So Many Books -

If I have an obsession, it has to be reading.  (Sorry Tim, I love you, but I've sworn to speak the truth.)  I read history, philosophy, theology, popular science and of course ***drumroll*** novels.  In 38 years I have amassed quite a library, in spite of the fact that I loan, give, and donate enough books to qualify as a one woman literacy program.

The thing that disturbs me more than any other is the list of books that I HAVEN'T read.  I've never read Les Miserables, I've never read anything by Thomas Hardy, and though I love the quotes I can pull from T. S. Eliot, I feel completely stupid when I try to read his poetry - so I don't.

Several years ago, I hunted up several "100 Great Books" lists and combined them into one list that I'm still working my way through.  But there are millions of books out there.  And I wonder if I tried to put together a list of "Pretty Good" books what should go on it.  Now understand that I'm the woman who'd probably burn to death trying to decide which books to save if the house caught on fire. 

So using a less drastic image, which books would I pack today for a trip to a mountain cabin (safely assured that I could come home to the rest of my friends when my vacation was over.)

1. I'm gonna admit up front that I'd grab my Bible CD-Rom before I grabbed any of the printed versions. 

2. CS Lewis' Screwtape Letters, I reread this one every year and I have it on cassette tape so I can listen to it in the car on the way.

3. Complete Shakespeare - in an isolated cabin there is no one to make fun of me if I act all the parts the way I think they should be done.

4. Daniel Boorstin - whichever of his books I grabbed first would do.

5. J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings

6. Thomas Cahill - whichever book I grabbed first.

7. Greg Boyd - Satan and the Problem of Evil because I haven't read it yet.

What would you recommend to round out my reading?  I need at least three novels.  And what's the point of a vacation without some junkfood!  I'd have to have several romance books for reading in the bubble bath.

Happy Thursday -

Well, its a rainy, cold nasty day in South Arkansas.  So obviously, its a day meant for hanging out on Xanga - catching up on the sites I haven't read in a couple of days.  There are some WONDERFUL sites on xanga and I'm having a hard time keeping up with everyone I like to read.  But today I'm making the valiant effort.

Many thanks to moniet and madeline for my new holiday look. 

So I'll try to get around to writing a lovely and thought-provoking blog (that makes everyone want to comment) later.    But for now, I'm off to see what all the rest of you have been up to for the past several days.

OOh, ooh, ooh - here's a good one already!  The first site I visited has a link to a quiz to show you which character you'd be in Lord of the Rings.  I'm Celedron and I'm thrilled.  Head over to Jennifer's site and see if you'd be an elf, dwarf, hobbit, or a troll.  (Does anyone just want to be a regular human?)

Harry Potter

Over the past couple of years I've recieved dozens of emails and heard multiple speakers who have warned us of the satanic influences in the Harry Potter books.  Some of the emails I recieved purported to contain excerpts from the books that illustrated and substantiated these warnings.  These excerpts were indeed the kind of narrative that I generally try to steer my kids away from.  But they are still young and it hasn't been an issue in my house.  With the movie ads, suddenly they've been asking about the stories and so I've done my parental duty.

Over the past four days, I've read three of the four Harry Potter books.  Today I'm breathing a little calmer, but I have to say that over the weekend I've been an angry woman.  I don't know who the people are who started the smear campaign against Harry Potter books, but that is exactly what has occurred in Christian circles.

The letters I received contained "quotes" that are not in any of these books, unfairly characterized the plot and ethical orientation of the books, and drew unfounded theological conclusions.  I don't know who these people are.  I suspect that, like me, many of my friends have avoided the Harry Potter books based on this misinformation.  Shame on the liars who started this.  I'll be happy to discuss the Harry Potter books with anyone who has questions, but I'll ask you please don't use the misinformation that has been circulated to argue with me. 

Up Your Nose With A . . .

You all know that kids do things that adults don't understand.  When we were kids, Madeline used to do this thing that is still discussed at big family gatherings.  She would put a dry bean in her nose, then she'd do a fake "sneeze" and shoot the bean out to "gross out" the unsuspecting.  On one particular occasion, she put the bean in her nose, only to discover that her intended victim had wandered off.

So she waited, and waited.  When she finally got her chance she did the big kerchoo and . . . nothing happened.  The inside of a nostril is a moist environment and the dry bean had swelled.  After several consultations with the adults, and much huffing and puffing, the bean remained firmly lodged in her nose.  So Dad had to take her to the ER where an amused doctor used a tiny scapel to dissect and remove the bean. 

Other families gather around the thanksgiving table and discuss the blessings of the previous year.  Our family skips right to the good part, telling the stories that have made us laugh over and over.

Holiday Fun

Well, I spent last night at the theater with four little kids (and my husband and Madeline) watching "Monsters, Inc."  I'd love to say that it inspired some thoughtful blog that would impress me when I looked at it again over the next weeks, but in reality, I just laughed.  I'm not sure which was funnier, the movie or the kids' reactions to it.

We had a couple of good moments worth reporting.

1. Michael dutifully tried to eat a pickled beet cause Grandma told him it was good.  His response, "Oh man, this is definitely poison, here Tucker have some."

2. My husband surprised the boys in the midst of something they knew they shouldn't be doing.  So immediately they began to run around saying, "What, what, what?" 

"Boys, I know you're up to something, you look guilty."

Tucker said, "Oh no Dad, we look beautiful."

3. On the way to the theater last night a vehicle passed us that was having serious problems with its emmissions.  My husband said, "Uh oh, did someone make a stinker."  Madeline's youngest, answered quickly.  "My Daddy isn't here."

I just couldn't resist - Madeline was out of town and I just happened to remember her new password.  Hee Hee!  Happy Thanksgiving to All.

truth and consequences

I remember a game show from when I was very small, the Announcer introduced each round with a booming bass tone "Truth OR Con-se-quences."  I was way too young to have a clue what con-se-quences meant.  But, I got that it was a BAD thing.  And somehow I had the impression that this was a simple either or formula.  Truth OR Consequences.  But in the reality I inhabit, I've learned that it's more usually truth AND consequences. 

Telling the truth doesn't change reality.  Once we've made choices, committed actions, or spoken the words, telling the truth doesn't grant us immunity from the results of our little exercises in freedom.  The pregnancy is still there, the dish is still broken, the sound of our voice cannot be erased from the  air.  You get the picture.

On the other hand, its very tempting to try to control our fate by choosing the consequences first.  Dr. Phil McGraw says that we all wear masks, all of us, most of the time.  In the harshest of light, the masks we wear are nothing but lies that we project.  We try to choose the consequences by projecting something other than what we really are.  For example, I'm really not comfortable telling you that I'd rather be boiled in oil than go to that NBA game, but I don't want to hurt your feelings.  I think to myself, it won't hurt to pretend that I'll enjoy it.  In the end you'll think that we have more in common and you'll like me better.  I've tried to manipulate the consequence (you'll like me) by manipulating the data (pretense of liking NBA games).

We all make these choices.  And we all rationalize them to ourselves.  It's easy to convince ourselves that we're being polite, friendly, nice, _______ (fill in the blank with whatever works when you try to convince yourself to project a falsehood about yourself.)

This is not a blog about the evil of telling lies.  I don't have to convince you of that.  This is a blog about the evil of forgetting that we all do it.  There isn't anyone out there who is 100% exactly what they seem at all times.  Even me.  

Sometimes its accidental.  I write about my thoughts and feelings here on Xanga, and no matter how much of myself I reveal in these lines, there will always be more to the story.  Sometimes the part I DON'T say could change your opinion significantly if you knew it.  I'm not saying that I deliberately lie about who I am and what I think, I'm saying that I'm the hero of my own story, and my perspective is always going to paint me in that starry light.

When I find out that someone else has deliberately painted a false picture I can choose to feel indignant, hurt, self-righteous.  That's easy.  Or I can remember that its only a matter of degree.  None of us are completely for real.  And if I forget that, I project another harmful falsehood - that I believe its possible for us to somehow live in perfect truth.  Now that's hard.  That calls for me to confront some of my own deeply cherished illusions about myself.  I'd like to believe that I live and speak the truth.  I hate when I have to face my own unreality.  But the only way to really accept you for who you are, is to remember that sometimes even YOU don't know who you are.  Because I'm just like you.  Or you're just like me if you prefer.  Sometimes I don't know who I am. 

How about we jump to the game show that followed Truth Or Consequences on my local station.  Let's Make a Deal.  I'll accept you for who you are, even the parts of you that I don't know, and I'll listen to your thoughts and I'll hear what you say if you'll do the same for me.  Maybe after a lifetime as friends, we'll know each other.

Late November Day

Fresh bread bakes, soup bubbles on the stovetop, ingredients for peanut butter cookies wait on the recently wiped countertop.  The kids are sitting around the dining room table playing ker-plunk (more or less happily).  Holiday ribbons and lights brighten the house.  People move with unhurried steps to the rhythm of slow rain dripping.

It's an unusual gathering today.  My grandmother lies in the hospital bed while we take turns sitting and reading to her or just helping her to be comfortable.  Mom, Aunt Pat and I vacuum, sweep, wash, wipe, chop and dice.  Three little boys keep us from relaxing too much.

All the "working" people, are gone to their jobs.  We are here minding the home that has become the hub of all our lives.  At first I thought it was a sad thing that my grandmother's illnes was dragging out.  I felt sorry for her prolonged suffering.  But I've come to see it differently.  Her dying has become the controlling event in our schedules.

The rhythm of family often serves as the unheard metronome.  Jobs, deadlines, and needs make up the percussive element of our ordinary lifesong.  But when the family beat takes over, we are moved to a place outside time and timing. 

The holiday we are preparing to celebrate could be happening any year.  There is nothing special that ties this observance to 2001.  The Thanksgiving lists the children have been making up could have been written last year, or twenty years ago when my sisters and brother were the children.  They are thankful for candy, games, cousins to play with, Mom and Dad.

Funny, I'm thankful for the same things.

Monday Morning

It's rainy and cold in Arkansas, just about like November ought to be.  Finally, the clothes I packed for my visit are comfortable!  I've had a long and tiring weekend, I'm trying to divide my time between caring for my grandmother and watching the kids.  Not much room in there for developing my thoughts, or even leaving comments on the pages of you who have posted.

I haven't had a good hair day since I've been here and I'm afraid that people are starting to feel sorry for me, so I'm starting the morning off right.  A long hot shower, a cup of coffee, and school with my kids.  School is a great way for me to snag a few minutes for myself.  I have to stay right beside my kids to keep them on task, but I can read, write, study . . . .  it's amazing how much I appreciate those minutes.  Yes, I'm the same mom who was griping to high heaven about homeschooling just a few posts back, but all of a sudden, it doesn't seem so bad.

I think this afternoon, maybe we'll bake cookies.  None of us NEED cookies, but it seems like the thing to do on a rainy November Monday.

How Wide Is Your God?

I wonder sometimes how big our God really is.  Or at least how big we understand him to be.  I know we talk a good game about how God is everywhere, but do we act like we believe it?  Do we believe that our God is big enough to hear the fervent prayer of a man, woman, or child who has never heard the "gospel" or do we believe that He is far removed from where most people live? 

I ask this question because I have noted a certain arrogance in my own theology.   I have had the idea that no experience of God outside the confines of the orthodox stream of Christianity was authentic.  Gradually over the past 7 or 8 years, I've been reevaluating my position.  Now I'm thinking of how my relationships with people are affected by my former assumptions.  How sincerely can I "listen" to someone "outside" my narrowly defined circle of the theologically correct if I assume from the beginning that they have nothing of value to say to me?  How can I establish a loving relationship with any person I think "wrong" in all his/her thinking and experience of God?

As I read through the New Testament, I don't see the missionaries of the early church behaving as though they believed that all experience of God outside their church was "wrong".  Paul meets people where they are and shares information that adds to their understanding of God rather than approaching them as contemporary evangelicals tend to view those "outside" as the "lost, immoral, deluded,  . . . "

This to me says something not only about Paul's interpersonal communication style, but also about his basic understanding of the Nature and scope of God.  He assumes that God is already at work in the life of every person he meets.  He ACTS as though God is truly everywhere.

I can talk all day long about what I believe.  But the way I act reveals what I REALLY believe.  I don't think that I've met very many people in the contemporary church who have modeled for me the belief that our God is a wide - open - loving - Creator reaching out to all humanity.  My experience even inside the church has been that those who fail to conform to the theological or behavioral expectations of others are more likely to be shot at than welcomed into fellowship.

The Christian view of man tends to fall in one of two camps 1) All men are sinners and deserving of condemnation or 2) All men are loved of God and highly valued.  Both positions can be defended theologically.  But, I think I'd rather be sitting next to someone who sees me through the lens of the second position than the first.  I'd rather be the person viewing others through the lenses of grace and mercy.  There is plenty enough guilt, remorse, condemnation, and judgment in the world without me adding to it.