This Squirrel's Cache

RE: Planned Parenthood Open Letter

2012-02-03T08:52:00.001-08:00

Why is it that we think ‘basic health care’ is a basic human right? What do we mean by ‘basic health care’? (See Philip Barlow’s essay “Health Care is Not a Human Right”)

But even beyond that, what is this business with Planned Parenthood expecting Komen’s foundation to subscribe to PP’s stance on anything? Or are they simply concerned with one particular party’s ability to choose (over and against everyone else)? That doesn’t sound like choice at all.

Toast to Brian

2011-09-25T09:06:00.000-07:00

… Thank you all for coming to witness this new covenant of marriage between Brian and Christy. It is my honor and privilege to stand up here and say a few words about Brian. I have the special position of speaking from the perspective of being Brian’s longtime roommate and Christy’s lifelong cousin. My name is Marc Shaw and I am incredibly humbled and blessed to be Brian's best man.

Thank you David and Janise and Uncle Jim and Aunt Marcia, not only for putting on this show and including all of us, but for giving us all a share in YOUR lives through participation in Brian and Christy's lives. They are truly full of the Love of God which FEEDS their love for life. Brian, I am truly honored to be here to celebrate this amazing day with you. Everyone in this room is gathered today as a living testament to the love that we have for these two as well as the love they have for each other.`

Now, I know the drill, I have heard the rumors, the whispered encouragements, anonymous tips in my mailbox last week. This is my opportunity to reveal to you who Brian really is. Many of you know him as ‘that nice kohl kid’ or perhaps have heard tell of his homework helping, teacher-like tutoring skills, or maybe even have been blessed as peers under his benevolent tutelage (that’s the only word for it).

Well, I guess I could dig up some stories about Brian’s personal downfalls or embarrassing flub-ups, but the trouble is, Brian is a planner. He plans and plans and waits and waits, and plans and plans, and waits and waits, so none of his fiascoes have been public fiascoes...or have they? On a small scale, Brian has a true knack for mispronouncing words that he has only seen on paper and have crawled up into his vocabulary, having never seen the light of day. Then at the opportune time, they jump out and are blinded by a world that does not know them.

No Brian, your heart is not perculating, although it may be percolating, but neither are on account of the coffee...But these are small stakes crimes... and are really a testament to Brian's ambition and voracious appetite for knowledge and wisdom.

I could tell you all about his history of nefarious deviousness; a trait I have heard has been carefully and intentionally passed down over generations of Kohls. I could tell you how he hazed upperclassmen as a freshman at New Saint Andrews with anonymous signup sheets for all girl bible studies led by some of our favorite upperclass MEN. I could tell you about all the times where Brian would outsophist the sophists and all the kids who took debate in high school...but that's no crime. I could mention briefly, how he successfully impersonated his headmaster in a school-wide email... but i promised to keep it shorter... so instead, I’ll keep things really short by talking about Brian's achievements.

Brian's highest achievement, before tonight, is that he went through four years of rigor at New Saint Andrews College. Thankfully he has not only survived in one piece, but thrived on account of his stint there. In those days when school was busiest and I felt like I was drowning, Brian had all the right words: be faithful in the little things, read the bible, and don’t choose the lesser of two evils.

Although many may label him as an ‘eager beaver’ who cuts to the chase, obsesses over the details, or jumps right in, they’re right. Brian is exceedingly faithful and has an incredibly insatiable desire to do what is right. He loves God and his neighbor and doesn’t hesitate to help his friends figure out anything from paper topics to day-to-day life-choices. He gives himself away and doesn't expect anything in return. He loves his Mom and sisters. He respects his dad and seeks out wisdom.

Brian, since that first day of freshman year, Christy has been sitting waiting in the back of your mind, fueling your focus both on studies and on completing each task until the time was right. You have planned and waited and waited and planned. And finally today has come. Christy is fun, artistic, and has an incredible extended family… just awesome awesome cousins… Christy, you also have survived the intensities that make up New Saint Andrews and have a perspective that is focused on finding your place in God's kingdom. Christy you have found someone who is inordinately patient, obtrusively thoughtful and above all faithfully devoted to God, his family and his community. Find your security first in God's incredible faithfulness and showers of Grace, and then in Brian's love for you.

Brian, the covenant that you have cut with my Uncle Jim to marry my cousin Christy is a good one. You’ve got someone who’s beautiful, smart, hilarious, loving and willing to play cribbage with you. Now I won't pretend to have any experienced marriage advice, so I stole a quote from someone who does.

Matthew Henry once said "(Note) that the woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam; not out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be loved."

Here’s to a lifetime of devotion to God and to each other for Brian David and Christina Joy!

Spurgeon said, "God is Jealous" (Nahum 1:2)

2011-09-12T07:46:00.000-07:00

God is jealous of our fellowship. The moment things are seeming to drop into a rhythm and everything feels under control, that's when we are most vulnerable to denying Him our devoted attention. We have our faithful days, thanks to God's grace and immediately take His gift for granted. It's incredible how fast a good situation can slip out of control. God has good gifts for us, for He is our good Father. He gave me a family that not only doesn't want to kill me, but shows Christ-like grace every time I slip, every time I mess-up, and especially every time I fall flat on my face. He gave me a job with faithful Christians who are ministering around the world. He gave me an incredible girlfriend who writes awesome letters and is 100% encouraging no matter the situation. He gave me food to eat and coffee, water, and wine to drink. He is jealous of our fellowship: love, trust, and company. The moment we feel the most in control, we focus on something other than Him. We slip when we focus on one of His good gifts more than Him. And that's the hardest part. Refocusing on God the Father is the only way to crawl out of our pit. And that's what it is... Our alternate universe is void of God's creativity, beauty, truth, and goodness, it's a pit of self-loving and self-loathing where we wallow in ourselves, mutually condemning and praising ourselves in arrogance. There is no one that we should love more than Jesus, who gave up His life for us. There is no one that we should love more than Jesus, who loved us with such love, that he can't bear it when we jeopardize that relationship. He loves us so much that He spilt His blood for us. There is no one who we should look to for comfort before Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. And so, Spurgeon says, "oh that we may have grace this day to keep our hearts in sacred chastity for our Beloved alone, with sacred jealousy shutting our eyes to all the fascinations of the world!"

everything is changing

2011-08-19T00:20:00.001-07:00

...the future is open wide and God is outside of time listening to all of your prayers, pulling all the stops and opening up a plethoric myriad of opportunities and indescribable mercies and blessings...

work these days

2011-07-20T11:29:00.000-07:00

Mumford & Sons Debut a New Song

2011-07-07T13:30:00.000-07:00

"Home"

Mumford & Sons - "Home/Untitled" (Live on KBCO) by TwentyFourBit.com

where you are

2011-07-03T13:11:00.000-07:00

"God is sovereign and God is gracious, and this means that God takes you from where you are, and not from where you should have been. If we were standing around where we should have been, we wouldn’t need salvation. If we need salvation, we are not where we should have been. A godly response to this is always the same—cry out to the Lord. Trust in Him. Follow Him."

via Pastor Wilson's Sermon

a shift report

2011-06-24T06:33:00.000-07:00

Dearest MGMT,

I came to my shift right around 5:00 poste meridiene. It looked calm and peaceful, little clusters of people sitting around their small tables and cups of coffee, a few with baked good crumbs fumbling for the safety of the far reaches of their tiny plates...everyone seemed to be in pretty good moods, this, the second day of the summer, warmer than usual, the weekend right around the corner...

it has been super quiet... its 640 and I won my scrabble game after i checked that all the chores were done... ok i didnt win, but i played and that's cool.

uh oh, chris bottoms johnson just made a bee-line for the bathroom... (what is a b-line anyways, you would think that would take a lot longer to get anywhere if it was actually a "bee"-line) i will probably have to "man the trenches" and "really go for it" to clean up after his duty is complete...oh, here he comes with that i-just-completed-my-dutiful-duty swagger. looks like he made it to his seat and i didn't smell him as he swung by the counter, so maybe just maybe i will be A-OK.

guys guys guys... i seem to be doing just fine after diving into the bathroom with squinted eyes and an arm over my face. It is clear that he has to have done an excellent job ridding his body of that most unnecessary substance, that which must not be named, that wicked fecal matter... bowel movement success!

please please listen closely once again!! i may be likewise as to previous danger, now in similar immediate danger! he has once again placed his promontory elbows down upon the sides of his chair in order to lift his bulky body from the depths where they rested so comfortably mere moments ago... and now i can only wait, wait with bated breath and an indefatigable spirit of courage and heart of hope... should it be, could it be, will it be disaster?! i can only fidget with my little post it pad and nervously look around this empty coffeeshop, somehow hoping for a familiar face, or an encouraging momentary glance, but NOTHING!!!

Here comes chris bottom johnson, shuffling along those tired feet with that abhorrent discontent running around on his face and facial features, which these days feature less facially and more sink deeper and deeper into his head. his face kind of drooping from tired eyes... but again! a miracle bathroom meets the eyes...

that is the most interesting thing that happened tonight...

Early June

2011-06-20T09:50:00.000-07:00

Kenny and Jen tied the knot...

Kelly and I...

Kelly and summer wheat...

"Praise in Summer" by Richard Wilbur

2011-04-21T08:16:00.000-07:00

Obscurely yet most surely called to praise,
as sometimes summer calls us all, I said
the hills are heavens full of branching ways
where star-nosed moles fly overhead the dead;
I said the trees are mines in air, I said
see how the sparrow burrows in the sky!
And then I wondered why this mad instead
perverts our praise to uncreation, why
such savour’s in this wrenching things awry.
Does sense so stale that it must needs derange
the world to know it? To a praiseful eye
should it not be enough of fresh and strange
that trees grow green, and moles can course in clay,
and sparrows sweep the ceiling of our day?

April Flowers

2011-04-21T08:05:00.001-07:00

so full of May's potential beauty
the wet of April envelopes me.
one might mourn the melancholic drizzle,
but I have April flowers beneath my window.

Trip to Portland

2011-04-04T23:57:00.000-07:00

Spring Break 2011

2011-03-23T22:24:00.000-07:00

This is my spring break in four photos.

Late late one night, while I was hanging (including, but not limited to several intensely delicious mixed drinks) with James and Samuel, I felt the sudden urge to buy eggs, orange juice, deodorant, water bottles, toothpaste and vanilla scented candles. So we took off for Winco where James and I promptly lost track of Samuel in our search for the perfect toothpaste. It had probably only been about five minutes when we saw Samuel swing around the corner on the scooter. Even the Winco team of re-shelvers appreciated his synthesis of childlike playfulness and eternally ancient aching demeanor. It was very educational.

On the first day back from break, I was sitting at Onesies, waiting oh-so-patiently for my girlfriend when Kenny perfunctorily lifted his water glass from the distant coffee table and splendidly poured the entirety of its contents on himself, his pants and the moleskin he was writing in. Of course this wasn't the end of the world, and he finished his thoughts around the spillage marks and ink drainings.

Meanwhile, Jen efficiently put a dent in her task of completing wedding invitations.

But, most importantly, I have been getting to know the greatest girl in the world, my girlfriend Kelly. One of her plethoric myriad talents is fixing people's problems. In this picture she is replacing a headlight in her Jeep. Admittedly it is her own problem, but we fixed it together and that made it great.

Matis the Man

2011-03-02T21:23:00.001-08:00

I can't get enough of Matisyahu.

The Water of Purification

2011-03-01T10:29:00.000-08:00

With the presence of such symbolism in the Old Testament, it is important that we do not overlook the Old Testament instructions that were pragmatic in value and that testify to a Master Mind behind the writing of the Law. One such directive is found in Numbers 19, where the Israelites were instructed to prepare the “water of purification” that was to be used to wash any person who had touched a dead body.

At first glance, the water of purification sounds like a hodge-podge of superstitious potion-making that included the ashes of a red heifer, hyssop, cedar wood, and scarlet. But this formula was the farthest thing from a symbolic potion intended to “ward off evil spirits.” On the contrary, the recipe for the water of purification stands today as a wonderful example of the Bible’s brilliance, since the recipe is nothing less than a procedure to produce an antibacterial soap.

(an excerpt by Kyle Butt, M.A. "Scientific Foreknowledge and the Medical Acumen of the Bible"

red man dust

2011-02-20T21:59:00.000-08:00

Genesis 2:7 explains the formation of man in more detail. He was formed out of the dust of the ground from the earth that had been formed out of nothing. Then God took the man and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils. ‘Man became a living being.’ What is the nature of this breath of life? The word for ground in the Hebrew text is adamah, feminine derivative of the root ‘dm meaning blood. From this root we also get the word adom which means ‘red’ from the hew of Israel’s dirt. Interestingly, the word adam thus refers both to the blood coursing through man’s arteries and veins, and also points to the dust/ground out of which he was formed. When man dies, his flesh and blood will return to the red dirt. But it is deeper even than this. In Leviticus 17 when Moses is describing the sacrificial process, he warns that whoever eats ‘any matter of blood,’ they will be cut off from the people, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.” This reveals quite a bit about sin and death as well as the nature of blood. Man’s sin jeopardizes his soul, making it deserving a blood atonement. The physical and metaphysical; the soul and the body are a man. These aren’t parts that make him up. These aren’t attributes to which he is member, nor does he carry around this soul and body. Man is body and soul. This changes how we talk about men, souls, and bodies. This changes how we talk about medicine, as we will see later on. Men do not have souls and bodies, but instead a man is body and soul. This physical aspect of human beings is very similar to the physical aspect of animals. The word used here for being or creature is naphesh used for both humans and animals. Additionally, naphesh is used for dead bodies and bodies that are passing into death. (Numbers 9:6)(Job 11:20; Jeremiah 15:9) This gives the ultimate perspective on the physical aspect of mankind. This precreated material that made up the fruitful soil of Eden was scraped up and shaped into animals and human beings. When these creatures’ hearts stop beating, their bodies fall upon the ground and their blood, ‘dm, is the first to be swallowed back into the ground, followed by the rotting epidermal layer and liquefied muscles and organs, leaving those bones buried in the flesh of the earth. So when God says, “Let us make adam,” he references to the nature of the creation for which He will make in His image and likeness. Man is by nature, chemically the same as all the dust of the earth.

adam in God's image

2011-02-20T21:54:00.000-08:00

In Genesis 1:26, God says “Let us make,” but a closer look once again at the Hebrew text reveals that this make is different from the making of the world in the beginning. When God begins ‘creating’ the words used are ‘bara’ and ‘asa,’ signifying making or the sense of building out of nothing that is characteristic of creation. Yet, in this ‘making’ the word used is ‘yasar.’ Throughout the Old Testament, this word is used when something is formed out of something else, a common example being a jar from clay. And so man is made from a preexisting substance, rather than formed out of nothing as the world was begun in Genesis 1:1. Being made in this image, man is creative, not in the ‘out-of-nothing’ kind of way, but rather in the natural propensity and God-given purpose to take a natural beauty and improve upon it. A similar example would be, once again, the potter who forms the clay into a more useful shape and adds beauty to its shape and design. An even more straightforward example is the world. Man was put into this created world and told to ‘be fruitful and multiply.’ God has given us the natural propensity to take the lemons we have been given and to plant the seeds to create a continuously productive crop. An endless supply of lemonade. This creation was prepared not only for the joyful work of dominion, but also our enjoyment and exploration. Fundamentally, man reaps what he sows, and yearns for the “Well done,” from his master. A more intimate picture of this would be when the psalmist says, “Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD… happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them…” (Psalm 127) God’s image is creative, joyful and productive.

untitled

2011-01-24T00:56:00.000-08:00

i used to think
"the path is vague,
individual pebbles pop out at me
i can see where it ends
but not where i am supposed to be."
but now i know
the way is sure,
it's thankfully not up to me
I take the plunge, trust grace
'cause that's how its supposed to be.

Green

2011-01-24T00:36:00.001-08:00

Poem by Richard Wilbur

Tree-leaves which, till the growing-season's done,
Change into wood the powers of the sun,

Take from that radiance only reds and blues,
Green is a color that they cannot use,

And so their rustling myriads are seen,
To wear all summer an extraneous green,

A green with no apparent role, unless,
To be the symbol of a great largesse

Which has no end, though autumn may revoke
That shade from yellowed ash and rusted oak.

last year around this time

2011-01-24T00:32:00.000-08:00

Take my heart and tear it apart.
Open my chest, hear my request.

There is my soul,
borne naked on my face and in my
gesticulations
as I slump through the days,
forgetting each event
as it slips behind my exhausted limbs.

jan 22, 2011

2011-01-19T13:43:00.000-08:00

Well, here's the beginning of my final undergraduate semester. I am taking Traditio and Thesis for this term at NSA as well as Chemistry 112 at University of Idaho for a grand total of just under 11 actual class hours. I am more excited about school than usual, maybe because it is so close to the end and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. But I am actually looking forward to this final stretch. I am working on applying to some post baccalaureate programs for premedical prerequisites and I will start job shadowing in earnest next week. My thesis is huge, yes; however, my advisers gave me great feedback and I feel that I can hone my thesis statement into the right question and still spend time on my other school and bible studies and maybe some social time.

Oh and here is a virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel from the Vatican interweb nation

a letter to a guest lecturer

2011-01-14T14:36:00.000-08:00

Dr Stokes,

I recently took a trip over to the eastern coast. On the flight from Seattle to DC I had an awesome conversation and I owe you big time for the incredible results. I boarded the plane in Seattle and switched seats so an elderly couple could sit together. When I approached my new seat, which was a middle seat, I examined my new seat mates carefully before slumping down next to them. To my left was a man in his mid 30's with a bedhead and a wedding ring, slumped up against the window, fast asleep with his thick-rimmed glasses pressed tightly against his face. As soon as I saw the girl in the aisle seat I came to certain immediate conclusions and slotted her in a pretty specific category. Here, let me describe the situation. She had on black leggings stuck into those classy Ugg boots (retail at $90?) with one of those extra long JCrew sweaters with a belt. Her hair was pulled back and she had minimalist make-up on with dangly silver earrings. So naturally, I assumed she was some rich college kid going back to school at some East Coast snazzy school. Being put off by the pizzaz, I immediately fell asleep and didn't wake up for another 45 minutes, whereupon I espied her green folder which read "PreHealth Stanford University: Washington DC." Because I have always been interested in all things medical, I was re-interested in conversing with her and so I started up a conversation that rabbit holed until the flight landed. Both her parents went to Stanford Law, she is a triplet in a family of four kids, grew up in Seattle at first as a semi-nominal Christian family. She went to a snazzy private high school in downtown Seattle, Lakeside High. But more to the point, our conversation didn't on her prehealth program, although we did a personal history summary and talked about interests and plans and goals and such. After I described NSA's education system, she asked me, "So if someone isn't a Christian at NSA or they lose their faith, would they be expelled?" Naturally this launched into a discussion of sin and Christianity. She was a highly educated Junior at Stanford, so I was incredibly careful how I worded each response. She believed that everyone was born with a certain natural code of ethics built inside of them, and so we talked about different murderers, especially non-psychopath murderers and then spent about an hour talking about homosexuality and how it was wrong. Then she brought up John Locke in her defense of a system where everybody 'does good' to each other. I was overjoyed to hear his name! He is probably the philosopher that I remember most clearly from last term. Anyways, at the beginning of the conversation we were getting upset looks from different people for talking out loud and for bringing up homosexuality. But by the end, people were trying not to look at us because of all of the sources cited throughout the conversation. She was initially curious and by the end very very receptive to the gospel and I feel like it hinged on the point of our conversation when I expressed a pretty good understanding of John Locke.

So that's my story. I wanted to thank you for your clear lecture on John Locke. I eagerly await your next guest lecture appearance, having seen the fruit that God has sewn through you and both your thorough understanding of philosophy and also your love for your subject and your students.

Thank you so much,

MES

it really is that time.

2010-12-28T03:04:00.001-08:00

I am coming to beginning of the end of my undergraduate experience. Mid-January marks the start of the finishing up of the last semester of college as I know it. It is kind of a daunting feeling. An imminent feeling. A powerless moment; yet an empowering moment. Anyways, everybody gets to this point, having had there nose to the grindstone, or at least not focused on the ultimate direction and future with any real intensity. This point is the break before the sprint to the finish, or so I hope, because I really need to kick butt in some of my courses. I guess it isn't about all the things that make me different or unique in this experience, because that would be lonely, introverted, and kind of depressing. It's actually more about going through what so many people have already gone through. It's about trying to talk to the right people to get the right advice from, and making the same right decisions that they made, or should have made.

So here I am, at this over-analyzed in over-expressed terms and this same over-emphasized point...thinking about all that. That futury stuff. I have been looking at med schools and different routes that could take me there and what options are better or shorter or cheaper or what-have-you. It's kind of overwhelming. Each program is different. MCAT prep, easy grades, rigorous education, counselors, professors connected to different med schools, high competition... etc etc To top it off, I am reading a lot for my Thesis on Osteopathic Medicine and trying to see myself in different doctors' shoes, or lab coats. But when I read about my personality type it says, "You're indecisive and too focused on the external" whatever that means. I know, I know...I am actually indecisive a lot of times, and what people think matters to me more than it should...but why is this job list so frightening to me?

Accountant/Auditor, Actor, Administrative Assistant, Administrator, Artist, Banker/Economist, Career Counselor, Church Worker, Computer Specialist, Consultant, Designer, Diplomat, Editor, Engineer, Events Coordinator, Facilitator, Homemaker, Human Resources, Librarian, Musician, Nurse, Occupational Therapist, Politician, Project Manager, Psychiatrist, Psychologist/Counselor, Sales Representative, Scientist, Senior Manager, Social Worker, Teacher/Professor, Technical Specialist, Trainer, Writer...

Alright Alright...so medical doctors aren't on there... and psychologist/counselor sounds intriguing...but a lot of these are generic enough that they fit with any trade really. I am just glad that it's ultimately not in my hands to choose what is right but instead just to do what is before me and go hard for the things that I want.

day dream to Portland

2010-12-24T23:46:00.000-08:00

I carved soul-words, painted
in enigmatic strokes; broken amateur
with warrior-poet day dreams.

I dug up hate-bones, waded
through despondent mires; insatiable
arrogance with crystal clear recall.

I looked out these death-walls, screamed
from impregnable depths; enveloping
moistness with sandpaper finger-hold.

paindarknessnothing

A sudden squeeze from this dead blood-muscle,
a voice from above breathes words that swim;
indefatigable savior-grasp with grace in his eyes.

Tis the Season

2010-11-22T10:33:00.000-08:00

There was a huge storm last week. This is my cousin's car, very nearly hit by a massive broken tree.

Then it started snowing yesterday, and I went on a long walk with my sister through it all. I thought it was a lot of snow yesterday, but this morning I woke up and there were at least three inches of snow outside my apartment!

So now I have to go and work on my Milton paper and my Osteopathy paper and drink my eggnog latte. Speaking of coffee, my mom bought some fiesta ware coffee mugs and I totally dig the colors.

2010-11-11T09:34:00.000-08:00

On my sister's birthday I felt like making a cd mix for her. So I did, but I ended up spending a lot more time on the cd case, making kind of a collage-ish artsy fartsy case outta envelopes and random cool looking clippings from around the house. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of it; however, I decided to do the same type of gift for my pseudo cousin Kirby. Here's how it turned out:

This is the front.

This is the back.

This is a close up.

Anyways, this week is super busy, and therefore I am more inclined to postpone school and feel artsy, indie, and ironical. Oh, I went to a Josh Ritter concert with Samuel, Michael, Elliot, Laura, Kristy, and Kelly. It was a pretty awesome show, despite the dorks who were rubbing up against us for the majority of the show, wallowing in their midlife crises.

post november 11

2010-11-11T01:56:00.000-08:00

I have tons more to do and can't sleep. Here is a squirrel.

Prayer for Agony

2010-11-08T10:59:00.000-08:00

God, thanks for grace. Thanks for wine.
All my sins, all my failings, you erase
as if I never stood, your law defacing,
and you set me in line, gave me a pace.
You gave of your blood and made it as mine.
and Christ's pure witness, to me, you assign.
Please take me and break me fantastically.
Rebuild me as yours; end this catastrophe.
I have twisted my life from your truth.
Make me new and humble. Touch vermouth
to my parched lips and rotted tooth.
Convict me to trust, and to look to your Love
which from the cross did squeeze thereof;
From his body did shove... that liquor sweet and most Divine.
My God's throbbing blood; to fill my cup with wine.

The Loizeauxs and the Panamanian Harpy

2010-11-06T15:49:00.001-07:00

Seeing the eagle on the Clearwater River immediately gave more depth and potency to a story I have always heard and loved.

It is the story of a pet my mom’s family had when she was growing up in the Panama Canal Zone. My grandfather Paul Herbert Loizeaux was an Army Surgeon, and was totally loved by all of the locals, who brought him injured animals in addition to their own medicinal needs. Driving to and from town and his office he found injured animals and brought them back with him. He fixed them up and taught my mom and her 2 brothers and 4 sisters to nurse them back to health, to love them as God’s beautiful gifts. Needless to say, my mom enjoyed a unique variety of pets while she was growing up. A coatimundi (kind of like a fierce brown raccoon), countless dangerous snakes, monkeys, cayman, rats, etc. But this story is about one harpy eagle that was dropped off with my grandfather by some missionary friends in the hot afternoon one summer day. His wing was all banged up so he couldn't fly, and he was blind in one eye from an ancient injury. He sat shivering in fright as my grandfather's face lit up like light microscopy. And by osmosis, his seven children were likewise enthralled with the magnificent bird. After my grandfather fixed him up, 'Harpy' stayed with the Loizeauxs for a number of years as the resident HUGE harpy eagle. I mean look at this picture of a Harpy eagle:

Anyway, Harpy continued to grow and hang out with my mom's family until he was healed and they couldn't handle a fully grown eagle, and so it was decided that he would be given to a zoo where he could live out his life in domesticated tranquility. And so it was done. Although it was hard to part with the bird, the Loizeauxs knew it was for the best. After a few years they visited Harpy at the zoo, and as soon as Grandpa entered the bird exhibit, he heard the piercing joy of Harpy as he swooped down from his lonely perch, from which he hadn't budged since he had arrived at the zoo. He was the picture of happiness, fumbling over himself to express his enduring love. The zoo keepers had never seen him so active, and after my mom and her family left, they never saw him budge again. His health deteriorated. A week later the zoo contacted my grandfather Loizeaux to tell him that Harpy had died of a broken heart.

an obfustic night

2010-11-02T07:53:00.000-07:00

Chemistry is an interesting class. That is one of its attributes, whether I try to justify it or not, whether I am gripped with this interest and overcome with the emotional intensity of chemistry, it remains at the constant of 'interesting.' I mean to a certain extent, its all really a slough of ridiculous theories that only make sense if you think really hard and accept all the philosophy that came before. But I guess that there is also the angle that, well, God wrote the world in such a way that these theories would be around, whether or not atomic theories are right on, a little bit on, or way off. Last night I pulled the first all nighter in a while, and it felt different from the rest, because instead of pondering philosophy and 'just trying to get at' what theses guys were trying to say, I was detail searching and equation memorizing. The craziest part of the whole thing is that there were these actual men who were actually motivated to actually think super hard about a plethoric myriad of potentialities. Thank God it wasn't up to me, or we'd still be in the dark ages of science. I just keep hoping and praying that God push my understanding and grade up in that class, even as I admit that I have no time, and the time I should have spent in all of my classes is long long past.

suspended nebulous precipitation

2010-10-31T22:07:00.000-07:00

Clouds don't look like sheep sitting on a hilltop with their lyric shepherd. They look like old pillows, not long ago ripped violently to shreds, now floating in the early morning calm. They look like turtles made of cream puff filling. They look like Noah's ark broken open, all the animals frozen in salt, mid-crumble as they flee a world worse than Sodom. Clouds are cities full of people packed up and headed out west across the plains, trailers and cars packed far beyond capacity, possessions stocked to billow up like Santa's sleigh. Clouds are oceans of albino elephants stampeding cross the Grand Canyon. Clouds flow like water, billow like flames, tumble like lemmings, and herd like cattle. We see God as a cloud pillar leading His people out of Egypt. He is shrouded in clouds when He reveals Himself to Moses on the mountain. The Dove descends from the clouds, and Christ ascends into the clouds. Clouds are incredible! Water gets whipped into shape and tossed around in HUGE groups and they have a ginormous dance party in the sky with all of their favorite evaporative buddies, just waiting for the chance to free fall back down the exhilarating distance to the earth, prepared for any surface, any place, any time. And then it all happens again.

the crew

2010-10-26T08:16:00.000-07:00

i went to fish with sammy d and crew. I actually went more to watch than anything...i don't, at this point, have a fishing license, and i don't generally make a habit of dabbling outside of the law. So I went with Samuel, who went with the crew-Sampson, BK, Plaz, Eric, and Elliot-who went to fish (all with licences) yet I went to swim and experience the river, as did Samp. As we parked, all the actual fishers began organizing all their various fishing accouterments, fiddling with their hooks and gadgets and grabbing their canoe. Meanwhile, Samp and I, who as aforementioned were not there to fish, set out along the stream that was to take us up to the Clearwater river, passing under the cement culvert-looking bridge, stepping carefully on the slippery river rocks. It seemed pretty shallow at first, but as we neared the big river, the water rose to my belly button and we decided to strike it out on land. Stepping out of the chilled water, we climbed on to the driftwood which covered the face of the marshy undergrowth of cotton woods. I had barely made it to the top of the pile, with Samp close behind, when there was a big WHOOOSH of air as an enormous eagle launched out over our heads. I was stunned--I mean its not like I haven't seen an eagle before, but this one was soooo close when it rushed out of the forest, and it was at least twice the size of any that I had ever seen. As Samp and I made our way across the sea of rotting driftwood, our eagle landed across the Clearwater from where the crew would end up fishing. He perched a half mile across, content to peer from the second branch up on a tall lonesome pine that had clearly seen better days. Content to sit; content to stare; content to wait for hours, occasionally gleaning his speckled wings. And I was content to stare, as the others dragged bedazzled hooks repeatedly along the surface; casting and recasting w/ instinctive wrist flicks as all of the Clearwater ravine throbbed with calm, organic vivacity.

excessive brain waves

2010-10-26T08:07:00.000-07:00

A while back I had one of the most vivid dreams of my life, and I wrote it down as soon as I woke up. Here it is, free of edits and thus, it remains in a broken narrative.

I had the most intense dream i have ever had last night. The macktruck was in front of us on the runway, so we couldnt take off... I realized I was just standing there as the scene unfolded, just as Mrs. S looked helplessly at me. I Sprinted accross the air field over to the sandwiched yellow airplane. It was a mess, like yesterday's cardboard recycles, decomposing in the morning dew. The cockpit was unrecognizable, glass cubes from the shattered windows covered the ground, and the roof ruffled back from the frame to reveal the cabin. I only saw Mr. S at first. He was wearing some kind of pilot/bee suit, face covered and heavily gloved. I suddenly remembered something my brother eric had told me about his CNA class and checking pulses, so I reached down under his chin with the pads of my index and middle finger to feel for a pulse. Right as I felt the first pulse, Mr S spasmed and took off his bee keeper pilot helmet and lay dazed. I immediately moved on to the rest of the cabin, the pilot had been thrown in front of the actual plane. Now this was a strange passenger situation. Each passenger had been zipped into a small pyramid shaped clothe compartment that had a seat in it. Luke (my 17 year old brother) had clambered out of his and was dizzily crawling off to the side, but the other compartments were silent. I ripped the first open as Mrs S ran up. It was 2 year old Ben, but he seemed to be alright, Luke came over and scooped him up to check him for any injuries. Then I came to the back-most pyramid compartment and I flipped the zipper down. curled into an bloody unconscious ball was little their 5 or 6 year old Morgan, and I lost it, sobbing as I picked her up and held her tight. As I turned to Mrs S, i felt Morgan fuss and she called for her mom, whimpering painfully. As we all regrouped, Luke stood at the edge of the plane holding Ben and kicking at the wreckage. Suddenly--i don't know how it happened--but behind Luke, a stone's throw from the mangled plane, was the mack truck, front end wrapped around the tree- but I could see the passenger door was swinging open ( on the other side of the truck from us), and the dazed driver fell out as I looked up, and something metallic flashed in his hand. Mrs S screamed and we huddled by the smashed plane as I watched the driver's feet as he crawled around the truck-but i could see that his gun had somehow fallen forward out of his hands and lay ten yards in front of him as he attempted to sneak along the ground. Luke chose this as his opportunity to rush in, and picking up one of the pipes that holds the wheels to the frame, he rushed of, still holding baby bennet. I freaked and took off after him, still clutching morgan tight, grabbing another of the pipes, which must have been strewn around the crash. As the macktruck driver turned the corner luke swung the pipe into his chest, sending him back. -various peeps arrive to help the russian mobster truck driver, i grab ben and luke goes in hard core ape shit on these guys and gets beat up pretty bad, as i am setting ben down. for some reason i continue to hold morgan and go in to the fight, and with precise strikes, i clip the major arteries of the mobsters and drag luke away from the scene as the russians crawl off. the last bit of my dream is me angry at luke for being reckless, and he is like, whateves even thoughthere is blood all over his arms and face, and we all just sit there bloody/tired/exhausted as the camera zooms out, the macktruck smoldering around the tree at the edge of the airstrip. mangled plane with bloody crew. russians crawling off...and...end scene.

minishaws

2010-09-23T17:03:00.000-07:00

Oliver and Layla love hanging out together.

In Your Face

2010-09-23T17:02:00.000-07:00

“Therefore, O Painter, make your smaller figures merely indicated and not highly finished, otherwise you will produce effects opposite to nature, your supreme guide.”

Taking a step away from the classically trained, highly educated, and enlightened minds of our previous readings, this week we read about Leonardo and Brunelleschi. In this quote Leonardo proves his upbringing. He takes nature as our supreme guide, and what is he speaking of? Fittingly enough, perspectives in art. Urging our Painter on the proper techniques for producing a convincing portrayal of perspective in art, he uncovers an important fundamental aspect of his foundational philosophy. He takes an genuinely humanist approach to every aspect of his work and life, and that is why he got a lot of it right. Over and over Leonardo points to his unclassical uneducation and seems to flaunt it in the face of the current educational system. Some kind of “In your face!” urge to itch.
Through his incredible, unheard of, unique powers of observation, Leonardo unknowingly applies the wisdom and consensus of the day. Through constant and thorough examination of the stuff of the world around him and most especially through a careful observation of human beings, Leonardo has changed art forever. Its crazy to say, but in my chemistry lab this morning we talked about the difference between standard weight and our own measurements of different weights. We had to come to the understanding that actual measurements aren’t going to be anything like the standardized weights. In much the same way, focusing in on the specific delineations from the idealized concepts of the day, Leonardo struck a true and beautiful chord.

Machiavelli's Man

2010-09-23T16:59:00.000-07:00

Devoid of the moral and ethical constructs of humanity, Machiavelli’s prince exists in an inhuman world. Shakespeare’s King Henry V condemns Bardolph, “We would have all such offenders so cut off.” (Act III, vi, line 101) Despite the pleas of Pistol, a good friend in his youth, Henry cannot dismiss the thievery and looting of any man, for he is Machiavelli’s Man, humanly realized. Through Bardolph’s punishment, we see that Henry’s transformation is complete. In true Machiavellian cold and pragmatic resolve, his duty as King trumps his friendship with his old bar mates. Among the rules of advice as pertaining to power in The Prince, Machiavelli stresses the necessity for a prince to “keep himself from his citizen’s and subject’s possessions…” (ch 15/16) Further on he warns princes that are not hereditarily descended to be cautious of the citizenry, for it is difficult to maintain the proper balance of winning over the people and controlling them as a prince should. Henry V especially proves his knowledge of this with respect to the wild days of his youth. He has turned a new leaf. He knows that an army of thieves and looters will not be particularly appealing to his new French subjects, and so, seeing any of these growing habits, he must squash them in their beginnings. Machiavelli claims “Nothing makes a prince more esteemed than great undertakings and examples of their unusual talents.” (ch 21), and Henry proves this in his conversation with the Welshman in the ending. In contrast with Machiavelli’s advice to be careful of virtue, however, Shakespeare’s Henry confesses his fears and proves his humanity on his walk the night before Agincourt. Professing his fears and insecurities with respect to his kingship, he says, “Upon the king, let us our lives, our souls, our debts, our careful wives, our children, and our sins, lay on the King.” (IV. 1. 238-241) And so our Machiavellian prince descends from his ghostly apparition to don the incarnate being of Henry, a veritable savior of Machiavelli’s prince, to grapple with the real complexities of human kingship.

Osteopathy and Christian Medicine

2010-09-23T16:53:00.000-07:00

a proposed thesis: Because Osteopathic medicine aims at a holistic approach to people as mind, body, and soul, osteopaths are better equipped for a Christian medicine.

The Scripture’s emphasis on bones begins at the very beginning. Adam sees Eve and calls her, “bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh,” for Eve was essentially out from Adam’s physical rib, crafted by putting flesh to the bone. Moses makes particular emphasis to carry the bones of Joseph back to the promised land to bury them in the land of God. (Exodus 13:19) Bones are the framework for the human body and the structure. For this reason the Psalmist warns, “When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long.” (Psalm 32:3) Spiritual atrophy strikes at the bones, the structure, the foundation to the spiritual life. (Gen 1:27) As the Osteopath approaches the medical scene, not only do they bring with them a holistic view of a person as inseparable mind body and soul, more importantly, the Osteopath begins with the bones and our musculoskeletal nervous systems. As the spinal cord makes its way down the vertebral column, within each bone a plethoric myriad of neurons synapse fed by local glial cells. Begin with the bones. When Peter heals the lame man, special emphasis is placed on his bones. Being born with broken bones, he had never experienced the fundamental gift of bones. Our faith is in Christ’s bones. That they are human bones and that they bear up our burdens on His back as he climbed the cross. As an osteopath focuses on manual manipulation, nutrition, and lifestyle changes, he focuses on these bones. And so as Christian physicians, they are more aligned even from the get-go.

Fall Music #1

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

Want to see a fun french music video? Its called "Comets" by the band Cocoon.

"Comets" by Cocoon

Their album, "Where the Oceans End" is coming out towards the end of October.

And Here's September

2010-09-07T15:46:00.000-07:00

For some odd reason I had a peaceful picture in my mind of my senior year of college. I would have more down time and my days would be filled with extra readings and an overabundance of elaborate writings just spewing from my relaxing position in my final year here. However, it has not been any of these things for a while, although at the beginning it was looking good. But here I am at the start of week 4 for NSA, taking freshman rhetoric, sophomore logic, and senior traditio (not to mention being in week 3 of chemistry class at University of Idaho) aaaaaand I am swamped, disgustingly swamped. Between trying to stay current in all my readings, sufficiently prepare for chemistry, working at Bucer's, and worrying about grades, there isn't a whole lot of down time to speak of. What it has come down to is a rethinking of what life is and a sacrifice of some of the things that I thought were really important. Grades are important; enjoying the class is less important at this point--so no extra time spent exploring tangental topics that fall by the wayside of the already voluminous readings.

Anyways, all that to say...just like everybody else, I am loading up a huge helping for this year, because I don't really want to come back for seconds. I keep checking my plate to make sure I am not letting everything slip off the side, but I know it will be good. Its beyond my ability to balance it without the absolute help and sustaining hand of God. Prayer, Scripture, Faith.

Can't you lead a good life without believing in Christianity?

2010-08-02T19:40:00.000-07:00

This is the question on which I have been asked to write, and straight away, before I begin trying to answer it, I have a comment to make. The question sounds as if it were asked by a person who said to himself, 'I don't care whether Christianity is in fact true or not... I'm going to choose beliefs not because I think them true but because I find them helpful.' Now frankly, I find it hard to sympathise with this state of mind. One of the things that distinguishes man from the other animals is that he wants to know things, wants to find out what reality is like, simply for the sake of knowing. When that desire is completely quenched in anyone, I think he has become something less than human...

C.S. Lewis
('Man or Rabbit?')

How much of a setting writes my words?

2010-08-02T19:25:00.001-07:00

-the pencil/paper
-the sounds/weather
-the mood/distractions/spiritual state
-standing, sitting, legs all bunched up, along a sun warmed bench, book in hand, cars droning by, someone to sit with
-coffee/cereal/ice-cream/hungry

I heard that Thomas Wolfe was so tall that he could stand at the fridge and use the top as a writing surface, and that's where he wrote the majority of his work. Hemingway had his raised desk that he stood at to gain inspiration. Robert Lowell lay in bed. Yeats paced and mumbled to himself. Robert Frost had a favorite chair and a board upon which he jotted his writing notes.

I don't know what my ideal location or situation or tools would be, but I think its interesting that my writing is so much more than me. It is the place i am in. It is the mindset that I am in. It is, more holistically and sensually, everything from the sounds of the whirring dryers in the laundromat that I am currently sitting at, to the smell of the cigarrettes that I am still recalling/regretting from when I first stepped out of the car outside. It is also the drooping of my eyes and the hunger in my belly, although this whole time, I had thought it would be the visual elements that most inspired my words.

Anyways--just some deluging, unapologetically sporadic thoughts as I am sitting at the Laundromat table, letting my thoughts tumble around.

God Draws Happiness with Tragic Lines

2010-08-02T19:23:00.000-07:00

Isn't it strange that something so tragic and so utterly inconceivable as death can bring joy? Its like it takes that rocking of the soul to really fully realize the depth of what is going on, or even, just to acknowledge that it really is deeper than we can imagine.

friday, July 30th

2010-07-31T15:28:00.000-07:00

my shift starts now. 6:00 post meridiem pacific time, and the shop is all a flurry of activity. although the doors are closed (supposedly) locking out the heat, the temperature seems to vaunt at a steady 82 degrees fahrenheit. despite this locked in/out temperature, there are four fans set at the highest, utmost airflow via mechanical arrangement, dissallowing optimal audible confirmation of orders, basic commmunicatins, and of course, basic human speech. i think its funny that the bag hanging accross from me (made out of the burlap coffee sacks) is simple yet elegant, smooth yet rough...

this hand bag is no longer a burlap sack, but just as it still has the vestiges of that burlap, and maybe the sweat of the shoulders of the Nicaraguans who hoisted it down the mountains from the coffee fields, just as it still holds some of the juices of those first fruits of the coffee season, freshly-plucked from the coffee plant--just as these still hold essences, immortal pieces, or at least enduring vestiges of what was before, so too, this handbag, this one-strapped satchel bag, this holds flashbacks to an alternate reality, or another life, but definitely, this holds the symbols and logo from the company that brought it here...or at least part of these symbols. the bag accross from me has half of a mountain, maybe even the famed Concepion volcano, backed by another simply sketched green moountain. then, above these, in what used to be a semi circle, i am sure, and now is a semi-semi-circle, are the letters, "F NICARAGUA" i guess i found that amusing, that this bag had travelled so far, and been through heroic (i'm sure) adventures of harrowing nature, and came to be made in to another bag that carries gum, pens, books and changes of clothes, with the new emblem of "f nicaragua"

July Mix

2010-07-28T00:06:00.000-07:00

As the strong July sun struts on his lengthy day-hikes across the sky, I have accumulated a good amount of music for winding down after work. So here is my "end of July mix"

1. Tickle Me Pink--- Johnny Flynn
2. Slow Moves --- Jose Gonzalez
3. New Romantic--- Laura Marling ** she has gotta be one of my new faves, her poetry is fascinating.
4. The Cave --- Mumford & Sons** also a new fave, especially this song, nuff said.
5. Holly --- Jay Jay Pistolet
6. Berceuse --- Coeur de Pirate
7. Moving Pictures, Silent FIlms --- Great Lake Swimmers
8. Love & Communication --- Cat Power
9. You and I --- Wilco
10. Universal Traveler --- Air ** it just floats...
11. Troubles Will Be Gone --- The Tallest Man on Earth ** because troubles are already dealt with.

Short, chill, and mixed...

also, when I got back from Maryland, Eric and I wandered around the Palouse and I took this pic

Anyways, it's late, and I work in the morning.

2010-07-27T12:58:00.000-07:00

canadians, below the clouds

2010-07-23T00:31:00.000-07:00

Hello, Saskatchewan.
I have never seen you before,
except from this plane,
through the burgeoning clouds.
But you must be down there this morning,
sipping your Saskatoon coffee
and deploring
the summer rain.

rose-eating monster

2010-07-23T00:17:00.000-07:00

I went out into the orchard by my parents' house and found all these red monsters eating up the rose plants, but not the plants in between and around.

enjoy the little things

2010-07-06T10:56:00.000-07:00

wildflowers in the orchard

2010-07-06T10:48:00.000-07:00

Love Poem With Toast

2010-07-03T17:24:00.000-07:00

by Miller Williams

Some of what we do, we do
to make things happen,
the alarm to wake us up, the coffee to perc,
the car to start.

The rest of what we do, we do
trying to keep something from doing something,
the skin from aging, the hoe from rusting,
the truth from getting out.

With yes and no like the poles of a battery
powering our passage through the days,
we move, as we call it, forward,
wanting to be wanted,
wanting not to lose the rain forest,
wanting the water to boil,
wanting not to have cancer,
wanting to be home by dark,
wanting not to run out of gas,

as each of us wants the other
watching at the end,
as both want not to leave the other alone,
as wanting to love beyond this meat and bone,
we gaze across breakfast and pretend.

summer writer's block

2010-07-03T17:23:00.000-07:00

i need to write more this summer i decided, after an extended hiatus from the busy pub life. but every time i set aside for it, i just end up reading a bit, thinking a lot, and jotting down lists of notes and phrases that i think are 'cool' so i decided that nothing is too little and writing something is more important than writing the best thing.

summer is canoes tied on car racks.

2010-06-14T16:04:00.000-07:00

Summer is Sidewalk Construction

2010-06-14T00:17:00.000-07:00

elope with soap

2010-06-11T22:34:00.000-07:00

i packed up my socks,
some undies and soap
thats all i need, babe,
come on, lets elope.

we'll take the next train,
and ditch this dead town,
just leave a short note,
and grab your best gown.

Nino Nioki Kall

2010-06-08T23:23:00.000-07:00

I met a little eight year old today named Jordan. She told me that she was from Hawaii, but unfortunately, she said English was hard for her to understand. She said her name in Hawaiian was "Nino Nioki Kalla"...which is apparently further explained by 'nano ceeko itiaioh.' She rode her 'stunt bike' up to me, my cousin Christy, and my little brother Eric and promptly picked out her favorite watercolor brush from Christy's supply and talked with us nonstop for an hour and a half about her difficulties with English, and her astounding knowledge of the Hawaiian words for everyday things (like trees, street, and trash can). You see earlier, Eric and Christy and I set up a water color pallete on a blanket by a weather-worn piknick table in East City Park. Once we had finally got to mixing colors and begun our accidentally impressionistic stroke work, we were surprised by our unabashed onlooker. Christy kindly set up a paper and brush for her, and she was our friend for the afternoon. We taught her some Greek, she taught us some of the more rare Hawaiian phrases, and told us all about how fortunate it was to be from Hawaii. The language, 'is in me,' she said. Well she said so many things, that I can hardly remember, and at the end of the painting session, she swapped paintings with Christy and we left her feigning confusion at various english words for park landmarks. (grass, backpacks, and flowers.)

Well this is kind of a blurry picture of Christy's painting of me and my sad maple tree attempt.

oh and I wrote a poem, with Jordan's help. It is named after her traditional Hawaiian given name:

Nino Nioki Kalla (nano ceeko itiaioh)

We walked out of the coffee shop
and prepped ourselves to paint.
We grabbed some cousins, and a Mac laptop,
and were off without complaint.
Alone at first, we soon were joined
by peacefulness... and Jordan.

my sister's travel blog

2010-05-29T16:06:00.001-07:00

My sister Laura is studying in Paris! You should check out her awesome travel blog.

http://justluckyiguess-laura.blogspot.com/

idaho silos

2010-05-28T06:08:00.001-07:00

I had waffles for breakfast covered in sliced bananas with syrup and a dollop of cream.
Fresh french press dregs swill at the bottom of my cup, and my life is all a dream.

Spring is Green

2010-05-22T09:54:00.000-07:00

Summer Break

2010-05-21T16:15:00.000-07:00

Graduation for all of my senior friends (and cousin) was a couple weeks ago. What feels like the end of a chapter for many of these friends, is really a page turn in my book, a big one, with lots of goodbyes, farewells, and well-wishing, but none-the-less a page-turn. And now I am a senior, which feels like an accomplishment. Maybe not an active accomplishment, more of a passive, "I survived this long" kind of accomplishment, which is to say, "One more year!" But these past three years have melded together into kind of a single life-changing event. And its not just the education, although that would seem to be the backbone of the issue. Its about the family members, the friends, and the small town itself. The time is also important. Three years of learning, both in school and in life. Three years of living. Three years of change. Obviously enough, change is progressive. Change is gradual. Change is a "work-in-progress," which brings me back to progress. This summer is about progress, goal-achieving, good old-fashioned box-checking, and most importantly about future-planning. But I think more importantly than all of that, this summer is for relaxing, for recuperating, for enjoying. Enjoying friends and family, enjoying work, enjoying life.

a field and early rising moon

2010-05-06T12:34:00.000-07:00

Simply, Matt

2010-05-04T11:20:00.001-07:00

It isn't anything specific about the way in which you exist.
Although your mustache is like a spoiled breakfast sausage,
just sitting there above your silent lips, below your shifty eyes.

You see, its semi-warm outside and you still wear the hat,
the one that you grabbed from the dumpster out back.
Your junior high jeans on your junior college body, there's that.

But this is just who you are, what you wear, your 'persona'
Ah, we hit the point. Matt, Get real! Persona's are fake...
And you are putting on the persona of a true creep.

Beatrice

2010-05-04T10:41:00.000-07:00

through the spheres,
step by step.
progressive,
through these tears
he looked to her.
purposed
and effective
eye contact.
vicar, she, prepared his eyes,
to look upon the sun.

Spring is Bugs: #2

2010-04-28T08:35:00.000-07:00

when I woke up it was wet

2010-04-27T18:46:00.001-07:00

The rain came while I slept--not so much in a slow pitter-pattering, drip-dropping kaleidoscope of constant activity. Last night was windy; this morning was wet. Wet like my sandals, which ironically enough, I left outside to dry yesterday when I got back from the river. But as the day went on it just rained more and more. More and more like my life, which seems to cycle through the same issues methodically. As soon as I am comfortable, something slips/shifts/falls, and I realize that I really cant do any of it. Its too much. Its too hard. I am not strong enough. But it seems simple enough. When someone makes a mistake, there is always forgiveness. There is always grace given. There is always life beyond the moment of the travesty. But still, even now I find myself asking "Why did it happen? Why does it continue to happen? Why can't we all see that it is happening until it is too late?" Christ is the Way, the TRUTH, and the Life. If our first goal is truly and honestly Christ and the kingdom, there is no room for bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. There is no room for selfishness. If we are to remain steadfast in our calling as Christians, we are always to seek first Christ and the kingdom.

It is all about the perspective. Love Christ, for your relationship with God is of the utmost importance, and is the vital source and heart of life and the human experience. From our love and trust in God we can begin to live according to the promise he has given to us. Choosing our lifeless worthless bodies from the pile of filth. Nothing in and of ourselves saved us, lest any man should boast. So what are we afraid of? This life has been created by OUR God. He took this world and put us in it for a purpose, to love Him and enjoy Him forever. Not for ourselves. There is no action required for us in that charge. There is no extreme effort, no strength of will, no courageous and extra-human muscle contraction necessary. In Him we live and move and have our being. Cast your cares on Him and trust in Him, and live through Him. Believe on Him.

theme of the week: don't be afraid to be completely and utterly embarrassingly honest with yourself and all those that you love, above all to God, who alone is wise.

Spring is Bugs: #1

2010-04-21T18:17:00.000-07:00

No-Flash Photography

2010-04-05T09:07:00.000-07:00

A Fleet of Dandelion Heads

2010-04-02T15:27:00.000-07:00

Just in case you forgot what flowers look like.

Jonsi

2010-03-30T09:20:00.001-07:00

Porky

2010-03-29T11:53:00.000-07:00

Here our 'Porky' lies,
as photographed by James.
Here, met his demise,
without knowing our names.

stowaways

2010-03-23T14:39:00.000-07:00

Along the River

2010-03-13T12:27:00.000-08:00

Two thinking cousins
Running farther than they think,
Blinded by blue they run
Past uncanny cliffs.

Battling a windy wall along
A dark blue river,
They turn silently
Into the stillness of the sun
Tripping through an entire city of McDonald's cups.

He recites poetry about a meek stallion,
And she says she wishes she could be
The stallion
Doing hard humble things.

~Jill Becker

(my cousin Jill wrote this about the half marathon we ran together)

2010-03-08T00:18:00.000-08:00

I’ve learned it’s taking me a long time to become the person I wanted to be.

Who the Meek are Not

2010-03-07T00:42:00.000-08:00

by Mary Karr

…..

Not the bristle-bearded Igors bent
under burlap sacks, not peasants knee-deep
in the rice-paddy muck,
nor the serfs whose quarter-moon sickles
make the wheat fall in waves
they don’t get to eat. My friend the Franciscan
nun says we misread
that word meek in the Bible verse that blesses them.
To understand the meek
(she says) picture a great stallion at full gallop
in a meadow, who—
at his master’s voice—seizes up to a stunned
but instant halt.
So with the strain of holding that great power
in check, the muscles
along the arched neck keep eddying,
and only the velvet ears
prick forward, awaiting the next order.

Someone To Watch Over Us

2010-03-04T11:41:00.000-08:00

Pathetic things happen. We live out our lives each day empathizing with other people's situations and relationships, trying to find a relatable thread of transcendant truth through which we can better ourselves or improve their situation or at least create an informed perspective. We wake up in the morning and crawl out from our beds, from beneath the blanket which is named for the comfort it wraps us in each night. The downy comfort slips from off our tired bodies as we stumble across the room snatching up our mangled glasses. And then we are there, in front of the mirror, judging that face. Those exhausted eyes, from their sunken sockets peer out inquisitively. As soon as a prolonged stare is recognized, we avoid our own gaze and cannot look into those lying eyes. The blemished, tired skin of our faces is ridiculous. Once clean, all of our emotional problems and physical ailments covered by layers of make up, sweaters, hair product and our shoe laces properly tied, we grab our books and laptops, leaving behind the growing mess of life that mounds about our desks like a clydesdale's neglected stable, unorganized, generic, slough of meaninglessness.

People fill up this life, but not until we are properly prepared and not until we have walled ourselves in from this reality. We are the "illuminated manuscripts" which have been overabundantly decorated and gaudily dressed up beyond the truths of the text which began the whole fiasco. And what have we lost?

Conversations echo in the emptiness of this mental existence, but we have hid our real thoughts, our true reactions to the news, our genuine disinterest. We have hid our disdain. We have covered it all up, even the love. The love that has grown and grown despite our indefatigable resolve to bury it deep deep under layers of what we would call our true selves. What have we hid?

As each moment comes and goes, fleeting glances of the truth behind those eyes, we realize those walls in our minds go both ways. We have closed ourselves in, like the hermit who lives far from civilization. And we are worse off for it. Slowly we come to the realization that what we need isn't some kind of stronger resolve, or thicker makeup and sweaters, but rather less of all of it. It takes courage to break out from this mindset of ignoring problems, this habitual covering of symptoms. If the pattern progresses, how can the doctor help if he has no idea what is going on? How can a general lead an army if he has no one reporting to him? How can a man see if he has gouged out his eyes? Without honesty, there can be no progress. Without accountability, there can be no honesty. Without God's grace, we can go no further. What we need is someone to watch over us.

Love Calls Us to the Things of This World

2010-03-03T17:04:00.000-08:00

Poem by Richard Wilbur

The eyes open to a cry of pulleys,
And spirited from sleep, the astounded soul
Hangs for a moment bodiless and simple.
As false dawn.
Outside the open window
The morning air is all awash with angels.

Some are in bed-sheets, some are in blouses,
Some are in smocks: but truly there they are.
Now they are rising together in calm swells
Of halcyon feeling, filling whatever they wear
With the deep joy of their impersonal breathing;

Now they are flying in place, conveying
The terrible speed of their omnipresence, moving
And staying like white water; and now of a sudden
They swoon down into so rapt a quiet
That nobody seems to be there.
The soul shrinks

From all that it is about to remember,
From the punctual rape of every blessed day,
And cries,
"Oh, let there be nothing on earth but laundry,
Nothing but rosy hands in the rising steam
And clear dances done in the sight of heaven."

Yet, as the sun acknowledges
With a warm look the world's hunks and colors,
The soul descends once more in bitter love
To accept the waking body, saying now
In a changed voice as the man yawns and rises,
"Bring them down from their ruddy gallows;

Let there be clean linen for the backs of thieves;
Let lovers go sweet and fresh to be undone,
And the heaviest nuns walk in a pure floating
Of dark habits,
keeping their difficult balance."

Psalm 143:7-8

2010-03-02T00:46:00.000-08:00

Answer me speedily, O LORD;
My spirit fails!
Do not hide Your face from me,
Lest I be like those who go down into the pit.
Cause me to hear Your lovingkindness in the morning,
For in You do I trust;
Cause me to know the way in which I should walk,
For I lift up my soul to You.

Bob Dylan

2010-02-24T23:25:00.000-08:00

incredible.

Running Through My Head

2010-02-24T17:26:00.000-08:00

"Head Rolls Off," by Frightened Rabbit

"Title and Registration," by Death Cab for Cutie

"Black Dirt", by Sea Wolf

Everything by Gogol Bordello

Lewiston Faces

2010-02-22T10:57:00.000-08:00

At the Foot of the Cross, and How Could I Not?

2010-02-14T23:55:00.000-08:00

Today was a good day. I decided that I should write while I am still in this moment. So here I am, sitting in the plaid easy chair in the family room of my house. My slippered feet stick out of my thick pajama pants resting on the ottoman. Head phones shoved deep in my ears, I let the music write my soundtrack, queued at random, clicked to 'shuffle.'

I remember not too long ago when things were different. I was behind a barricade. I thought of what people must think of me and decided that that was a frightening thought. Instead of speaking to these people, I wrote their thoughts and judgments and ripping back their scalps, I shoved till the thoughts fit, pushing them back into my imagination to roam around spouting my judgements and critiquing my life. What's worse, I listened and followed the advice that I had force fed their minds. I heard their lips slide open, their jaw unhinge as their cold evaluations slither slowly out, slipping to the floor and stopping pensively at my feet.

"Shut up!" I shout, turning my back on that existence. Familiar faces, but those aren't the ones I know. Those aren't the ones I love. Those are figments of a past that never happened. Those are the excuses for insecurities and bogus justifications for bitterness that was locked inside.

But these are Christ. They are His and He directs their steps. His good gift has been given. And out of the ashes and very rottenness of death he grabbed my sunken bones and breathed life into them. Taking up all these my sins and judgments under the skin on his back, he stepped onto the cross above my bones. And as each hammer struck the nail home, the smallest trickle of blood fell from his blackened palms, pooling on my bones. Each blood cell multiplied and grew into veinous capillary beds where they flowed into estuaries. Streams became rivers and rivers grew and grew till they filled the emptiness of my chest with life and breath. As the sun descended, my body, my gift, my life...complete. Unconditional love poured from Christ's side as he prayed, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do."

wistful echo

2010-02-14T02:01:00.000-08:00

Spokane Geese

2010-02-14T01:25:00.000-08:00

Kenny and I sat in Riverfront Park and wrote poems. The deal was, no editing after we wrote them, so this is about as "in-the-moment" as they get.

Broken away from the flock
of conformity, two Canada geese
take a rest. They see my walk
as I wander through, mind at ease,

and stare. Standing alone on their rock
they forget their fowl duties and take in
the moment. The flowing river, their lonely rock.
Busy cars, they aren't interested in.

Like me, they rest in God's time.
Tomorrow is for tomorrow, today is for the now
but I want to know what brings them rhyme
or reason. Or maybe, simply how?

So much pondering, unorganized debris
rolling around in its head...alone
or perhaps it is nothing, and full of empty.
The Peace of God is sure, it just has to be shown.

Chaucer Riddle

2010-02-12T12:27:00.001-08:00

Whylom it fil fro the olde story,
There went a hermit with much glory,
Trewe, much learning he got,
What countrees he left, he got him tale.
And with solitary and with melodies
I lete this herm on the roads to
mo canterbury and the fest
God woot shoope.
Perterben my tale with mych crynging?
Far along this waye, herm halt my thought
With thilke villainy and leggen privyly
Fro the fil parfait of the nerd.
Where that he kneel in the by way
his voice pleyne God's fate,
that it was routhe for to seen and to
here and sayd, "I wretch that wheep and
wayle thus. Yern'd for knowledge.
Under reed I recketh right routhe, Lorde."
And whyle the seige thereabout lounged
about the by way, I stood to hear tales
of truth and of knowledge and a stente
in a hermitry in bitter solitudinous vagabondry.
Into that fait he runt then strode,
and alone in knowledge he built his abode.

A Chance

2010-02-11T01:57:00.000-08:00

Why didn't you look?
My eyes faltered
and I looked away,
lids sunk in dismay,
nothing to say,
gone away to stay.

Why didn't you speak?
I left you behind
and turned to despair
couldn't utter a prayer
my life in disrepair
Reality? I was unaware.

Why didn't you scream?
I carefully placed
each solid brick,
lathering mortar thick
made a wall to stick
you behind, quick.

Why did Christ die?
I realize everything
was a chance for me
to look and see
clear out the debris
if I really want to be.

Mess of Words

2010-02-10T17:56:00.001-08:00

Words can fill a page, but how will
they show what I cannot describe?
transcribing the thoughts from
my chaotic mess of synapses.

slowly seeping, silently trusting
my surreptitious fingers slide
from sentence to sentence,
but now i am just acquiescing

to emotion. Emulating motifs,
stolen from Billy Blake and Milton,
making the most of my misery...
doomed to this macabre murder of poesy

Full Peace

2010-02-10T15:50:00.000-08:00

"Re-enter your own heart,
you who are dissemblers of it.
Cling to him who made you.
Stand with him and never fall.
Rest in him and have full peace."

~Augustine~

Thanks for Today

2010-02-09T15:03:00.000-08:00

God, you have taken away my guilt
with the scourge of your mercy.
Through your sacred purification,
I am cleansed into your harmony.

You shattered my frozen heart
and then melted all the pieces
with your transcendant grace.
You made me a brand new heart.

Out of Sion, you sent your peace,
grabbing my neck's nape,
out of discarnate introspection
you winged my broken satiety.

Only love, purest, selfless love,
nothing sweeter to taste,
penetrates my being into song
and melodic ascension into happiness.

Save Me

2010-02-09T14:14:00.001-08:00

God, my God, save me from all the shit
that I have shoved in my brain.
Give me the grace to live and regain
the Christ in me who can do all of it.

life blood....

2010-01-23T09:04:00.000-08:00

Crisp and uncharted,
ashen and layered,
the morning opened
like a thick book,
full of things to do.
The lazy sun hid
bundled up in clouds,
peering in as I
rolled from my sleep
and snatched my
book bag leaving
the huddled, lonely
warmth of my apartment.
Saturday greeted me
with powdered sugar snow
and enveloping fog.
It is time i thought
for words to pour out
time to build my oeuvre
my testament, my masterpiece.
Or maybe it is time
for my idealized phantasms
to bleed out, thicken,
and coagulate like soup
in my mind's eye.
Time for the
picture that has been
stuck on replay in my
brain, to travel through
my hypothalamus,
maybe make a pit stop
at one of my alveoli for
some oxygen. Then
peristalsis can work the
thought into my left atrium
to be squeezed through
my aorta and down,
down, down to my
femoral artery where
the thought throbs,
thickens, then bursts
into sodden reality.
Cover me with
your throbbing truth.
Chart out my days
in this life-blood,
Forget the forms of
Plato and Plotynus'
congealed hypostases.
Instead, mull over this
fist-full of soil, as
the granules slip between
your finger-cage. Taste
this air as the frozen
molecules cling to your
togue. Flare your nostrils
and drink deeply.
The cold that pierced
me awake, now glaciates
my resolve for
all that is actual:
My people, my dog,
my house, my yard
my God...

lecture

2010-01-14T11:36:00.002-08:00

You wait as I do,
but across the aisle.
Above us the air
swirls with the anticipation
of robed scholars, their minds
gorged past the overfill line.
Don't speak out here.
There are too many places
for words to get snagged,
torn apart by the eager beavers,
no end to their voices.
We know this hall,
cautiously we built these walls,
with our intellect.

Buried Life

2010-01-14T11:36:00.001-08:00

Pulling back the crusted lids from my dry eyes,
I snap out of my day dream digression.

You held me in that vivid moment,
my veinous arms throbbed with reality,
and I drank deeply.

But that was then, my eyes long for the wetness of that existence, that alternate reality. Now, my swollen mouth reeks of the flesh of my potential glory. Lips cracked, teeth caked in decay. Before, I stood up to life, each foot planted in surety and defined by decision. Now I wallow through these endless days.

Past love, but not forgotten, you dare to define me. The blood we shared is rotted. Formaldehyde flushes my cheeks, and pulsates in my neck. You told me to open my eyes, but who needs eyes when I hear defeat and taste sorrow. I peel back the greed and self doubt that the enneagram showed inside of me. Taking my bloody fingers, I grip my lower ribs, retinas focused on some distant dream, as my hands clamp tight and rip me open, mouth agape and apathetic. What am I afraid of, when it has all been decided, and given to me? As opportunities stream past on golden platters, and each promised cornucopia potentially rises within my sight, I shoot each a timid glance and walk the other way.

Rods and cones arrange the images in perfect color and high definition. As my optic nerve delineates fact from fable, desirables from undesirable...I can see too. Awakened from the grave I had opted to live inside of, I clamber for the freedom of life outside of the hole. Pores gush out the filth as my broken body gasps for clean air. This is the life I was given, thrown, cast into.

Breathe in the air, even if it isnt fresh...

I don't want to live a buried life...

train tracks past eden

2010-01-08T00:14:00.000-08:00

New York in Three Pictures

2010-01-07T23:51:00.000-08:00

I suppose I should write something inspiring or at least inspired.

Busy streets and people
we got lost in it all
towers and a steeple
i didn't mind at all

some day i will return to all your
paved glory. but for now I must
accept the small gift you pour
from Liberty's torch. I trust
the smells and sights wont bore

me then either. even if i do make
my way to Empire's tower and
at Ground Zero, with awe, take
in the emotion, reality, and therefore
stand.

DC Cathedral

2010-01-07T16:12:00.000-08:00

Vampire Weekend's "Contra"

2010-01-05T13:52:00.000-08:00

Washington Obelisque

2010-01-02T20:51:00.000-08:00

cuneiform covered your predecessors,
crumbling slaves in bath towels,
dancing out stiff commands..

but you are cold tonight
shrouded in wet air

For Brian

2009-12-22T20:51:00.000-08:00

Brian, sé que siempre has querido aprender español.
Así que toma esto como su oportunidad. Recuerde, a pasos de bebé.

Con tanto amor de mi corazón,

Marc Elliot Shaw

For Samuel

2009-12-22T20:50:00.000-08:00

riddle the emptiness with scrubby passages
that grow from the roots of your soul
into the flourishing topiary of song,
to garnish the rooms of your life.

sleep is best

2009-12-11T21:47:00.000-08:00

i won't have any more coherent thoughts

or physically coordinated movements

for today

i am too tired for punctuation too tired for the cold

gripping at the back of my calves

too tired for expectations and hope

i will think better tomorrow, or more clearly...

now i listen to all in unidentified chaos

all the noises and worries melting into a feeling

a feeling that i ignore as it slips out my brain's drain

i sip my hot tea and kick off my shoes

hope can wait till tomorrow

Home is wherever I'm with you...

2009-12-10T18:43:00.000-08:00

Music is addicting...I am not really doing as much homework as listening to lyrics and melodies. I will finish my homework. Eventually.

I am Aeneas, knowing that my destiny is much better than I deserve and yet striving against it every time I lose sight of the light at the end.