Books For The Journey

I'm reading two powerful books right now. The first is called, The Relentless Tenderness of Jesus, by Brennan Manning. These pages are full of deeply cutting words, ideas that slice to the marrow of our desperate need for Jesus. It offers powerful glimpses of His remarkable love for us, His children, and what we are meant to become when His love has been given sovereignty in our lives.

I confess, I can only handle a page or two at a time. I have to digest, apply and reapply these concepts. In the forward, Larry Crabb says he read the book in two hours. I simply can't imagine how. That's like being proud of eating a seven course meal in eight or ten minutes. (NOTE: I'm not picking on Larry. His name on the front is what led me to buy the book in the first place.)

The second book I'm reading is The Irresistible Revolution : Living as an Ordinary Radical, by Shane Claiborne. You can read a sample here (PDF). Lovin' it. Shane's a...well, an individual. He spent time in Calcutta working in Mother Teresa's ministry (or Momma T, as he calls her), he's interned at Willow Creek, visited Iraq (during the bombings), and founded a social action Christian community in the dark heart of Philadelphia. In short, the guy's been there and done that. In what is my favorite quote of the book so far, Shane's recalls a statement Rich Mullins made in a Chapel address at Wheaton College:

"You guys are all into that born-again thing, and that’s awesome; we’ve got to be born again. You know Jesus said that to Nicodemus. But if you tell me that I got to be born again, I can tell you that you’ve got to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy, too. But I guess that’s why God invented highlighters, so we can we highlight the verses that we like and ignore the other ones."

Zing!

Oh, The Shame

Well, my beloved Buckeyes were brutalized in the national championship.

It was like watching a biker gang pound on a 120-lb Floyd the Barber. For the first time in my life, I actually turned the game off before it ended. I was yelling at the TV, jumping and screaming and creating a very, very dark cloud in my home. Not acceptable, that. So...I turned to my new vice instead: World of WarCraft. Talk about your addicting games! I spent the fourth quarter glued to a monitor instead of my TV.

Over the holidays I ordered a new iMac for my family -- and we're having a ball with it. Every member of the family has their own login, desktop and (restricted, of course) access to all of the seriously easy-to-use programs and features.

The options are amazing on this thing. I've been a PC guy for 20 years, but I may never go back. The difference is incredible.

All of that, though, and I find myself spending all my home computer time playing a stupid game.

Let it be known that I've never claimed to be bright...

One last bit of post-game news, this one an e-mail from a friendly Notre Dame alum:

"Hey, who dotted the "i" in Ohio last night? Oh, that is right -- Florida did!! (I have no room to throw stones as ND got whupped by LSU a few nights earlier.) Welcome to the losers lounge. Drinks are free."

Only if Charlie Weiss is buying.

Florida Gator-Aid for Drunk Drivers

So my beloved Buckeyes are set to play the Florida Gators for the BCS College Football Championship. So I'm stoked, right? Reading everything I can get my hands on. (Buckeyes understand...it's a sickness, really.)

Well, I'm on Yahoo! Sports reading articles listed on the OSU page, and then I click over to read articles on the Florida page. While reading one of the articles (from the Independent Florida Alligator...whatever that is), I notice the ads at the bottom of the article are all for Florida DUI attorneys. What?

Similar ad placements for OSU articles on Yahoo! Sports are for OSU-related merchandise. Similar ads are placed for just about every school I've looked at.

So what's up in Gainesville? Is it THAT much of a party school? Maybe it comes from being the only people in the state not on the AARP mailing list.

The Bittersweet Passing of Traditions

Christmas Eve has always been a special time for my family.

As far back as my foggy memory reveals, my family has gathered at my parent's home each December 24th, eaten a wonderful meal, lapsed into a colossal (but never ugly) discussion about politics or religion, ignored the grandkids as they washed the dishes, and then retired to the family room to open our presents in a controlled frenzy of flying paper, Styrofoam, batteries, neckties and bath gels.

A lot of wonderful, difficult, glorious, painful years have gone by for our family.

When we started celebrating Christmas Eve, I was the baby of the family, always clambering to get the "old people" to shut-up after dinner, already, and get on to the good stuff! Then came the cool teen years. While my clambering continued, I usually managed to keep it internalized. After all, feined indifference was so mature, right? Then, more years passed and the pestering was handed off to my nephews and nieces, who soon moved on to cool teen years of their own. Then, out of no where, the babies in the room were my own.


Now, our family is scattered like dust across the cities and townships of Ohio, Illinois, Florida and even Montana. Worse yet, I'm a Great Uncle. I have a son that's younger than this largely unknown Great Nephew of mine, but the fact he exists still makes me feel old.

Here's the point of my post (at last!): all of my family's traditions are dying. Like my parent's generation, they're fading away before our eyes, one by precious one. And I can't begin to express my sadness at the loss of them.

Where are the spring work parties to clean out and fill up the swimming pool (and the steaming stacks of well-earned pizzas at the end of those long, hard days)? Where are the annual family reunions at the old wooden shelter houses...and the parties we had at our home afterward, with countless cousins scurrying about like ants on a hill? Where are the Thanksgiving weekends that seemed to last three weeks, stretching out into lazy days of gorging and game playing and couch-lounging movie watching? Where are my nephews and nieces, those precocious, screaming, running, singing, laughing little kids that I loved like they were my own...until I found out what that kind of love really meant?

I'll tell you where they all are...and I'll tell you what happened to our Christmas Eves, too. They're memories now, chemical cocktails in the synapses of my mind. And I miss them terribly. But here's the sweet for the bitter: each of those traditions and memories and relationships and families are being replaced, year by year, with new traditions and memories and relationships and families. My wife and I are now forging together the new traditions my kids will remember. And they're good ones, too, even if they aren't quite my own.

Still...

On The Road Again

Long dry spell. Just doesn't seem to be time to blog these days.

Lemme see...

• I spent four days playing at the Terribles Casino in Osceola, IA. Two one-hour shows per day for four days. It was remarkable. Great place. Wonderful crowds. Treated us like rock stars. No kidding. My buddy Isaac talks about it here.
  
  
• Just played Paradice Casino in East Peoria, IL.
  
  
• And I just got back from Columbus, OH (or Buckeye City, as my three-year old calls it) for Thanksgiving with the family. We rushed back in our new van (okay, it's a 2003) so I could play Saturday night in Galesburg with our groups alterego, and I'm not making this up, Pajamas. Our boy Al is a bit of a promotional genius. Think PT Barnum. We play a huge mix of party-type dance music and people get a discount at the door if they come wearing their pajamas. After all, we do! We also wear wigs, costumes and the works.
  
  (The pic is of me in the dressing room.)
  

Anyway, all for now...

One of my brighter moments...

A couple of weeks ago, I was in New York for the US Open. For work, no less. After sixteen years shooting film and video in landfills and chicken farms, my stars, it seems, finally aligned.

Well, my moment of brilliance occurred when we decided we wanted to get a shot of what it looks like to enter the city...through...the Midtown Tunnel. That's right campers. We filmed ourselves driving through the tunnel.

When we emerged on the other side of the river, one of New York's Finest was waiting for us. He pointed right at us pointed to the side of the road, and we spent the next half and hour or so explaining our complete idiocy. No, we didn't know it was illegal. Yes, you can watch us erase the footage. Yes, we actually found the tunnel interesting. "Whatchoo wanna shoot that for?" he says in his thick Bronx accent. "It's bowring."

Once they realized we were just a couple of harmless, Midwestern morons (trust me, I've never been more thankful my name isn't Mohammed), they let us go.

So God bless the men in blue. They're still kicking it hard in NY. Keep at it guys, you're the line in the sand. And God bless the poor G-man that's stuck monitoring my calls for the next forever. He's got the dullest job in government by far. And that says a lot.

Moral Dilemma

This Saturday, Michigan plays Notre Dame.

I hate 'em both. Like, bad.

Is it possible to wish for both teams to lose?

If I had to chose, it would be for a Irish victory. It will make for a better National Championship match against the Bucks come January. And I'd still get the satisfaction of Lloyd Carr losing another big one.

Still, though...