sunday School series on Church History, Matt did a lesson on The Puritans in England, and followed up with a lesson profiling both John Owen and John Bunyan. I realized then I needed to go ahead and plow forward with The Death of Death, which was timely since I had managed to put the book on my Christmas list.

What I find most interesting about all of this is the subject matter of Owen's book. It concerns the extent of the atonement. Owen holds to a limited atonement, like any good Calvinist does. It was only in the last year or so that I have come to consider this most hotly-contested of the so-called five points. The L was always my sticking point when you spelled TULIP. Total depravity, check. Unconditional Election, check. Irresistible Grace, check. Perseverance of the Saints, check. Limited Atonement....? That just seems.... so.... harsh. Doesn't John 3:16 put the nail in the coffin of those who hold to a limited atonement? That verse uses the word "whosoever", right? Doesn't Charles Ryrie explicitly say in his Basic Theology that Christ died for all? Wasn't Ryrie recommended to me by a Conservative, Bible-believing pastor? Doesn't Ryrie have a Bible named after him? If he can't be trusted, what can I do?

Oh, the angst of it all. But I digress.

A couple of other extra-biblical books I read last year have helped me to see that if you are going to believe what the Bible says about the T, the U, the I, and the P, you really have to take the L as well. All five either stand or fall together. John Murray's Redemption Accomplished and Applied first rattled me with this fact, and Lorraine Boettner's The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination rattled me again. Of course the Bible itself is the final authority, and after looking more into the subject, the Bible certainly is authoritative on these topics.

But still, after growing up as a Southern Baptist, who are in my experience not Calvinistic in nature, and in general not very keen on expounding the great theological truths of the faith, it was fairly attractive for me to simply ignore the extent of the atonement. Was it really necessary to determine what the Bible says about this? Did I really have to come to grips with the efficacy of Christ's spilled blood?

It would seem that not only was it necessary, it was inevitable. I did not go looking to study up on this. I did not choose to read the books I mentioned above because I was interested in the extent of the atonement. I read those books because I had a desire to learn more about what it meant to be a "Reformed" believer. And whether I liked it or not, the subject just kept bringing itself up.

And now, finally, I have found myself cracking open John Owen, whose topic is hitting my quandary head on. In his Introduction to the book, J.I. Packer writes that reading Owen is difficult. He recommends taking notes to follow along with Owen's train of thought and exposition. After reading Owen's Preface, I agree with Packer. This will be a difficult read. But I will take notes, and perhaps I'll manage to post a few quotes and thoughts here on the old Web Log as I go along. My only hope is that it will help me better understand what Owen is saying, which may also help me grasp what the Bible has to say on this topic.

Tonight, just a few quotes from the Preface. These are good. I'll be including page numbers from the Banner of Truth publication, published in 2007.

"To what purpose serves the general ransom, but only to assert that Almighty God would have the precious blood of his dear Son poured out for innumerable souls whom he will not have to share in any drop thereof, and so, in respect of them, to be spilt in vain, or else to be shed for them only that they might be the deeper damned?" (Owen, 37)

"A general ransom without free-will is but "phantasie inutile pondus" - "a burdensome fancy;" the merit of the death of Christ being to them as an ointment in a box, that hath neither virtue nor power to act or reach out its own application unto particulars, being only set out in the gospel to the view of all, that those who will, by their own strength, lay hold on it and apply it to themselves may be healed." (38)

"It seems our blessed Redeemer's deep humiliation, in bearing the chastisement of our peace and the punishment of our transgressions, being made a curse and sin, deserted under wrath and the power of death, procuring redemption and the remission of sins through the effusion of his blood, offering himself up a sacrifice to God, to make reconciliation and purchase an atonement, his pursuing this undertaking with continued intercession in the holy of holies, with all the benefits of his mediatorship, do no way procure either life and salvation of sins, but only serve to declare that we are not indeed what his word affirms we are - namely, cursed, guilty, defiled, and only not actually cast into hell. (38-39)

"This they say; which is, in effect, "All things will be well when God is contented with that portion of glory which is of our assigning." (40)

"God would never allow that the will of the creature should be the measure of his honour." (41)

"...and to give them all the comfort the death of Christ can afford before they feel any power of that death working within them, or find any efficacy of free grace drawing their hearts to the embracing of Christ in the promise, or obtaining a particular interest in him; which are tedious things to flesh and blood to attend unto and wait upon." (42)

On to Chapter One . . .

Thomas Horton, 1956 - 2009

2009-12-03T23:02:00.000-06:00

I regret that I am a week late to post this, but I felt I should honor Thomas' memory nonetheless.

In a previous post several months back, "The Joshua Tree," I wrote about the "token grown up" who accompanied myself and five other teenagers on an adventure in rural Somervell County. This "token grown up" was Thomas Horton, now passed on to Glory.

Thomas died, very unexpectedly, a week ago, on Thanksgiving.

I honestly can't say when the last time was that I saw or spoke to Thomas. It has likely been nearly 10 years. I just didn't manage to keep in touch with him after I left Arlington to go to college, nor since I have returned to the Metroplex. But thankfully, some unknown number of years from now, I'll see him again, in what will certainly be an adventure for eternity.

Lucy Logic

2009-12-02T22:22:00.000-06:00

On Sunday a few things happened that led Lucy to come to this conclusion at the dinner table:

"He didn't want the Isrealites to come to His birthday."

I think I can follow her logic:

1) In Lucy's Sunday School class the children are learning about Moses and the Isrealite's Exodus from Egypt. This leads Lucy to proffer random comments such as "Moses was scared at the burning bush," and "Pharoah didn't want to let the Isrealites go," and "The Pharoh king made the Isrealites very sad."

2) Sunday night we started to put up the Christmas tree, and after dinner we were talking to Lucy and Ben about what Christmas is about, or Who it is about, rather. It is about Jesus, of course. So we were talking not only about Jesus' birth, or his birthday, but also why Jesus had to come to Earth in the flesh at all - to save His people from their sins. Related to this, based on her recollection of learning about Gethsemane, Lucy is quick to remind us of this fact: "Jesus didn't want to be killed." To which we say, "Yes, that is right, Jesus didn't want to be killed, but He was obedient to His Father, even unto death."

3) There, I think, lies the key to her comment Sunday evening. In her funny 3-year old brain, as we were talking about Jesus' birth(day), she still had Pharoah rolling around in her head, as well as an ever-present desire to talk about anyone's birthday, so she put Jesus' wants and Pharoah's wants together in this birthday scenario:

"He (Jesus) didn't want the Isrealites to come to His birthday."

The Face Says It All?

2009-11-16T21:51:00.001-06:00

Tomorrow is Tuesday, which means in our neighborhood it is trash day.

At about 9:30 pm I was wheeling the trash cans down to the curb, and happened to encounter one of our neighbors whom we had not yet met.

He was out to walk his dog, as I had seen him do plenty of times before, though never on an occasion to really introduce myself. As I was setting a trash can in place, he walked over from across the street to introduce himself, and trailing behind him was perhaps his wife or companion of some sort.

He introduced himself as Mac, his yellow lab as Mojo ("the nicest dog in the world"), and his companion was Anne. Very brief small talk ensued, and when he learned that I work downtown, he noted that he used to work downtown as a lawyer, but now he was a "Speaker."

"A speaker?" says I.

"A face reader, in fact."

"Beg pardon?"

The next sixty seconds was a blur as Mac launched off into a very quick-spoken listing of characteristics and personality traits. I thought he might have been describing his work as a "face reader," but strangely as he continued I frankly had to admit it sounded like he was describing me. Truly.

When he concluded I may have had an incredulous look on my face when I asked him sheepishly, "Um, did you just read my face?"

"Yes. Did I get it right?"

"Quite possibly," was my honest reply.

At some point Anne even chipped in some face reading of her own which was generally spot on as well.

I then asked him how he got into reading faces, he matter of factly noted that he had written a book on the subject, then we exchanged farewells, and he, Ann, and MoJo walked off down the sidewalk in the glow of the streetlight, and I turned back toward the house trying to puzzle out what just occured.

My neighbor had just read my face. At first sight. In the dark. And got it right.

Turns out, a quick Google search has shown that my neighbor Mac is none other than Mac Fulfer, who is indeed both a Speaker and a Face Reader. You can Google him yourself, or visit his site here.

A Picture Is Worth . . . .

2009-11-02T20:46:00.001-06:00

A few recent photos from the camera phone:

We are the parents who take their kids to Ikea to let them play on the furniture:

Lucy hugging some plant-thing at Target:

Storm water overflowing the curbs in our neighborhood, while I was on the way home from the bus stop. My shoes took a week to dry out.

Sunrise, October 17th, Glen Rose, Texas:

Jaxon, Keara, and Lucy sharing some reading time during Children's Church:

I Can't Decide

2009-10-29T21:23:00.000-05:00

1) If I should be ashamed that we eat at Kincaid's too often,

2) Or if I should be offended that even though we eat at Kincaids too often, the lady at the counter still can't remember my name.

Do As I Shout, Not As I Spank?

2009-10-22T22:28:00.000-05:00

I read the New York Times for many reasons. Here are eight, in no particular order:

1) For whatever reason, it seems the site is devoted to news, rather than entertainment. I cannot say the same for any other news outlets' website.
2) Occasionally the Times publishes well researched, well written pieces on interesting subjects.
3) Nicolai Ouroussoff 's architecture reviews.
4) Travel stories on cool places.
5) The liberal op-ed pieces challenge my thinking.
6) I just like to learn about the fascinating City of New York.
7) I like to roll my eyes at the insufferable Maureen Dowd.
8) On the other hand, Gail Collins seems like a nice lady.

Tonight I ran across an article on shouting at your children. I quote it at length:

JACKIE KLEIN is a devoted mother of two little boys in the suburbs of Portland, Ore. She spends hours ferrying them to soccer and Cub Scouts. She reads child-development books. She can emulate one of those pitch-perfect calm maternal tones to warn, “You’re making bad choices” when, say, someone doesn’t want to brush his teeth

That is 90 percent of the time. Then there is the other 10 percent, when, she admits, “I have become totally frustrated and lost control of myself.”

It can happen during weeks and weeks and weeks of no camp in the summer, or at the end of a long day at home — just as adult peace is within her grasp — when the 7- or 9-year-old won’t go to sleep.

And then she yells.

“This is ridiculous! I’ve been doing things all day for you!”

Many in today’s pregnancy-flaunting, soccer-cheering, organic-snack-proffering generation of parents would never spank their children. We congratulate our toddlers for blowing their nose (“Good job!”), we friend our teenagers (literally and virtually), we spend hours teaching our elementary-school offspring how to understand their feelings. But, incongruously and with regularity, this is a generation that yells.

“I’ve worked with thousands of parents and I can tell you, without question, that screaming is the new spanking,” said Amy McCready, the founder of Positive Parenting Solutions, which teaches parenting skills in classes, individual coaching sessions and an online course. “This is so the issue right now. As parents understand that it’s not socially acceptable to spank children, they are at a loss for what they can do. They resort to reminding, nagging, timeout, counting 1-2-3 and quickly realize that those strategies don’t work to change behavior. In the absence of tools that really work, they feel frustrated and angry and raise their voice. They feel guilty afterward, and the whole cycle begins again.”

Did you see that? "...in the absence of tools that really work..."

Poor Ms. Klein. I would offer that it is at least a mild form of insanity to jettison any particular discipline technique because it is "not socially acceptable," especially if you choose to resort to another technique that is proven to be ineffective.

If yelling doesn't work, and time out doesn't work, and counting 1-2-3 doesn't work, and nagging doesn't work, then what is a parent do to? I guess for those who are socially acceptable, like Ms. Klein, they are simply out of options.

As for me, I'll follow the advice of the Proverbs:

"The rod and reproof give wisdom, But a child who gets his own way brings shame to his mother."

"Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; The rod of discipline will remove it far from him."

"He who withholds his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him diligently."

To be sure, Stephanie and I are not too far along in our journey as parents, and we are certainly still learning, and surely make mistakes, and in fact we have surely erred at times in applying the rod to our children's backsides, but we dare not ignore these Scriptural warnings. I would rather do the hard work (and it's not easy) of finding the right way to correct our children with the rod, rather than throwing spanking out the window just because psychologists say it's not couth.

Interestingly, the NYT article also says this:

"Professor Rohner noted that while spanking is considered taboo by the major medical and psychological associations, there are still some religious and conservative groups who support it as an effective disciplinary tool, believing that the Bible explicitly allows it."

I would say the choice of the word "allow" in that sentence is not entirely accurate. While it is certainly true that the Bible allows spanking based on the verses above, I would say those verses go farther than that, and expects spanking as the correct manner of discipline for a child.

There are more than a few well-written books that can elucidate these Scriptural ideas of discipline far better than I can. I am simply befuddled that, according the the NYT, seemingly an entire culture has abandoned a tried-and-true (and Biblical) method of discipline for other methods that simply don't work.

Or perhaps the key to this mystery is fairly simple enough. Ms. Klein should just put down the child-development books and pick up a Bible. Why not get clues on rearing kids from the One Who created them?

Bono or Bonehead?

2009-10-18T15:26:00.000-05:00

The New York Times continues to give column inches to celebrity musician/humanitarian Bono. And I quote:

"...the world sees that America might just hold the keys to solving the three greatest threats we face on this planet: extreme poverty, extreme ideology and extreme climate change."

Naturally I cannot consider myself within the group of people Bono calls "the world," for I am within the group of people called "America." So I can neither say with certainty if "the world" really does think that America holds the keys to solving the three "threats" that Bono lists.

All I can say, as an American, to the world: Prepare yourselves for disappointment.

America cannot even solve the problems within its own borders, much less come close to solving any other nations' problems.

Bono also offered this bit of foolishness:

"The world wants to believe in America again because the world needs to believe in America again."

Again, let none of us be so stupid to "believe" in America. I'm not even certain what that means, but I am certain that anyone who "believes" in America will be sorely frustrated.

Perhaps phrases like this make sense within U2's song lyrics, and resonate with the average NYT reader, but I can only hope that these printed words of Bono wind up where they belong: as liner for the bird cage and cat box.

Do As I Say, Not As I Listen

2009-10-08T22:10:00.000-05:00

Today I learned that in fact my Great Grandmother Looper is not dead. I thought she was. Yet she lives, as she has for 107 years now. It is true that earlier in the week she suffered two heart attacks, and in fact is currently (to my knowledge) unresponsive, yet resting peacefully and in hospice care. BUT yesterday my mom left a voicemail on my phone about Grandmother, and for some reason I was sure that my mom was passing along to me the news that Grandmother had passed on. Gone from this earth. So when I had a chance to call my mom back today to find out more, it turns out I didn't listen very well to her voicemail, and indeed Grandmother is still alive. I felt fairly stupid, and rightly so.

Later in the same conversation today, I misunderstood something else my mom was telling me, and she called me out on it, noting it was just another case of me not listening to my mother. (Just as I have for nearly 30 years now.) Surely if there is any communication break down, it is going to be on my end. I struggle to listen to people like I should, and in fact I struggle to talk to people like I should. At work my propensity to keep quiet means that I don't share information as well as I should. I assume sometimes that people already know something, when in fact I haven't told them what it was that I expected they already knew. So I constantly try to improve on that.

I also try to improve on making eye contact with people. I have done absolutely no research on this, but I feel like eye contact and listening go together. If I can become a better eyeballer I might become a better listener, and vice-a-versa. My two benchmark examples of eye contact fall at opposite ends of the spectrum: my FBC Arlington youth minister Curt Grice had an amazing way of looking directly into your eyeballs constantly. It was almost unnerving. He bored little holes into your irises when you were talking to him, and when he was talking to you. On the other end of the spectrum was one of my college roommates, James Watkins. He never looked anyone in the eye. When you talked to James, he was looking about four or five feet to your left or right.

For whatever reason over the last few months I have been catching myself not keeping very good eye contact when I am talking to someone. I feel like I keep good contact when someone else is talking to me, but I find my eyes looking off to the side now and again when I am speaking to someone else. Frankly I have been embarrassed to ask Stephanie about it, for fear that perhaps I'm actually like James, and for other people I'm the guy that they think never looks at them. I hope not. Perhaps it is acceptable to look away occasionally, but honestly my goal is to be a Curt Grice kind of eyeballer - all the time. Inside my head, when I am speaking to someone, I am truly telling myself, "don't look away... keep focused... watch those eyeballs..." It is difficult.

Yes, communication is difficult for me, mostly because I am selfish and would rather not use words unless I have to, and because I'm more likely to selfishly consider myself or another subject when I should in fact be listening to whomever is talking to me.

Pride is at the root of it, like most things. Tonight during Family Worship we read from Mark Chapter 10, the account of James and John making a remarkable request of Jesus - that they might sit at his right and left in His glory. At first we are prone to react like that's a ridiculous thing to ask - to share in God's own glory, and sit at his right and left hand? Are you kidding? But in reality we do it everyday, in fact we go farther than that, and simply place ourselves in God's rightful place when we choose to worship anything other than Him. It is also interesting to note that we would very likely be right there with the rest of His disciples, who were indignant that James and John made that request. But I would venture to say that they were not indignant because of the absurdity of the request, but because they probably thought they deserved to sit at Jesus' right and left hand, instead of James and John.

While I was attempting to apply this little story to little Lucy's life, as always, it came back to me. Far be it from me to expect Lucy to consider others first and eliminate forms of pride in her life, if I am not willing to do the same. Someone recently referred to their children as "little mirrors." It is true that we do not really see our faults in full view until we have a child to display all our shortcomings right in front of us. That is one way to bring a man down. For every time they may see their father do something well, they surely see him do ten things poorly.

The fact is, communicating poorly is not just my problem. It may well become my children's problem if I do not redouble my efforts to improve. To be sure, they will always be responsible for their own behavior, and cannot someday blame me or Stephanie for their misbehavior, just as I cannot and will not blame my own parents for my own misbehavior. But I, as their father, am doubly responsible, to first behave as I should, and secondly to train my children to behave as they should.

So hopefully someday, years from now, I won't be leaving a voicemail on their phone that results in them thinking that a dear old family member has kicked off, when in fact she really hasn't.

Home Sweet Home

2009-10-03T20:55:00.000-05:00

Now that we're moved into the new house and unpacked, here's a photo to prove that we're settled in nicely:

G.I. Joe, Rest In Pieces

2009-09-20T21:49:00.001-05:00

In six days we are moving.

Today we started packing in earnest.

Today I also cleaned out and organized our cache of stuff in the storage shed behind our house. Some of the items I rummaged through were boxes of my childhood toys and games, including Legos, Ghost Busters, G.I. Joe, and the like. I was puzzled as I was sorting through my old G.I. Joe collection that many of the figures were dismembered. Look closely below, and you will see torsos fairly well separated from lower extremities.

Knowing that I was a conscientious child and never willfully destroyed my possessions, I knew that these figures had been torn apart by another. Given that the G.I. Joes have been in cardboard box storage either in my parents' attic or our own storage shed for the past +/- 20 years, I had to deduce what might have happened.

Either cycles of heat and cold, as well as humidity can break down the flexible/elastic pieces that held the figures together, or some critter enjoyed that same elastic as a meal. I'm not sure which option is more likely. Honestly, I hope it was a critter of some kind who would have snapped their legs off quickly, rather than the weather, slowly, year after year, breaking them down into this condition. Given that there were no other casualties among my old toys, I really can't say what exactly happened.

But so much for these guys making me any money on ebay.

On Fathers, Fictional and Non

2009-09-12T15:40:00.000-05:00

As you well know by now, I am a deep thinker.

Today, for a rainy day diversion before nap time, my children were watching Mary Poppins (MP), and the cogs in my brain suddenly started cranking up. Nothing like Disney to get the brain going. Insert eye roll here. I began to consider the similarities between MP and the other feature film our kids enjoy, The Sound of Music (TSOM).

These two classic films, released just one year apart (MP in 1964 and TSOM in 1965) perhaps bear some things in common, besides the much-loved lead actress.

As my brain was puzzling this out, I eventually arrived here, in a sort of generic plot summary that could fit either movie:

1) Children of a wealthy, yet distant father constantly misbehave.

2) Numerous Nannies (or Governesses) have failed to properly right the children's wrong behavior.

3) Suddenly a new Nanny (Governess) arrives, who is unlike all others who have come before her.

4) New Nanny (Governess) ensures that the bratty children are able to have fun, rather than be forced into a cold, rigid upbringing that was the norm.

5) Children become less bratty, and seem to thrive under the care of the new Nanny (Governess).

6) Eventually, though a complex series of events, the children's fathers are made aware that they are distant from their children.

7) The fathers (one sooner than the other) embrace their children in a right relationship, due to the Nanny (Governess) actions toward (or with) the fathers.

8) All is well. Fathers and children are happy.

Admittedly these films take place in different countries, in different eras, under different circumstances, and the plots are otherwise very divergent, with MP's nanny strangely flying off into the clouds, and TSOM's governess becoming wed to the children's' father, and ultimately assisting in the family's escape from the Nazis. Very different outcomes. Yet it seems at the root of the films the eight points outlined above hold true.

I find that interesting.

And of course the films' origins were quite different. One film was actually somewhat based on real life events of the Von Trapp family (TSOM), and the other (MP) was first created by a children's' author, P.L. Travers, and subsequently turned into a film by Walt Disney.

Yet it seems from these different origins the eight points outlined above still found their way onto the screen.

I also wonder about the era these films were made, the 1960s, the time apparently when feminism came to the forefront (at least in America). Feminism ironically plays a bit part in MP, where Mrs. Banks is indeed a fighter for women's rights and suffrage ("we're clearly soldiers in petticoats," she sings in the film). Did the filmmakers of the 1960s somehow desire to cast men in a bad light, creating characters who were so cold and detached from their own children? Did the filmmakers desire to have women swoop in to save the day? Indeed neither of these films have heros, but only heroines. Captain Von Trapp even refers to his initial love interest, Baroness Schraeder, as his "savior." Of course, in time the Baroness is dropped like a bad habit when Maria drops her habit and in turn sweeps the Captain off his feet. But that's beside the point.

I might even begin to argue that feminism is further apparent in TSOM in the way that the Captain shruggs his Nazi Naval assignment in favor of a singing contest. "No, don't go off to war and be a hero again, Daddy, come with us and sing songs about bread, jam, and flowers." Still, I can't blame him. He was right to resist the Nazi conscription and head for the hills of Switzerland, leading his family in retreat from the enemy. But his method of retreating did involve some silly songs and hiding out in a nunnery. Not exactly conduct becoming of a decorated Officer in the Austrian Imperial Navy. But that's beside the point.

Come to think of it, it wasn't a manly cricket game or even manlier rugby match that Michael wanted his father, Mr. Banks, to play. It was just to go fly kites. But I guess it wasn't that emasculating, given the fact that the chairman and other officers of Mr. Banks former employ were there in the park, too, with their fists holding tight to the strings of their very own kites.

It is true that fathers must do silly things for their children. Even today I wore a ridiculous hat in the shape of a horse's head while Lucy wore a hat in the shape of a butterfly, as we sat in the living room floor and had a make-believe picnic. Lucy made it clear that these hats were in fact "straw" hats, like the ones Bear and Pig wear in her book Bear's Water Picnic. We had a grand time. And even this morning during Ben's morning nap Lucy and I sat at the kitchen table and drew pictures (really) of Burt, Mary Poppins, Jane, and Michael, all flying their kites. If we got Lucy her own kite, I'm pretty sure all she would want to do was fly it. All the time. And I would be glad to oblige.

In the end, my deep thinking today has not really progressed out of the shallow end of the pool. Pondering possible themes within musical films is not exactly hard (or manly) work, and since I have done absolutely no research to back up my eight points above, I can't defend them too vigrorously. Still, if you've seen the films recently, I think it's hard to argue with the similarities noted above. But feel free to do so.

Ahead of His Time

2009-09-11T21:52:00.000-05:00

"It is a mistake to say that people will no longer listen to doctrinal preaching. Let the minister believe his doctrines; let him present them with conviction and as living issues, and he will find sympathetic audiences. Today we see thousands of people turning away from pulpit discussions of current events, social topics, political issues, and mere ethical questions, and trying to fill themselves with the husks of occult and puerile philosophies. In many ways we are spiritually poorer than we should be, because in our theological confusion and bewilderment we have failed to do justice to these great doctrinal principles."

If these words by Loraine Boettner were true when he wrote them, in 1932, how much moreso now!

Whiz Wit

2009-08-28T21:39:00.000-05:00

When in South Philly..........

Summer Round-Up

2009-08-06T22:19:00.000-05:00

The dog days of summer have been bad for the web log. We have been busy with everyday things, life as usual, and a few unusual things have happened, too. All of the "busy-ness" has led me to neglect the blog, but since I haven't heard any complaints from my dear readers, I suppose no one is really disappointed. In any event, if there was anything in my life that was a good candidate for neglecting, it would be the web log. My devotion to it may wax and wane, but my devotion to the (mostly) smiling faces you will see here must remain constant.

Anyway, on to the good stuff..... We travelled to Sugar Land back in June for a combo birthday party for cousins J, Charlie, and Hazel. A good time was had by all - lots of backyard swim time. The first photo, below, is special to me because it is remarkable to see Lucy's hair in a pony tail. It has grown so slowly the past 3 years, I can hardly believe it's actually long enough to do that. But in her own words, she calls it a "sheep's tail." ("Mommy, I want my hair in a sheep's tail.") Never mind the fact that it doesn't really resemble the tail of a sheep. Charlie is on the right.

For the boys, the wagon train full of ice and cold drinks was a popular place to hang out. They had their fill of ice, and more. L-R, J, Ben, Charlie:

Lucy wearing Uncle David's hat:

We had a "first" for our family while in Sugar Land - staying in a hotel out of town. A good time was had by all at the Homewood Suites, too:

Lucy enjoyed laying on the A/C, and looking out the window, down to the sport court below. The basket-ballers captured her attention, or perhaps it was just the coolest spot in the room:

Back in Fort Worth, Lucy is always desirous to visit fountains, largely because she and I spent some good, quality time at a big, elaborate fountain at Sugar Land Town Center. Here at the Fort Worth Botanical Garden, the fountain is simple, but it served its purpose, to put her feet in the water:

And pose with the frog:

One of the joys of summer time, the grill. Here are some delicious shrimp, in progress:

Ben is becoming more and more animated / opinionated / goofy. He makes all sorts of faces all the time, in ways that Lucy never did:

Just relaxing watching a DVD of some sort:

In July all the cousins from Sugar Land came to Fort Worth for a visit. The "official" cousin photo-op was not well-received. This is really the best shot I got. The kids were not interested at all in sitting still. In the shots that are not blurry, Ben's eyes are clearly red and his face is flush from crying. Oh, well.

Now for a serious Ben.... We need to get him his first haircut. His longest hair tends to be right on top of his ears, but we have been procrastinating. We are not interested in having a son with long hair, but we're also not interested in the mad scene that could erupt at the barber, when ever we actually get around to it. Hopefully it will go better than the cousins' photo shoot.

And a silly Lucy.... In case you can't tell, she is eating her salsa with a fork. She dispensed with the chips entirely, and just went with her fork. The girl loves salsa, and for that I am grateful. I don't want to raise any sissy kids afraid of hot foods. We are training Ben to do the same, and he can keep up with me as far as chips and salsa intake. But just using a fork for the salsa, that's a new level of commitment to America's favorite condiment.

And finally, from the same dinnertime, Ben, enjoying a hand holding with his Mom. Who wouldn't?

Or was he pulling her finger? Tex Mex can have that effect on a person.

Just a few other thoughts..... all of these photos were taken with a hand-me-down digital camera, which is great for quick shots, and easy for uploading to blogger and facebook and such. BUT, for the past unknown number of months that we have gone digital, I have proven my digital theory correct. My digital theory states that when one uses a digital camera, one will rarely if ever print out 4x6 photos to go into a photo album. For that very theory, I was historically resistant to shift entirely to digital. I very much enjoy having real photo albums to look at. There is something very comfortable about turning through and seeing life travel across the pages. Nothing else is quite like it. And I guarantee that 30 years from now, when Lucy and Ben are showing their children old photos from 2009, they will be dusting off an album and looking through it, not trying to find photos on somebody's hard drive or web site. I believe that the hard copy media will last longer than the digital. Web sites go down, computers crash, files get corrupt, but an album on the shelf will last. We have three full photo albums, dating back to Lucy's birth, and some untold number of developed 4x6's in a box waiting for a new album, but ever since we started with the digital, nothing's been printed out. At some point we will have to upload hundreds of shots to Walgreens, to get back glossy media for the albums. I'm now thinking we should go back to 35 mm.....

Finally, last night during bathtime, Stephanie put Lucy in the bathtub, and Lucy stomped her foot on the water and said, "I cannot walk on water." Stephanie laughed out loud, and I had to smile. We have been making much of Jesus' miracles during family worship, as we are reading through Mark's gospel after dinner most nights. Lucy says "mir-cul-cle," and we tell her a miracle is something that only God can do. Last night she saw for herself that perhaps her Mommy and Daddy are telling her the truth. The story of the paralytic man sticks with her too, the "man whose legs and arms didn't work," as well as Jesus' words to the storm, "Hush, be still." Every night when we read about another mir-cul-cle, we pray that God would someday work that most important miracle in Lucy and Ben's hearts - changing their hearts of stone into hearts of flesh; making them alive, though they be dead in their trespasses. That's something only God can do!

Edwards, 1; Hayes, 0

2009-07-31T17:20:00.000-05:00

And I quote:

"Well, it is obvious that you don’t know what the hell you are talking about [pun fully intended!]. Your “experience” in Texas is, unfortunately, the same as millions of others who were misinformed [lied to?] about the words of Jesus when He told the religious leader Nicodemus, “You must be born again.”
He, you and millions of others have asked the same question that Nicodemus did: “What?” Can a man return to his mothers womb and be born a second time?” Jesus sternly told him that the new birth was “from above,” not from below. It is a spiritual regeneration that lies in the hands of God himself. In the same context, Jesus said that the Spirit of God, in His work of regeneration, is the decider of whom it will “light on.” Stop this nonsense of whether or not man can rebirth himself! It is an absurdity.
Why do you still feel guilty? It is clearly stated, in fact, by the very Apostle Paul you malign and mock in your letter. He said to the Romans: “For the wrath of God is [present tense] revealed from heaven against all ungodliness [which you admit] and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.”
Comment: You know God at some level. It is not a saving knowledge, but it is an absolute knowledge which God has has constituted in the nature of man - everyone has it.
You are purposely and willfully suppressing the truth of God, and you know it full well and thus feel guilty and spend your life seeking to get out from under God’s condemning law. But you cannot, and thus you write books and articles about your willful rebellion against God’s truth.
Reading something you write about God, faith or whatever is like reading a comic book written by a “moron,” which is a Greek word used in the very passage that Paul writes about those who deny God. the Old Testament says the same thing in Hebrew: “The fool has said in his heart, there is no God.”
Keep writing. I need more examples of the truth of Romans chapter one. :-)"

— Victor Edwards

"As a lifelong atheist, I am puzzled by the commonly accepted idea that the only source of morals must be religion. On the contrary: if the only reason for being good is because some strong guy tells you what you have to do,, that is the moral code of the Mafia: do what the De Capo says and don’t ask questions, or he will kill you. Myself, I take full responsibility for my actions, as all fully adult humans should. I don’t need faith, nor should anyone else who hasn’t been brainwashed into believing one of the medieval superstitions.The reason that people feel a moral pressure is because we have evolved to feel it, just as we have evolved to see or to breathe: it is part of being human. Human society works best when it consists, largely, of moral agents. And so you cannot be fully human, cannot fully realize your own nature, until you are a moral agent. There’s nothing divine or mysterious about this, and it doesn’t need the imprimateur of any religious doctrine to stand behind it. It is part of the way the world is; which to me, makes it even more wonderful than if it was the word of a capricious God. Even if there were a God, tell me this: *why* should I obey her? Would I not still have the responsibility to judge her actions and views against *my* own moral code, and to rebel and disobey if *I* considered her actions as immoral?(As, by the way, I would indeed judge those of Yaweh, the jealous, cruel and inhuman God of the old testament. If that God exists, then I’m on the side of the rebel angels.)"

— Pat Hayes

Bathtime Conclusion

2009-07-17T21:27:00.000-05:00

Lucy: "I will go down the drain thing and I will not see us anymore."

Me: "You're going to go down the drain and I won't see you anymore?"

Lucy: "Uh-huh."

Me: "You really want to go down the drain into the sewer to live with the rats and alligators?"

-pause-

Lucy: "Yes."

This Way to the Subway

2009-07-02T20:47:00.000-05:00

I found myself at the Fort Worth Intermodal Transportation Center (ITC) today. That's where multiple modes of transportation connect in downtown, such as city buses, commuter train, Amtrak, Greyhound, even rent cars and of course, taxis. I found the above sign humorous, so much so that I figured I might was well snap a photo, since I had a camera with me at the time. I've been to the ITC countless times, but this signage is apparently fairly new, as I didn't recall seeing it before.

What's funny to me is the explanation below the Subway logo, "Sandwiches." I guess that the ITC was concerned that given the other modes of transport available, someone might see a sign directing them to the Subway, and then begin to look for the stairs down to the D Train to catch to Rockefeller Center. So to avoid such confusion, they made it clear that this particular Subway was not, in fact, a below ground mass transit system, but instead the ubiquitous sandwich shop.

Cooling Off at the Kimbell

2009-06-27T21:10:00.000-05:00

Father's Day Menu

2009-06-21T22:37:00.001-05:00

Pan-Seared Pork Tenderloin
Baked Potatoes with butter, cheese, and sour cream
Seasoned Zuchinni and Squash
Homemade French Bread

and

Lemon Meringue Pie for dessert

It's good to be a Dad!

Thanks, Stephanie! You will notice that I convinced her to dispense with the salad. What a woman!

Wednesday Night Musings

2009-06-16T21:54:00.001-05:00

Last night I read an interesting yet disturbing opinion piece by Frank Rich of the NYT.

But what I found most interesting was one of the reader comments posted by Butler Crittenden of San Francisco, California. One of Mr. Crittenden's comments read thus, the "they" referring to Conservatives, and I believe the Republican Party in general:

...Most important, they assume the worst in humans and play to that, and we liberals assume the best and wait patiently for our inner best selves to come out and change the system...

Mr. Crittenden is certainly no official spokesman for liberals, but is just a lowly reader such as myself. BUT, he appears in his comment to make a fairly sweeping statement about the liberals' ideology in general, while at the same time explicitly counting himself among them.

Naturally, I do not consider myself a liberal. I have friends and family who are, but I am not. And if ever I needed a reason NOT to be a liberal, Mr. Crittenden's comment is reason enough. What is striking to me is how he has defined the difference between liberals and conservatives in a very non-political way. He has looked far beyond nuts and bolts of policy and methods of governing and has delved into human nature itself.

Is this really the way that liberals perceive people? How bizarre that anyone would assume the best in people! I wonder what type of life Mr. Crittenden lives, or they type of lives that he assumes that his liberal friends live, where he expects people's "inner best selves to come out." I could start counting on one hand, and quickly move to my second hand, and soon enough need to use my toes to continue counting all the rotten things that I saw people do today. And then I could start over and use all my fingers and toes to count the rotten things that I myself have done today.

Just to speak in general terms, today I witnessed others commit (or myself committed):
lying, lust, greed, pride, selfishness, unwholesome talk/crude language, bitterness, and perhaps even rage. And this is by no means a comprehensive list. Think about it. What did you see or experience today? Surely even a liberal would agree that the above noted behaviors are not good behaviors, but bad.

So how can anyone see our human race as having an "inner best self," if these things I've noted above are part and parcel of any "normal" day at the office? To be sure, I suppose I witnessed and perhaps even participated in a number of good things today, but good behavior never happens on accident. It is always purposeful. Bad behavior just happens by default, without thinking about it. We are naturally predisposed to do bad things. A theologian would call this depravity.

Apparently Mr. Crittenden and his fellow liberals are ignoring their fellow humans' depravity, or they are blind to it. As for me, I see it everyday, and would have to agree with his depiction of Conservatives' tendency to assume the worst in people. Aside from experiencing this firsthand everyday in my interaction with others (and by examining myself), it is also clear from Scripture that we are a depraved human race. I believe I have covered this in a previous post if you are interested in the theological support to my argument.

In the end, I don't have any political ax to grind, nor a desire to compare and contrast various liberal and conservative points of view. But don't you think that the world (or at least the U.S.A.) should be a much better place than it is today, given the amount of time liberals have allegedly been patiently waiting for inherently good people to "change the system?" Perhaps Mr. Crittenden believes that just now, in 2009, have people really been given a chance to begin changing things, since Mr. Obama has been elected. If that is the case, it's going to be very long wait. I truly hope Mr. Crittenden is a very patient man. In the meantime, I'll continue to have a very low view of man, a high view of God, and appeal to Him to change things, since left to ourselves, conservative or liberal, we humans will screw things up every time.

Scrabbled

2009-06-15T22:05:00.000-05:00

Stephanie and I played a game of Scrabble the other night - after the kids were asleep. We played the nine-letter version (instead of seven) to make the game go faster. See below for one of my actual turns - what would you make of this?

Roadtrip!

2009-06-01T21:17:00.000-05:00

Last Thursday we headed south to Rockport, and had a "lay-over" in Austin for lunch. Here's a few photos from the day. It was a beautiful day, so we chose to dine al fresco. Can you pinpoint our dining location, in the first two photos?

Then we headed over for a good healthy dose of the 40 Acres. Here's our Little Longhorns Lucy and Ben:

I think the kiddos enjoyed their visit to UT, which was their first, I think. While we didn't find any kiddo attire we liked a the Co-op, it was worth the stop. As we were walking through Goldsmith Hall, to see if there were any cool architecture projects on display (and there were), Lucy kept saying, "This is a nice, quiet place." She was right. I think we were the only ones in the building. Which was good, since Lucy broke part of one of the very nice models on display. I think the student's project was a Winery, and there was a flawlessly crafted basswood model, and Lucy couldn't resist touching, and we couldn't stop her in time, and she broke off one of the many pieces representing the plantings in the vineyard. Oh, well. I figure the project was finished, graded, and the student was long gone for the semester. Hopefully it had already been photographed, too.

The photo below is one reason NOT to be proud of my Alma Mater. Before we all got back in the car for the 2nd leg of the trip, we stopped in the Union for a potty break. I recalled from a couple of years ago there was a Family Restroom, which we sought out, only to find it had been re-named "Gender Neutral Restroom." I also recalled that I read some time ago in the Daily Texan that the GLBT groups on campus were lobbying the administration for restrooms that were for niether men nor women, so that students who could claim no particular affiliation would not have to endure the trauma of eliminating bodily wastes in the same restroom as other students who happened to know their own particular gender. Apparently the adminstration was convinced, and this was the result. Stephanie and I stood for a moment with our jaws dropped, then Stephanie said, "I can't use that restroom." So we went down the hall to a good old fashioned Mens and Womens room, and then went on our way, shaking our heads at this crazy University.

Finally, below was after we were down the road some distance, and brother and sister were enjoying some car seat hand-holding.

Must Be Something in the Air

2009-05-22T21:41:00.000-05:00

Today I did something that perhaps I should have done a long time ago.... I was tested for allergies! While there has been no mistake that I have suffered from seasonal nasal allergies for 15+ years, it was somewhat gratifying today to see firsthand the degree to which I am affected, and understand exactly what it is that my body vehemently dislikes, and does its best to expel through sneezing, runny nose, and watery and itchy eyes. See below for yourself:

This is my very own upper back, about fifteen minutes after the testing was applied. You can see that there were eight patches of eight pricks each. That is, I was tested for sixty-four individual allergens. It seems clear that more than half of those my body found quite offensive.

When my allergist came back into the room and saw this, he suggested that if I had a camera phone he would snap a photo, if for no other reason than "to get some sympathy at home." In a word, Dr. Haden described my testing results as "impressive." While that is not a word I would use to describe my allergies, I guess it is apropos.

Each of the sixty-four allergens was given a number between 0 and 4, based on my body's reaction, and if above 4, plus signs were added to note particularly severe reactions. Anything 2 or above I'm allergic to. So without further ado, here's my results, in increasing order of severity:

2
Hormodendrom/clado (a type of mold)
Cat
Cattle Hair
Horse

3
Rabbit
Guinea Pig
Careless (weed)
Lambs Quarter (weed)
Mugwort (weed)
Privet (weed)
Black Willow
Cedar Elm

4
Giant Ragweed
Western Hemp
Pigweed
Sorrel (weed)
Cocklebur
Hackberry
Mesquite
Cottonwood
Birch mix

4+
Bermuda grass
Russian Thistle (weed)
English Plantain (weed)
Ash mix
American Elm
Sycamore, American

4++
June grass
Johnson grass
Short Ragweed
Mountain Cedar
Box Elder

4+++
Bahia grass
Timothy grass
Rye grass
Sweet Vernal grass
Eastern Oak
Pecan

So perhaps the easier thing to answer is, what am I not allergic to? The vast majority of the molds, and things like house dust, tobacco, feathers, cockroaches, and several other miscellaneous items.

Moving forward from here, my treatment won't be much different than it has been for the last fifteen years - we'll continue with a particular cocktail of prescription drugs for a while longer (albeit new ones that I've never tried before), and we'll see what happens. Depending on how things go, we'll consider the shots next.

So if anyone out there suffers from seasonal (or year-round) allergies, why not go get tested? It was kind of fun, and perhaps as a result you'll get some sympathy at home, and maybe even a cool photo of your upper back!

Pool Time

2009-05-16T21:28:00.000-05:00

Half a Decade

2009-05-14T22:55:00.000-05:00

I admit I'm a bit late in this post, but alas, where does the time go?

Last week, specifically on May 8th, Stephanie and I celebrated our 5th year of marriage.

As the anniversary was approaching, I was pondering how very much had happened in the past five years, as well as the several years before that when we dated and were engaged. Obviously the biggest changes are two of the most visible, and their initials are L.E.C. and B.S.C. And countless other smaller changes have come about, as a direct result of them. Plus, there have been job changes, house changes, church changes, family changes, all sorts of things have happened since 5-8-2004. It occurred to me that I have already lived in 3 places in Fort Worth, since moving here in 2003. That's more places than I lived Austin, when I was a college student! And I would venture to guess we'll be moving on from here at some point. Eleven hundred and forty square feet can't contain our family forever.....

But I digress. The five-year mark has come and gone, but I'm still in a reminiscing mood. I'm also in a "What-If" mood. I look back and consider how our lives would have changed if certain things hadn't happened, or if certain events had taken place sooner or later than they really did. Of course there's no way to know, and I wouldn't change anything over the past five years.

The most amazing thing is, I think, how incredibly fast things have happened. Time is blazing by at an incredible rate of speed. Seemed like that the school year took forever when I was a kid. To get out of high school was like a snail's pace. College seemed like a long five years. So why are things faster now? Some would likely attribute it to the kids. Perhaps to some degree this is true. I think also there is just so much stuff we have to do everyday. Except for most of Saturday and Sunday, most of my time M - F is booked up from the moment I wake up until I get back into bed at night. Of course my job takes up a lion's share of my time, but my time at home is fairly well full, too. I know that Stephanie's days are just as full as mine, but filled with different things.

I contrast that with memories of being a kid (or even a college student, to some degree), and there were hours on end when I did nothing. I would come home from school, plop on the couch, cat-nap while watching Jeopardy, soon enough have dinner, then watch some more TV or do a bit of homework, then more lounging until Letterman and bedtime. That kind of lifestyle seems so foreign now. Of course, eventually I did actually get a job my Senior year in high school, but I quit in May, right before graduation. Why? Wouldn't any intelligent teenager want to work really hard his last summer before college, to save up money? Not me, I wanted to be supremely lazy. I do recall a few "jobs" that summer, mostly "house-sitting", which consisted of being lazy at someone else's house, and getting paid cash to do it. Maybe there was some intelligence there after all.

The velocity of our lives today is such that for the first time in my life I feel like I need a calendar to know where and when I'm supposed to be somewhere. For example, a strange occurrence happened today at work. I had to schedule a doctor's appointment, and since I work in an open studio, everyone within 30 feet of my desk can hear every word of every phone conversation I have (and I theirs'), I usually step away from my desk into a conference room or empty, enclosed office to make "semi-private" phone calls. Maybe I'm the only one who feels awkward calling the doctor's office, and letting everyone in on the conversation. So I was away from my desk, on my cell phone, trying to schedule an appointment, and was paralyzed because I didn't have my Outlook in front of me. My thought process was like this: "I need to see my calendar, but I don't have it here. But I also need to schedule this appointment, but I don't need the whole office to be hearing about my medical issues. What do I do....?" I will sadly admit for the first time ever I actually thought I might need something like a Blackberry, so I could keep my calendar with me at all times, since I have so much going on. It was a terrible thought.

Things at home are even worse. Since I don't put personal stuff like parties, church events, etc.. on my Outlook, Stephanie keeps track of these, and occasionally reminds me. I am always forgetting these things, because they are not popping up on a screen reminding me. Stephanie can't believe how much I forget, but I truly can't keep track of it all. I will resolve to work harder on this for the next five years, before Stephanie gets worn out from reminding me of stuff I need to do.

It's funny to think about how very scheduled even our wedding weekend was. I doubt we still have this document, but Stephanie and I created an hour-by-hour schedule from Thursday before the wedding through Saturday night. It was distributed to all parties involved, and I think we even made some family members unduly stressed out with their assigned times and tasks. It was perhaps a bit too much, but everyone and everything went right on schedule and it was by and large a perfect weekend.

Indeed, these entire past five years would qualify as perfect, as much as that is possible. There have been disappointments and delays and difficulty, but only from our human perspective. And everything has come so fast that there's never much time to dwell on anyone thing before the next occurs. I suppose in the final analysis the lesson to be learned from this quickening pace of life is that our time on this earth will eventually run out. I rejoice in each dawn that comes, for the Lord's mercies are indeed new every morning, but I know that I am not promised even the next sunset. What Jesus said in John 9:4 is sobering... "We must work the works of Him who sent Me, as long as it is day; night is coming, when no man can work."

Night is coming, when no man can work.

I hope that I am not in the twilight of my life, only because I know that I have not yet worked as I should have. I've spent too many years being lazy, or working for things that don't amount to much. Even now, as I am constantly "busy," am I really putting forth the work that I should, that makes a difference in people's lives eternally? I hope that a half decade from now, I'll be able to answer that question in the affirmative. Until then, the "busy-ness" of life will likely not subside, but nor must my efforts.

Lyrical Lucy

2009-05-03T15:28:00.000-05:00

Lucy got up into my lap yesterday at the dinner table (we were finished eating), and matter-of-factly asked me to "Sing the Central Market Song."

I looked at her quizzically and admitted that I knew of no such song.

While we have indeed visited the blessed CM just a few blocks from our house countless times, I was unware of any particular song about it.

Lucy then took my fingers, put them on her barefoot toes and repeated herself, "Sing the Central Market Song."

Suddenly it dawned on me.

This little piggy went to Central Market
This little piggy stayed home
This little piggy had roast beef...

and so forth.

She was pleased that I knew the song after all, and I was too.

Architectural Children

2009-05-02T16:02:00.000-05:00

I ended up with my hard hat at home recently, though it usually stays at the office. When Lucy came out to greet me in the front yard, she decided she wanted to try it on. An interesting episode followed, and Stephanie happened to have the camera....

Ultimately I think she likes wearing it about as much as I do.

A couple of weeks back we went on a Rainy-Saturday-Outing to The Science Place in Dallas. Never been there before, to my knowledge. It was a fine outing. One of the special exhibits was all about Buildings: types of structures, construction techniques, a bit of architectural history, sustainability, and so forth, with quite a few interactive exhibits.

I came away from the exhibit scratching my head and thinking, "Wow, architecture looks like it should be a fun career...."

Sea, Air, and Land.....? No Thanks.

2009-04-25T15:39:00.000-05:00

This week a flyer landed in our mailbox, addressed to yours truly:

I'm not sure what to make of it. Either the Navy SEAL Fitness Challenge has grossly mis-targeted their audience by sending me this card, or they are trying to shame me for my spaghetti muscles and convince me to get in shape.

I'll let you draw your own conclusion / punchline.

Poop Post

2009-04-16T22:03:00.000-05:00

At the risk of being a bit gross, I'll share that Lucy names her poop. After people.

It started maybe in the last month or two. She made a "big" poop, looked in the toilet, and announced, "That's a daddy one!" She continued to relieve herself, and plopped out some smaller ones. To this she remarked, "There's a mommy one, and there's a baby one."

But now this habit has progressed to actual names. While she was pottying the other night, she said, "I'm going to make an Amanda one," referring to her forthcoming poop. I responded quizzically, "You're going to make an Amanda one?" Then she shakes her head and says, "Going to make a Kevin one first." The she pooped.

(Amanda is one of Stephanie's good friends, and Amanda's 2 year old son is Kevin, and thus one of Lucy's friends.)

And tonight while she was hesitating on the potty I asked her, "Do you need to go poo-poo?" She responded, "I'm going to do a Daddy one, a Mommy one, and a Lucy one". . . . grunt. . . "I'm going to make a Ben one first."

I guess naming poop isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it was bad when tonight after she wiped herself she then proceeded to wipe her nose as well with the same t.p. Hopefully that doesn't become a habit of its own. We'll have to work on proper wiping protocol.

Easter Ben

2009-04-12T21:53:00.001-05:00

Sad But True

2009-04-01T21:40:00.000-05:00

I'm losing my hair.

This is no surprise to those of you who have seen me lately, but some recent photos have given me a fresh perspective on this.

See for yourself:

Stephanie snapped some photos of Lucy and I in a Fort we made in her room. Since I usually am not afforded a view from directly above my head, I was startled to see the thinning out of my hair right on top. I was well aware of the receding line along the forehead, but the thinning out was somewhat of a surprise.

Oh, well.

A few more Fort photos, just for fun.... Notice the way you are able to see directly into our nostrils. If you look closely you can see that Lucy's are full of snot.

The Joshua Tree

2009-03-22T16:20:00.000-05:00

The Joshua Tree, shown above in its native habitat, is the common name of the Yucca brevifolia, a plant species belonging to the genus Yucca in the family Agavaceae. Its habitat is clearly the desert, and is native to parts of the Southwestern United States, confined mostly to the Mojave Desert, which stretches over portions of California, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah. There is in fact a Joshua Tree National Park in southern California, ranging over some 1,200 square miles of harsh landscape.

The Joshua Tree is also the name of rock band U2's Grammy award-winning 5th album, released in 1987. Album artwork included photos of band members in Death Valley, and the tree depicted above was featured on the album as well.

Some ten years later, in 1997, myself and six friends would find ourselves at another "Joshua Tree," depicted below:

Clearly the above tree that we visited is neither in the desert nor a Yucca brevifolia. I am not certain of the species, but if I was to hazard a guess, I might say it is a Quercus virginiana (Live Oak). For my friends and I, this was a special tree, as it was for many other young people who grew up in Arlington and ever attended a youth camp with the First Baptist Church.

As you can see, the tree is HUGE. While I also cannot verify the tree's size, judging by Thomas' height in the photo, I estimate the tree's overall spread to be at least 130 feet. The height would appear to be at least half that. In my memory, it is the largest tree I have ever personally seen, and makes the famous "Big Tree" on the Lamar Peninsula near Rockport look like a sapling.

So what's the connection between this oak tree, the yuccas in the Mojave, and the U2 album?

Read on....

For whatever reason, in the early 1990s, there was a number of youths at First Baptist Arlington who were enamored with U2's 1987 release. To be sure, there are some memorable songs on the album, including "With or Without You," "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," and "Where the Streets have No Name." As a result, this album was in fact the first compact disc I ever purchased, used, for a bargain at CD Warehouse. It remained in my possession until last year, when I sold all my CDs to Half Price Books, for far, far less than I bought them for. Turns out CDs are not a good investment.

Anyway, the album and the band apparently loomed largely enough in these suburban kids' minds that they decided to christen this oak tree in North Texas with the same name, "The Joshua Tree," nevermind that the species and habitat were all wrong.

To a certain extent, the tree was always somewhat of a mystery, until that hot June afternoon in 1997 when we all made a pilgrimage to see it up close. Until that day, we had only been able to experience the tree from perhaps 2,000 feet away. Our Joshua Tree is located in the Brazos River Valley, in rural Somervell County, down a cliff and across the River from Riverbend, the popular Baptist encampment. Myself and thousands of other children, teenagers, and adults have spent time at Riverbend through the years, and we all know the fantasic view from the camp, which is high on a bluff above the Brazos. Featured prominently in the sweeping vista from atop the bluff is this tree, this "Joshua Tree," standing by itself in a swath of short grass prairie.

The Joshua Tree's size was what always amazed us. Even from up on the bluff, at the Camp, the tree looked enormous. We could only imagine how big it really was. Some of my peers in years past determined to make the hike from Camp, down the bluff, and across the Brazos to get to the tree. This was, of course, verboten. Of all the rules that FBC imposed at church camp, going down the cliff to the river was paramount. A tragic accident had occured in days gone by, back when water recreation took place on the river. I think a student drowned, and ever since then, no one was permitted to go down there. But as teenagers are prone to do, even Southern Baptist ones, they break rules, and I am certain that through the years some have made the trip down and back to see the tree from Camp.

My friends and I tended to toe the line, rather than break the rules, so one summer after camp was over we decided to see the Joshua Tree the only other way you could - approach the tree from the north side of the river. While this seemed to be a reasonable plan, there were problems. Certainly our Joshua Tree was on private property, likely behind one or more fences. Were we willing to trespass to see our mythical tree? Plus, in those days, aerial maps were not yet readily available on the internet. How would we know exactly where to approach the tree from? All we knew of the tree was that one sweeping vista, high above and some distance away. It would be entirely different, approaching from the bottom of the valley, inherently not being able to see the tree from afar.

So I did what I could to prepare for our pilgrimage. I bought a good map of Somervell County and began to plot our course. I could determine with a reasonable degree of accuracy where the tree was likely located. The only real question was, how do we get to it? After some thought, I figured we ought to go about it in the most honest, straight-forward way possible, and simply knock on the appropriate farmhouse door, and ask the presumed property owner if he would let us head out onto his Back 40 and see his Joshua Tree. Again, this was a good plan, but how did we know which farmhouse door to knock on? This was before the days of appraisal district records online, or if they were online, I was certainly unaware of them. So basically all my research came down to an educated guess. I consulted the map, found what I thought was the most likely "end of the road" nearest the Tree, assumed there might be a house at the end of the road, assumed that the person inside the house would be at home when we showed up, and assumed he would let a half-dozen teenagers on his property.

Looking back, this was a long-shot, but in the end, it worked out beatifully, partly because we teenagers took an actual adult with us. I think having a responsible grown-up (who also very much wanted to see the tree) accompany us added legitimacy to our pilgrimage. At any rate, all my assumptions turned out to be right on, except that the person who opened up the farmhouse door that afternoon wasn't a man, but a dear old lady. I do wish I could recall her name. She was actually willing to go with us to see her Joshua Tree, after we managed to explain to her who we were, and what we were doing on her front porch.

So everyone hopped in the back of my pickup, our hostess got up front with me (with her small dog, who I think was called "Tiny"), and she directed us down a dirt road, over a creekbed, and eventually out into a prairie, and soon enough our objective loomed large and majestic in the distance. It turned out that the Joshua Tree was unmistakable from any angle, and was truly one of the most glorious displays of God's creation I have ever seen.

Our kind hostess remained in the truck, while we all rushed out to see the tree. Our pilgrimage only had one more task remaining: carve initials in the massive trunk. That we did:

And after it was all over, here we are, L-R: Leighanne, Emily, Nathan, Mrs....? (with Tiny), Loni, Thomas, Jr., and Chris. Our token grown-up, Thomas, Sr. was taking the photo.

I trust that the Joshua Tree still stands now, much as it did then, though I wonder if the name lives on. Perhaps the FBC youth still call it the Joshua Tree, and perhaps some curious teenagers still make the forbidden trek down the bluff and across the Brazos to see it up close. Perhaps they would see our initials in the trunk, and add their own. But to my knowledge, no one else has made the pilgrimage quite like we did, to see the amazing Joshua Tree.

Fun With Photos Friday

2009-03-20T17:58:00.000-05:00

I enjoyed crafting Thursday’s post so much that I decided to continue the theme of historic photographs for Friday. I will be looking in particular at the five years following high school, namely College.

The photographic record of my college years is spotty at best. After high school, a photographer no longer shows up once a year to document your growth and development in a portrait suitable for framing. Perhaps this is because during college it is no longer your body that is growing and developing, but your mind.

I also think my lifestyle in College also contributed to this dearth of photos. I was certainly no fraternity-boy, nor was I interested in all that, so I never really attended those parties where professional photographers showed up to snap dozens photos of frat guys holding onto their drinks and their dates.

Added to that is the fact that the years 1998 – 2003 were transitional years from film to digital. Nowadays everyone seems to carry around a tiny digital camera with them, or at the very least a phone capable of posing as one. But back then I think people still used 35 mm, by and large. I admit that I may be one of the last people on earth clinging to his 35 mm, and certainly most everyone else has moved on.

So, if we were to look at the sparse photographic record of my college years, what would we learn? That’s the question I will try and answer. No longer can we simply look for variations in hairstyles, because for the most part the hair finally normalized itself sometime in 2001. Instead we have to look at what I’m doing in the photos, who is with me, or where I am.

Best as I can tell, in chronological order, this is what I could find:

Year 2000 begins with an action shot:

Action shots are rarely (if ever) found anywhere in my photographic past, be it childhood or college. I think this is because I tend to not be very active. You wouldn’t find old photo albums full of my soccer or basketball games, largely because there were few of those, and even fewer times that I actually handled the ball. Thankfully my parents didn’t simply take a bunch of photos of me sitting on the bench.

Anyway, this rare action shot (a similar one will appear below) features me and my college friend and roommate Joshua pushing one of our architectural models off the 4th level of the parking garage at our church. I suppose there was something cathartic about destroying a project we had worked hours and hours on. Kind of like paying it back with destruction for the way it had drained our energy, brain, and time.

And now for a “post-action” shot:

This photo could be captioned “Five white boys who just got schooled by four Peruvians on the hardwood.” We had just finished playing basketball, and in case you can’t tell, I am the one dead-center who’s relieved that the game is finally over. On the far left is Joshua again. Unfortunately nothing in the photo suggests the location, or the nationality of our darker-skinned companions. You will just have to take my word for it that we were in Peru at the time on a mission trip.

This photo’s location is also not apparent, but was taken in La Villita in San Antonio. Other than trips home to Stinktown during holidays, the city I probably visited most often was San Antonio. It is my 3rd favorite city in Texas, behind Funkytown and Austin, and is a great city. I enjoy the missions, museums, neighborhoods, and urban fabric of the city more than the ultra-famous, tourist-choked Paseo del Rio. Stephanie and I would eventually honeymoon in the city, though at the time this photo was taken I had no idea who Stephanie was! One of my architectural colleague’s arms is strangely floating behind my head. Also, note that around my neck is my precious 35 mm.

Another action shot, again destroying an architectural model, at the very end of the Spring semester 2001. This time, instead of heaving the model off of a high place, the chosen method of destruction was stomping, followed by driving over with an automobile, repeatedly. See below for the model, pre-stomping. I think it was probably the finest basswood model I ever did. The project was a truck stop on IH-35 at the Walburg exit, F.M. 972. Every time I drive past Walburg I think about that project. The fun thing about Walburg is that there is a good German restaurant there, where all of my studio mates met for dinner after a grueling semester. Excellent Hauptspeisen and Nachtisch.

These photos were also shot on-location, this time across the globe in Lugano, Switzerland:

This was one of nicer hotels we stayed in, complete with a large-scale chessboard on the terrace. My opponent in this game was another Josh, though not my roommate Josh. I will never forget that after a long and hard-fought game, my skills prevailed and Josh was finally vanquished. As the winner I got to remain in my place, and take the next player. I’m glad there are no photos of that game. I was feeling so proud after beating Josh, and my other colleague Jesse just demolished me in about 4 moves. I felt about as tall as one of those pawns. ‘Tis true that pride goeth before a fall; a haughty spirit leads to destruction.

And here I am mimicking a statue at the McNay Museum in San Antonio. I hadn’t noticed this until after I found this picture just now, but the sculpture is actually fairly disturbing. I presume this is a mother-and-child, and the mother looks quite distressed, but the baby is even worse. Naked, rail thin, and sickly. Weird:

Here we have ringing in the New Year, 2002. To the left is my now-wife Stephanie, though at this point we weren’t even dating yet. We were actually just getting to know one another, and later that Spring Semester our relationship would begin. To the upper right is Joshua, yet again. Farther right (with the party popper) would be Joshua’s now-wife Tiffany.

Stephanie now begins to appear in many photos at my side, this time accompanying me to a friend’s wedding. In the background is the lovely landscaping and brick wall of my apartment complex Su Casa. It appears from the website that today the 2 bedroom units go for more than $1100. Back when I signed on in 1999, it was $850. Rent increased every year that I lived there, while amenities decreased. While I was a tenant, Rainier removed the swimming pool, filled the hole with dirt, and planted a couple of palm trees.

Whlie I am still technically in this photo (at least my legs and feet), this is about the cat. Lexus is one of those cats that allow people to actually like cats. As I always used to say, "She is 100% luxury cat." Lexus had a fondness for flip flops. If ever a pair of flip flops was on the floor, which was basically 100% of the time in a college girl’s apartment, Lexus would lay down and stick her paw in the flip flop, like she was wearing it. That particular pair of Reefs in the photo was my first pair of flip flops to own. I was very conflicted about purchasing them, but eventually did, and wore them quite often. I’m working on my 2nd pair now, and wonder if now I’m getting too old to wear them. I see these 30 / 40-ish guys with their wife and kids at Central Market wearing their polo shirts, khaki shorts, and flip flops and wonder, “Hey guy, isn’t it time to grow up?” Seems to me a dramatic shift has occurred in mens’ wardrobes, and it is very easy succumb to today's trend. In the past (perhaps quite some time ago), boys and young men dressed to look like their fathers (long pants, shirts with collars and cuffs, and even ties and blazers). Now fathers dress to look like their kids (shirt tails untucked, baggy cargo shorts, and flip flops). What happened? The culture of youth in this country has reversed the role of boys looking up to their fathers in order to become mature, and has become fathers looking down at their sons in an attempt to still be youthful.

Well, so much for rhetoric about being mature. Here’s me with Mickey Mouse, Spring Break ‘02. This time Stephanie was behind the camera.

Finally I’ll conclude with some photos that don’t include me directly, though I’m just a doorway away. Let it be said that my fondness for naps is well-known, even in college. So much so that my friends took advantage of this, and chose to memorialize the occasion in film. In these four photographs I am asleep in my bed, some 20 feet away from the these clowns, oblivious to the fact that Jason, Russell, Stephanie (not my now-wife), Sarah, Becca, and Deborah converged on my apartment, turned all my road signs upside down, read my Statesman, ate my food and drank my milk, and even watched by TV, all while I snoozed in the next room. Not sure what the moral to this story is. Maybe it’s just lock your front door before you lay down for a nap.

Travel Back In Time Thursday

2009-03-19T18:40:00.000-05:00

I ran across a small packet of photos in my sock drawer (of all places), and the contents of the packet have become the topic of Thursday's post.

Here, in school pictures, we can see my progression from Kindergarten through the 11th Grade (alas, no Senior pictures were to be found in the packet).....

Kindergarten:

1st Grade:

2nd Grade:

3rd Grade:

4th Grade:

5th Grade:

6th Grade:

7th Grade:

8th Grade:

9th Grade:

10th Grade:

11th Grade:

Let me first insert a shout-out to my most excellent Father-in-Law Bradley Spaulding, who has made this post possible. More than a year ago he gave Stephanie and me a new computer for Christmas, and this is really the first time I’ve taken advantage of the neat-o scanner. Thanks Brad!

What is interesting to me is the progression in my hairstyles. In the preceding twelve photographs I can distinctly discern no fewer than 6 hairstyles, which means on average my hairstyle would have changed about every 24months. This is an emasculating thing to admit, but as they say, “the camera don’t lie.”

So let’s see what we can learn about me from these photos, especially as it relates to the hair.

In general, Kindergarten through 3rd grade look very much the same, though I think I do look considerably “younger” in Kinder, compared to the others. Typical “little boys haircut,” I think, at least for a kid with thin, straight hair. It is also interesting to note my apparent fondness for turquoise and white striped polo shirts.

Then comes the “wave.” Fourth grade apparently brought some big changes, not the least of which was big hair. Aside from the hair, consider the smile. You can now see that I am smiling widely enough to show some teeth. No longer a tight-lipped grin. And, consider the fact that this is the first time plaid has entered my wardrobe. Until now, it had only been stripes apparently. But most jarring of all is the “wave” hairstyle. Not sure what I was thinking, except I recall that my friends were doing it, too. Perhaps your friends were also doing the “wave” back in 1990.

At the risk of embarrassing myself further, I will also admit that the “wave” was actually a team effort between my Mom and I. Indeed, I was not skilled enough to operate the comb, hair spray, and blow dryer all by myself. Mom had to do this for me. Every morning. I remember it well.

At any rate, the “wave” seemed to last for only a couple of years. That said, 5th grade still seems quite a bit different than 4th. I look somehow taller, I think. And for the first time I’m wearing a long-sleeved shirt (though turquoise again). And did you notice how much paler I am compared to a year before? While I maintain that I have never in my life had a proper tan, 4th grade looks downright golden compared to 5th. My fate has always been either varying degrees of paleness or sunburn. So why did I look extra-white in 5th grade? Perhaps I spent more time than usual inside that year, or perhaps the photo shoot was in Winter (might explain the long sleeve shirt). Who knows? Finally, the smile goes back to a tight-lipped grin. No teeth.

And then 6th grade throws me for a loop. This is the only year where my hair is just totally a mess. Clearly I had abandoned the “wave” of years past, but I also had not yet settled on the next style, which appears in 7th grade, known affectionately as the “butt-cut.” The term “butt-cut” is derived from the part right down the middle of the head, much like another area of the human anatomy. And I daresay there are elements of the “wave” here, too, though by 1993 I was able to style it all by myself. And now the teeth are back in full view, for good.

Eighth’s hair is largely the same as 7th’s, though again I appear to have matured from ’93 to ’94. And for some reason I’m looking down at the camera. In no other year can you see quite as much under my chin. This is odd, though perhaps the photographer didn’t properly adjust the seat from the kid before me.

Nineteen ninety-five continues the “butt-cut,” though by this time all vestiges of the “wave” are gone. The style is bushier than before, perhaps due to a lack of mousse holding everything down. Why did I stop adding product to my hair? I can’t recall.

Finally, high school arrives. Tenth grade finds the part shifted slightly to the left – no longer straight down the middle. Why did I decide to move the part to the left? Why not right? I am now, as I was then, a Conservative and not a Liberal, so shifting right would have made more sense. At any rate now I have what I would consider less of a“hairstyle and more of just a regular guy’s haircut, for the first time in ten years. Variations of this cut would persist for the next 5 years, though the cut would increasingly get shorter, until 2001, when I finally dispensed with the scissors altogether and transitioned strictly to the clippers, which continues to the present day, as many of you well know. But back in tenth grade, there was still a fair amount of follicle on top of my head, as in eleventh, which is virtually unchanged from the year before.

So there you have twelve years worth of changes in hairstyles, and many more changes in life!

Wordless Wednesday

2009-03-18T21:40:00.001-05:00