Life at 3 miles an Hour

So there is no coffee shop and no early morning peacefulness ... Not to mention no chocolate croissant either. I had no way of getting there this morning. At least not how I had planned on getting there. Yesterday we said good bye to another member of our family who has been a vital part of our lives and is now gone once more. Our beloved Ford Focus, who has been part of our lives for 2 years now, has begun the transformation from daily companion, to the automotive equivalent of an organ donor. The fatal blow came in the form of a head gasket that could withstand the pressure of too much heat. In weighing the options, as well as our bank account, it was deemed necessary to put her to rest. Most likely she will endure the purgatory of craigslist to await her final destination, but regardless, her fate with us is sealed. In my younger days she may have found refuge in my garage to await a life saving procedure. However, those days are not today and "I ain't as good as I...

It has been exactly a month since I've last been here. Two things brought me back this morning. The first was a desperate attempt to wrestle my life back from the tyranny of the urgent. The only thing that brings me balance in times of desperation is balance...if that makes any sense. Balance, for me, begins with some of my own time in my own place with my own coffee listening to my own music and writing on my own iPad...although it seems as if, once again I'm already outdated. The second thing, and the inspiration of some additional writing, is the felt need to process some, in my opinion, misguided and destructive thoughts on faith and disaster that have appeared to the masses this past week. These originated from someone whom I will choose not to identify because the thoughts expressed, unfortunately, are not unique to him. He just happened to be the mouth piece for these thoughts and, again unfortunately, he happens to have a huge forum for delivering them. These th...

I'd be curious to know just what the percentage of people in this world is that admits to sitting around in public spaces just watching people. My wife and I have a few games that we've come up with over the years to refine our own guilty pleasure in this field. One of them is called "friend or relative" which we usually play at occasions such as weddings or large social gatherings. This one is fairly simple. It's usually a matter of determining whether a particular person was invited from desire or obligation. Another game is "whats their story?". Or to put is a bit differently... "what did he/she ever see in her/him?" or however the couples match up. Go ahead and judge me if you want, but we all play these types of games. I realize that I am also the object of someone else's game that they are playing. I think that this realization is a healthy humbling knowledge. How many of us have a couple that we know personally where one o...

It's amazing what a change of scenery will do. I highly recommend it. It's true that many will not be able to experience the extent of the change that I've been fortunate to experience, but anything is a step in the right direction. A month or so back I made a move from a years old tradition of a beachside Starbucks view to a smaller urban neighborhood caffeinated venue. The change has been good. This week I am tagging along with my wife on her conference at the happiest place on earth. No, I'm not in Cleveland...I am right in the heart of the realm of the mouse. Disney world is indeed everything that the name implies. It is another world. Many will disagree and charge me with being part of the "1 percent" and for this week I'm certainly Ok with that. After all, I am sitting here, lakeside in a gorgeous resort, typing mindlessly on my iPad, so I can't reasonably deny the charge. I could ignorantly claim that I deserve this, or I earned it ...

What began as the promise to a new day with coffee and A chocolate croissant in my new home away from home quickly turned into an hour long search for the key that would enable me to get to my caffeine refuge. It's interesting that one little piece of a specifically carved alloy can determine one's destiny. When you find the right one you can open closed doors, move inanimate objects and begin a journey to a destination that you didn't even realize was possible before turning it. I can, in a sense, become the legendary "key master" of Ghostbusters fame. So I'm looking on a new year with a sense that there are many destinations possible by the end of it and I hold the keys to many of them. I, like many of you, travel in circles where I, depending on the keys held, can influence the destinations of many lives beyond my own. As a Pastoral Artist responsible for the direction and leading of a community o' faith, the keys I choose to turn or not turn can i...

Ok... So I've been enjoying the relative peacefulness here for what, 3 weeks??? Guess who just showed up? If you've read my earlier posts you know the answer to this one. That's right... A new group of retired "women" walkers are now holding court in my upstairs sanctuary. Nice...merry Christmas to me. The week just keeps getting better and better. A few days ago our source of video fulfillment decided that it couldn't do "It's a Wonderful Life" one more time. The little red light just blinked mockingly in the void. Experience told me an the manual validated that it was time to call the Sony service man. Right...like that's going to happen. What it really means is check the papers for the best sale on a new one. There will be no repurposing, reconditioning, or redeployment for the beast. I call it the " beast" because it literally is. Lets face it, when you need a chain hoist to get it up the stairs and then a mini crane...

So it's now week 3 here and I'm pretty much settled in on my new place of inspiration. The final push has been made this morning as I finally succumbed to the chocolate croissant...exceedingly good plan. My intent for these next several weeks is actually to simply post things from the past as I wander through my archives and edit along the way for an attempt at a book during 2012. However, the spirit of the season has begun to mesh with the spirit of protest and I'm beginning to get more and more unsettled about how this is all beginning to be played out in the realm of influence that I have, that being pastoral artist. Since I live in a city where the occupy movement has had a significant presence, I am perhaps more enmeshed in these thoughts than others of my profession in other areas of the country. The best way that I can process is to write, and so I've set out to write down some of my thoughts. Many are not going to like and or agree with me and that's e...