God Is Love

When I was young, I did not understand love. Though I received it freely, I did not know how to return it, except instinctually - a smile, a hug, a thank you, a song, a dance. But love requires effort, not non-challance, and dies quickly of neglect.

When I was on the verge of manhood, I did not understand love. Though I enjoyed its many rewards, I also dabbled in its many sins - anger, jealousy, fear, pride. But love requires patience, wisdom, and understanding, and I was still a child.

When I had traveled the world and explored its wonders, I did not understand love. Though I watched others fall in love, commit to love, and bring love into the world, I did not know how to join them - I dated, I failed, I longed for a lasting companion. But love requires community, not independence, and I was unwilling to settle down.

Now that I am old enough to understand love, I still do not have love. Though I struggle to give it freely, I have not found many to accept. Though I have been patient, understanding, and sought wisdom, I do not have anyone with which to share what I have learned. Though I have settled down in a community of faith, I have not found a true companion. For all my wasted years and efforts have taught me the most important lesson of all. Love comes from God. It is His most sought after and treasured gift to us all. And we squander it at our own peril.

I gave over my heart to God, right after I finished cursing and swearing at the driver in front of me for going to slow.

The car in front of me was nothing more than a stone in the road, an obstacle to be avoided and passed at the earliest convenience. I wasn't in any particular hurry, mind you, but I didn't want to be stuck behind the stone all the same. This object was bothering me. So I cursed him and swore at him and thought all sorts of terrible things about him and his parentage.

We have this urinal at work that I hate to use, but occassionally I forget and use anyway. Its at such a height and angle that as you're taking a piss, it splatters. You can feel your own piss landing on you, but its too late to do anything about it but feel disgusting and unclean. When I sin, it too, has a tendency to splatter. After cursing this thing that was making my life inconvenient, I suddenly felt disgusting and unclean.

Right there, in the car, at that very moment, I prayed to God, "Lord, please make me a better person. Open my heart up to my fellow human beings and to you. Allow me to feel love again."

This was only two or three weeks ago. At first, it was a mighty struggle. I'd been so used to driving around obstacles for so long and cursing the ones who deigned to want to share the road with me that I was constantly feeling God's hand gently guiding me back to the right road - the one with all my fellow travelers. It wasn't that I slowed down, so much, as that I suddenly didn't mind slowing down if I had to let someone in front of me.

I'd like to say the transformation was instantaneous and that I am a much more courteous and happy driver on the road, but, that doesn't happen in reality. Let's just say its a work in progress.

But as I drove to work more peacefully than I could remember in years, I also began to notice other things happening - a confluence of events that could not be mere coincidence.

I began to remember with joy the years I'd spent as peacemaker in my family - not taking sides, but actively working to prevent sides from being formed. I remembered that when I was younger that I'd thought I'd had some talent at that sort of negotiation and that I felt learning to be a family peacemaker had taught me a great deal about human nature, which I used to great effect in my writing. Though there isn't any great crisis in my life, I found myself beginning to use my peacemaking skills again - dusting them off and shaking loose the cobwebs.

I found more enjoyment in my reading of the psalms. I found great thrills reading each other's blogs. I looked forward to spending time with friends and family. I embraced Christmas as a holiday to enjoy, not as an ordeal to rush through. I worried more. I prayed more. I contemplated more. I felt more alive.

I also began to realize other things. I began to realize that I had been holding God responsible for many of my own failings. I'd actually been ridiculous enough to think things like, "If God doesn't want me to eat this cheeseburger, he'll send me a sign." And I knew that I'd been treating God like a cosmic Ouija board. But I didn't know what to do about it.

Before I even knew how to ask the question, I had the answer to my prayer. That's been happening a lot lately too.

Psalm 118:5-6


5 In my anguish I cried to the LORD,
and he answered by setting me free.
6 The LORD is with me; I will not be afraid.
What can man do to me?

The Lord is with me; I will not be afraid. I stopped treating God as a crutch and started treating Him as a friend. Don't do it for me, God, but help me to do it. Help me to be reminded of what it is that I'm trying to accomplish. Don't catch me a fish, teach me to be a fisherman.

I started to suspect that there was more to the Bible than I was reading into it - that perhaps the true strength of this book was not of the Do This, Do That variety - but of the love behind the Do This and Do That - the wisdom of God, more so than the instruction.

And that was when Andy gave me the present of Donald Miller's, "Searching For God Knows What?" for Christmas. I had thoroughly enjoyed Blue Like Jazz and found it to be an interesting gateway into Biblical thought - not the authority figures of Chesterton or C.S. Lewis, but a schmoe from Portland who had grown up a lot like Andy and I. Here was a way into Christian thinking that didn't require a PHD. Here was someone I could understand. But what I didn't realize was that Donald Miller was also working for God.

His book's first four or five chapters were all about - A) Not using God as a wish fulfiller. B) The hidden language of Love in the Bible. And C)Finding community in both our relationship with God and with each other. Here was a perfect synthesis of exactly what I'd been experiencing and feeling for the past three weeks, already written out, and already published - waiting for me to stumble upon.

St. Augustine once said that he'd looked back over his life and saw a pattern develop. Again and again, God had intervened and guided his path. I don't even question this passage anymore. God clearly walks beside me where ever I go.

Despite Donald Miller's assertion that the Bible is not a source for simple formulas, I had a thought a while back, when I first started writing this blog, that you could apply the Mathematical Transitive Formula to the Bible and come up with the following result that would tell you exactly what God is like. So, let's give it a try...

According to the transitivie property of Mathematics, If A=B and B=C, then A=C. Using that formula, let's start with, God is Love 1 John 4:16, and take it as God = Love. And then apply that thought to 1st Corinthians 13:1-8. Wherever you read the word Love, here, replace it with the word God.

1If I speak in the tongues[a] of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,[b] but have not love, I gain nothing.

4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love never fails...

Okay... you might need to change the word It to God as well. Its an over simplification, of course. God is all these things and so much more. We can not begin to fathom God.

But all this thought of love got me to thinking about what it was that I had been doing wrong - about how I might truly attain the thing I most sought. If God is love, and He is the greatest thing ever, then the best way to emulate God, the best way to be like God, is to be love.

To live a life of love. To live a life in love. To live a life to love. To take the I out of live, and replace it with an O. There should be no I in live. It should be replaced with the circle which represents unending, ceaseless, infinity. To take the I out of love.

If I have not found someone to love, it is because I have not been ready until now. I am ready to love. I am ready to give and to receive love. I am ready to embrace love. I am ready to be love. I will not be afraid, for the Lord is with me. What can man do to me?

As you head out into your New Year's celebrations, I want you to do one thing for me. Please ask God to open your heart and help you learn to love. None of us will be perfect. Many of us, myself included, will take a long time to get the basic concepts. But the rewards will far outweigh the struggles. Let us all live a life of love. We can not fail for the Lord is with us.

God bless you all, and have a Happy New Year.

I AM NOT A CLANGING GONG! WOOHOO!

I've just had an epiphany! I am not a clanging gong! This is very important to me.

I've been worrying lately that I do not have enough love in my heart. Its been a bunch of subtle things - stress over the holidays and such - but I've honestly been wondering if I had some sort of love block, preventing me from loving as I should. Well, I just got my answer.

I was reading Elisa's excellent blog where in she wondered whether her friends and family were going to Heaven and whether she was going to Heaven - very guilty Catholic kind of thinking. I wrote her a response and then I went back to work. While I was working on mind numbing number crunching, my mind started to wander. I was especially moved about her question of whether her brother had gone to Heaven. I wanted to just reach out to her, hold her in my arms, and tell her - "Yes, your brother is in Heaven. You can rest easy tonight. God is a great and merciful God and He loves us." And I was angry with her "friends" for telling her that she was going to Hell because she belonged to such and such church. I wanted to tell Elisa, "No, you're not going to hell because you belong to such and such church. God doesn't work like that." But then it occurred to me... I don't know a damn thing about any of that. Who am I to say these things? How the heck should I know any of this?

And that was when the epiphany hit me. I realized that the knowledge I had about these things was coming from my heart - not my head. There was no amount of book reading or blog reading or burning bushes that I could read or hear that could tell me the truth of what was already in my heart. God wrote his new covenant on our hearts. And it was at that moment that I knew I didn't have to be a scholar to say what I was saying because it was coming from my heart and was being said in Love.

I don't remember the actual words from 13 Corinthians and I'm totally hopeless about finding Bible verses on the web, but to paraphrase for my own purposes, "If I speak of Heaven, but have not love, I am nothing but a clanging gong!" I have love. I realize that now. I am not love deficient. I am not love blocked. I am not love intolerant. And I know what I am talking about, because I have love!

WHOOOEEEEE! God is truly great and magnificent! All praise to God!

It's Official! We have a ghost!

I'm not inclined to spread hoaxes, but this one was too weird to pass up.

Yesterday, my co-worker came rushing down the hallway all flustered and read faced. She'd been all alone in the back room working on a project when she saw something out of the corner of her eye. She turned and saw a figure of a woman in a white wedding type dress descending the steps into the room, and then it just vanished. She would not go back into the room the rest of the day.

I don't know what she actually saw to make her think it was a ghost, but I know some people who swear to have encountered ghosts before (Heather!). This person was not the type to make up a story like that, so I gotta believe that she believes what she saw.

Now that's not the official confirmation part.

Last night, after everyone had gone home except the janitor, the President of the company and his brother were talking to each other about the story that my co-worker had told. Skeptical, they went into the room and started looking around for something that might have cast a reflection or made her think that there was a ghost. While they were looking, someone began rattling the outside door (next to the staircase). Thinking they'd accidentally locked the janitor out of the building, they rushed to the door and pushed it open. Nobody was there. The Janitor was in the front of the building at the time. This story was confirmed by all three participants.

So, it looks as if we've picked up a hitchhiking ghost just in time for the new year. I don't care what anyone says, I know that's good luck. As poor as this company has been doing the last couple of years with the downturned economy, it just goes to show us that our spirit is alive and well and rattling the doors of opportunity.

Looking forward to 2006. May you all have a Happy New Year.

"I Do Not Believe In God!"

Donald Miller ends the second chapter of his book, "Searching For God Know's What," with this pronouncement and it was the last thing I read before going to bed. I tossed and turned all last night after reading this terrible sentence. I'm hoping the book gets better after this, or else its going to be a very short book in terms of a Christian Message (Searching For God Know's What - a new book about Christian Spirituality from someone who doesn't believe in God ;)

The passage in the book equates belief in God to belief in Santa - that many of us have Christianity stamped on us like children have Santa stamped on us. Eventually we grow older and stop believing because God was never a real construct for us. While I debated posting yesterday's blog about Reality vs. Fiction, this second chapter was really making my point for me and I realized that I needed to post the blog so that everyone could understand my further discussions of this book.

In my College English term paper entitled, "The Arm Chair Diety," I argued that people write to change the world. It is my firm belief that we humans try to emulate the real world in our arts by creating an idealized version of it. The daily drives and tediums of reality can never be fully captured in the arts because, quite frankly, who would want to capture it? No matter how good the play, the movie, the book, the poem, the painting, etc... it can not capture the minute by minute experience of daily life. We don't go to a movie to watch two hours of a character's life - to see them walk around thinking inane thoughts, sit at their computer and type their daily blog, go to the bathroom, wash their hands, contemplate lunch, make phone calls, scratch themselves, etc... It would be boring and pointless. We emulate the real world in such a way that we can skip all that in-between stuff and get straight to the point - love is good, evil is bad, heroes thrive, villians die, etc... Thus showing the world the way we want it to be, not the way it is. But in doing so, we also show the world the way it needs to go, or warn it against going a certain way.

Writing has greatly affected the world. The Bible has had a lasting impact on generation after generation. Mein Kampf led the world into unspeakable horrors. Shakespeare continues to enlighten and enthrall.

A good writer can lead us into places we do not want to contemplate. I was thinking about this after reading Miller's above passage. I have certain things that I simply refuse to contemplate. I just know I'm not strong enough to resist the intellectual urge and I'm afraid that once I start down that path of discovery, I will never be able to find my way back to safe, normal thinking. The first, and foremost, is What if there isn't a God? Not going there. Don't need to. The second, and almost as scary, is For what would I sell my soul? Again, not going there. Don't need to. Don't want to. I'm afraid that just contemplating such a question may create a pact between you and the Devil. As if the question is just floating out there, an unsigned contract, and mere contemplation and decision would seal the deal. Hell no! Not me! And finally, I never contemplate suicide. There's just bad karma waiting around the bend on that one. Donald Miller is making me confront that first question... and I don't like it... but I'm sticking with it for now.

Am I stuck in some sort of adolescent stage as a result? Is my unwillingness to challenge my own belief in God mean that I am clinging to some Santa Claus ideal of God - some wish fulfillment fantasy? I don't think so. I am old enough to know now that God has some better things planned for me, but in terms of denseness, I make the original disciples look like super geniuses. God keeps having to beat my head against the wall to get me to learn anything ;) Or, rather, I should say, I keep beating my head against the wall and God continues to say, "Will, there is a better way, if you'd just listen to me."

Anyway, I look forward to chapter three where I'd better read these words, "Not believing in God wasn't a great idea..." or Donald Miller will have some serious explaining to do. And so will Andy for that matter... ;)

Reality sucks!

My thanks to Andy who gave me two new Donald Miller books for Christmas. I waded into "Searching For God Knows What" last night and came away with the following lesson, "Reality is like wine. Children don't appreciate it." The rest of the first chapter expresses Miller's attempts to write a story about Christianity and looking for a formula and discovering that there is no formula to reality. That's the gist of it, anyway - I was starting to feel that Triptofan buzz when I read it.

My mind travels down strange paths. It always has. But for the longest time, I've known that my body can not travel where my mind goes. Reality and fantasy have become two very real worlds for me. I like to live in the latter, even while forced to live in the former. Most of who I am, most of what I want to be, is in the fantasy world. I've often felt that there ought to be a way to make the two worlds one.

"Harry Potter suceeds because it is a case of wish fulfillment," said a recent critic of the best selling books on the planet. But I really wonder, how much of that is true? You read Harry Potter, and maybe it brings you joy and pleasure for a few hours, or if you're a slow reader like me, a few days, but eventually you have to return to the world of reality. At most, you are only a visitor - and an unwanted guest at that.

But how much more so is that the case of The Bible? On its surface, it is a story of a man who claims to be the son of the one holy ruler of everything - a being so powerful as to be omnipotent - who comes to Earth to save us all from Satan's power, when we have gone astray... Oh, Tidings of Comfort and Joy... Oops, sorry, still in Christmas mode. I mean the Jews had been wishing for a Messiah all their lives, and voila, there He was. Wish fulfillment, right? Now here was a Messiah who could heal the sick, feed the hungry, toss out demons, give sight to the poor, and asked nothing in return except faith. The son of a God who had liberated his people from the all powerful Egypt by sending plagues on Pharoah and drowning his army in the parted Red Sea had come for us. Total wish fulfillment. Snap his fingers, if he wanted, and you could have anything your heart desired.

Only, of course, there was a snag. Harry has to face death and dismemberment every year. God's people don't believe in him no matter what he does. Jesus had to die on a cross in order for us to be saved. Hardly what I'd call wish fulfillment.

It seems that even wish fulfillment can not escape the adult pleasures of reality. It seems that those who seek fantasy and have some measure of success attaining it, only delay the arrival of reality. We all want the fantasy. None of us want the reality attached to it.

I write because I want to live in a fantasy world. But as a writer I am cognizant of one important rule about every story - it has a beginning, middle, and an end. The fantasy world stops and the real world returns. Wish fulfillment is just an escape. But it is an important escape because it shows us, however briefly, the kind of world we want to live in - the kind of reality we want to experience. Whether it be casting spells with our friends or living in community with Jesus, it will always remain a fantasy until we make it a reality.

If fantasy is great, and reality sucks, then I want to make my reality more like my fantasy. And that is why you can not abandon fantasy and experience only reality. Without fantasy, reality has no direction.

Hark! The Herald...

Angels sing...
Glory to the newborn king.

I'll leave you with that. Finish the song on your own. You know you want to.

Merry Christmas to all! Goodwill and Peace On Earth To All Mankind!

Nature vs. Nurture

Not to be outdone by my partners in last night's movie going experience, I too had some thoughts on King Kong. Though, really, relating King Kong to sin was pure genius.

My thoughts are much more mundane, human, and perhaps morbid. After all, they came to me in the shower this morning - my own private little creative laboratory where my body goes on neutral under the warm flow of water and my mind is given free reign to come up with some of the bizarrest thoughts of my life. This one was no exception.

Having seen The Chronicles of Narnia on Monday, and King Kong on Tuesday, the thought occured to me about what sort of havoc Kong would wreak in Narnia. Kong, as Peter Jackson envisions him, is just pure raw nature - destructive as an earthquake, dangerous as a forest fire, and yet, tender as new fallen snow. Nature, in all its power and glory, unleashed on mankind. In its own environment, it rules. In proximity to humans, it is deadly. Narnia, on the other hand, is an allegory for the Christian story and is meant to symbolize some sort of Christian kingdom. It is ruled over by a lion, by the name of Aslan, who sacrifices himself to save the entire kingdom though he is pure and innocent.

Right off the bat, come on - Giant Ape that can defeat several dinosaurs at once versus a lion. No contest. The Ape would smash the lion and rip its head off. (Like I said, morbid ;) But this is no ordinary contest. The lion has the deck stacked in its favor. For though Kong represents all of nature - nature at is most wild, spectacular and dangerous - the King of the whole natural world, King Kong would kneel before the lion - not for fear of losing its life, but for the hope of gaining it.

If King Kong would bow before the lion, shouldn't we as well?

Monday's More Important Things...

And now for some more important things...

There's an online petition to strongly suggest to SBC/AT & T to rename SBC Park/Pac Bell Park home of the San Francisco Giants, Willie Mays Field. Please support this noble effort by clicking here and signing up.

Kudos to Time Magazine for naming Bono of the rock group, U2, and Bill and Melinda Gates co-people of the year for their tireless efforts to end world poverty and hunger. If you haven't already joined, please click here to join the One Campaign. For just the price of your signature, we can pressure the governments of the world to do something good for all mankind for a change.

So Willie Mays Field and the End of Poverty and Hunger in one blog... that must be some sort of record... ;)

Silence is Golden?

Ariel posted this, "Inaudible Answers to Prayer" in which he quotes the following from Oswald Chambers:

"If God is taking us into the understanding that prayer is for the glorifying of His Father, He will give us the first sign of His intimacy—silence. The devil calls it unanswered prayer."

Ariel has posted a Blogger Limelight challenge to respond to this quote. He asks:

"What do you make of Chambers' statement? Do you violently disagree? Or does his assertion contain some truth? If so, how much—a few grains, or a whole sackful? At the bottom of this is the question of what we actually should expect, experientially, when we pray to God the Father."

(God, I love cut and paste... thank you Andy for typing up this first part... saved me a lot of time... ;)

I think this whole assertion rests on the very first part of that statement. IF GOD IS TAKING US INTO THE UNDERSTANDING THAT PRAYER IS FOR THE GLORIFYING OF HIS FATHER... Okay, maybe I missed that message somewhere. Or maybe God and I aren't that intimate. I don't recognize that understanding yet. Prayer, I think, can take many different forms. It can be spoken aloud - publicly, and en masse. It can be intimate - spoken in a quiet moment when no one else is around. It can be a feeling - a communion between your soul and the soul of God that doesn't even require words. It can be done in song, or poem, or chant. Sometimes it is used to thank God for the many blessings we have achieved. Sometimes it is to ask God for His help or His understanding. Sometimes, and let's be honest, its to ask God, why? And sometimes, it is to praise God. In a sort of metaphysical sense, to pray is to glorify God by recognizing that He is your sovereign Lord and savior and that He is the one you need to approach with your heart, mind, and soul. But the act of prayer, itself, is not always meant as a glorification of the Lord Most High.

As to the second part of this phrase, that He will answer us with the intimacy of silence, my first and honest response to this is... Poppycock! It'd be some answer to anyone's innocent question about whether God hears our prayers if we were to answer, "If you're doing it right, God will answer you with silence." And if we're doing it wrong? "You'll hear nothing." Uh... isn't that the same answer? The better way of phrasing this, I think, is to say that if you are still and calm and silent, you will hear God's answer, though probably not audibly. In other words, His silence speaks volumes.

And yes, the Devil would want people to think that not hearing a voice from the clouds that sounds like James Earl Jones means that God's not listening and not answering us, I doubt that the Devil would have to work that hard if we told new parishioners that God answers us with silence. The Non-Believer in us would naturally say, "Riiiight," and walk away slowly.

Prayer is a deep and personal thing. It is our communion with God. It is our chance to talk through our own troubles with God an active listener. But its kind of like sending snail mail to someone to clarify something that you already sent via e-mail. God already knows what you want to say and has already answered your question before you've even asked it. I find most often that the act of prayer itself is the answer to the question I haven't yet asked. If I am troubled about a relationship and I go to ask God what I should I do about it, I will usually find my answer to the question while I am asking God for His answer and I'll just suddenly know what the answer is. You can't tell me that God's answer is silence. I know from personal experience.

Friday's Filings

Brought to you by Kellogs... start your day fresh with a big bowl of Kellog's Breakfast Cereal... and by the Number 4.

Lately, I find myself thinking of a certain President flying onto an aircraft carrier and declaring to the world that the "War is Over". I "Finished My Novel" on May 17th. It is now the end of December and I still haven't reached the half way point on the rough draft. Its taking a lot longer than I thought, primarily, because I've never been this far before on a novel or story. I've never rewritten anything. And the tendency is to try and perfect something that you know you'll never be able to perfect. Its like making Spaghetti and after cooking the noodles and adding the Ragu sauce, you want to start experimenting with spices to give it the most authentic Italian flavor possible. Sooner or later, all you're left with is a big mess of cold spaghetti. So, I've finally forced myself to come up with a withdrawal date - Novel done or not - and I'll be pulling my creative troops out of harms way on March 7th, 2006. See, Mr. President, it was that easy.

And speaking of Bush... Why does he need the Patriot Act? He seems to be dismantling the Constitution just fine on his own without any help from Congress.

Politics aside, this January 1st marks another banner day for me and my annual tradition. About 8 years ago I started a new tradition of creating a list of New Year Resolutions - one for each year that I've been alive. So, this year, now that I'm 36 (at least, I'm fairly certain that's how old I am... doing math is getting more complicated as I get older ;) I have to come up with a list of 36 New Year's Resolutions. Now, most of these resolutions tend to be the usual sort that you find on everyone's list - eat right, excercise more, write novel, win Pulitzer Prize for Fiction; that sort of thing. But combined with that smaller list, I usually try to match it with things that I actually want to do - to sort of force myself to do them. It just works as a sort of reminder throughout the year to take time out and do things for myself - like vacation or concerts or spend time with friends, things that I might cancel for other "more important" things if they weren't on my list. At least a few times every year I use the excuse - well, I've got to do that because its one of my resolutions. So, anyway, I totally recommend this excersise to you. I'll tell you now that you'll have no more success with 30 plus resolutions than you do with one. I usually get about 2 to 7 done a year. This year, I think I actually got about 10 done. But it definitely reminds you throughout the year what you wanted to accomplish and makes you think ahead about what's important.

This year, I believe the things on my list will include: Go to Disney World, Go to NCAA Sweet 16, and go to Giants game on my birthday. If any of you would like to chime in with some fun things you think I'd like to do, please send your comments. I have until January 1st to finish my list.

Under New Management...

Apparently, I've been bought out. In an agressive move, Andy from Mile From The Beach blog, bought up 2700 shares in ICON and is now the majority stock holder with 54% (which really makes one wonder who owns the other 46%). This is all part of a fantasy blog share game that you can access through Andy's blog at Mile From The Beach.

As Andy is now in charge, I will, of course, be changing my demands. No more will I be speaking about myself in whatever manner I choose. But now, since Corporate America has taken over my site, I will, of course, skew my dialog to whatever demographic pays the most money to visit my site and my advertisers. And since this data is collected scientifically and because Andy wants me to maximize my earning potential, I will no longer be advertising Gay Ford Trucks on my blog. That's right. Only manly trucks will be advertised here.

Of course, this is all dependent on whether our contract negotiations go through. As an employee now, my union wants a few words with Management. I need paid breaks, a good pension, and about a thirty million K signing bonus (whatever K is supposed to be ;) No bling, no blog. Its that simple.

*Sigh* I remember the day, not too long ago, when blogging was simple - before the corporations took over and became mega-bloggomerates. Back then the message was all about truth and God. But there's no room for that in the Corporate world.

So tomorrow's topic will be The Latest Things Paris Hilton Is Doing To Her Hair.

Guess You Had To Be There...

The Prodigal Son is the story of the beginning of wisdom. Every person goes through their own prodigal journey. Its a growing experience. Without it, we never will learn the important lessons of life.

For those of you who are new to the Bible, let me recap: A young man comes to his father and tells him that he wants to go see the world. The father gives the young man his share of the inheritance and sends him off. The young man travels the world. He sees amazing things, does amazing things, and generally sows his oats - so to speak. But then, he runs out of cash. He finds himself slopping the pigs for some farmer in a foreign nation just to survive. Then he realizes that even as a slave for his father, he would be treated with more respect - so he returns home. When his father sees his son return, he is so overjoyed that he calls for a great feast and restores his son to his former glory as his son (though one suspects the trips to Vegas aren't included in the new deal ;) In a nutshell, that's the story.

I just finished watching a movie called Jarhead. I can't recommend the movie, but to a very few people, but I think it perfectly captures the particular experience of youth finding their own way in the world. There's a scene near the end of the movie where the young Private, played by Jake Gylenhall, is in the middle of the Iraqi desert with his Staff Sergeant, played by Jamie Foxx. All around them it is artifical night as the oil wells burn and black clouds cover the landscape - illuminating the desert with their fiery glow. They are standing in a bomb crater. A completely fire gutted car sits silently at one end of the crater. The Staff Sergeant looks at his Private and says, "You know why I like this job?" "No, Staff Sergeant." "Because of this... where else are you going to see something like this?" It is a painfully ironic moment - and the beginning of wisdom.

Where else are you going to witness the fiery hell of war? Where else are you going to find yourself upside down and someone sliding an entire beer down a tube into your head? Where else are you going to go skinny dipping under a waterfall? Where else are you going to want to jump out of a perfectly good airplane? Where else are we going to stay up all night talking to someone we can't wait to know better? Youth. Prodigal youth. The beginnings of wisdom.

Until you live life, you can't begin to understand it.

Soap Box Time

In my novel, there is a character who, in essence, is the Prophet of this generation. He speaks to the people of the United States about being good and faithful servants. Basically, he gets up on his soap box and tells the people of America what he really thinks.

I was thinking. If you could stand up on a soap box and tell America one thing, one bit of wisdom, or one prayer, or one exhortation, what would it be? What would you tell America?

So, please, tell me what America needs to hear...

As the song says...

If I didn't have bad luck, I'd have no luck at all...

I just got off the phone with my Ford Dealer. Now, to preface this, I don't really blame Ford. They're just playing the game. The dealers have always been nice and I've gotten nothing but exemplary service. That being said...

I bought this Ford Explorer in 2002. As part of the expense I took the warranty. The warranty was 3 years, 30,000 miles (Full Coverage) and 6 years, 60,000 miles (Extended Warrany). Because of the release date of the truck, its 3 years ran out about a month after I got the truck, and surprise, there was nothing wrong with it. About four months later, the hatch on the back of my truck broke (just a tiny piece of plastic sheered off). I took it in. $600 in repairs... and, because it was the exterior of the vehicle, it wasn't covered by the extended warranty. Since then, every six months or so, there has been some minor repair that has been needed. And surprise, its never once been covered by warranty.

I took my truck in yesterday with a problem with the pressure valves - an inside the engine kind of thing, right? There's only 57,000 miles on the truck. Well, as I said, I just got off the phone with my Ford Dealer. Not only has the extended service warranty expired - by one month - but this pressure valve thing wasn't covered by my warranty anyway. Another $300 down the drain.

I've probably already spent more for this car, in three years, than I did for my previous two cars over the course of 8 years. *sigh* And now with gas being what it is, its probably impossible for me to resell and not lose money. Oh well... at least I get a rental car for the next day...

Talk about being born under a bad sign...

Christian Music

I grew up in the choir - almost as much as I grew up in Youth Group. My first choir director was Mr. Groves. When I was in grade school, Mr. Groves would not only teach and direct the boys and girls choirs, but he would also write and direct musicals. I sang in a couple of these musicals, most notably as Jamichi's Grandfather and The Selfish Giant - though I really wanted to be the dragon.

As I grew too old for boys choir and my voice started to change, I joined the adult Chancel Choir. I joined them just in time for Mozart's Requiem. To this day, that is one of the most challenging and best pieces of music I've ever sang. I sang with the adult choir, off and on, throughout high school and into my first year of college. Then I left to join the Navy.

Also during my youth group years, we would have singing sessions during our meetings and sometimes on our work camps. My good friend, Andy, preached recently about sitting around a campfire on the beach singing songs. One of the songs he mentioned was Have You Seen Jesus? I read the title, and I admit, it brought back no memories for me. I could see half of the titles as songs that I'd probably sung, but only a few tunes had stuck in my head since then.

More than ten years after I'd gone off to the Navy, I decided to go back to Lakeside. The thing that drew me back, actually, was the chance to sing in the choir. Though I was rusty at first, I really enjoyed the time spent singing. I've never been a very good singer - maybe better than average, but that's about it. I'd come to respect the fact that I was never going to be the next Pavarotti a long time before. And since, when you go off into the world, you tend to forget those skills that aren't going to take you anywhere - like riding a bike or playing pinball - I'd left singing behind as something I no longer needed. But when it was time to go back, I remembered how much joy I'd had singing. And sitting in that choir and singing to God really brought me back to my youth and reminded me of how good it felt to be in communion with God. I haven't looked back since.

The strangest thing happened to me today. Out of the clear blue, I was thinking about my Uncle's struggle with cancer and wondering what the future held in store for us all, and suddenly... this tune popped into my head. My brain is weird, all the time, and so I realized that it had probably seen the title of the song and started sifting through twenty years of memories to find the corresponding tune and words. But there I was, at work, suddenly humming and singing "Have You Seen Jesus?".

Here are the lyrics, in case, like me, you've forgotten a word or two...

Have You Seen Jesus My Lord?
Words and Music by John Fischer
(Written during his summer as the first music director at Ponderosa Lodge, the new high school camp at Mount Hermon Christian Conference Center.)

Have you seen Jesus my Lord
He's here in plain view
Take a look open your eyes
He'll show it to you

Have you ever look at the sunset
With the sky mellowing red
And the clouds suspended like feathers
Then I say you've seen Jesus my Lord

Have you seen Jesus my Lord
He's here in plain view
Take a look open your eyes
He'll show it to you

Have you ever stood at the ocean
With the white foam at your feet
Felt the endless thundering motion
Then I say you've seen Jesus my Lord

Have you seen Jesus my Lord
He's here in plain view
Take a look open your eyes
He'll show it to you

Have you ever looked at the cross
With a man hanging in pain
And the look of love in his eyes
Then I say you've seen Jesus my Lord

(I remember a verse that isn't there... so I think maybe there was another later version).

Anyway, I just wanted to share with you some thoughts on music. Hallelujah, Amen.

More

I've been spending time these last couple of weeks thinking about my own needs. Not in the selfish way that I usually do, but in a philosophical way intended to better myself. I think my biggest problem is that I always want More. More money, more food, more happiness, more love. Isn't it the Bhuddists who say that all of our problems are created by not accepting things as they are? I don't really know. All I know is I want More Knowledge on the subject.

Emile Durkheim proposed a theory at the turn of the century that all religions speak to the desires of the society. The theory suggested that if a society wants law and order, the religion will promote just that. Its really hard to agree or disagree with the theory because as an American I have grown up in a poly-religious society. If I want a religion that promotes law and order, I can go find one. There is no one religion that we all belong to. But I have often thought that the single greatest flaw in this theory is how counter-intuitive Christianity is. We all strive to be first in everything - that is human nature - but Christ said, The Last shall be First and the First shall be Last. And I don't see a societal shift of everyone racing to be Last.

I've been thinking a lot lately about what it means to be self-less - to take yourself completely out of the equation. I mean, think about that. What if you were to make every choice, and every decision, on the basis of what it would mean to other people? I'm not sure it can be done. I'm not sure that even Jesus did it. Even He stopped to feed himself from time to time. Even He didn't give all His possessions to the poor. Presumably He kept the clothes on His back and the sandals on His feet. But Christ did give everything for us. He sacrificed Himself for us. He took the whip for us. He took the flail for us. He took the Cross for us. Even though He knew He could stop it at any time. I'm not sure that I'd be anywhere near as good. I hate pain. I can't even stand to go hungry. I'd be broken a lot faster than three cock crows. I'd probably break after the second... or maybe the first.

So what does it mean to want More? What does it mean when you spend your entire life thinking about how you can do things that benefit you the most? Does it just mean you're human? Does it mean that you're trying to be the best you you can be? Or does it mean that you are not yet self-less? Or dare I say it, selfish? Is Greed a part of my daily life?

I don't know. I want to know more. I think we all do. I'm pretty sure that doesn't make me greedy. But I'll bet God is the judge of that.

The Hills Are Alive...

I thought we'd change pace a bit and rewrite some classic songs in honor of Christmas using our own words. While this first song isn't exactly a Christmas song, I always watch this movie at least once this time of year.

I've only written the first verse, so feel free to chime in with the rest...

Rainstorms and doughnuts and lovely swimsuit vixens!
The flicker of movies and chicken - finger lickin!
Electronic games that like to go "ping!"
These are a few of my favorite things!

Join in!

The Word Part Dos

As if in answer to what I was saying yesterday, I was reading Psalm 91 last night and I came across words that were familiar to me. Later, as I was reading the liner notes from the Bible I noted two things. First, the psalm was attributed to some random scribe or song leader - or, in other words, some schmoe just like you and me. And second, that the familiar words were quoted by Satan to tempt Jesus in the wilderness. Now, how's that for lofty ambitions? Who here wants to write words so important that Satan will use them to try and tempt Jesus? Nobody. And nobody can. No matter how hard you try, you can't write the words of God. Only God can write those words. You might physically put them on the paper, but the authorship of the words is not in doubt.

The Word

In the beginning was The Word. I like to picture this, perhaps because I am a writer, of a voice of unspeakable beauty and majesty floating over the formless void - over a newly bubbling and still smoldering Earth. Tolkein would change The Word into music for the creation story of his Middle Earth in the Silmarillion. Either way, it is a lyrical and imaginative look at what is true about the creation story, no matter what side you fall on in the debate. The Word came first.

We can imagine the new people of this planet struggling with language. Humans had the capability to speak for as long as they've been around. But we don't find evidence of written language until about 10,000 years ago. For some 100,000 plus years, humans communicated strictly with words and gestures - making their meanings known to one another without any formal concept of what any of those sounds meant. It is still almost mind-boggling to me that written language should have ever developed as anything other than pictographs. Its one thing to see a cat and point. Its another thing to see a cat and call it a cat and everyone to nod that that is what you are going to call a cat from now on. Its a third thing to point to a picture of a cat and say cat and have everyone agree. But its another thing entirely to write the word CAT and have everyone agree that not only do those letters equal the picture, but also the sound of the word, Cat. Written language is truly a divine miracle.

When the Bible was first written - first in the Torah - it must have seemed that way for the people of the tribes of Israel. Here were God's words, preserved, for all to read or be read to them. This was divine truth. But here is where I start having trouble, because somewhere along the line a split occurs.

Next came Jesus and His words were written into the Bible as well. And I have no doubts in my mind that they are the divine words of truth - no different than those written by Moses. But, there is an entire tribe of humanity who thinks that I have been deluded - that the only words of God that are true are those written by Moses and the prophets. They discount Jesus's words as the holy words of God. It sounds crazy to me, but the Jews were not convinced of Jesus's divine origins. I feel, in part, that they missed the boat and that they weren't ready to admit that Jesus was the savior.

But then, it gets complicated. Mohammed came. And he claims that God spoke to him and even wrote the words of the Koran. And these holy words do not discount the holy words of Moses or Jesus, but they supercede those holy words. I think, perhaps, this is crazy and these people have been deluded. But then, I wonder, isn't that what the Jews think of Christians.

And what are we all to make of the Mormons, who claim that we're all wrong and that Joseph Smith heard and recorded the words of God in his Mormon Bible. Are the Mormons just a cult? Are Joseph Smith's words any less authentic than Moses's?

Its all confusing. When you write, you are putting down words and trying to describe an event - you are painting a word picture. The purpose behind this picture might be to convey wisdom, or beauty, or entertainment, or even truth. But when it comes to God's words, who do we say has the right to put those words into writing? Who do we believe to be the conduit for God's words?

Pastor Dave has long been my hidden conscious. Long before I was blogging, he always seemed to say things to me that were already on my mind. When I knew I had done something wrong, but was unwilling to admit it to myself, along would come Pastor Dave and innocently say, "You know guys, such and such is wrong." And secretly, in my heart, I would think - how did he know?

For a while now, I have been struggling with writing. I have been wandering aimlessly from word to word looking not for technical skill, nor ideas, but direction. Where did I want to go when I write? My novel teeters on the outcome of this wandering. It is written, but it is not yet polished. I have been looking in different directions wondering what path to take. This weekend, I had a revelation. I was watching The Family Man with Nicholas Cage and when the movie was over, I suddenly realized that I would never be Nicholas Cage. This may not seem a huge revelation to most of you. In fact, I imagine that many of you right now are saying, "Duh!" But I realized that, without giving up hope, a life of family - wife and kids - was not my destiny. My purpose here on Earth is to write. And as it all started to cascade into my brain, I realized what it was that I was supposed to have known all along - my direction. I've been put here to tell the truth - as best as I can fathom it.

Pastor Dave wrote, sometime over the weekend, "Will, while you're novel is in gestation, you might consider publishing a book of liturgical verses. Your psalm and this littany are heartfelt and gracefully phrased." My secret conscience strikes again. Compliments aside, Pastor Dave was telling me something I had already known. But, then the thoughts of the complications rose again - who am I to write the word of God?

And finally, I understood something that I had only had the barest hint of knowing - the most important glimpse of the communication between God and us.

In the beginning was The Word... And The Word was without form until written... And The Word was without meaning until read.

There is no such thing as God's written word, unless we read it and receive God's words. We, the readers, are the ones who make God's words important. We are the ones who decide what they mean. We are the ones who act on them. We are the ones who pass them on to others. Anyone can write God's words, but only us readers can make them mean anything.

Cat means cat. God means God. We all agree - and that's how Words work.

Thankful Thoughts

Its not Friday, but it might as well be... so here are a few of my thankful thoughts...

I, too, was appalled at the Weaver's portrayal of their Christianity in last nights episode of the Amazing Race - that hit oh too close to home (They started in Lake Powell, went to Green River, UT, and then ski-jumped at the Utah Olympic Park, and finally ended up in Salt Lake City... been there... done that!). I can't say I know anything about the Weavers and to criticize them unjustly would be wrong. So I can imagine that they come from a church full of like minded individuals in Florida and have probably never been challenged in their faith before. Their idea of good deeds is writing a check, washing cars and baking cookies for fund raisers, and perhaps even attending a week long mission trip to Mexico to help those poor individuals who are unfortunate enough to live there. Though their minds are in the right place, their hearts are maybe not there yet. They can't imagine being those people - therefore they can't see them as people. Its the old, There But For The Grace of God, Go I syndrome. If you can't honestly say that about your situation, then you have missed the point. Empathy begins with imagination - with realizing that you too could be homeless or poor or tired or angry or whatever. I think the Weavers have never been challenged to empathize with others less fortunate than them. And as a result, like so many of us, when they feel attacked by others, they attack back. The reason Christ said to turn the other cheek wasn't because He was some sort of masochist, but because He understood that until you realize why that person has hit you in the first place, you will never be able to dissapate their anger. What the Weavers should have done was reach out with an olive branch to their other teammates and try to understand them instead of taunting them and condemning them and saying bad things about them and then being unable to understand why everyone was mad at them. They will know you are Christians by your love, not by your admission of faith.

On this Thanksgiving weekend, I am thankful of so many things;

For my health and the continued health of my entire family, I am thankful, Lord.
For the addition of a new niece into my world, I am thankful, Lord.
For the continued joy that I see on my nephew's face, I am thankful, Lord.
For a healing church and renewed spiritual energy, I am thankful, Lord.
For a nation willing to question itself, I am thankful, Lord.
For friends who continue to inspire me, I am thankful, Lord.
For entertainment and sports to enjoy, I am thankful, Lord.
For freedom to speak and to write, I am thankful, Lord.
For peace, for hope, for faith, for charity, for you, oh God, I am thankful, Lord.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I will see you on Monday.

The Psalm of Welcoming

Lord, those who we greet,
We do so in your name.

When strangers come looking for you, O Lord,
We are your smile.
When they come to meet you,
We are your handshake.
When they come to embrace you,
We are your hug.

Install in us, Oh Lord,
The confidence to greet your people
With the love and respect
You have for each of us.

Teach us, Oh Lord,
To be the perfect hosts
To all who come to your house.

Honor us, Oh Lord,
With your presence
In everything that we do.

Show us, Oh Lord,
The incredible variety of human experience
Available to us
Right outside our doors.

Protect us, Oh Lord,
From the traps of doubt and fear,
That keep us from doing
Your will on Earth.

Those who have come here seeking the Lord are welcome.
God, the Holy One of Israel, welcomes you to his house.

Fate vs. Pre Destination

We believe that God gave us free will - that we are free to choose our own path. Yet, there are some troubling problems with that built into our own faith.

There is the holy trinity - God, the father, God, the son, and God, the Holy Spirit. They have been manifest since the beginning - since before we were created. Which means that before we were even conceived, before we'd ever fallen, Christ was alive and already headed for his death. Before we'd transgressed, before we'd betrayed with a kiss, God already knew the outcome of events. If free will does exist, how is it that God knew what was already going to happen?

I'm not casting aspersions on the idea of free will. God is far more beautiful and magnificent than my brain could even begin to comprehend. He is infinite, which according to Einstein is where parallel lines meet. So, if there is a way to know what's going to happen, and still not have a pre-ordained life, then God knows it. But I'm curious what you all think? Does Free Will exist? Does fate run our lives? Or is there some other explanation that none of us can fathom?

Quick thoughts on Friday...

My nephew turns two today. Happy Birthday Joshy!

He is also my god son. Which, of course, makes me a god father. Now, any of you god parents out there who have any suggestions about what exactly we're supposed to do as god parents, please let me know. (I've taken the mumbling lessons, moved my office into a dark room, had a few guys whacked, even started going around granting favors - but somehow it all seems so Hollywood... and besides, I would never want to cut off the head of a horse. I like horses.)

No, but seriously... What is the role of the Godfather? Anyone have any clue? I mean, I know the basics - protect and nourish Josh in his walk of faith. But isn't that the role of all Christians? Shouldn't we all be Godparents when it comes to that?

Other thoughts... Hollywood has managed to massage a 750 plus page book into a two and a half hour movie again - Harry Potter - and while I will go see it, I'm kind of wondering how Hollywood would manage to massage The Bible into a two and a half hour movie. So here are some thoughts...

1) World created with great special effects in 70 seconds underneath opening credits with "Invisible Touch" playing softly in the background.

2) Cut back Joseph's musical numbers and don't dwell so much on his coat.

3) Run the entire book of Leviticus and Deuteronomy underneath the film in small print with a scrawl.

4) Amalgamate all the Judges into one badass super Judge and have him played by Clive Owens.

5) Jews defeat the Babylonians - thus no need for all those time consuming prophets.

6) Get 50 Cent to record a few of the psalms as raps, and play them over the closing credits.

7) You know... I'm thinking it might just be easier to make a trilogy of super extended DVD's with audio-commentary by Charlton Heston. No way you shorten the Bible into 2 1/2 hours.

8) Wait, I got it. In not trying to offend anyone, writers cut the overt religious message of the Bible and are left with 43 minutes and change. After you add back in the car chases, wild stunts, and gratuitous sex scenes, the Bible clocks in at a cool two hours.

HAH! And you said it couldn't be done!

Have a Happy Weekend. I will add The Welcoming Psalm later.

Welcome back my friends...

Okay. I was out sick yesterday. Something I've noticed lately. I seem to always get a cold every year when the temperature variant is at its greatest. So, its like 80 degrees here during the day and 40 degrees at night. Boom... flu like symptoms - which you can't take lightly anymore.

Anyway, back to our Welcoming Psalm...

What we have so far...

Lord, those who we greet,
We do so in your Name.

When strangers come looking for you, O Lord,
we are your smile.
When they come to meet you,
we are your handshake.
When they come to embrace you,
we are your hug.

I was thinking, at this point, that we ought to have something that describes not only our hopes, but also our fears, in any encounter with a stranger - followed by assurance that God will make everything alright.

Any ideas? Heather? Are you still lurking out there?

Help me to help you!

Part two of my Welcoming Psalm blog...

Pastor Dave Lamb wrote some interesting things in his comments about welcoming people. I happen to agree with him about the difficulty in greeting strangers, even at church. I think my church, Lakeside, has a problem with this. Its not intentional, mind you, but its hard to greet people these days. We've become very insular as a society. That was one of the reasons I wanted this first New Psalm to be a Psalm of Welcoming.

So, thanks to Dave, here is what I've got so far...

Lord, those we greet today,
We do so in your Name.

And that's it... Any suggestions on where to go from here?

A Hello In Any Other Language...

Good morning. Greetings. Happy Monday!

First of all, a message for Pastor Dave. Lila says hello. She only uses her computer to play, what else, solitaire - so she doesn't have the capability to send e-mail. I am sort of her conduit to the former youth group. She wants to tell you all that she misses you and wishes you to stop by some Sunday at Lakeside and say hello. We will be having our Second Annual Youth Reunion Sunday in May - so that might be a glorious time to stop by. More details to follow.

I saw a wonderful film last night as part of our new Film/Flicks/Faith program at Lakeside. The Spitfire Grill, if you haven't already seen it, is the story of a young woman who comes to an ailing town as a stranger and manages to transform the town through her acts of love. It was a deeply inspiring film and our group could have gone on talking about it for most of the night.

I've been trying to wrestle with the Psalms lately because everyone looks to the psalms for bits of inspiration and wisdom. I've had this sort of nagging feeling of wanting to write my own psalms, but I never know where to get started.

I've decided to write a Psalm of Welcoming - inspired by the film I saw last night - and I was wondering if you all would like to help me out. If you feel so inclined, please send me something that you'd like to say to a complete stranger that you feel inspired to say by God.

We're not looking for thee's and thou's here people. Just tell it like it is.

I look forward to reading them. Maybe by Friday I'll post New Psalm 1 - The Psalm of Welcoming.

Just a quick thought...

Before the weekend...

My friend Nick just got back from New Orleans where he was helping his family-in-law repair Katrina damage to his Grandmother-in-law's home. I was glad to hear that he got home safely and that, from the sounds of it, the house was able to be saved.

Nick had a great comment that I think sums up so much of what we all want to be. He said he found it hard to come back to work. He missed working with a sledgehammer. But mostly, he missed feeling like a hero.

Amen, brother. Amen.

FRIDAY FOX MADNESS

Bill O'Reilly proved what a deep thinker he is yesterday when he called for San Francisco's Coit Tower to be bombed by Al Kye Duh because we had the nerve and the audacity to say that we didn't want recruiters in our schools and guns in our homes. Rather than going on a long and lasting rant about how angry this made me feel, I've decided to do the Christian thing and turn the other cheek. Its what Jesus would have wanted me to do.

So in the spirit of Friday Insanity, I'd like to offer Il Quae D'oh a list of other targets that they might as well blow up while they're here enjoying San Francisco's gorgeous weather and charming hospitality.

First, Candlestick has got to go. If the 49ers are ever going to get a new stadium, come on, blow that sucker up!

Second, The New Cliff House - I'm sorry, but its ugly! Bring back the old one.

Third, half a dozen Starbucks Coffee Houses - it's not many, but its a start.

Fourth, those high rise condos on Bay Street that block the view of the bay. Honestly, the guy who put those in place should be chained in the building first.

Fifth, about half the new high rises around Willie Mays Field - I liked it better when it stuck out there all by itself.

Sixth, Pacbell/SBC/AT&T Headquarters - but just a small one - we only want to knock some sense into them about naming Willie Mays Field.

Seventh, any developer who wants to turn Treasure Island into a giant Wal-Mart.

Okay... that's about as many as I can think of. But I'd like to take this opportunity to speak to El Qae Dhuh. Come on guys, the suicide bombings are so last year. Get a new racket. How about reanimated corpses or zombies? Maybe combine some human DNA with a fly and wreak havoc that way? A giant Sea Monster attacking Tokyo or San Francisco would also be cool. Don't evil geniuses have any pride in their work anymore? Whatever happened to mad scientists and crazy schemes to destroy the world? People just don't take the time anymore to do things right.

And as for Bill O'Reilly, I just have one thing to say... but I'm not going to say it, because it isn't polite and probably anatomically impossible.

That's it. Anyone else have any suggestions for Hal Khy Der, while I'm at it?

Bad Movies We Love

For at least two years now, my brother and I have been having an unofficial Xmas contest. We each try to find the DVD that represents the best movie you ought to have in your collection, but probably don't. Past years have seen movies like The Right Stuff and Laser Blast, and last year, Andy joined the fray with The Final Countdown.

But now I'm starting a new category this year and I need your help... Bad Movies We Love. Movies that are never going to win any awards, that for whatever reason, we still watch over and over again. Grease is, I think, the prime example of this genre. We all mock it. We all cringe at parts during the movie. Shakespeare it ain't. And yet, we love this little film.

So I'm opening the doors wide open... any suggestions?

Apologies

I reached another dubious milestone today. I've now been writing this darn novel for two years. I'm happy to say that I'm almost half way done with the rewrites and should reach that mark by next week when I have another milestone - 6 months since I finished the first draft. But I should have never gotten into this thing without an exit strategy. There are times when I just feel like I'm never going to escape this thing, that its going to consume me and destroy me and ruin my life. And then there are days where something clicks and I feel on top of the world.

Being a writer means surrendering to writing. When the urge hits you, you write. If you don't, you feel terrible. Writing becomes your life. When you write, the world is great. When you don't write, the world is terrible. Even though you know that the world hasn't changed, you can't help but feel that way. Writing colors your whole being.

I say this because I want to apologize to all of you. I have not always been a good friend, brother, relative, or student. In fact, at times, I have been downright awful. I have been snippy. I have been vacant. I have been there in body only. I have been slow to respond and completely self absorbed. Though I try my hardest to keep relationships close, there are times when I completely disappear and the writing takes over. The writing becomes my own, my precious, my obsession.

I have known this about writing for years. I have known what it does to me. And yet, I choose to keep doing it. I'm not succesful at it. I'm not making a living doing it. I don't really love it. I don't even think I'm very good at it. It doesn't make me a better person. But, I can't walk away from it either. I'm going to be succesful at it. I'm going to make a living doing it. I'm going to love it. I'm going to be great. It's going to make me a better person. Why do any of us do the things we do?

So I'm sorry for being moody, withdrawn, self absorbed, possessed, and, well, insane.

Now, I'm going back to work on my novel... so leave me the heck alone! ;)

The Perils of Freedom - Part I - Sleight of Hand

A truly masterful magician knows the value of sleight of hand. He gets his audience to watch the first hand and when everyone's attention is focused there, he uses the other hand to perform the magic trick. The end result is always remarkable - things appear out of nowhere just like magic and we've all been fooled and conned to the delight and entertainment of all.

The first peril of freedom is exactly this - the fooling and conning of the masses. This sort of thing does not occur in societies of oppressed people, because there is no reason for the pretense. If a dictator says something will happen, it will happen. And if that thing does not happen, the people will know it did not happen. There is no need to fool or con the people. They have no choice but to live with the consequences. But in a free society, where the people decide who shall lead them, the fooling and conning of the people is prevalent. The masses must be entertained, or they shall become informed.

I have always been fascinated with the rise of Naziism in Germany - not because I'm a big fan of Hitler or anything, but because the rise of Naziism went part and parcel with the fall of German democracy. How did the German people give away their freedoms? How did they allow Hitler to come to power?

The answer, of course, is not a simple one. Hitler used every trick in the book. He dazzled them. He charmed them. He threatened them. He bullyed them. He fooled them. And he conned them. To be sure, the German people were not in the best shape. Their once great nation had been rocked by a series of terrible setbacks. They were afraid of the world around them and just wanted a little sanity restored to their daily lives. Hitler seemed to be the answer.

And Hitler didn't just fool and con the freedom loving people of Germany. He tried to fool and con the rest of the world as well. For the most part, it worked.

A strong clue as to when a nation is being fooled and conned is when a leader tells a people where the danger is located. If the people didn't know there was a danger there before, look out - chances are you're being conned. The People of India, for instance, don't need to be told that the nation of Pakistan hates them... and vice versa. If the leader of India, then, suddenly points to... oh, say... Australia and says that Australia poses a threat to them, the people of India should be very wary.

Prior to World War II, it was first the Austrians threatening the Germans inside their country. To "help" the Germans there, the Nazi's invaded Austria. Then, it was Chechoslovakia. Then, it was Poland. Then, France, England, Russia, Africa... etc... But, by then, the German people knew... and it was too late to do anything about it. The spell had already been cast. The die had been thrown. Their fate had been sealed.

Without directly comparing George Bush with Hitler, I find that my senses are immediately alert when George Bush has to point out how much of a threat Iraq is to the American people. Iraq, which got their butt thrashed in the first Gulf war, was suddenly such an imminent threat that we just had to invade this country. My alarm bells went off. If one hand was getting the American people to look one way, what was the other hand doing?

The peril of freedom is this - constant vigilance means constant vigilance - both foreign and domestic. We can never be content to accept the word of anyone as truth, but must be wary at all times, lest we find ourselves hearing terrible rumors about supposed "enemies" being shipped off to camps in other countries for crimes against the United States.

Keep your eyes on everything the politician does. And when they try to get you to look one way, keep an eye on the other hand. That's the only way to remain free.

Its just like riding a bike...

Two things ran through my mind as I took my first training ride on my bike around Lake Merced in San Francisco on Sunday... 1) OOOOWWWWWWWWW! THE PAIN! MAKE IT STOP! and 2) If you never forget how to ride a bike, how come I need a coach?

My friend, Jay, a former cycliste profesionale, not only gave me the bike that I'm riding but has also agreed to coach me on its fine use. He taught me things yesterday that I never knew, nor suspected I needed to know, about riding a bike. I learned to keep my legs straight and to not twist my ankles and to keep pedaling even on downhills and that Lance Armstrong is such a genius on the hills because he has one less testicle - I learned that one the painful way.

All this got me to thinking... they say love is like riding a bike. You never forget how to do it. If I knew so little about riding a bike, what did I really know about love? What had I learned and forgotten? What had I never suspected that I needed to know?

My only love affair was, thankfully, not brief. I was in a loving relationship for six years that never quite made it to the final step. I was young. And stupid. So perhaps that's a good thing. But over the years I've often wondered how much I really knew about loving someone else.

To be honest, I was never very good in this department. When other kids were chasing girls in school, I was busy writing or playing games or seeing movies. When they were learning social skills and dances, I was in front of a computer learning how to program. When I did fall in love in High School, I fell hard. And I was completely discombobulated. But I was really, truly, deeply in love and so, somehow, despite the dangers of rejection and social ostracism, I took the plunge and managed to get a girlfriend out of it. Total wooing time, however, was about one month and included two dates.

Six years later when I broke up with my girlfriend, I had no clue what to do next. There was a long period of mourning. And when I was helped out of that period I had a few dates that all ended in disaster. I tried the online dating thing - disaster. I agreed to be set up - disaster. I went out with a girl who had a crush on me - disaster. I've come to realize that I am a disaster when it comes to love.

To be fair, I've never again felt anything like I felt when I was around my ex-girlfriend. No butterflies. No utter fascination. No strong desire to be near someone and to share their thoughts, dreams, and hopes. They say that no love is like your first love, and perhaps that true. Perhaps I'm just hoping for a feeling that will never return, or that perhaps was never there in the first place.

They say its better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. I don't know. I think the jury is still out on that one. Before I fell in love, I was perfectly content with my lot in life... now I'm constantly wondering what's wrong with me. I've been left with a dull aching pain and a strong desire to yell... OOOOWWWWW THE PAIN! MAKE IT STOP!

But at least I go up hills faster... ;)

Freitag's Gerspelunkenzinen's

Congratulations... if you're reading this blog, your computer has now been infected with the dreaded WMD Virus.

Don't waste your time looking for it, just accept my word that its there. You can spend billions of dollars trying to find it and fighting to get rid of it, but this unholy terror will never be found. Why? Because it doesn't actually exist. It never has. And though you may be mad that you were made a fool of to believe such a thing existed in the first place, that won't affect me - because gullible Americans will still insist that the virus was there in the first place, but that its probably been moved somewhere else. And as a result, they will continue to support my work and elect to bring me back to make fools of them again, and again, and again. God Bless America.

(Okay, this is what's called sarcasm. There is no such virus. Please do not go looking for it.)

I showed this to all the equines down at the stables in Golden Gate Park but they just stared up at me with unseeing eyes. I guess it's true. You can't blog a dead horse.

And on that note, I'm outta here... Have a good weekend.

The Mountain Bike Comes To Mohammed

Or something like that.

I am officially throwing my hat in the ring - whatever that means. I am going to start training for the yearly AIDS Ride from SF to LA. I doubt I'll be ready by next spring to make the trek, but I plan to be ready by 2007 for sure. This 400 mile ride takes one week to complete. Riders raise funds for AIDS research. I expect you all to cheer me, prod me, and give me the occassional ride when my tires explode from the stress.

Thank you, and good day...

We choose...

"We choose to go to the moon not because it is easy, but because it is hard." John F. Kennedy

In my novel, the grandfather of one of the main characters tells him, "A leader makes choices. They may not always be the right choices, but he makes them all the same."

Right now, we need some leadership in this country - leaders beholden not to promises, but to choices, not to Gallup polls, but to choices, not to key backers, but to choices. We need leaders who make their decisions not based upon what is popular, but what they believe to be the right thing to do.

I could respect the man in the White House much greater if he could make a choice like that. But he can't. He's incapable of it. Whether he's beholden to his political base, to his many generous benefactors, or whether he's just a puppet for other powers that exist in this country, he's incapable of making a choice. He must take the path others have laid out for him.

When it comes to nominating and electing a Supreme Court justice, he has chosen the path laid out by the people whose money got him elected - the Conservative Right Wing of his party. Why? Because he promised them to overthrow Roe v. Wade if elected by placing anti-abortion justices on the nation's highest bench. If you think their right wing agenda is going to stop there, you are sorely mistaken. It should be really obvious to you that two moderate liberal justices were replaced by right wing conservative white males for a reason. Say goodbye to every liberal gain made in this country in the last century. Environmentalism - gone. Civil Rights - history. Equal Rights for Women - never happened. If 51% of Americans weren't paying attention last November, odds are they still don't have a clue now.

When it comes to getting us involved in an illegal war, and then finding a way out of it, our President has no choice but to continue doing what his business interests tell him to do - keep protecting their newly gained oil fields. With the amount of oil newly under United States control, OPEC decisions to increase or decrease oil prices and oil production don't effect us as much anymore. Or, in other words, we can keep the oil prices as high as the market will allow. Gas prices have soared since we took control of the oil in Iraq. So have the profits of Oil Companies. Do you think they have any desire to see the US pull out of Iraq? No, we must stay the course in Iraq. Freedom demands it.

Not only have the powers that be taken control of the Christian image in the United States and used it to their benefit, but not they've co-opted the image of a patriot as well. You simply can't be a good Christian, nor a good American if you're against this nation's policies.

These are but two policies directly controlled by other interests. Our "elected" official seems to have no interests outside of these. When Kennedy said, "We choose to go to the moon..." he didn't have to say it. There was no huge contractor out there threatening to yank their large body of votes away from his reelection campaign, or pull the money from his coffers. Kennedy chose to go to the Moon, because he was a leader. And that's what leaders do. They make choices.

I wish this nation could stop producing so many righteous patriots and maybe produce a leader or two.

A Tale of Two Churches

In the closing days of WWII, two events had profound impacts on the lives and faiths of two great European nations. In England, using the brand newly deciphered Enigma machine, British scientists learned that the next target for the German bombing runs was going to be Coventry, England. Winston Churchill agonized for hours over whether to stop the bombing from taking place and expose to the enemy the knowledge that they had cracked the codes of the Enigma machine - a code thought unbreakable by the enemy, or to allow the bombing to occur. Ultimately, Churchill decided to save the code and not the city in order to bring the war to a close much quicker. Coventry was flattened and their cathedral was burnt to the ground. Churchill wept at the news of the destruction that had been wrought. To this day, the burnt out shell of the cathedral remains in Coventry to remind all of the destruction of war.

In Germany, in the closing days of the war, the Allied bombers bombed the German city of Dresden so thoroughly that almost the entire city was destroyed by a combination of bombs and fire. The fire was so intense that anyone caught inside the city would literally burst into flames just from the heat. Dresden's Cathedral was, as well, completely destroyed by the flames. For the past 60 years its burnt out husk has remained at the heart of a rebuilt Dresden to remind its citizens of the destruction of war.

On Reformation Sunday, yesterday, the Dresden Cathedral was reopened and rechristened. Amongst the items given to the church at its rechristening was an iron cross from the city of Coventry - a symbol of peace between two former enemies.

War is Hell. There are no two ways to look at it. No matter the noble cause, no matter the personalities involved, no matter which side God is allegedly on, war is the exact opposite of Christ. War is everything that Christ does not want for us, or for our enemies. Love your neighbor as yourself does not include an exemption for war. In all things, we should work to end war and injustice, and bring about peace around the world.

As America mourns its two thousandth death in Iraq, as politicians bleat on about justifications or condemnations depending on their own political views, we Americans must remember that we live in a representative democracy. We are at war because we want to be at war. We are allowing this slaughter to continue. We are both Coventry, and Dresden. Either way, we are destroying ourselves.

Enlarge Your Soul Now!

Its easy! Swedish religious scholars have discovered a way to enlarge your soul. By reading one little book three times a day and practicing the instructions given there in, respondents can expand their soul up to ten times its normal size. You could swell your soul to gigantic proportions and be the envy of every person in your office. There's no gimic here! And best of all, you can do this in the privacy of your own home! Its 100% completely legal! (Product may be banned in less enlightened countries!) So apply now and get your Swedish Soul Enlarger for just three easy payments of $19.95. Call now! Operators are standing by.

Its not quite a burning Bush, but if you were to receive this message on your computer, you'd probably throw it away as Spam. And Spam is what it is. But I read somewhere that the reason Spam exists is that because for every 999 people who reject its message, one reads it and says, Cool! I've got to get me some of that. The cost of the Spam is less than what one customer in 1000 pays out, therefore, the Spam is cost effective, therefore Spam continues to exist.

This Spam is from God. The Soul Enlarger, naturally, is a Bible. But that aside, how much of God's message do we classify as Spam? How many times does he send us messages that we ignore as being too good to be true or likely to cost us something or too time consuming. Sometimes I have to look at some of the stuff God sends to me and I just shake my head... there's no way I'm opening up that message. I don't even want to think about it. I didn't ask for it. I don't want it. No matter how much it costs. I reject the Spam before I even read its content.

We all have so many natual filters in our brains - culture, religion, language - that we sometimes never ever receive the message sent.

My friends, clear out your filters for a change, embrace the message, and see what wonderful things are in store for you... unless they come from Sweden... ;)

Have a wonderful weekend...

First Friday Ramblings...

I was awoken this morning by a truly stunning bit of news... Sulu is gay. My mind boggles. Sulu... Gay. It seems inconceivable after all this time. No wonder they never showed his cabin on the ship, it was probably filled with track lighting and tastefully decorated. But then something hit me out of left field... Sulu had a daughter! How the heck?! And, of course, I realized that in the 23rd Century there is no stereotyping, there is no prejudice, this whole straight/gay thing is probably a relic of the past. I mean, if Kirk can have sex with every alien species to ever walk, slither, beam or fly at warp speed, what difference does it make if Sulu and Spock want to fly off together for a romantic weekend with sword play? Surely, Sulu adopted. Of course, it totally gives new relevance to the line from Star Trek VII where Kirk is astounded to learn that Sulu had a daughter, "Where did he find the time to have a family?" Well, now we know.

Tongue firmly planted in cheek,

Will

The Good News

My friends, hear the good news. The end has arrived, so that we can begin again. We all await the long fallow period between seasons when trades are made and teams reborn. Hope springs eternal until next spring when young men return to the diamonds of our youth and compete in the time tested rite known as spring training. Though we will suspect certain teams of superiority, there is no right to the title, no guarantees of victory, no definite outcomes preordained until that first official cry of "Play Ball" and the season is renewed. So repent of all your bad feelings over missed opportunites. Forget wrongs done and errors committed. Embrace the newness in life that has been bestowed upon you and your fellow followers in fandom. We are all even now.

Giants record for 2006, 0 wins, 0 losses, and 0 games out of first place.

The Day I Met God For The First Time

I was a religious kid. I may not have been good at it, but I showed up. I did the choir thing and the youth group thing and the lectionary thing and the usher thing and the committee thing and the serve cookies, make coffee, clean up, set up tables, etc... thing. I thought I was pretty hot stuff, religiously speaking.

I had a few very capable youth leaders who really taught me what it was to be a Christian by their actions - Pastor Dave, Lila Bennet, Phil Hughes, Thad Lewis and a large host of others. I really enjoyed my time spent with them and I felt that they had the coolest jobs in the world (little did I know ;).

I remember the day Phil Hughes told us that he was going into Seminary. Phil was a cool guy. We really liked Phil. But he was a college student, not a religious student. How the heck does one decide to be a Seminarian? I asked him. And he told me point blank, "I was called." To this day, really, I haven't a clue what that means. I've been waiting for a call for so long, I'm assuming my number's been disconnected. It reminded me, in hindsight, of the scene in Contact where Matthew McConaughey describes the moment he found religion, (I'm paraphrasing here), "And there He was... God." The look on his face and the light in his eyes suggest something in McConaughey's character that implies the awesome majesty of the Risen Lord.

The day I met God, I came to the conclusion that I too wanted to be a youth pastor. I was a senior in High School and as I often did in my senior year, I took the long and quiet way home from swim practice so that I could have time to think. I walked through the green fields and pastures of the upper Sigmund Stern Grove park and my mind wandered over the thousands of possibilities layed before me for the course of my life. Somewhere along that route, I came up with the realization that I'd be a really good youth pastor.

You see, I already knew the job. Pastor Dave and Phil and Lila, etc..., had been such good teachers. You create a devotion. You tie some games into it. You make some punch. You sing some songs. I could even learn to play the guitar (Boy, how wrong I was on that last one ;). And every summer you take the kids to a work camp somewhere, and I love to travel! This was great. I was already such a religious person - how hard could Seminary be?

About the time I could see my house up ahead, though, I suddenly realized that I was missing one thing - one key ingredient in this fantasy of being a youth pastor. I had not received my call. God had not called me to be a youth pastor. Didn't know what that was, but I knew from Phil that it was important. So I stopped walking, closed my eyes, and I prayed to God.

"God, this is Will. Listen, I've been thinking. What do you think about me being a Youth Pastor?"

And that was when I heard the voice of God - a strong, hearty, pleasureful, robust laugh like I've never heard before. God laughed at me for so long and so hard, that I could almost see the streams of tears in His eyes. It was so infectious that I started to laugh as well.

I mean, who was I kidding? Me, a youth pastor?

My life has taken many twists and turns since then. And I've never received my call. But I've never once doubted that God existed since that day when He laughed at my pretention. I wonder sometimes, if he's still laughing.

Mad Ramblings of Count Friday

It must be Friday again... cause here I am with more insanity...

My mind has been whirling, of late, and swirling, and dancing, and singing, and prancing, and poeticizing, over the issue of music. My church, stubborn as it can sometimes be, is now involved in Musicgate - an issue of what sort of music we ought to be playing within our walls. Some want a more contemporary and worldly music, and others want to stick with the tried and true classics. This is a deeply held issue in our church, but we are by no means the only ones living with this issue. Our pastor's wife recently returned from a women's retreat where she was the musical director and she declared with satisfaction that she managed to tiptoe through a minefield of musical selections so that most of the group was only mad at her selections less than half the time. As a singer and a lover of music, I find the issue very interesting. As a Christian, however, I find the issue rather silly. This is the modern equivalent of arguing over which end of the egg to eat first.

In theory, of course, we make music in our worship service to glorify God. Clearly, God has been around a long long time, and probably knows tunes much better than anything we've ever created - even Mozart. So to Him, the music doesn't matter so much as the heart behind it. I can picture Him in Heaven with his fingers in His ears smiling at our attempts to please Him. After all, He grew up on music from the lyre and lute and people banging quietly on cymbals and drums. This modern stuff with violin concertos and organs and harpsichords is just not really his cup of tea. But He appreciates the effort being made on His behalf and He enjoys the music no matter the content, the sound, or the creator. He probably even secretly watches the Ozzy Ozbourne show when nobody is looking (He really likes the dog). The point being that any preference in music in church is OUR preference, not His.

#B) Does Tom DeLay know something the rest of us should? He's claiming he can't get a fair trial because he's a Republican and his judge is a Democrat. So, should us Democrats be worried that we can't get a fair shake from a Republican judge? And what's a poor Independent to do? How does this shake out for the country with two new Republicans on the supreme court? And does this mean that justice is blind, but your voting record is available in braille?

Part The Third:
Love rescue me
Come forth and speak to me
Raise me up
And don't let me fall.
No man is my enemy
My own hands imprison me.
Love rescue me.

Many strangers have I met
On the road to my regret
Many lost who seek to find themselves in me.
They ask me to reveal
The very thoughts they would conceal.
Love, rescue me.

And the sun in the sky
Makes a shadow of you and I
Stretching out as the sun sinks in the sea.
I'm here without a name
In the palace of my shame
I said, love, rescue me.

In the cold mirror of a glass
I see my reflection pass
I see the dark shades of what I used to be.
I see the purple of her eyes
The scarlet of my lies.
Love, rescue me.

Yeah, though I walk
In the valley of the shadow
Yet, I will fear no evil.
I have cursed thy rod and staff
They no longer comfort me.
Love, rescue me.

Sha la la la etc.
I said love, love, rescue me.

Yeah, I'm here without a name
In the palace of my shame
I said love, rescue me.

I've conquered my past
The future is here at last
I stand at the entrance to a new world I can see.
The ruins to the right of me
Will soon have lost sight of me.
Love, rescue me.

A PSALM FROM U2

(Thanks, Heather...)

And on that note, have a great weekend.

The Roads Least Traveled

My good friend Andy and I are now both writing blogs about our journey's in life - his with a slightly more spiritual leaning than mine. Considering that we grew up together in a church in San Francisco and then, as is natural, went our own separate ways - but remained best friends, it is not a stretch to see that we are both now sharing our love of God at the same moment in time. But the roads we traveled to reach this moment are very different.

When we graduated from high school, we went to two different colleges. After one year, I joined the Navy and Andy joined a fraternity. After college, Andy married his college sweetheart, and I broke up with my high school sweetheart. When Andy was getting a good job, I was going off to Idaho to get my degree. When Andy was buying his house, I was living in Las Vegas. When Andy was having his first kid, I was just starting work with a new company. When Andy was having his second kid, I was moving back home again. (A very abbreviated version of ten years of our lives... ;)

Shortly after I started my new job, I realized that I was finally in a position to have free time and to do something different with my life. I remembered fondly my days at Lakeside Presbyterian Church and I decided to go back there. At first, I just went to sing in the choir. I'd always enjoyed singing. That lasted about five minutes on the first night before I was recruited into the bell choir as well. After another couple of months, I realized that the Associate Pastor was having trouble doing things with the Youth Group because her long time volunteer had left to join the seminary (I sense a theme...). I took her aside and told her that if she needed my help with the youth group, I'd be happy to do things from time to time. Before long, I was a full time youth assistant. And then, I was asked to serve on Session and became the head of Christian Education. Finally, last spring, the Associate Pastor moved on to another church and the entire youth group program fell to me.

For five years now, I've been very active in the church and much more active in my faith than I'd ever been before. My confidence in my faith has been growing steadily in that entire time. I've read the Bible now nearly twice through - to the point that during one Men's Breakfast I was able to rattle off the name of a prophet before the Pastor could remember it (which shocked me more than him ;) I pray regularly. I've led the youth on one mission trip, conducted my own overnighter (How did Pastor Dave manage to do that? I only had three kids!), done two Ice Cream Socials, and watched my first graduating class take their first steps into the bigger world.

Andy, on the other hand, had quite a different route. He went back to church when his second child was born and spent the first couple of years with a more evangelical church. After a while, he realized that this wasn't the sort of religious experience he was looking for and headed instead to his current church. Since then he's blossomed into an educator, puppet master, and part time pulpit supply at his church.

We've gone down two completely different paths, seen completely different things, had completely different experiences, and yet, we've arrived at the exact same point - we're are now both walking the footsteps of Jesus Christ. How many other roads are there that all lead to this point? How many narrow paths coming from so many different directions meet at this one road? Einstein's definition of infinity is that it is the point where parallel lines meet. I've always thought that a poetic statement that to me sums up where we will find God. Though Andy and I walk side by side, in Christ, we walk as one.

The Death of TAC?

The Adventure Chronicles was started on a July day in 1983. For the past 22 years it has come to represent my dream for a company of creative equals. But in recent months, I have come to suspect that the dream might finally be over and that I might just be too stubborn to accept the idea. While I've long known that I was the heart and soul of TAC and that the dream of TAC was mine alone, I'd always thought that I'd have plenty of energy to carry TAC's dream to fruition. Lately, however, I've begun to doubt my will and my level of energy. How long can one person hold on to an unfulfilled dream?

For as long as I can remember I've wanted to make this dream a reality. Before TAC, in 3rd Grade, the company was called JDW Films, and that changed to SDW Films, and then, at one point, it was WAG. But with the writing of the words The Adventure Chronicles Present, TAC was born and came to symbolize to me every thing that I'd always dreamed could one day happen.

I pictured a huge entertainment empire on the scale of Disney - where creativity was king, and not just a commodity to be bought and sold or gone without if the budget didn't allow for it. Naturally, I'd be the leader - but only since this would allow me the resources to bring my own ideas to fruition, not because I wanted to boss anyone around.

The problem with this dream was that to have a huge empire, you need more than just yourself. I created TAC with the idea that I could lure people over to my side of the fence, that I could instill this dream in them.

But time and again, I failed. And let's face it, who wants to bank on a dream? A dream doesn't get you a good job. A dream doesn't get you a spouse or kids or a nice house. A dream doesn't buy you fancy things or send you on vacations. When all is said and done, a dream is just a dream - a flighty figment of fantasy.

And so, I've been thinking of chucking it, throwing it out, abandoning it to a world of childish pasttimes. I've been thinking of all those things I missed and all those things that I can have, if I can just forget the dream and go after practical pursuits.

Aye, but there's the rub.

I can't. I've thought about it, and thought about it, and sometimes even fantasized about it, but I can't abandon the dream. I can't abandon TAC.

You see TAC is more than just a dream to me - TAC is me. Whenever I think of ending it, I get short of breath and panicky. To abandon it, to shut it down, to move on to greener pastures, at the expense of never again imagining leaping from an exploding blimp, using Mock Fu to disarm a large opponent with bad breath, stealing a rickshaw, or traveling to countless worlds and countless adventures - I just can't do it. TAC is more than just a few words on a page, it is an attitude, a way of life, that says that life is precious, and crazy, and thrilling, and extraordinary. And by extraordinary, I don't mean MORE ORDINARY, I mean SO FAR BEYOND ORDINARY THAT YOU CAN'T EVEN COMPREHEND IT. I could no more shut down TAC than I could will myself to stop breathing.

TAC is like my inner flame. It takes a few blows from time to time. It dims. It flickers. But it never goes out.

So, no more dreams of money, or women, or children or fancy real estate. If I never quite achieve the TAC Potential, so be it. My life is set. My course is laid. My bed is made... only figuratively, of course. ;)

And now, back to work on TAC... and my next great Adventure.