random stuff from around now ...

Stair riser chevron ... If you're thinking about doing this ... I have a few tips:
1. Don't.
Yeah, that's the tip ... it's freaking crazy to sit on a step applying "interest" to the stair risers.  My back ... hates me.
If you simply must have chevron risers (as I still believe I must ... and you are borderline OCD about perfect edges as I must be) ... find wall paper in a nice chevron pattern.  Yep ... wall paper is the ticket, no doubt.  It remains to be seen if I don't wind up rerouting my plan A for wall paper.  Surely it can be found, and ... when I have time to relax tonight, I'm going to shop on line for some.

here is where I am at ... I did the work on the top two today and by that I mean several hours worth of measuring, cutting, peeling (the worse part if you can believe it) the backing away from the black contact vinyl. Obviously, there is some tweaking yet to be done. I think I have 8 more plus the finish up on these already begun.  Then ... the bannister will come down for a refinish and just a bit more painting behind the banister ... over the years I have learned that it is just easiest to loosen or remove stuff that you don't want paint on away from the surfuce you're painting.
Someone recommended a stencil for this effect ... and I think that idea has potential.  My house is old and not exactly "plumb".  As I've worked on interior finishes over the years, I've noticed that houses simply aren't reliably "square".  Also ... in my case, these were milled "less then" we have come to expect in newer buildings.  The actual wood is magnificent ... densely  grained, heavy ... real, real wood ... bit of a love/hate thing!
Someone suggested using a 2" painters tape to mask the white and then brushing on black paint. I don't think I know enough bad words to express how truly mind bending that would be for me ... how would I get my perfect 90 degree turns on each end?

My daughter suggested an "algorithm" ... and honestly, I had to look the word up ... I made a template. It helps.
So ... I listened to my documentary ... and later to Norah singing her mournful little songs ... sounds nice in the stair well ... and I stocked up on Advil ... bet there are easier ways!
Next ... hummus cups ...

super easy and very festive ... One of the kids had a thing last night so I made these in support of that. Cucumber peeled with zester then peeler, cut on diagonal (maybe it's the chevron thing) melon baller scooped out seeds ... piped Publix hummus in and garnished.  The girls loved them ... big hit.  It's good when yummy can also look pretty I think.
And this ...

D texted this photo of her door wreath ... I think it's just perfect ... she said she will add a bird, or some antlers ... ummm, not like the kind that are trophy style ... loose ones.  Gorgeous.  Fall ... bonfires, football ... sweaters, soups, lower AC bill ... good stuff.
And, an interesting thought ... 

I think I have found that to be true. 
Maybe it's more like integrating the mind with the soul ... not an entirely silent mind, but ... interesting thought, I think.  This quieter couple of years has been great for me.   Sometimes I think you just have to hold on as best you can 'til you can quietly figure out what to do ... and ... somethings really aren't thinking things, but they might be thoughtfully packaged.

97/1000

Cooking ... that I actually learned to cook, and I love it ... planning the weeks menu ... shopping for groceries (the produce market especially) ... unpacking the bags and putting our items in the frig or the pantry. This week I made ginger shrimp which required my wok.  I don't get to use it near enough.  It was the first pan I bought for myself and during college practically everything I made was cooked in that wok ... perfect first pan.  This is what I am specifically thankful for ... my number 97 ... that I have a kid who loves to cook almost as much as I do and who will cherish that cooking vessel someday.  I have a copper wok that I have never cooked in ... it's like it's too pretty.  I should give one of those to him ... .

Just trying to distill the fruits of Mr. Lewis' labors as shared in Four Loves ... man, talk about an excellent book!  Perfect for me at this time, it provides a wonderfully wrought implement for "getting a handle" on love.  I read and reread and ... I kinda wish I had the book form to write in as I puzzle it out, but the PDF is kinda excellent too because I like to read on my iPad, low intensity lightness is perfect for the middle of the quiet night.

So ... did finish the tree project ... I taped one little leaf up there and painted the stems and leaves for Paper flowers to be added ... .

This is a shot of the chevron pattern on the stair risers ... hugely labor intensive ... and super cute.  Will post another picture later, maybe much later because I seem to have only enough serenity for one per day ... this is hair pulling kind of tedious.  The withe is high gloss paint and the black is very carefully measured and cut contact paper (adhesive back ... knock on wood that it stays put! May have to paint a clear coat over the entire shebang.)  I looked and looked for the paper before ordering it from Amazon ... two rolls will do 13 fronts if you do this ninety degree turn ... not much room to mess up (lol, I will likely need another roll before the deed id done) ... can't even imagine painting this!

This morning, bright and early, I mapped out a route through six garage sales ... never have done that before and it was pretty much fun.
C needs a couple of chairs ... one for the desk, another for her bathroom.  I thought I could find them for maybe twenty bucks apiece.  The white chair is for her ... once I strip it I will know what do do with the frame.  She has already purchased a fabric ... gonna be sweet!  The middle chair ... I just like the lines.  It needs to be entirely rebuilt.  Under the upholstery is red leather ... I will find some outrageously gorgeous graphic floral for it ... I think, we will see.  I am excited about it.  The rocker ... thinking about painting it black for my front porch, but I secretly want to paint it aqua and antique it with a rich tobacco brown... I am thinking about it (and it is making me smile).  C came up with the idea of buying icky furniture and restoring it to something usable and cool.  I think I may have found my little in home business.  I like messing with furniture.  I could probably sell it as fast as I could love it up ... think I would enjoy that.  I want to make some money.

First chair is for C ... I've hand sanded enough of it to see that it's a soft light wood.  Because of her sensibility I think I will paint it white ... her fabric is a cool geometric graphic, traditional yet updated ... I am going to do something unique in the little cut out back detail ... maybe veneer tiny little silver seed beads ... something subtle ... oh that would be cute and maybe little silver seed bead boots.

I've been piddling around with this post on an open screen all day ... now it is time for dinner prep.  Just L and I tonight ... ginger shrimp.  It's different to cook for two ... .

End of Summer

The sky this morning reminded me of one of the early lessons I learned while earning the instrument rating ...what's happening "here" is transitory ... you may go through it, you may let it go through you ... but it's a thin veil or layer back to where the sun shines (Yeah, maybe more, but it's never as bleak as it appears to be).  I thought of when I read Lewis' analogy on nearness of approach (to God). Sometimes the overcast seems more then it is ... so ... summer's weather coming to an end.

Summer's end shoe sale ... nets these fun paint splattered cork wedges ... and turquoise toenails in support of ... I really do love shoes ... and shoe sales. (Yeah they are super comfy) Gotta save this funny memory here ... at some women's thing and the speaker asked "What is your definition of best girl friend?"  My buddy girl H replied, "Someone who wears my same size shoes."  Love that.

And this ... end of summer peaches ... picture of today's lunch ... spray coat grilling pan, slice, grill, drizzle with honey ... D gave me the recipe earlier this week and I've just been waiting on the peaches to ripen.  Delicious ... while no one was looking I drank the juice from the empty bowl ... the only way this could be better would be eating it with your fingers ... or something like that. Oh!  Maybe with ice-cream!  Highly recommend.

 I love these Redbud leaves for their heart shape and their very intense greenness ... wet with early morning rain painted on in blue.

You can still see the heavy humidity in the way it disperses the sun light, bright on the new tin roof and the tops of the bottles.  I did a u-turn to come back for this picture.  That is an authentic bottle tree.

PS to yesterday's notes ...

"You said some of the best moments last week were when you were sitting outside just relaxing, and I know that you were thinking about something, and I know that it must have been something interesting.    My golf buddy said he really enjoys watching his children parent, but it grieves him that they don't make taking the family to church a priority - Sunday is a rest day from a week that is just too busy.  I think that is where we find ourselves, too busy to think.  You have the luxury of not being too busy and I think it would be sweet for you to share what you are thinking about with people who don't have the time to sit outside and relax, share those best moments." That's what my husband said to me yesterday at lunch, and I have been thinking about it.  

It has taken me quite a while to decompress from years of too busy. And even lately I've seen myself thinking about things more clearly then I was able to just the week before.  I noted here that fear doesn't wear well, what I didn't say, that I do believe, is that we don't wear it well because we weren't designed to "wear"  fear. Fear wasn't part of the original plan ...  intending to say scared fear, not reverent fear.  I love it, in the Bible, when the angel says, "Fear not ... "  it always cracks me up 'cause the appearance of an alien life form would be pretty intense ... apparently, they come with a message, and it's tricky to deliver clear communications through the sometimes impermeable cloak of fear.  And yet we all have our fears ... and our fears are somehow connected to betrayals, breaches of trust ... lessons learned and probably some mis-learned. Little big and big little things that ding cracks in our souls.  How can one let another so sweetly, so lightly, run a finger over their soul if there is no trust ... ?  

As I sat outside last week, landing pumpkin seeds husks on a Redbud seedling and Hosta leaves I was thinking about that dream which represents a difficult time, and fear had me engaged when all I really needed to say was ... I can't fix this ... because it is not mine to fix.  Me, trying to offer any fix for it was actually contributing to the problem.  It's not the problem, but it fuels the problem.  And ... fear is part of what drives me to participate, as well intentioned as it might be, intentions informed by fear are mostly not on the mark.  And ... for the lexicon of that dream, a friend reminded me that there is a Chief Pilot, and I answer to Him.  And ... truth is, He has the big picture and is actually looking out for me, and everyone/everything else, in relation to that better view.  In that dream I was actually contributing to the overall problem ... and not even identifying the most pressing problem ... duh ... low on fuel. When the fuel poops out the plane is going to land.  Period.  It was a problem of managing a landing, not keeping the thing in the air ... .  I was thinking about the relief of disengaging myself from the tangle and ... I had read Lewis' words ...  

"But in the long run it is perhaps even more apparent in our growing - for it ought to be growing - awareness that our whole being by its very nature is one vast need; incomplete, preparatory, empty yet cluttered, crying out for Him who can untie things that are now knotted together and tie up things that are still dangling loose." 

So ... I'm thinking about this.  I have the wonderful luxury of being not too busy to think about this.  And maybe there are some stories worth writing from those thoughts.

My husband really really really, like practically insisting kind of really, thinks I should write a book.  He is bossy like that. And ... this morning he very cheerily said he wants to hear all about my female character at lunch.  I was standing in the closet trying to decide if I should "flip" my summer shoes up to the top shelf making my close toed shoes more readily accessible.  Yeah ... that's the sort of thing I have time to wake up thinking about ... . As I look at my picture I see that I have been able to stretch myself away from black only footwear.  That's a good thing.  Female character at lunch.  This is funny; I was so not thinking about writing a novel that when he said "my female character" I thought he meant my female character, as Toby Keith sang, I thought this was my occasionally.
I worked so long and so hard towards something, just the scrapes really, something in commercial flying ... always mindful that it would be up to me to make it fit with my promises ... all the most important of raising children and tending my home ... and movie night. It was a lot of work for how I don't use it now.  It feels a lot like a fail. Writing a book ... . I don't think people just sit down one day and write a book.  It's true that the few people who know and love me best have all suggested I give it, writing a try.  My husband suggests, based on the flimsy fact that I keep a journal and pretty much always have, that I demonstrate a passion for writing.  I don't think that is what my kinda writing is about.  He, very kindly I think, says I am one of the most curious and tenacious people he has ever seen, meaning, when I am interested in something I explore it ... I like learning about things.  He thinks I should take my love of learning about random stuff and make it research for novels.  For example ... if I like astronomy I might develop a character who does astronomy ... I might find a favorite telescope and plan my story at that general location.  I guess that's basically what Sagan did with Contact ... he spun a story from stuff he knew and stuff he just dreamed up.  I just don't know.  I have accepted that I won't be flying much.  I am settled on the choices I have made there.  Most of the time I am really okay with it ... glad for the luxury of accomplishing a wonderful goal ... ask me anything about weather ... wanna know from whence cometh the winds? ...  ask me about airplanes ... I understand the magic ... it's the joy and grit inside the pilots that makes those things fly ... yeah, it's magic, it really is.  It's what's coming behind fly by wire.  People think we'll take pilots out of the planes ... like drones fly, unmanned.  I think it's just as likely that pilots will become even more integral, plugged in, maybe they will call it fly by desire ... I think the human element provides the magic of flight ... otherwise it's just engineering and physics ... it's good, but it doesn't make mankind's collective spirit soar.
I'm 53 and I haven't worked full-time since the week before my first child was born.  If it were just me, I think I would join the peace corps ... something like that, maybe there wouldn't be any flying for me anyway ... truth is, teaching was all I wanted to do with flying anyway.
Well ... my husband really doesn't want me to get a job outside our home.  He is unable to articulate why.  What I actually do feels ... fairly useless ... .  You know ... what is the point of writing a book?  The bookstores are full of them.  I actually think people spend too much energy on empty entertainment.  I loved reading the Clavell books. And the Kidder book, Mountains Beyond Mountains ... it tells a story that I'm glad to know.  Hmmmm ... .
I told my husband I may have another three or so epic failures in me.  One of them could be a writing career I guess.

Got another tree to paint up at the church ... and more Lewis to absorb.  His books have been a great joy to read.  This one I re-read as I read.

Clive Staples Lewis, commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, poet, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian, and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland.

just wow ...

today in the night sky ... severe overcast here ... cool stuff happens up there all the time ...

both found images ... just wow

September

Four Loves (C.S. Lewis)... Chapter1/6 notes on the Introduction

~found image

PDF for Four Loves
written by C. S. Lewis, first issued in 1958

Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 Likings and Loves for the sub-human 
Chapter 3 Affection
Chapter 4 Friendship
Chapter 5 Eros
Chapter 6 Charity 



A radio DJ wondered on air If you could sit down for a visit with any one person ... not family, not Jesus ... who would it be?  There may be several people  whom I would love to share some time with, some maybe not a conversation, rather more just the opportunity to observe them or hear them speak, or sing ... and of those people, the reasons for wanting to spend some time in their company vary significantly, and the reasons (or excuses) are not all virtuous.  But, given only one wish company, I know I would chose time with C.S. Lewis.  I've read several of his books.  I like the way he arrived at Christianity.  I like his way ... his sensibility. I like that he seems to know love.  Four Loves is a new title to me.  I would like to have read it in my teens and again and again through my life time.  I wondered as I read through it what I would have been able to make of it as a young woman ... it was written before I was even born.
Well ... in an effort to brief my notes I will re-read it these next few mornings and tap out my thoughts on his thoughts.  Some of them.  It's funny, I do not know this man's name ... not the C or the S of him, but I do know something of his heart.  He shares his heart while he shares his mind ... it's very personal.   I'll change the font color on "my" thoughts as I range through his words.

The book is 129 pages, 6 chapters in all.

Chapter 1 

Introduction

"God is love" ~ St. John (signpost on the highroad ... not only that simple/straight-forward though)

• Gift-love - typically love which moves a man to work and plan and save for the future well-being of his family  which he will die without sharing or seeing.
• Need-love - that which sends a lonely or frightened child to his mother's arms

I think I have seen "work" used as a substitute for the arms of a mother ... but I get what he is trying to help me see.

He states, Divine love is Gift-love in that  God gives all to the Son ... the Son gives all He is back to the Father and to the world, thus giving the world (in Himself) back to the Father ( via the offer of saving restoration to mankind) Need-love is our actual nature. "We are born helpless.  As soon as we are fully conscious we discover loneliness.  We need others physically, emotionally, intellectually: we need them if we are to know anything, even ourselves." (pg 3)

panegyrics = a lofty oration or writing in praise of a person or thing

need-love is actually love ... we do in reality need one another this need-love is not merely selfishness ...  and ... "Every Christian would agree that a man's spiritual health is exactly proportional to his love for God." (pg 4) Man's love for God is largely, often entirely, a Need-love.
love this idea quoted:

"But in the long run it is perhaps even more apparent in our growing - for it ought to be growing - awareness that our whole being by its very nature is one vast need; incomplete, preparatory, empty yet cluttered, crying out for Him who can untie things that are now knotted together and tie up things that are still dangling loose." 

Lewis references "Come unto to me all ye who are weary and heavy laden..." and "Open your mouth wide and I will fill it" ... I think the entire scriptures help us see a need for restoration ... that we need is the skeleton of our story. 
"Thus one Need-love, the greatest of all, either coincides with or at least makes a main ingredient in man's highest, healthiest, and most realistic spiritual condition. A very strange corollary follows. Man approaches God most nearly when he is in one sense least like God. For what can be more unlike than fullness and need, sovereignty and humility, righteousness and penitence, limitless power and a cry
for help? This paradox staggered me when I first ran into it; it also wrecked all my previous attempts to write about love."

fullness and need
sovereignty and humility
righteousness and penitence
limitless power and a cry for help

I see these acted out on a purely human scale, and ... it seems to frequently be shrouded in a big cloud of stink ... humans do not play God well. Perspective seems to be of utmost importance here ... I may, in human interaction, either give to one in need or receive relief for my own needs, but it is important in either role to keep in mind (and heart) that this is done via the grace of God ... as, every good gift is from God (even those which are delivered by human hand).  
We chase our vanities, it seems to me, when credit the fulfilling of "love-needs" to others, also when we require credit for such acts.  
I can think of things that I want which God's hand wouldn't even touch.  I can also see some things which are offered to me which I know didn't come through God's hands ... I will experiment with the idea of where my particular consumables originated, also my motives for lending a hand ... .  I admire people who help when they can and especially those acts offered without expectation.  I imagine those acts to be sacrifices offered to/through God.
As I look around, I see a lot to be thankful for.

Nearness to God, nearness of likeness, nearness of approach
This is an excellent analogy I think ... 

"Let us suppose that we are doing a mountain walk to the village which is our home. At mid-day we come to the top of a cliff, where we are, in space, very near it because it is just below us. We could drop a stone into it. But as we are no cragsmen we can't get down. We must go a long way round; five miles, maybe. At many points during that detour we shall, statically, be far further from the village than we were when we sat above the cliff. But only statically. In terms of progress we shall be far "nearer" our baths and teas."(pg 6)

And here I pause to smile and shake my head at myself ... this isn't brief ... these notes should maybe be in outline form ... idk.  I'll adapt as I go ... I haven't read the last of the book before I started re-reading and making notes of the beginning ... at this rate, I may not get through it this week!  And ... I wish I were smarter.  Sometimes, I have to read the thought over and over again to grasp what he is trying to to get across!  I think once I get his voice in my head I might read several of his books back to back.

nearness via likeness  is conferred and thus we can't do anything to become more near to His Likeness 
nearness via approach is initiated and supported by Grace ... is something we must chose to do
and this is the crux as I see it ... "Hence, as a better writer has said, our imitation of God in this life - that is, our willed imitation as distinct from any of the likenesses which He has impressed upon our natures or states - must be an imitation of God incarnate: our model is the Jesus, not only of Calvary, but of the workshop, the roads, the crowds, the clamorous demands and surly oppositions, the lack of all peace and privacy, the interruptions. For this, so strangely unlike anything we can attribute to the Divine life in itself, is apparently not only like, but is, the Divine life operating under human conditions." (pg 7)

"Love ceases to be a demon only when he ceases to be a god."~Dennis De Rougemont (via C.S. Lewis)
offered as a safeguard as "God is love" may slyly come to mean for us the converse ... love is God.


"We may say, quite truly and in an intelligible sense, that those who love greatly are "near" to God. But of course it is "nearness by likeness". It will not of itself produce "nearness of approach". The likeness has been given us. It has no necessary connection with that slow and painful approach which must be our own (though by no means our unaided) task. Meanwhile, however, the likeness is a splendour. That is why we may mistake Like for Same. We may give our human loves the unconditional allegiance which we owe only to God. Then they become gods: then they become demons. Then they will destroy us, and also destroy themselves. For natural loves that are allowed to become gods do not remain loves. They are still called so, but can become in fact complicated forms of hatred. 

Our Need-loves may be greedy and exacting but they do not set up to be gods. They are not near enough (by likeness) to God to attempt that." (pgs 9 and 10)  
These last two sentences I am thinking about, because I do believe that those things which we worship are precisely little gods ... recent reading in Psalms talks about made by human hand with eyes unseeing, ears unhearing and those who worship thus become as empty as the gods they crafted ... I think those are seen today not so much in totems (though I do see little gods in little shrines at the nail salon) as in the empty and emptying ways we use our lives.  and maybe equally so in the ways we fill our lives up ... maybe I busily serve my little gods while neglecting to make time holy in worship of the God.  I see what Lewis is saying by "likeness" they remain vacant, but perhaps I must respectfully disagree here.  I do believe we may construe needs to be so very important that they seem to become our little gods.  Maybe I miss the point he is making.  See ... lunch time would be very helpful to my better understanding!
"The human loves can be glorious images of Divine love. No less than that: but also no more - proximities of likeness which in one instance may help, and in another may hinder, proximity of approach. Sometimes perhaps they have not very much to do with it either way." (pg 11) ... this in support of his stance ... I'm thinking about it. 

“It has shown me that everything is illuminated in the light of the past. It is always along the side of us...on the inside, looking out.” ~Jonathan Safran Foer

“It is impossible to grasp another human's inner world. But even in the darkness of the densest forest, there can always be the light of a firefly.” ~ Krupakar, Birds, Beasts, and Bandits: 14 Days with Veerappan

He spread a cloud for a covering; and a fire to give light in the night. Psalm 105:39

And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night:  Exodus 13:21

Pottery efforts

This little wind map (SVC) is just super cool ... kinda love it.  Husband just asked me if it's going to rain on his golf game tomorrow.  This image doesn't especially help me answer that question, but I can see the way the wind is blowing ... and ... I will guess that tomorrow will be just slightly clearer here then today has been.  Hope Mississippi needed water!  I wonder what the winds aloft are doing ... .  Now I'm really going to have to look at the charts.

I spent this morning up at the church painting a tree on a wall.  They want two of them.  Looking like another three mornings will get that lovely.  I enjoyed my time up there.  Here is a photo of the tree ... they asked for it to be bare of leaves because the leaves will be added over the year to support the idea of "growth".  I imagine they will have memory verse and such ... maybe the children will receive a leaf to hang on a branch as an attendance thing.  I look forward to seeing how they will use it.  Another tree is planned for the other side of the room and I imagine "tying" a festive line of banners between the two.  I think it is what they wanted, and it does cheer the room up a bit.

This week's project at home has been prepping the stair well for new paint and it has been a bit of a mess. Stairwell walls are tricky.  It's going to look pretty cool when we get it done I think.  The girls have asked for chevron stripes on the risers ... and that's what I'm going to do for them.  I'm going to stain the wood steps and the hand rail as dark as possible and paint the risers creamy HG white ... the stripes will be black.  I'll get a before and after picture up later. Three had to remove several of the stair boards to get his box springs out ... and the door frame.  Perfect time to get everything freshened up and back together.

96/1000

H called the other day and reminded me of our little talk on Lindor's delicious truffles ... and I thought "That crazy child is the only soul on the planet who I would even be able to share the Lindor burden with ... buddy girls are just great."

She told me this story:

“And so seated next to my father in the train compartment, I suddenly asked, "Father, what is sexsin?"
He turned to look at me, as he always did when answering a question, but to my surprise he said nothing. At last he stood up, lifted his traveling case off the floor and set it on the floor.
Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?" he said.
I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with the watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning.
It's too heavy," I said.
Yes," he said, "and it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It's the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger, you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.” ~ Corrie Ten Boom

or in brief:

“Some knowledge is too heavy...you cannot bear it...your Father will carry it until you are able.” ~CTB

 She encourges me to remember that ... heard it a long time ago, a variation of it, and it is a perfect illustration of relationship between God and a soul who trusts. It has my heart thinking this morning.  Some knowledge ... some stuff I don't know about at all, like the child on the train ... some I do "know" but don't understand ... stuff too heavy for me.

“This is what the past is for! Every experience God gives us, every person He puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for the future that only He can see.” ~CTB

Maybe this idea of "every experience" ... I sure don't credit every experience I've found my wayward way in to as being God-given, but I do think it's entirely possible that He knows how to perfectly lace them into a future which only He can see.  

Corrie Ten Boom ... Quotes

Truffles ... not on my list for now. ... and that's okay.

Hope is the ability to hear the music of the future.

Faith is having the courage to dance to it today. ~ Dr. Peter Kuzmic,

theologian, Slovenian-born, citizen of Croatia

~ found photo of

 St. Augustine Lighthouse

Dennis Anderson ... Auroral Display

"Ion Butterfly" Captain Cook State Park, Kenai Peninsula, Alaska

Fantastic colors were produced in a spectacular show that was visible on this night in many parts of the globe as far south as Mexico and Cuba. The eruption of a "super flare" on our sun sent a barrage of charged particles Earthward that resulted in the most intense shock-front ever recorded. The subsiquent geomagnetic storm and subsiquent auroral display was, for many, a once in a lifetime look at this beautiful natural phenomenon.

Copyright Dennis Anderson

Thoughts about writing ... I'm trying to think of my favorite books, novel type books that is, and I guess my favorite author is James Clavell ... just wow.

James Clavell, who died in 1994, was a screenwriter, director, producer, and novelist born in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Although he wrote the screenplays for a number of acclaimed films, including The Fly (1958), The Great Escape (1963), and To Sir With Love (1967), he is best known for his epic novels in his Asian Saga.

Also memorable was Thornbirds and Roots ... I like the Michner books, but I haven't made it a point to read all his books ... yet.

Those books have in common ... scale ... each are big stories.

My husband tells me that the shades of grey trilogy is the ... well, he said 20% of all books sold right now are the grey books.  I haven't read them.  Nor did I read the, ummm, those werewolf/vampire books.  One and I saw part of one of the movies and I thought, wow, an entire generation of young women spoon fed the idea that this is love ... he may kiss me or he may drain my life force ... on second thought ... lol, ouch. 
Recently finished reading the book, Picture Perfect, by Jodi Pichoult ... from the back cover:

"... a cycle of hurt, denial, and promises ... torn between fear and something that resembled love ... how could she leave ... how could she stay?" 

The Library Journal says this is an important book from a talented writer.  I don't disagree with the fact that she is a talented writer with a formidable imagination. The characters in this book resolved their physical issues by creating physical distance ... the emotional/spiritual aspects remained entangled within a tragic love net which ensnared others as well. I'm trying to think of why the book might be important, and I guess an answer (for me) is that it illuminates how individuals find their way in to abusive relationships, why they stay there, and how those relationships may play out.  Ms. Picoult, educated at both Princeton and Harvard, has successfully sold a ton of books.  A third story of hers is sitting on my bedside table right now.  Last night it sat un-opened while I searched the Internet for something that would make me laugh.  I wound up looking at a You-tube video tutorial on how to create a cowboy hat from an empty beer case box ... big USMC ink and a twang. Life seems to be full of tragedies. 

Two had a thought for a book.  How about you take the Disney princesses and re-write their stories.  Yeah, the prince can tell Snow White that he just can't get around that whole running away and living with seven men thing ... he loves her but ... . Or with Aladdin ... the princess "loves" him, but realizes he is a compulsive liar, a thief, homeless, totally unreliable ... not the life mate she needs.  Mulan's guy falls in love with her while she is masquerading as a man ... uhhh, possibly some bromance issues there.  Or this ... Sleeping Beauty's prince kisses a corpse... ugh ... and his kiss re-animates her!  Little Mermaid's prince comes upon her when she is naked and without a voice ... that's some kind of beginning for true love story. Sounds like a good beginning for a Master's thesis.

Important stories ... hmmm.  Love is important.  I've seen a couple of epic real life love stories this year.  I'm living a complicated love story ... aren't we all?  Aren't all our very important connections about love?  

Different topic ... Neil Armstrong ... a face on an epic story.

Galileo's pendulum clock
Galileo: the Cosmos through a telescope 

What does something like this (pictured above) have to do with that story?  Where do stories begin?  Where do they end ... what is the story that is constantly retold, the peddle point to the song of life?

Or this very good thought ... interesting on a human level.

Interesting as we relate to each other  

interesting within the concept of how/where we relate to God.  

How do we discover who we are and how we might most successfully interact with others? 
I think that may be Ms. Picoult's genius.  She seems to explore the psychological aspects of human connections.

well ... back to re-finishing doors!  Hand work is pretty easy stuff ... stick with the check list!

Sunday

Pretty much a perfect day.  Really ... I want to remember some stuff from today.
When I woke up this morning I was happier then usual because while asleep I dreamed myself in that place where I flew to in my loop dream.  It's a really good place.  I should try to describe it, but ... I don't know a place like that.  It's more about how it feels there.  The road I was walking along was dirt ... that soft dirt that's more like sand ... powdery dirt, and the road, while it seemed to be an old road, was cut in and maintained by one of those yellow tractor things. It feels like an old place ... comfortable, familiar. This place feels like out in the country, it's natural, alive, and there are people there, but I didn't see anyone I know from life.  It's peaceful there.  There's a big ... huge ... tree with a swing hanging in it, and the rope is so long that you can really go way too high ... and the grass is soft underfoot. Remembering it, I see my feet bare which I never do unless I am at the coast. I think it may be near the coast, but I haven't seen any birds there, so, I'm not sure.  This is what I want to remember ... people were singing there.  Oh man, it was great.  I heard three different people singing during my dream ... they had really wonderful voices. One, a man, was singing in what seemed like a very clean small barn ... the acoustics were amazing and I remember looking at the structure's shape wondering how the space was constructed to carry the sound around so well.  I noted that it has like a barn roof at that time and the singer noticed that I was looking around, my eyes searching the probably flow of the sound.  He smiled at me and nodded ... like, yep, it's a cool space to sing in.  Hearing them filled me with happy.  When I woke up I could humm one of the songs, but I have forgotten it entirely now.  The other thing that I barely remember is I heard a baby crying and I went towards the sound to help it.  I very gently placed my hand on it's chest to let it know that I was there and it immediately stopped crying, opened it's eyes and smiled in to me ... and suddenly there were seven babies, they were all smiling at me.  In the dream I thought how strange that they all look exactly alike and move in sync with one another.  I said to them everything will be all right now.
I like that I have constructed such a nice place.  A barefoot place, a place where ropes are used for hanging swings, a place where music perfumes the air ... I am comfortable, without a care there.  Maybe it is heaven.  This isn't supposed to be a dream log, but ... I think I will always hope to visit this place in my sleep.  I want to remember it as well as possible when I am awake.

Next ... church.  Beautiful sermon about being a friend with the Holy Spirit.  The verses were from Ephesians 4 mainly.  Pastor used an illustration of a child at a Van Cliburn type event ... the child wanders on stage and begins tapping on the keys as children do ... the virtuoso joins the child and filling in the chords, together they create something special.  Pastor says we are "plunkers" ... all of us, but the Holy Spirit is just waiting in the wings for the opportunity to join us at the piano.  He made the point that the HS is sorta shy ... his friendship is not about acquiring and wielding referent power.  His power enables us to live more like Christ, not more powerfully entrenched in our frailties.

Later Two showed me this video ...  kinda cool ... . We spent some time together on the front porch. Then I had some time alone.  Still time.  I really like it, I like that I have learned how to be still.

I wanted to re-read that loop dream thing I noted and I wanted to think about the place I flew to ... the place trust flew me to.  A favorite place.  People wonder at these words this  somethings are true which never happened ... attributed to Elie Wiesel ... this dreamed place happened again, it feels quite true.  "... life does not consist mainly -- or even largely -- of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the storm of thoughts that is forever blowing through one's head. " ~ Mark Twain  I  think these guys are on to something.

 It cracks me up that I basically sat on the porch tossing seeds, landing them on Redbud leaves ... ridiculously amusing and other then that doing nothing 'cept noting the wild life and the breeze ... and ... wondering about random goofy stuff ... relaxing.

summer

95/1000

this evening  ... sitting on the front porch finishing up the book I was reading ... listening to the evening insects warming up their hummers and a bird in the pecan tree cooing ... summer night dropped like a an eyelet edged curtain and the yard lights winked awake ... I sat still as a small smile ... relaxing while the fire flies flitted in and out of the hydrangeas

photo from Pinterest ~uncredited

Storms ... Shelter ... Love

National Hurricane Center weather graphic from this morning ... loosely translates:  Today would be a good day to check and restock the storm pantry!  Earlier today I looked for recipes for cooking when you have no power ... from mostly canned foods.   The cookbook, A Man, A Can, A Plan  has made it's way to Texas I do believe ... .

What usually happens here is we lose electrical power.  Several storms
ago we were without for about two weeks.  As soon as was possible I changed my kitchen stove to gas.  So much better, even on clear days. The tall tress pull the power lines down.  Seems like a lot of this area has above ground electrical cable.

 beautiful from way away ... storms are something to be as ready as possible for ... I'm going to grind some coffee beans in a minute.  Isaac means laughter, laughing ... .

 I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm. ~Psalm 55:8 (NIV)

I read it early this morning before I got out of bed, another translation substituted ... well, here:

How quickly I would escape--far from this wild storm of hatred ~Ps 55:8 (NLT)

Sometimes it's interesting to see how different people translated these ancient texts.  I still don't understand a lot of the passages in Psalms, but, I'm trying.  The book is surprisingly tender at times ... it helps me quite a bit to begin the day with readings there.
My brother and I are discussing the idea of how and who does one decide to love ... and ... what does that mean.  Gosh, I enjoy talking with him about stuff.  My brother is a good man. Well, he is a bit of a stinker too, but I am a big fan ... I've especially liked him for a very long time.  Well anyway, my main question or ponderance (lol) is kinda difficult to express.  I am wondering if one can truly love a person they have never met.  Like ... I really like some writers ... big fan of Thoreau and Emerson, Longfellow, Eliot ... these guys write words that provide shelter.  A short cut to what T and I are talking about ... These writer guys have been given a place in my heart, but they came in through my mind.  That probably doesn't make sense.
I love my kids ... that love is from my heart to my mind ... I love them because they are my family, chosen by my heart, my mind can not evict them. ... Ummm, strangers ... also chosen by the heart I believe, because when my mind starts getting involved I am cautious (not a bad thing).  The people who my eyes never see ... how do I love them?  Do I love them?  That's what we are talking about, and I think yes.  Yes and it's interesting because I love them with my mind ... my mind loves them ... or the them my mind sees them to be (which is very one dimensional).  But, I think it is a sort of love none the less.  And ... isn't that precisely how I come to love God?  Some of the words in His book eventually penetrate my heart, but they come to my heart from my mind. And ... as this:
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’^[b] 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’^[c] There is no commandment greater than these. ~Mark 12:30 and 31
 I think the words are chosen for their significance ... they mean something different from each other. Heart. Soul. Mind. Strength.
I think I know love with my heart.  Also with my mind.  I think I understand what it means to love with my strength ... sometimes love requires lotsa strength ... love isn't easy.  With my soul ... harder to grasp in some ways and yet I think my soul knows.  That's what I'm trying to think about.  The soul seems to love generically as well as specifically ... I can see why love is such a big deal.
thoughts added this morning to my notes on Dust

for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust. ~Psalm 103:14

to the One who remembered us in our low estate His love endures forever ~Psalm 136:23

and that there is even any type of channel through which love may flow between dust and the Creator is amazing ... amazing that any of us is able to love in any capacity ... amazes me.  And yet ... we do, we know we do. We can see the evidence of love.

Storms ... shelter ... love.  That's what I'm trying to think about. 

And this ... the rock is good.

Ps 27:5 For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock. 

Jet A was $5.20

Nightmares ... the kind that grab a fist full of your gut ... and twist.  I wake up wide-eyed ... I am not smack dab in the middle of an aerial war zone ... thousands of feet above stable mother earth.  Familiar shadows reassure me ... a glass of water right there beside my bed.  I sit up pushing the damp hair away from my neck ... and I breathe, ssshhing myself.  It is so dark outside, and quiet ... deep night. My toes trace tiny circles on the wood floor ... Shhhsh just a bad dream ... . 

Yeah ... same dream.  I think this one is worse the the swinging suspension bridge.  The floor boards in that one would fall away as I passed over them.  "Don't look down ... keep moving forward ... there is no turning back", that's what I would tell myself and finally after many nights of peril I arrived on  bloodied knees at the door ... the destination ... it was freaking locked!  The cool thing about re-occuring dreams is eventually one realizes that this is the dream.  I told myself to have the key next time.  I wore it around my neck like a talisman ... that dream series ended with the turning of the door handle.  Gosh I'm glad I don't dream that anymore. It woke me up with a pounding heart and sweaty palms ... seemed so real, I am surprised I didn't have rope burns and splinters. I don't laugh at that nightmare now, but I do smile when I remember it ... I made it through.  Why does the unconscious brain take us anywhere other then ... on vacation?  I think I am going to do some dream research.

Most recently, I had been dreaming that I was co-pilot on a flight that was in big trouble.  Storms, Dark, Annunciators which I could hear but not see ... Low Fuel ... the unmistakeable smell of an electrical fire, maybe the fire had been extinguished, the cockpit seemed to be in a cloud of it's own.  The dream mutates in repetition, and when I'm awake reflecting on it, it's fuzzy as dreams tend to be, but I know that I am worried about low fuel and I am worrying about Va ... that's what I always wake remembering ... that and that the lightning explodes brightly in to large open places ... sometimes I can see the ground below ... it's exactly where it should be and I think there are several good ways to get the plane to there.  (Awake it reminds me of what hope really is.) The captain seems hell bent on besting this many tailed night beast.  I seem to be along for the ride in my own dream.  Ummm ... that doesn't seem right!  After several nights of this dream I composed myself and said ... yeah, we need to land as soon as possible.  Perfect.  Exactly what needs to happen next in a nightmare like that. It was a dream about a power struggle with the elements, natural and otherwise ... but it should have been a dream about ... a safe landing. That's not what happened, but the dream did stop.  I stopped having the dream.  For several nights I have just slept through.  Thank God ... I have been tired.

I think that dream means something.  And ... I think dreaming-me did, and said, eventually, what I could.  I think dreaming-me figured it out.  I was thinking I needed to save the flight cause the captain was, ummm, captivated by the ride ... locked in on to the contest.  But ... no matter how amazing my super duper co-pilot stuff could possibly be,  no matter how many nights of do-overs this dream gave me "saving" the flight was never going to be my option ... or, my job.  Best case scenario for dreaming-me is to hope the Chief Pilot  doesn't have many reasons to be totally pissed at me.