Executive Order

In the fall of 1980, in spite of having graduated from high school that spring with a respectable grade point average, I chose not to go to college. While I had an acceptance letter from UCLA, I did not have money. Nor did I know of any means of getting it except to work for it. I was unwilling to go into debt, and I was insufficiently tutored in the art of getting scholarships. So, after a year of working at various unskilled jobs and saving my money, I took off to seek my fortune in New England. Though I haven’t yet gotten a college education, life has taught me a lot. Which is another story. My point at present is this: When I read that Mr Obama has signed an executive order which offers relief for student loans, it reminds me afresh how out of step I feel with Washington in general and with our current president in particular. I disagree with many unspoken assumptions he seems to be making about the way government should be run, and how the economy works. I am worried about he does not sufficiently understand the complexity of the problems he is attempting to solve, nor even his proper role in addressing them.

Many people who are better qualified than I have offered analyses of the public education system, the student loan program, and the current job market. Perhaps someone can parse this situation and offer a well-thought-out course of action. I think Mr Obama’s solution is alarming for two reasons: He is 1) attempting to avoid working with Congress to solve a problem which, 2) is not really the federal government’s responsibility to solve.

Alarming reason #2 has been around much longer than #1. The fact that our president now feels frustrated enough with Congress to simply step over it indicates that he feels sufficiently emboldened by recent protests of those who call themselves the 99%. Of course, there are many of us who have been saying for many years that we have too much government. It grows ever more bigger and powerful. The executive order is not actually defined or described in the Constitution; it is a vague idea derived from a reference to “executive power.” In the evolution of the US government, the executive order has sprung forth and been allowed to grow relatively unchallenged. I think the time has come to challenge it.

I don’t have a problem with government programs designed to get people over a temporary setback or devastating loss. I don’t have a problem with programs designed to help families maintain stable homes for their children or disabled dependents (though, ideally, these things should be seen to by private charitable organizations). But really, I think it is time we face up to the fact that the government simply cannot fix everything. The fact that one man can make sweeping policy decisions which will effect our already imperilled budget does not inspire me with confidence. It makes me afraid of what he will do next. If there’s anything that will cause our economy to become still more constipated, it is a spirit of instability and fear. I’m no economist and no businessman, but I am a consumer, and I can tell you that people hoard and clutch their money when they lack confidence in the economy and the government. Only when they have confidence do they unclench their fists and start spending again, and taking the risk of investing in new businesses and hiring new workers.

The End

While Benjamin and I were discussing my plans for fall of 2012, he wrote, “Don’t you know the world is supposed to end on December 21, 2012?”

Turns out he was derisively referring to this movement:

ttp://www.december212012.com/

So I took a look at it. There it is, complete with celebrity “experts”, smiling people modeling apocalyptic tees for sale, and banner ads for automobile tires. It looks like an “Onion” article. But it’s not.

I don’t want to be irreverent here (or anywhere else). Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think the idea of the end of the world as we know it, or even the end of the world, is outlandish. Environmentalists warn that humans could destroy the planet, and secularists write of the earth being sucked into a black hole, imploding or being hit by a comet or other planet. And of course religionists of many stripes have their versions of the apocalypse.

I don’t even think the idea of some supernatural warning about the end is absurd. Am I not a Bible-believing Christian? Yes, the end will come. Yes, I want to be prepared. No, I don’t think that being prepared means stocking up on bottled water, buying a gun and hunkering down in a radiation-proof bunker. If and when the bomb drops/the economy collapses/the barbarians invade/the tribulation comes/the comet hits/the pandemic sweeps over, I don’t expect to be the last one standing. I don’t think that’s what winning would look like.

I suppose if I were a true Darwinian, I would fight to survive at all costs. In the unlikely event that I were one of the victorious few to live through a worldwide holocaust, I could pass on my wisdom to young fellow survivors. Though I personally have taken my turn at bat as far as reproducing is concerned, I could still do my race proud by helping the fittest humans to persevere.

I am not a true Darwinian. I am more like a silverfish. While cockroaches must be smashed by the energetic wielding a heavy object, such as a shoe or a book, silverfish may be dispatched silently by a small child pressing the insect gently between the pages of a book. Actually, I am not even as hardy as silverfish, which can live for a year or more without eating.

Instead, I imagine in the doomsday or semi-doomsday scenario, I’d pretty much be one of the first to go in the carnage, or soon after. I hope I die well. Can I hope to meet my end whilst participating in some sort of rescue effort? Comforting someone? Tending to a sick person? Forgiving my enemies? Or will I give in to the temptation to behave in a selfish or cowardly way, stealing food or shooting the one who demands my coat? Wait, am I supposed to give him my tunic as well? Even now, when there it’s maybe just him and me for miles? Yes, especially now.

Why would the rules change in the hour of greatest extremity? Surely that is the time when the rules are most needed. We practice our faith because practice makes perfect. Do your scales every day, and when your turn comes to perform at Carnegie Hall, you won’t be ashamed.

Whatever happens, my goal is not to live forever in this silverfish body, on this compromised planet. My hope is to live honorably and well for all the days my Creator has marked out for me. He loves me and has redeemed my spirit. He is currently busy with repairs and renovations on my soul, and when it’s all over, He has promised to finish up the job with a brand new designer body on a brand new earth.

I enjoy being alive right now, today. The renovation process is difficult, but it’s part of what makes life exciting. It reminds me I’m getting ready for something bigger, like a pupa shedding its outer layers as it grows. The final shedding is what unnerves me. I don’t want to die. Not only is the prospect of death scary, the process seems painful, undignified, messy, confusing and traumatic. Sudden or slow, death is not something I look forward to, but something I accept as the common lot of humanity at present.

I don’t know the religious views of the 2012ers, or even if that’s what they call themselves. I don’t understand what they hope to accomplish. If I knew with certainty that the world was going to end on December 21, 2012, I wouldn’t live differently than I am right now, except I wouldn’t send in my college applications.

“When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?" Jesus asked rhetorically in Luke 18. Maybe this movement, like the ones before and those that will come after it (they appear like mushrooms after rain), will serve to help some of us examine our current trajectories and make needed corrections. It helps, from time to time, to ask what it means to live well and, therefore, to die well. To me, that means good old fashioned trust-and-obey faith, every day: scales, recitals, ceilidhs, lullabies; choruses, dirges, and songs in the night.

Slice of Life Sept 28, 2011

The sun’s coming up later these days. And very often I don’t even need to alarm clock any more. I turn it off as soon as I’m sure I won’t fall back asleep. So today I lay there in the semidarkness just praying for whatever came to mind. There aren’t many words when I first wake up, just pictures from the dreams, and yesterday’s emotions still sitting my stomach, sometimes. Just throw them all on Jesus as soon as I’m aware of them. They’re usually too big for me.

After a quick trip to the bathroom, in which I notice fleetingly that it could use a good, or even a poor, cleaning, I shuffle off to the kitchen for what my daughter calls a micro-breakfast. Then, cereal still clinging to my teeth, I walk into Michael’s room and announce it’s time to get up. The boys are wrapped up in their blankets like cocoons. I step up and down on Jon’s half-deflated inflatable mattress (Ozark Trail, not Coleman). Michael is the last to wake. The boys shovel down their macro-breakfasts of Life cereal and milk, and Jon starts putting his bed away for next week.

I ask them what their plans are and tell them to get to work and don’t go on Facebook or YouTube. Then it’s off for a walk. Home. Check email. Down the first of many cans of cold seltzer. Leadership Team emails need to be answered ASAP. Take care of that, shower, and feel like a million bucks. Showers make me feel like everything is new again.

The boys want to walk to Subway with Nathan, and I tell them they may, but first they must craft a good thesis for their essays. My helpful questions are beginning to feel like tasers to all of us. Mentally, we are running around in a closed room, and I am swinging my taser at them, and the room is getting smaller and smaller, and finally they are down and I am making them write their thesis sentences. We are all glad when it’s over. I drive them to Nathan’s, and there is Jenna with her face pressed up against the glass of the storm door, her nose and mouth squashed up, and I knew she would do that.

On the way home for lunch I stop at the East/West Market for some Korean rice and some Japanese seaweed. How many kinds of rice are there? Why is seaweed so expensive? Who buys all those scary things in pink packages from China? How much palm oil is in the pastries by the checkout counter?

At home, some of the girls in the class have emailed asking for help on their theses, so I sit in front of the computer with a bowl of tomato, avocado and seaweed, and try to help them. I am printing out Joyanna’s essay to share with them, when I realize I was supposed to pick up the boys and take them to the park for Frisbee. So I rush out and do that. But it’s raining. No, it’s drizzle. No, rain. Clear. Should we play Frisbee? What if there’s lightning? We finally decide to stay. Kids will play, adults stick around in case it starts to rain we can stuff everybody into our vans and get outta there. But it doesn’t rain any more, and I get to sit on the drizzly ground and catch up with Pam. Connie has gone to the playground with a whole flock of kids: her kids, her grandkids, Pam’s kids. I meet a new Frisbee mom. Elizabeth is tutoring a son in her car. The teens are out on the grass running and I feel good because my son is doing something wholesome. Connie returns with her gaggle. Benjamin’s diaper is full of rainwater from the slide, and he smells terrible. Poor Pam. All the way home.

I take Jon to his dad’s office and in the dumpster in the back there are wooden wine boxes from the liquor store. Those will do very nicely to hold Christmas gifts, if they are sanded and decoupaged. I throw six of them into the back seat and off we go.

At home there are more emails. I RSVP for a screening and print out the production notes, Meanwhile, there are a few more things I need to do in order to get ready for the arrival of a guest. She’ll need a map and some other things, which I pull out of the catchall.

I have put on some water to boil for raviolis, cut up some broccoli to steam, torn up some lettuce to spin. While making dinner I read more emails. Someone has sent me the longest email ever, written over the period of a week. I takes forever to read, longer to digest. It is Important. My friend has had a breakthrough and is so happy. I will have to read it again later. For now I must eat dinner with Michael. But wait, the lady in charge of Picture Day wants me to send out an email to the entire Senior High Choir. So I send it off using my six distribution lists because of my klugy email program. Then have dinner by myself, as Michael is on the couch, feeling ill, and I am wondering fleetingly if it is listeria. What rhymes with listeria? Wisteria, but not hysteria. Mysterious sort of rhymes, but it’s not a pure rhyme and makes me feel a bit soiled. But he hasn’t had any cantaloupes and has no muscle aches, so it’s probably nothing. Meanwhile the inner Mom doesn’t want to go anywhere because I am afraid he’ll die and I’m not there. The inner cat doesn’t want to go anywhere because I don’t want to make the effort. But I have this meeting at the church, so I go.

I’m feeling a bit logy at the meeting, so I’m not really myself, but nobody seems to notice. There is too much happening.

At home, Michael is fine. I am beat, but not too beat to pick up a New Yorker from a stack of half-digested magazines by my bed and read an article or three before dozing off. How else am I to know what’s going on? I set the the alarm so I can get up in the morning and take Michael to choir practice. I lie in the dark and thank God for life and children and peace and joy and purpose and being able to read and eat and breathe and walk and drive and pay bills and write things and just feel okay most of the time. There is a squirrel in the tree outside my window and he keeps knocking the acorns off the tree and onto the porch roof of the house next door and it sounds like someone is throwing rocks at the house. But no one is throwing rocks. It’s just a squirrel, doing what squirrels do. And he will do it tomorrow. Or one of his friends will. Because you can count on squirrels to keep doing the same stuff they’ve always done. I like that.

I wrote this in 2007 as an example to my students of the importance of point of view in writing. I was looking through my things for a friend who is teaching 8th and 9th graders this year. This made me smile again, so I thought I'd share it.

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Birth Day

First thing I remember is feeling hot, so hot. The first place I saw was bright. If I had eyes, I would have squinted. But it was so good to get out of the heat and be set down on a rack to rest and cool off. I felt then that I was destined for great things. Clearly, I was the center of attention. They kept coming in and asking if I was ready yet. And the one who had set me on the rack kept saying no, and making them all go away and stop touching me. I think she knew that I was special, too. She looked at me frequently, and every now and again she would place her cool palm on top of me and give a little smile.

I felt a little sorry for the things called "chips" and "pretzels", for they were dumped into a bowl and taken away who knows where. I later heard the ghastly sound of crunching. I can hardly believe that those who have made such a splendid creature as me could be so barbaric as to eat them. They hardly had a chance to live before they were whisked away into obscurity. Let us move away from this painful subject. Some are meant for lesser things, I suppose, and others of us are destined for honor and fame. Let us not feel too sorry for those who are less, as it is certain they have not the finer feelings that those of us on a higher plane possess, and therefore cannot feel the ignominy of their fate.

As I sat there I got to feeling stronger and more solid, like I could take anything. I watched as she put some things into a bowl and mixed them around with a spoon. She seemed to take great care with this concoction, tasting it frequently and frowning, then adding something else and tasting it again. Finally, she took a metal tool, scooped out a large dollop of this stuff, and slapped it squarely onto my back.

At first I was shocked. What had I done to deserve this treatment? But as she moved the metal utensil around in swirling motions, I realized she was actually trying to make me feel better. I felt honored by this treatment. It was relaxing, too. It was like I was some sort of a god, and she was the worshipper, making a sweet offering.

And now I notice that she has added some flowers and sparkly things to my new special covering, just as if she were dressing me up for a party.

A party! I see now…… there have been more of them coming into the house, filling up the place and making noise, eating those poor pathetic chips and pretzels. I understand now. I rejoice! They are all so happy because a new and beautiful creation has come into their world, and they must celebrate. Soon she will take me into the room where they are all waiting. I hear them beginning to sing a song of happy praise, like simple native island folk. And I, the recipient of their honor, shall nod and bow to them. Perhaps I shall throw them some kisses as my caretaker and servant holds me aloft for all to see. Farewell, friends, farewell! As I go to meet my adoring crowds, I wish you could understand how fortunate I count myself to be loved and adored by all. Farewell, and do not envy me, my friends. We all have our place, our destiny, and we must not complain if ours is not as lofty as that of another. Farewell! I go to meet my destiny.

More Chances, More Choices

So I was walking to the grocery store in Montreal, and I saw a man sitting on the sidewalk, extending his baseball cap out in front of him, his fingers making the cap go up and down, the universal signal of need. I had no food, only money. So I decided on the way home I would give him something. As I was packing up things in my backpack to take home, I pulled an apple out of the bag and held it in my hand, at the ready.

On the way home from Provigo, laden with produce, I approached the spot where I had seen the man. There he was..... talking on his cell phone.

I gave him the apple anyway.

It's not your imagination. Food has gotten more expensive recently. Inflation always happens, but it seems it's picking up steam. And especially in the grocery store. In Montreal this was brought home to me keenly as I searched the aisles for bargains. I learned to look for the half-price elderly produce and breadstuffs. Canned green beans, $1.79. A box of cookies, $3.99. Granny Smith apples, $1.99 a pound. I am used to the greengrocer's near my house where I can get apples for .89/lb. At Shoprite I can get a can of house brand green beans for .66. I'm not buying sushi or tahini or organic crackers, just the usual basic stuff. Provigo brought me to my knees.

I keep trying to, as I read somewhere, "live simply, that others may simply live." And yet it keeps being difficult to scale back. I have read, and find it to be true, that eating poorly is cheaper than eating well. But I keep thinking there must be some way to lower my consumption, or alter my consumption, so I have more to share with others. Ideas: eat less; eat cheaper stuff; do more prep at home instead of buying prepared items; look for sales, coupons, free and cheap food on the edges of society. I've done all these things.... maybe not enough?

Another day, our party was lounging in a shady spot in Old City Montreal after enjoying a lunch of cheese sandwiches, carrot sticks and apples. Our cold drinks had cost $2-3 each at a local fast food establishment. It was hot, and we had packed all our things away into the backpack (which Josh so valiantly carried for miles). A man approached us, explaining in halting English that the mission around the corner was closed on Saturday, and did we have anything to give him to eat?

I made him a cheese sandwich (pepper jack from Costco in NJ.... Yay!), Rebekah pulled and apple out of the backpack, and Michael handed him the last half of his Cherry Coke. The man thanked us and moved on.

I am finding that I like to feed people. It is such a basic need. I want everyone to have clean water and enough nourishing food. I wish I could make that happen.

If only I could get the kids in on this...... I had this idea that might help them understand how much things cost without making them just feel bad about it. As it is, I tell them what things cost, and they just feel guilty, or that I'm a complainer. Which really doesn't really help anyone. So I took my charge bills, calculated how much we spend on food per week, divided it by three, and told them I was giving them a food allowance to spend as they wished (Michael had a few stipulations regarding healthy choices). I told them I would take them shopping once a week, and any money they had left over at the end of the week was theirs to do with as they wished.

We made our first shopping excursion today. I am excited. I love to try new things and see how they work out. Will we learn anything? Will we become more aware? More effective?

On the way out the door of the greengrocer's, we compared totals. Michael crowed, "I am the frugalest!"

A Second Chance

So Deborah and I went into the city today, and we had lunch. I didn't want the pitas that came with mine, so I slid them, all fresh and hot and tucked up into wax paper sleeves, into my backpack.

As we were walking back to the bus station, a man approached the assembled crowd waiting to cross the street. "Give me some food please! I beg of you. In Jesus' name."

Deb looked at me and pointed to my backpack. Of course! I slid it from my shoulders, whisked out the pitas, and handed them to him. "Wait," I said, as he started to turn away. I dug out the apple I had put there this morning, which I had been hoping to share with someone who needed it. He seized it and immediately took a bite. Deb began fumbling in the backpack for the apricots we had just purchased at the fruit stand. Deb asked the man, "Do you like apricots?"

"Hell, yeah," he responded.

Deb handed him an apricot, he thanked us. We crossed the street.

In Port Authority, Deb said, "That really felt good. It was so simple. I guess it really is better to give than to receive." We had a laugh over that. Duh.

Review of "Sympathy For Delicious"

Catholic Lane published my review of "Sympathy For Delicious":

http://catholiclane.com/sympathy-for-delicious-healing-and-suffering-in-a-fallen-world/